Yankees rally but fall to Orioles in extras to spoil Gerrit Cole’s season debut

Gerrit Cole on the mound. Baltimore’s offense proving relentless. Giancarlo Stanton doing damage. Batters plunked by pitches with questionable intents. Comebacks, stiff-arms and remarkable plays as the two best teams in the American League battled for supremacy.

If Wednesday were a preview of what Yankees-Orioles showdowns will look like for the rest of the season and perhaps postseason, it was a fun one — and a disappointing one for the home crowd.

The Yankees roared back from a four-run hole beginning in the bottom of the seventh and sent the contest into extra innings, but the Orioles tagged Clay Holmes for a pair of runs in the 10th in a 7-6 Yankees loss in front of a sellout crowd of 47,155 in The Bronx.

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The Yankees (51-25) dropped just a sixth game in their past 20 and watched their AL East lead get shaved to 1 ¹/₂ games before Thursday’s series finale.

“It was a hell of a game. It really was,” manager Aaron Boone said after the Yankees scored three runs in the seventh and one in the ninth — all driven in by Giancarlo Stanton — to tie it. “There’s a lot of things there for us, where we could have grabbed that game.”

After thrilling seventh, eighth and ninth innings — which included Stanton’s three-run shot and his 120 mph, RBI single in the ninth to give the Yankees life — Holmes and Jose Trevino folded in the fateful 10th.

Holmes, pitching for a second straight night, allowed a bloop single to Cedric Mullins that scored the ghost runner. Mullins advanced to second on Alex Verdugo’s throw home and then took off for third.

Trevino — whose throwing arm suddenly has become a problem — threw the ball into left field to add a tack-on run.

“Just didn’t get a good grip on it, overthrew it,” said Trevino, who has allowed 13 base runners to successfully swipe bags in his past two games.

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That would be enough for the Orioles, who finally put the Yankees away in the bottom of the inning.

After a DJ LeMahieu single, Ben Rice lined a would-be hit into right field, but a diving Anthony Santander took the hit away and turned it into a sacrifice fly.

With Trevino up, Baltimore catcher Adley Rutschman did what Trevino could not, nailing pinch-runner Oswaldo Cabrera trying to steal second.

After Trevino walked, Jahmai Jones — taking the at-bat on a night Aaron Judge was unavailable — was punched out.

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“They’re a good team,” said Anthony Volpe, who scored the game-tying run in the ninth. “They won 100 games last year for a reason. They won the division last year. We’re trying to take it from them.”

The best development for the Yankees was Cole, shelved all season with nerve inflammation and edema, successfully retaking the mound and pitching into the fifth inning.

The reigning AL Cy Young award winner appeared to get sharper as his outing lengthened, finishing with four-plus innings in which he was charged with two runs on three hits, a walk and five strikeouts.

There were worse developments.

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Trevino’s arm has appeared to lose juice, and teams are taking advantage.

The bullpen was dented, with Ron Marinaccio allowing a homer, Victor Gonzalez allowing a run and Holmes taking the loss.

And the Yankees’ possible attempt at retribution may have backfired.

A night after Judge was drilled in the hand with a fastball that kept him out of the lineup, the Yankees may have responded in the seventh.

Gonzalez threw a first-pitch fastball that hit Baltimore star Gunnar Henderson in the back of the shoulder. The crowd cheered, and Henderson calmly took first base.

“Just trying to execute a good pitch inside, but it slipped out,” Gonzalez said through interpreter Marlon Abreu.

If the pitch were thrown with intent, the Yankees did not intend what came next.

Henderson stole second then scored the Orioles’ fifth run of the night on a double from Ryan Mountcastle.

That run loomed large when the Yankees’ offense awoke in the bottom of the inning.

Soft singles from Volpe and Juan Soto put two on for Stanton, who demolished a three-run home run against Baltimore fireballer Yennier Cano to bring the Yankees within one — the one-run gap a result of the possible retribution.

A remarkable eighth-inning catch from Verdugo, smacking against the center-field wall, kept the deficit at one.

Stanton’s blast into left field against Craig Kimbrel in the ninth sent the game to the 10th.

And the Orioles found a way to win a game that had gotten away from them.

There might be more like this one.

“That’s a heck of a game, obviously,” Boone said, “against a heck of a club.”