Yankees’ Luis Severino still searching for answers: ‘This whole year has been concerning’

ST. LOUIS — After his previous start, Luis Severino was giddy during his postgame presser in the Yankees’ clubhouse, joking that his new haircut was part of an ongoing journey to recapture his “2017 Sevy” form.

The right-hander had just thrown six scoreless innings against the first-place Rangers. It was a performance so good that it legitimately seemed like the right-hander figured something out, transforming back into his old ace-caliber self.

That buzz was gone on Saturday. The right-hander spoke softly after his start in Game 1 of a doubleheader against the Cardinals at Busch Stadium, an outing featuring nine runs, nine hits, three walks and two home runs allowed in a blowout loss.

“I thought it was gonna be a really good outing,” Severino said, his eyes glued to the ground in the hallway outside the visitor’s clubhouse.

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Severino started with two relatively clean innings, facing one over the minimum entering play in the third. Everything unraveled from there, a five-run inning featuring a three-run home run from slugger Paul Goldschmidt to the opposite field. St. Louis dropped two more on Severino in each of the next two innings — Nolan Gorman went yard in the fourth and the first two batters reached against Severino to begin the fifth, scoring after Yankees manager Aaron Boone called to the bullpen.

“There’s a lot of things within there that should get him back online,” Boone said. “He’s healthy and the fastball is there, we just gotta get him more consistent right now with command and just crispness of the stuff outing after outing.”

Severino has been consistent this year … just consistently unreliable. Since returning from the 60-day injured list after missing almost the first two months of the season with a lat strain, the right-hander has a 6.30 ERA. He was magnificent against Texas last week, but before that, Severino had posted a 9.16 ERA in his previous four starts.

“This whole year has been concerning for me,” Severino admitted. “I want to be able to go out there and help my team. That’s frustrating that I can’t do that.”

Severino and the Yankees are still actively searching for answers. You have to tip your cap to the Cardinals for pounding Severino the way they did, barreling up some well-executed pitches, but this falls on the right-hander’s shoulders more than anything else. He was the one giving up the hard contact.

The stuff that made Severino so dangerous early in his career is in there. We’ve seen flashes of it, even after all of his injuries. These kinds of starts make you wonder, however, if the right-hander won’t factor into the Yankees’ postseason rotation down the road, placing even more pressure on Gerrit Cole, Carlos Rodón, Nestor Cortes and more. And if that’s the case, the Yankees may elect to address the top of their starting staff at the trade deadline.

“Right now, I’m not in my best moment,” Severino said. “I can’t make excuses. I just need to figure out a way to be consistent and get people out.”

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Max Goodman may be reached at mgoodman@njadvancemedia.com.