The Oakland A’s Seth Brown grimaces after getting hit with a New York Yankee pitch in the top of the second inning at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx on Wed Jun 29, 2022 (AP News photo)

By Jessica Kwong

NEW YORK—The Oakland Athletics fell 5-3 on Wednesday afternoon and got swept in the three-game series against the best in baseball, the New York Yankees. Despite hitting a new low at Yankee Stadium, A’s manager Mark Kotsay said the “team fights, we always have and we’ll continue to.”

Oakland took an early lead with Stephen Piscotty, fresh off the injured list, hitting a two-run double. Elvis Andrus followed with an RBI single, putting the A’s up 3-0. But the Yankees quickly capitalized on left-handed pitcher Cole Irvin’s mistakes. In the first inning, Aaron Judge hit his 29th home run of the season, and DJ LeMahieu scored, cutting the A’s lead to 3-2.

In the third inning, Giancarlo Stanton hit a slugger of his own, his 19th of the season, allowing LeMahieu and Judge to score. The Yankees took a 5-3 lead, and the A’s were unable to produce any more runs.

Irvin (2-6) threw a career-high 103 pitches in seven innings, allowed six hits, one walk and struck out five. His grooved 3-2 fastball to Judge and 1-2 change-up to Stanton cost the A’s.

“I’m disappointed with the early runs,” said Irvin. “I felt like a threw a good change-up to Stanton but throwing a fastball down the middle to Judge is probably not the best idea. It’s about execution, but all-in-all I felt like I had a pretty strong day in my first start at Yankee Stadium.”

Irvin asked to go out after the seventh inning, and Kotsay conferred.

“Just two mistakes to two really good hitters and it ended up costing him five runs,” Kotsay said. “After the Stanton home run, he got back, engaged and went seven innings. Kind of a tale of two stories there, the first time around, then twice through the lineup. He kept us in the game and (we had) an opportunity to at least get back in it.”

Yankees right-handed pitcher Jameson Taillon (9-1) gave up only three runs in five innings and threw 105 pitches.

The A’s lost Monday’s game 9-5 and Tuesday’s 2-1. They’ve dropped to 25-52, while the Yankees improved to an MLB-best 56-20 (.737) to start the season. Kotsay said his team is capable of winning against even the best, but has not executed.

“We’re being competitive in terms of having a chance to beat these guys,” Kotsay said. “We know we can play with any team in baseball. We have that ability. We just have to put it together.”

The A’s head back west to finish their ten-game road trip with a four-game series against the Seattle Mariners. First pitch for game one on Thursday is at 7:10 p.m. The A’s will start right hander Adrian Martinez (1-0, 0.00) going for the Mariners (Logan Gilbert 8-3, 2.44) 7:10 pm PDT