CHICAGO — Gut-wrenching. Mind-numbing. Vomit-inducing. Give it whatever compound adjective you want.
But catcher Ali Sánchez’s throwing error led to easily one of the worst losses of the season for the New York Yankees, a brutal, 6-5 defeat to the Chicago White Sox in 12 innings Wednesday night at Rate Field.
Actually, Ryan McMahon had the perfect way to describe what it felt like when Sánchez’s low pickoff throw skipped past him at third base, allowing the tying run to score in the 11th inning.
“Horses–t,” McMahon said.
At the time, Munetaka Murakami — the extra-innings runner — was on third base. Andrew Benintendi was at the plate with a 2-0 count and reliever Camilo Doval was on the mound. The Yankees led 5-4 with two outs.
Murakami had advanced to third after Miguel Vargas grounded out to start the inning, and remained there after Luisangel Acuña grounded out to third base. But McMahon said he noticed Murakami had been taking an aggressive lead and was taking his time to return to the bag.
So McMahon shaded toward third base, but Sánchez’s throw was well short. McMahon couldn’t block it and it rolled into left field, allowing Murakami to tie the score at 5-5.
MUNE STAYS READY 😤
onto the 12th 👀 pic.twitter.com/jJglQAAmIb
— White Sox on CHSN (@CHSN_WhiteSox) July 30, 2026
In the 12th, Edgar Quero’s single to center field walked off the Yankees, scoring Tristan Peters from third base and setting off a wild White Sox celebration on the field.
It wasted a 4-0 Yankees advantage and squandered both 6 1/3 innings of one-run ball from starting pitcher Cam Schlittler, who struck out eight, and a three-run homer from rookie Spencer Jones. Reliever Paul Blackburn also deserved a large portion of the blame, giving up a two-run shot and a solo homer on back-to-back pitches in the eighth to turn a 4-1 Yankees lead into a tie game.
This all came after wins in the first two games of the four-game set with Chicago, and allowed the first-place Tampa Bay Rays to extend their lead over the Yankees in the American League East to 2 1/2 games.
“Tough loss,” manager Aaron Boone said.
But should Sánchez have even made the throw in the first place? With a one-run lead in the 11th inning with two outs, was it too risky? Boone didn’t have a problem with the decision, but pointed to the execution.
“Just got to have a good throw,” the manager said. “It’s playing catch. We’re big leaguers and we’re not going to not do things. Obviously, an option is to hold it. But it comes down to, we’ve got to play catch better there.”
Boone didn’t think McMahon made an egregious mistake by not blocking the throw. “Yeah, you’ve always got a chance to block it,” the former major-league third baseman said. “But it’s a tough play.”
Sánchez thought the throw was a fine decision, too.
“Me and McMahon felt that he was getting a little slow back to the base,” the catcher said. “Just (made) a bad throw.”
Ryan McMahon, pictured last week, said he thought the Yankees caught Munetaka Murakami off guard at third in the 11th, but didn’t execute. (Emilee Chinn / Getty Images)
McMahon took it particularly hard.
“We did a horses–t job,” the third baseman said. “I’ve got to block that. He’s got to get it there. It ended up hurting us.”
McMahon explained that he saw Murakami extend his lead past a particular part of the infield grass, which made him think they had a chance to pick him off.
“Personally,” McMahon said, “what I was seeing was, the first lead he got was, like, solid, but he was kind of (standing) tall. The second one, I thought, was a little bit lazy. Then I moved off the bag and I saw him extend. There’s that little cut on the grass or whatever and he was damn near to it or probably past it a little bit. … And then Ali and I — we didn’t execute.”
McMahon said he and Sánchez just “let it rip” and that it wasn’t a pick-off attempt called from the dugout.
“Trying to make a play,” McMahon said. “I thought we caught him off guard pretty good. I thought we had a chance at it.”
Later in the inning, during a mound visit with Doval, Sánchez pulled down his catcher’s mask and pounded his chest to take responsibility for the bad throw.
For Sánchez, it was his third throwing error of the season. He’s been behind the plate for 656 plate appearances this year, and that’s the worst rate of throwing errors per plate appearance among all catchers with at least 500, according to Baseball Reference researcher Katie Sharp.
The Yankees fell to 1-7 in extra innings — the worst record in the majors.
“Nothing about this is easy,” McMahon said. “Trying to make a play. Didn’t f—ing work. Right back at it (Thursday).”
