Yankees defense flops in ugly series-losing defeat to Blue Jays

TORONTO — The Yankees may never want to come back here again.

The entire country will likely welcome them back with open arms, though, given how generous they are in giving away free outs.

With a chance to claim the series against the team they are trailing in the AL East, the Yankees put together one last slopfest of a loss in Rogers Centre, which has become a house of horrors for them over the past three weeks.

They tried to hit enough home runs to wipe away the stench, but three straight innings with at least one error were too much to overcome as the Yankees fell to the Blue Jays 8-4 in front of another sellout crowd of 42,143 that delighted in all their miscues.

The final tally was four errors, enough to sink the Yankees (56-46) yet again as their defense kicked the ball around for most of the night and allowed the Blue Jays (60-42) to end the night leading the division by four games.

The only bit of good news for the Yankees, on a night when manager Aaron Boone and pitching coach Matt Blake were ejected for arguing balls and strikes, was that they are done playing north of the border this season after going 1-6 here.

The only way they would have to come back is if they meet the Blue Jays in October, though in order to get there, the Yankees will have to clean up their game in a big way.

The brutal defensive performance came on the heels of the Yankees committing two errors (which led to a pair of runs) in Monday’s loss and survived another error (that led to two more runs) in Tuesday’s win. Across their seven games here, the Yankees racked up a mind-numbing 11 errors.

On Wednesday, it all began to unravel in the bottom of the fifth inning, right after Anthony Volpe’s solo homer had tied the game 2-2.

Max Fried, pitching for the first time in 11 days because of a blister on his left index finger, issued back-to-back one-out walks before Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hit a chopper down the third base line.

Fried, who has fielded his position incredibly well this season, raced to field it, but then got off an awkward throw home that catcher J.C. Escarra could not handle.

The ball trickled away and allowed both runs to score safely to put the Blue Jays up 4-2.

Aaron Judge’s two-run homer temporarily tied the game again in the top of the sixth before the Yankees let it go.

With one out, Ernie Clement skied a fly ball to right field that the sure-handed Cody Bellinger lost in the lights, turning it into a free triple.

Boone visited the mound but left Fried — whose left pinky had begun to bleed — in the game to face Myles Straw, who roped a double into the left field corner to make it a 5-4 game.

Jonathan Loáisiga entered the game and got the second out, before Will Wagner hit a ground ball to first base that Ben Rice could not backhand cleanly, allowing another run to score.

Then in the seventh, Guerrero led off with a single to left field that bounced past Domínguez’s sidesaddle attempt, the error allowing Guerrero to take second.

Domínguez’s throw there nearly turned into another error, as Jazz Chisholm Jr. nonchalantly tried to scoop it, only to knock it away, though it was not quite far enough for Guerrero to take third.

Bo Bichette then clobbered a two-run homer off Scott Effross that made it an 8-4 game.