The recipe was there for a long, hot day, soup to nuts, all afternoon, first pitch to last. Day game after a night game after a blown chance to pick up ground on the devil Red Sox. A bear of a lefty pitcher, Blake Snell, on the mound. Ninety degrees, something close to 174 percent humidity.
(So hot, in fact, that home plate umpire Jerry Layne could barely muster the energy to raise his right arm on called strikes and needed regular visits from Yankees trainer Steve Donohue and his rubbing alcohol-soaked towels — and Layne didn’t even have the worst day among his crew, as we’ll see …)
So maybe it wasn’t unusual that Yankee Stadium chose not to harness its frustration any longer.