Dodgers exposing all the Yankees shortcomings

LOS ANGELES — This was not a hangover.Being unable to shake the dramatic, traumatic result of Game 1 would have actually been better for the Yankees.

Provided them an excuse. So this was worse.This was the Yankees going down two-nothing in the World Series and looking for much of Game 2 as if they didn’t belong on the same field as the Dodgers. If Game 1 was a classic, Game 2 was a class — with the Dodgers schooling the Yankees. So what do the late innings mean? Because Shohei Ohtani had to be assisted off the field in the seventh inning with an apparent arm injury suffered after attempting to steal second.

And after being held to one hit and one run for eight innings, the Yanks scored once and had two swings with the bases loaded before succumbing, 4-2. That left the overall very bad for the Yankees. Remember that starting pitching advantage the Yankees were supposed to have in this matchup? Through two games: nope. The ability to go homer for homer with the Dodgers? Not quite. The Yankees are losing, stars vs.stars — especially because their biggest star, Aaron Judge, is lost.

Long lineup vs.long lineup is one-sided through two games. The Dodgers beat the Yankees to Yoshinobu Yamamoto in the offseason and to Tommy Edman and Jack Flaherty at the trade deadline — all advantage Dodgers. Managing? Aaron Boone’s decision to not have Tim Hill go after Freddie Freeman in the 10th inning of Game 1 only looked worse when Hill got Freeman to pop to short as part of his four-up, four-down outing.

Boone went with Nestor Cortes, who surrendered the walk-off grand slam to Freeman in a 6-3 gut punch to the Yankees. But as far as carryover, this game was 1-1 through 2 ¹/₂ innings with Edman and Juan Soto exchanging homers.In theory, the game was stabilized.

The Yankees were not reeling from being one out away from snaring Game 1. Here is the thing, though: that homer was the only hit the Yankees managed in Yamamoto’s 6 ¹/₃ innings. In the bott...