Here is Part I of my three-day, three-game trip to Boston.

Tuesday night sucked. And to top off the 14-1 embarrassment, drinking Coors Lights for about five hours straight (and trying one or two of Brittni’s Angry Orchard Rosés) led to a brutal hangover on Wednesday. It didn’t matter that I had pizza from two different places, both near the end of the game and then again after the game. I crushed the breakfast buffet at the hotel and then took an afternoon nap. Then a few hours before the game, we went to Eataly where I had more pizza, and then it was time to get ready for the game.

We had to stop at my friend’s apartment on Comm. Ave. to pick up Brittni’s bag (it only had her whole life in it) that she left there the night before (Angry Orchard Rosé will do that to you) walking over to Fenway Park for the second game of the series.

Thanks to getting stuck by the slowest people in the slowest moving line in the history of event entrances, I was watching on a TV when Brett Gardner led off the game with a single and Aaron Judge walked before Giancarlo Stanton rocked a two-run triple to the deepest part of the park up against the 420 sign. At first I thought Stanton had struck out or grounded into a double play given the crowd’s reaction, but that’s just how many Yankees fans were in Fenway.

In recent seasons, there have been more and more “Let’s Go Yankees” chanting breaking out in Fenway, something I would have never imagined between my first Yankees-Red Sox game at Fenway in 1999 and 2004. Even in the few seasons after 2004, Fenway was still a scary place for Yankees fans to wear Yankees apparel, and the score would determine your safety after the game. But now people openly tell Jackie Bradley Jr. he sucks and yell obscenities at the Red Sox on their home field. It’s beautiful.

Somehow it was even colder than the night before. The wind was whipping around and in Section 34 in straightaway center field (the same viewpoint as what you see on TV), down below on Lansdowne Street, an aspiring musician or a crazy person with a few empty buckets (I’m going with the latter) drummed away the whole game. Drumming is actually not what he was doing, but rather just hitting the drum over and over like a metronome with no beat or rhythm. People in our section were pooling together money to throw down to him to make him stop, but the “drumming” lasted the entire game except for a few momentary breaks.

I didn’t think much of Tyler Wade’s groundout in the top of the third inning other than that maybe Tyler Wade isn’t very good and just an AAAA player. But then Tyler Austin and Brock Holt came together at second base as a result of that groundout and the benches cleared, and the “Yankees suck” chants began right on cue. Austin had slid a little to aggressively for Holt’s liking, and the two players barely hanging on to being Major Leaguers caused the benches to clear and hundreds of millions of dollars of baseball assets sprinting for second base. Both ownership groups were probably happy thinking about what a fight and a renewed rivalry would do for their wallets, while also worried about all of the money at stake in an actual brawl.

Austin had reached base on an RBI single that gave the Yankees a 4-1 lead. It was going to take a much more lopsided score for the Red Sox to throw at Austin if they really felt his slide was over the top. When Gary Sanchez crushed his second two-run home run of the game in the fourth, the Yankees had an 8-1 lead, and the Red Sox had the deficit they needed to throw at Austin.

Austin’s at-bat in the fifth came and went as he struck out against Heath Hembree on four pitches. In the bottom of the fifth, Masahiro Tanaka unraveled as the Red Sox scored five runs, including their second grand slam in as many nights, this one from J.D. Martinez. Suddenly, the lopsided Yankees blowout was now an 8-6 game. I wasn’t thinking about whether or not there would be a fight, I was thinking about how this game would join my list of bad Yankees games at Fenway Park. Losing this game would be the worst Yankees loss at Fenway Park for me since Game 5 of the 2004 ALCS.

Thankfully, the Yankees added two insurance runs in the sixth and Chad Green pitched a shutdown inning in the bottom of the inning to keep the Yankees’ lead at 10-6. Austin was due up in the seventh, but the game was still close.

Joe Kelly is a loser. I thought that long before Wednesday’s game. Wednesday’s game did nothing other than reinforce my opinion about him: loser. In 2015, Kelly told the media he would win the AL Cy Young award. It wasn’t said in jest. It was said in all seriousness and said a few times. Kelly made 25 starts in 2015, pitching to a 4.82 ERA and 1.444 WHIP. Cy Young indeed. He’s basically Nathan Eovaldi. All the velocity in the world and can’t strike anyone out.

Kelly tried to drill Austin, but his command is so bad that he missed, so he tried again, and this time he didn’t miss. Austin slammed his bat on the plate and then went right for Kelly as Kelly stood there with his glove begging Austin to come fight him. Kelly is 6-foot-1, 190 lbs. Austin is 6-foot-2, 220 lbs. Size isn’t everything in a fight, but knowing the demeanors of both, if Christian Vazquez hadn’t pulled on Austin’s jersey to trip him up right before he reached Kelly, Kelly’s career might be over. Luckily for Kelly, Judge came in to play referee and not play enforcer. He put Kelly in a headlock and with the help of Stanton, the two mammoth Yankees moved the entire pile of both teams across the infield.

“Yankees suck” filled the Fenway air as everyone tried their best to see who was throwing punches and who was taking punches. When the dust settled, the umpires took what felt like three hours to sort it all out as the temperature dropped. Phil Nevin came out to argue his ejection as the Fenway played “Let It Go” from Frozen. Brittni, wearing flats in the freezing temperatures, began to look like Anna near the end of Frozen (sorry for the spoiler), and the game still hadn’t restarted.

The game was long from over. Neither team scored in the seventh or eighth and the Yankees were once again scoreless in the ninth. With a four-run lead and desperately needing a win, Aaron Boone called on the highest-paid reliever in baseball to close out the game against the team he is barely ever able to close out a game against.

Here is what I wrote earlier in the season about Aroldis Chapman:

After watching Aroldis Chapman pitch for the Yankees for four months of 2016 and all of 2017, I know there are two Aroldis Chapmans. There’s the Good Aroldis Chapman, who comes in and there is actually a 0 percent chance anyone will reach base and close to a 0 percent chance that anyone might even make contact. Then there’s the Bad Aroldis Chapman, who comes in and need 30 pitches to get through the inning, if he even gets through the inning, as every triple-digit fastball is fouled straight back or hit for a line drive and every slider is sat on or misses the strike zone completely. This appearance was a combination of the two.

Bad Aroldis Chapman was in for the Yankees.

Jackie Bradley Jr., who is on his way out of the majors, singled to lead off the ninth, and then Christian Vazquez doubled to move Bradley to third. Fenway Park was on its feet and I felt like I was going to throw up all over myself. Here is what was at stake with a Yankees loss:

1. A third straight loss to fall to 5-7
2. A second straight loss to the Red Sox
3. Blowing an 8-1 lead two games after blowing a 5-0 lead
4. Losing a game in which the benches cleared twice
5. Watching your $86 million blow a four-run, ninth-inning lead to your rival

(On top of that, I had a four team parlay and the Yankees were the last team I needed to win it.)

Thankfully, Sandy Leon flew out on the first pitch of his at-bat for the first out of the inning and I could breathe for a second. The runners on base meant nothing, as did the batter at the plate. Just keep the tying run out of the batter’s box, and never let the go-ahead run get to the plate.

Mookie Betts battled Chapman as Chapman looked gas and like he might walk the park. Behind 3-1 in the count, I felt like dry heaving with Rafael Devers on deck and visions of Devers home run off Chapman last season started to replay in my head.

Chapman threw the best two pitches he will probably throw this season to Betts for a called strike 2 and a swinging strike 3 and there were two outs in the inning.

Devers came up to the plate and a wild pitch from Chapman scored Bradley to make it 10-7. But Vazquez and Devers still meant nothing. Hanley Ramirez standing in the on-deck circle meant everything.

Chapman struck out Devers to avoid the worst Yankees regular-season loss of my lifetime (no exaggeration given everything at stake). Brittni got warm and she got some sushi and she promised to never wear flats to an April baseball game in Boston again.

The Yankees were back to .500 and the Red Sox’ nine-game winning streak had been stopped.

Part III of my three-day, three-game trip to Boston coming tomorrow.

I have seen a lot of bad Yankees games at Fenway Park. A lot of bad games.

May 18, 1999: Joe Torre returns to the Yankees after missing the beginning of the season to battle prostate cancer. David Cone and Pedro Martinez go toe-to-toe, but trailing 3-2 late, Jason Grimsley can’t keep it close as he gives up three runs in the bottom of the eighth.

Oct 18, 2004: Game 5 of the 2004 ALCS, which also happens to be the third-worst night of my life. The second being Game 6 and the first being Game 7.

April 14, 2005: Randy Johnson gets lit up for five runs and Tom Gordon turns a 5-5 tie into an 8-5 loss with an embarrassing eighth inning. And to top it all off, Gary Sheffield brawls with some fans in right field.

May 1, 2006: Johnny Damon returns to Boston as Friendly Fenway’s center field gets littered with money. Tied 3-3 in the eighth, Tanyon Sturtze gives up the go-ahead run. With two men on and David Ortiz due up, Joe Torre calls for the Mike Myers, the lefty specialist and the man the Yankees acquired for the sole purpose of facing Ortiz. Ortiz cranks a three-run home run into the New England night.

April 22, 2007: After losing the first two games of the series, the Yankees take a 3-0 lead in the rubber match on Sunday Night Baseball. But after holding the Red Sox scoreless for the first two innings, rookie Chase Wright allows Manny Ramirez, J.D. Drew, Mike Lowell and Jason Varitek to go back-to-back-to-back-to-back on him to take a 4-3 lead. The Yankees would take the lead back in the sixth only to have Scott Proctor give up a three-run home run to Lowell in the seventh.

April 24, 2009: The Yankees lead 4-2 in the ninth with two outs and Mariano Rivera on the mound and Kevin Youkilis on first base. Jason Bay hits a 1-0 pitch over the wall in center to tie the game. In the 11th, Damaso Marte gives up a home run to Youkilis that landed just yesterday.

April 26, 2009: Hoping to salvage the final game of the series, Andy Pettitte falls apart in the fifth. Tied 1-1, Pettitte wakes David Ortiz up by allowing Ortiz to double home the go-ahead run. With Jacoby Ellsbury on third and Ortiz on second following the double, Ellsbury steals home on Pettitte and Jorge Posada and steals Pettitte’s pride, dignity and self esteem in the process.

(A period of a lot of Yankees wins.)

April 29, 2016: The Yankees have a 2-0 lead in the seventh inning. With two on and two outs, Masahiro Tanaka gives up a two-run double to Jackie Bradley Jr. to tie the game. In the eighth inning, Dellin Betances gives up a two-run home run to David Ortiz as the Yankees lose 4-2.

April 30, 2016: The Yankees lose 8-0 and Rick Porcello pitches seven shutout innings.

You can add April 10, 2018 to the list.

Thankfully, I’m up in Boston for all three games of the series because I was inside Fenway Park for a total of about 30 minutes on Tuesday night.

Last year on April 26, Luis Severino pitched a seven-inning shutout at Fenway. Then on July 15, he gave up one earned run over seven innings at Fenway. This start looked like his Aug. 12 start against the Red Sox at the Stadium when eight earned runs in 4 1/3 innings.

Severino didn’t have it from the start. Mookie Betts doubled, Andrew Benintendi walked and Hanley Ramirez singled. After three batters and 10 pitchers, it was 1-0 Red Sox with runners on first and third and no one out. With Chris Sale going for the Red Sox, the game was most likely over already. But just incase anyone thought the Yankees might still win, Severino made sure to erase those thoughts in the second inning.

Four more hits, including a two-run Benintendi triple and the Red Sox had a 4-0 lead. I knew it was game over, but I stayed anyway as I watched Brittni’s teeth chatter as she was somehow cold inside her long-sleeved shirt and two coats and hood. Two innings later when the Red Sox added a fifth run and the “Yankees suck” chants started to build with intensity, I had seen enough. I said, “Let’s go,” to Brittni and she moved like they were giving away puppies outside the park.

In the cab on our way to our friend’s apartment to catch up and drink away the pain of a loss to the Red Sox, I watched Aaron Judge homer (thanks to the FOX Sports Go app, which is the best invention of all time), and I thought it would really suck if I left this game early and the Yankees somehow come back. But I was frozen from my short time at the game and I knew better than to think the Yankees were going to mount a five-run comeback against Sale. I made the right decision.

At my friend’s apartment, I watched the bottom of the sixth inning unfold, which will hopefully go down as the worst inning of the 2018 season for the Yankees. If it doesn’t, then that’s going to be quite an inning.

Tommy Kahnle relived Severino to start the six. Here is how his performance went:

Groundout
Double
Walk
Walk
Double (two runs)
Sacrifice fly (one run)
Walk

Then the always reliable Chasen Shreve came in to get the last out of the inning. It took him a while:

Hit by pitch
E5 (one run)
Walk (one run)
Home run (four runs)
Groundout

That’s nine runs on three hits (all extra-base hits), four walks, one hit by pitch and one error. The Red Sox were up 14-1 and I was so pleased with my decision to leave the game in the bottom of the fourth inning for warmth and cheaper beer.

The loss put the Yankees back under .500 at 5-6 and 4 1/2 games out in the AL East, but at least it wasn’t a heartbreaking loss. Sure, this game is now on my list of Fenway Park disasters, but it wasn’t like the two losses to the Blue Jays or the Sunday loss to the Orioles. It was just a good, old embarrassing rout, and those are easier to shake off.

Part II of my three-day, three-game trip to Boston coming tomorrow.

Here is Part I of my two-day, two-game trip to Toronto.

The winning feeling didn’t go away when I woke up on Friday. Thankfully, I hedged my Opening Day four-team parlay that Brittni’s Dodgers cost me and wound up even on the day.

After breakfast, news broke of Aaron Hicks heading to the disabled list with Billy McKinney headed to Toronto to make his Major League debut. One game into the season, and the Yankees’ very deep outfield depth had become very shallow. Hicks would join Jacoby Ellsbury and Clint Frazier on the DL, and the absence of Ellsbury suddenly became relevant. I would rather Ellsbury not be and have never been a Yankee, but if you’re asking me Ellsbury or McKinney? Well, I have to take The Thief.

The day was spent at the Hockey Hall of Fame (for me) and then at the aquarium (for Brittni) with first pitch not until 7:07, and a second stop at Wayne Gretzky’s was made for a late afternoon lunch.

***

The last time Masahiro Tanaka took the mound was to shut down the Astros in Game 5 of the 2017 ALCS. His line in that win: 7 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 8 K. Between that start and his start against the Indians in Game 3 of the ALDS (7 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 7 K), no longer were Yankees fans hoping Tanaka would opt out of his contract.

Aaron Boone decided (or the front office decided and he was instructed) to bat Didi Gregarious fourth for the second game of the season. To me, you want your best hitters hitting as much as possible, so I would never break up Aaron Judge-Giancarlo Stanton-Gary Sanchez part of the order. It had worked against the left-hander J.A. Happ on Opening Day, and it didn’t matter to me that a right-hander in Aaron Sanchez was starting the second game. Ask any Major League pitcher or catcher which order of hitters worries them more: Judge-Stanton-Sanchez or Judge-Stanton-Gregorius. I think it might be a unanimous decision. But Boone (aka Cashman and Co.) set a precedent in Game 2 of the season that a left-handed hitter would break up the most feared back-to-back-to-back hitters in Major League Baseball. If Greg Bird weren’t on the disabled list yet again, it would most likely be him in that spot, but for now it would be Gregorius.

I have apologized countless times for being wrong about Gregorius with the majority of that apology coming after the first inning of the 2017 Wild-Card Game and some more apologizing after Game 5 of the 2017 ALDS against Corey Kluber. Gregorius has turned into an All-Star-level shortstop and has seen his power numbers increase in each of his three seasons with the Yankees, but I still don’t want him batting fourth or ever batting ahead of Sanchez.

All of my lineup complaining on Twitter before the game (and there was a lot of it) was quickly silenced as Gregorius jumped on an 0-1 pitch with a line-drive triple to center field to lead off the second inning. A Sanchez grounder to third would display the weakest part of Gregorius’ game in his baserunning, as he was easily thrown out at home. With two outs in the inning, Billy McKinney picked up his first Major League hit with a seeing-eye grounder through the right side and new fan favorite Brandon Drury smashed a 2-1 pitch off the very top of the right-field wall to score Sanchez and give the Yankees an early 1-0 lead.

After working around a two-out double in the first, Tanaka gave up a one-out solo home run in the second to the powerful Randal Grichuk. Thanks to the low ticket prices in Toronto, I was able to sit behind home plate for both games, and Grichuk, in person, looks slightly bigger than Ronald Torreyes. Despite his stature, he jumped on the first pitch he saw from Tanaka and hit a bomb to left-center to tie the game.

Drury struck again in the fourth with a two-out RBI single to give the Yankees a 2-1 lead and Tyler Wade finally came through with a big hit in his young career with a two-out, two-run double in the sixth to give the Yankees a 4-1 lead.

Tanaka lasted six innings (LINE) and Tommy Kahnle came in for a perfect seventh. Kahnle returned for the eighth, but after walking Russell Martin to lead off the inning and getting up a long out off the bat of Kevin Pillar, David Robertson relieved him for the final two outs.

After watching Aroldis Chapman pitch for the Yankees for four months of 2016 and all of 2017, I know there are two Aroldis Chapmans. There’s the Good Aroldis Chapman, who comes in and there is actually a 0 percent chance anyone will reach base and close to a 0 percent chance that anyone might even make contact. Then there’s the Bad Aroldis Chapman, who comes in and need 30 pitches to get through the inning, if he even gets through the inning, as every triple-digit fastball is fouled straight back or hit for a line drive and every slider is sat on or misses the strike zone completely. This appearance was a combination of the two.

Josh Donaldson struck out on four pitches (all strikes) and Justin Smoak went down on three pitches. Seven pitches, all strikes and two strikeouts and the Yankees were one out away from starting the season 2-0. And then Steve Pearce pinch hit for Curtis Grandson.

Pearce was an awful Yankee. Yes, his time with the Yankees was a very small sample size of 12 games and 30 plate appearances, but in those plate appearances, he hit .160/.300/.280 with one home run and four RBIs. That was back in 2012 when the Yankees were trying to win the division and avoid the first year of the wild-card format, so his at-bats were going at a crucial time. Since then, Pearce has gone on to play for the Orioles, Rays and Blue Jays, moving around the AL East and destroying the Yankees at every opportunity. Here is how he has done against the Yankees since

2013: 2-for-6, .333/.333/.500, 2B

2014: 14-for-47, .298/.411/.553, 3 2B, 3 HR, 7 RBIs

2015: 5-for-34, .147/.256/.294, 2 2B, 1 HR, 3 RBIs

2016: 13-for-47, .333/.447/.590, 1 2B, 3 HR, 6 RBIs

2017: 10-for-28, .357, 2 2B, 3 HR, 6 RBIs

Aside from 2015, Pearce has essentially been a slightly less version of David Ortiz against the Yankees, and he was again against Chapman.

Pearce jumped on Chapman’s first pitch and drove a double to left field, and the Rogers Centre crowd started to come alive for the first time of the season. Chapman got ahead 0-2 on another former Yankee, Yangervis Solarte, but like every ex-Yankee, Solarte would succeed against them, and he crushed a double to right-center to score Pearce. Suddenly, the Yankees’ lead was 4-2 with the tying run at the plate in Grichuk, who had already homered in the game. The game had felt like a lopsided blowout, but now Grichuk was stepping in with a chance to destroy Tanaka and Wade’s day.

Rogers Centre had gotten loud and got even louder after a first-pitch ball. When Chapman missed the zone again with his second pitch, Rogers Centre was rocking. After four consecutive foul balls, I started to feel sick. I know what Bad Chapman looks like and after starting out the inning so strong, Bad Chapman was in the game and Randal Grichuk of all hitters was getting closer and closer with his timing.

Fortunately, Grichuk took the seventh pitch of the at-bat for a called third strike and Rogers Centre went quiet as if someone pressed mute on the entire stadium. Brittni and I made our way out of Rogers Centre surround by thousands of sad Blue Jays fans and across the street to The Rec Room for a postgame celebration.

***

Two games, two wins. A successful trip north of the border for me and a successful trip north of the border so far for the Yankees. In the morning it was time to head to the airport to fly back to New York and watch the Yankees on YES for the first time this season.

The last time there was baseball, or baseball that I cared about, was back in October in Game 7 of the ALCS. When the Yankees’ season ends, it’s saddening. When the season ends one win short of the World Series, it’s depressing. But now the depression is over. Real meaningful baseball cures it.

There’s no better feeling in the world than baseball being back. No better feeling. And after the way last season ended and the way this season is expected to go, it felt necessary to head north of the border for the first two games of the season. So I told Brittni to pack her bags, we dropped our dog Charlie off at my parents and made the trip to Toronto for Games 1 and 2 of 2018.

***

The Baseball Gods weren’t happy about Major League Baseball’s decision to start the season so early in March to incorporate more off days into the schedule. And they let it be known as they made sure it poured in the hours leading up to Opening Day. Of course there were no cabs available because for some reason there aren’t a lot of cabs in Toronto (and for another reason they are all different colors), and because Uber was even harder to come by at the time, it meant a mile walk from the hotel to Rogers Centre. Brittni wasn’t happy.

Normally, I hate the cold. I’m as soft as can be when it comes to the cold. I’m Jacoby Ellsbury when it comes to the cold. Well, my fingers are as soft as can be when it comes to the cold. The rest of my body is fine, but fingers aren’t, and once the cold hits them, I’m ruined. The coldest I ever was was at the Rangers-Islanders Stadium Series game at Yankee Stadium back in January 2014. The first period was fine, but once the Zamboni hit the ice for the first intermission, it was all downhill. After that game, I stood in the corner of my shower in my apartment on the Upper East Side, which was one-third the size of a regulation-sized shower, trying to hide from the hot water causing burning sensations in my hands and feet. It wasn’t that cold in Toronto on Thursday, but it was getting there and the rain was enhancing the cold. But it didn’t faze me. Baseball was back! Brittni, on the other hand, stepped in a Lake Ontario-sized puddle early into the walk, soaking her feet, and I tried my best not to make direct eye contact with her as her teeth chattered because I figured she might not just leave the walk and Toronto, but also me.

***

Rogers Centre is a much better dome experience than Tropicana Field, but I doubt there’s any worse dome experience than Tropicana Field. The roof of Rogers Centre is incredible in real life, hovering what seems like miles above the field. It would have been nice to have one game with it opened and one with it closed, but the Baseball Gods coupled with it being March 29 and 30 in CANADA(!) made sure that wasn’t going to happen.

My first look at Aaron Boone as Yankees manager was of him bringing the lineup card to home plate. Ten years earlier, I watched Joe Girardi in his Yankees managerial debut take the field at the Stadium to “JOE GIR-ARDI” chants (that was the first and last time he would ever hear those chants) only to have the game be called due to rain, so this tenure and season was already off to a better start.

Brett Gardner opened the game with a line drive to Curtis Granderson that the Grandy Man dropped. Aaron Judge made the first out of the inning and as Giancarlo Stanton stepped up to the plate for the first time in a Yankees uniform, a man who hadn’t missed a meal in a long time made his way to his seat directly in front of me. I stood up to change my viewpoint just as Stanton swung and connected. The ball kept carrying and carrying and carrying over the right-field fence, which didn’t seem like a possible result after such an effortless swing. Yeah, I think I’m going to like this guy on this team with this lineup.

From that moment on, the game felt over. Luis Severino showed up as the ace, dominating the Blue Jays lineup each inning for this line: 5.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 7 K. Stanton added an RBI double as well as a second home run, which might have hit our hotel if Rogers Centre weren’t enclosed, Gary Sanchez had an RBI double as well and Gardner showed off his power with a solo home run. Brittni got her beer and her hot dog and made small talk with the surrounding Canadians as she awaited her own Opening Day with Clayton Kershaw and the Dodgers later that night. It was a near-perfect Opening Day with the only blip of the game coming in the eighth inning.

The first pitch of the season thrown by Dellin Betances was turned around for a Kevin Pillar solo home run. Clearly, Pillar was sitting on a first-pitch fastball from Betances, he got it, and didn’t miss it. It was a shocking moment, considering how Betances finished last season and all the talk in the offseason about how he would rebound, but I don’t think anyone thought he would go to his breaking ball on his first pitch of the season, and apparently, Pillar didn’t either. I’m the biggest of Betances fans, and always will be. He’s a native New Yorker and homegrown Yankee, who was the only consistent bright spot and star for the organization from 2014 until June 22 of last season. I believe he will return to his pre-June 22, 2017 self and once again be the most dominant member of the Yankees’ bullpen. I’m not at all worried about Dellin Betances.

Betances retired the next three batters he faced and Aroldis Chapman pitched a perfect ninth, striking out Steve Pearce and Kendrys Morales to end the game.

***

I missed that feeling after a Yankees win. I hadn’t had that feeling since leaving the Stadium following Game 5 of the ALCS when the Yankees finally solved Dallas Keuchel en route to a 5-0 win. That was back on Oct. 18. I hadn’t had that feeling in 162 days.

I didn’t care that it was still pouring outside Rogers Centre. Luis Severino’s dominance and Giancarlo Stanton’s unbelievable power had me dreaming of what this season and future seasons might hold. Sure, it was only one game, but for now that’s all I have to go off of.

Brittni and I made our way down Blue Jays Way and to Wayne Gretzky’s, and it might have been better than the game. A restaurant and bar lined with memorabilia from The Great One’s life took me back in time and made me forget about the Yankees’ win momentarily. A few Coors Lights, nachos, a grilled chicken sandwich and being surrounding by the presence of 99 was the perfect end to the perfect start of the season.

Part II of my two-day, two-game trip to Toronto coming tomorrow.

The worst contract in the history of the Yankees was one that never made any sense. This wasn’t the Yankees competing against several other contenders to add Carl Pavano or even Jaret Wright after the 2004 ALCS collapse. This wasn’t the Steinbrenners overruling Brian Cashman to give A-Rod a 10-year, $275 million after his second MVP season in three years. This wasn’t the Yankees continually upping their offer to CC Sabathia to put so much money in front of him that he would have to say no to California. This wasn’t the Yankees giving A.J. Burnett $82.5 million because he led the league in strikeouts once (with an above-4 ERA). This wasn’t the Yankees stepping in and stealing Mark Teixeira away from the Red Sox with an eight-year, $180 million deal. This was the Yankees deciding to pass on their own homegrown, All-Star talent to sign essentially a one-year wonder to a seven-year, $153 million contract (with a $5 million buyout for an eighth season, which we can’t forget) when NO ONE ELSE was bidding.

Given the contract and performance, Jacoby Ellsbury is the worst player in the history of the New York Yankees. Pavano is not a counter argument. There is no argument. And all of the weird injuries and issues aside, Ellsbury made more in his first two seasons with the Yankees than Pavano did in his four, and two years from today, Ellsbury could still be a Yankee, weakly grounding out to the right side, hitting for no power, stealing no bases and blocking prospects with real baseball talent from reaching the majors.

The idea that having Ellsbury and Brett Gardner hitting first and second at the top of the order was what the Yankees needed after the disastrous 2013 season was such a bad idea that it makes choosing Gary Sheffield over Vladimir Guerrero look good. Like that Sheffield-Guerrero decision, maybe this decision also wasn’t Brian Cashman’s call after the 2013 season since ownership had to watch the Red Sox win their third World Series in 10 years while the Yankees put together the 2006 All-Star team with Ichiro, Travis Hafner, Kevin Youkilis, Vernon Wells and Lyle Overbay. If it weren’t for Alfonso Soriano’s MVP-like return in the middle of the summer to string Yankees fans along until early September, maybe the front office would have done something more drastic than signing Ellsbury, Brian McCann and Carlos Beltran. Maybe they would have also signed Shin-Soo Choo to a seven-year, $140 million deal. (Unfortunately, that’s not a joke as Cashman and Co. did offer Choo a seven-year, $140 million deal.)

I never thought I would find a hitter streakier than Gardner, but Ellsbury has been that, except his hot streaks last a quarter of the time of his cold streaks. Yes, the Yankees’ plan was to put the two streakiest hitters in the game back-to-back at the top of their lineup in hopes that hot streaks would occur at the same time. Why would you want to do that? If you know the answer then maybe you can also tell me why you would want two Brett Gardners on the same team? And then maybe you can also tell me why would you want to pay the real Brett Gardner $13 million per year and the bad Brett Gardner $21.1 million per year?

If it the decision wasn’t Cashman’s then it needs to be made public. I can’t sit here four-plus years later with potentially three seasons left of Ellsbury (his fourth season will be bought out) and not know whose decision this was. Cashman has gotten a lot of praise in the last year and a half after he tore down a team he built and netted valuable assets like Gleyber Torres, Clint Frazier, Justus Sheffield and Dillon Tate. But if the Ellsbury signing was Cashman’s decision, I need to know. If it was someone in his front office then I need to know that they are no longer making decision for the New York Yankees. And if it happened to be ownership’s decision, well, that would make the most sense since Hal Steinbrenner and Randy Levine’s smart decision-making track record starts and ends with the Rafael Soriano signing. And if it weren’t for Mariano Rivera shagging fly balls in Kansas City, they wouldn’t have a smart track record.

Ultimately, it doesn’t matter whose decision it was. What does matter is that it can be fixed. The person responsible for the worst contract in Yankees history, which produced the worst Yankee in the team’s history, can salvage the monumental mistake that cost the franchise $153 million (plus his $5 million buyout for 2021) and Robinson Cano. And it’s very easy. Release Jacoby Ellsbury.

No team wants Ellsbury, not even for pennies on the dollar. Unless the Yankees eat a significant portion of his remaining $68 million and attach a prospect or prospects to him, no one is touching the one-year wonder, and that was made abundantly clear this offseason. Despite all the rumors and reports of November, December and January, no team was ever close to acquiring Ellsbury and Ellsbury made that known at spring training when he said the Yankees never asked him to waive his no-trade clause. I’m not even sure any team even entertained the thought of trading for Ellsbury.

The Yankees aren’t getting out of this mistake. They can’t pay Ellsbury to play for another team through a trade like they did with David Justice or A.J. Burnett or Brian McCann. The only way out is to release him and find out which team is the dumbest in the league. If the Yankees release him and he signs with another team for the league minimum, which he most likely will, so be it. He’s not going to become the player he was for one season of his 11-year career. That one season also happened SEVEN YEARS AGO! He’s not going to be rejuvenated and revitalized with a change of scenery and more playing time because he isn’t good. He’s not going to come back to hurt the Yankees. He will most likely play like a Hall of Famer against them when he faces them because every ex-Yankee does, but he’s not going to be the missing piece of another contender, and he’s not going to get some big hit or make some big play against the Yankees that ruins their own championship aspirations. Because in a game of that magnitude, Ellsbury will be on the bench, like he was for the 2015 Wild-Card Game and like he was for nearly the entire 2017 postseason aside from a few DH at-bats.

Aside from tying up $21.1 million that could have been used on Yu Darvish or can be used on Jake Arrieta, Alex Cobb or Lance Lynn, Ellsbury is destroying the development of Clint Frazier.  (Sure, the Stanton signing and the belief that two good months of Hicks’ career is enough to make him the starting center fielder are helping, but let’s stay with Ellsbury here.) If Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton are going to be the right fielder and designated hitter the majority of the season and Brett Gardner is in left and Aaron Hicks is in center that puts Ellsbury on the bench. And that puts Frazier in Scranton. And if one of Judge (knock on all the wood) or Stanton (knock on all the wood again) or Gardner or Hicks goes down, that means playing time for Ellsbury. Right now it’s going to take two injuries from those four or Ellsbury-like seasons from two of those four for Frazier to get to the Bronx, and even then, it might not be enough. And I certainly don’t want any of those four to get injured and if two of those four have Ellsbury-like seasons and the two are Judge and Stanton, well pack up the bats and balls and we’ll see you in 2019. The path to the Yankees for Frazier without some sort of injury bug or 2013-14 season repeat is incredibly hard. Ellsbury makes it that much harder. Not even just for Frazier. For everyone. That roster spot and position player bench spot is a big deal.

2013 was an embarrassment. 2014 was a disappointment. 2015 was great until the trade deadline and awful after it. 2016 sucked until after the trade deadline. 2017 was unexpected and the most fun I have had as a Yankees fan since the moment before Derek Jeter’s ankle was ruined in Game 1 of the 2012 ALCS. 2018 and moving forward is going to be like it was before 2013 when the Yankees were the Yankees and winning a World Series was an attainable goal. If the Yankees don’t win a championship this season it will be a disappointment like it was for eight years after 2000 and again for three years after 2009. Ownership likes to apologize to the fans when the goal of winning a championship isn’t met and they promise to do better and do the things necessary to win moving forward. Getting rid of Ellsbury is doing better and doing something necessary. It doesn’t matter if he’s the last man on the bench or the 25th man on the roster. He’s there and he’s a reminder and a holdover from the recent run of disappointing seasons and the bad contracts that led to those disappointing seasons.

It’s just the money, and it’s just $68 million at this point. The other $90 million has already been wasted. Sure, the Yankees could have used the Ellsbury contract to sign Cano, or give 765 New York City high school students $200,000 towards college, or give a $100 ticket or food credit at the Stadium to 1.53 million Yankees fans, or done anything other than give a one-year wonder on the wrong side of 30 a seven-year contract to play Major League Baseball. But they did and now it’s time to fix it. Release Jacoby Ellsbury.