The Yankees did what I asked them to do, which was to do to the Phillies in New York what the Phillies did to them in Philadelphia: win both games of the two-game series. The Yankees have now won four straight and four of five since the All-Star break.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. These Yankees are fun. And by these Yankees I mean the players, not the manager, who continues to mismanage his roster and bullpen and spew lies when speaking with the media. But these Yankees led by Greg Allen and Estevan Florial are fun.

These Yankees are fun because they’re winning, having won four of five games since the All-Star break. The Yankees entered the second “half”of the season needing to win 50 of their remaining 73 games to win the division, a .685 winning percentage over two-and-a-half months and so far they have played even better (.800), outscoring the Red Sox and Phillies 24-15. They have a long way to go to holding one of the three available postseason spots to them (3 1/2 games back of the second wild card, six games back of the first wild card and seven games back in the divison), but it’s a start, and they needed this kind of start after the break to have a chance at saving their season.

2. If the Yankees were at full strength, there’s no way Brett Gardner should be on the team over Greg Allen. Of course, Gardner hit a wall-scraping solo home run on Tuesday night, which will solidify his roster spot and playing time for the rest of the season, but the only thing he’s better at than Allen is age and seniority. And Gardner’s presence as a veteran leader on the team hasn’t exactly gotten the Yankees anywhere in recent seasons.

“Been an absolute pro in the room and been incredibly productive between the lines,” Boone said of Allen. “Obviously, the element he brings of running the bases, the versatility, and the really good defense he brings in the outfield … Every at-bat, the quality of the at-bat has been really strong.”

In five games, Allen is 5-for-12 (.417/.500/.750) with five runs, two doubles, a triple, two RBIs and three walks. He has been successful in all three stolen-base attempts and has been a part of every Yankees rally in the second half.

3. The same goes for Estevan Florial. All Yankees fans have been told about him is “he isn’t ready,” and yet, he was the most important player for the Yankees on Tuesday and scored the go-ahead run in the seventh on Wednesday.

“He’s got loads of talent,” Boone said about Florial. “The quality of the at-bat was there too. Results, yes, but really good at-bats too. It wasn’t an accident.”

In three games, Florial is 3-for-9 (.333/.455/.778) with two runs, a double, home run, two RBIs and two walks as well as a stolen base. His at-bats have been exceptional and he looks everything like the player the Yankees dreamed me might one day become (yes, I know, small sample size). I pray Florial continues to be great and to start for this Yankees team because the better he does, the less likely it is that Aaron Hicks has a future with this team.

3. The Yankees have won these last four games with singles and bunts and stolen bases and hit-and-runs, and the occasional home runs. The station-to-station baseball, which has ruined every Yankees season over the last 11 years has been temporarily removed as the team’s strategy with the absence of Aaron Judge and Luke Voit, and the Yankees have had to rely on other ways to score runs than waiting around for someone to hit a three-run home run, which usually never comes.

After Aaron Nola dominated the Yankees for 7 2/3 shutout innings earlier this season, the Makeshift Yankees got to him on Tuesday night. They manufactured their first run with an Allen triple and productive ground out by Florial. Then trailing by a run, Allen walked, stole second, moved to third on a Florial flyout and scored on an error. Then the bats came alive and Gardner hit a home run, Gary Sanchez hit a home run, Giancarlo Stanton hit a home run and Florial hit his first career home run, and the Yankees won 6-3.

4. The four solo home runs were responsible for two-thirds of the Yankees offense, but it was the speed of Allen that rattled Nola and took him off his game as Allen’s extended leads and the threat of him stealing his way into scoring position got to Nola. In the age of advanced stats, stolen bases have been mostly removed the game, as the risk of getting caught has been thought of as not being worth the gamble. But even David Cone, who loves advanced stats as much as anyone, says there’s a place in the game for stealing bases. Speaking from experience, he explained on YES on Tuesday with Allen leading off first, how much of a distraction it is to go from the windup to the stretch and to have to worry about giving up an extra base. Cone said it affected him when he was on the mound, and as a borderline Hall of Famer, if it affected Cone and his illustrious career, it’s certainly going to affect someone like Nola, and it did.

5. On Wednesday night, Cone said something that still haunts me even though the final result favored the Yankees. “It’s Nick Nelson’s game right here,” Cone said in the eighth inning of the two-game series finale.

Nelson was in the game because Boone had seemingly made Chad Green unavailable, saying as much with this postgame exchange with the media.

“Was Chad Green unavailable?”

“Yes.”

“He only threw 13 pitches.”

“He threw 30 two days before that, so he’s thrown over 40 pitches in three days, so Greeny was down. I wanted to avoid Greeny last night just because it’s been a little heavy for him lately. Yeah, he was definitely down tonight.”

Here are Green’s recent appearances:

July 10: Off
July 11: 12 pitches
July 12: Off
July 13: Off
July 14: Off
July 15: Off
July 16: Off
July 17: Off
July 18: 29 pitches
July 19: Off
July 20: 13 pitches

Boone was right, Green had thrown 13 pitches the night before. He was wrong about Green throwing 30 pitches on Sunday (he only threw 29). But what Boone failed to mention was that prior to the 29 pitches, Green had thrown 12 pitches over the previous eight days. Over the 11 days before Wednesday, Green had thrown 54 pitches.

If Boone hadn’t used Green on Tuesday, which he said he didn’t want to, he would have thrown even less, and the Yankees probably lose on Tuesday as a result. It’s hard to believe anything Boone says, but when he continues to say “the season is on the line” and then manages as if the Yankees have a 20-game lead on a postseason spot, it’s embarrassing.

6. After putting 31 baserunners on in 20 2/3 innings, while allowing 11 earned runs and four home runs as a rookie for the 2020 Yankees, Nelson’s 2021 had been unbelievably bad even before he entered Wednesday’s game. After taking the loss in the 10th inning on Opening Day, he had somehow been allowed to ruin two games against the Rays, one against the Braves and another against the Indians all in the month of April alone. He appeared in one game in June for the Yankees and allowed six baserunners and four earned runs in 1 2/3 innings against the Rays again, and in his only July appearance before Wednesday, he was idiotically chosen as the opener for a game in Seattle, and walked the bases loaded in the first inning, needing to be relieved after recording only two outs.

Then came Wednesday. After a Gleyber Torres error and a pair of walks by Zack Britton, Nelson was brought in with the bases loaded and one out and the Yankees holding a 5-2 lead in the eighth inning.

7. Nelson allowed a two-run single to the first hitter he faced — No. 9 hitter Luke Williams — to put a dent in the Yankees’ lead, making it 5-4. With runners now on first and second, Nelson walked the free-swinging Jean Segura to load the bases again. Two pitches later, he threw a pitch to the backstop and the Phillies tied the game. Miraculously, Nelson struck out J.T. Realmuto before walking Bryce Harper to once again load the bases. Thankfully, Andrew McCutchen decided to jump on the first he saw from Nelson, rather than let Nelson walk in another run, and McCutchen flew out to center to the end the inning.

Nelson threw 25 pitches (just 13 strikes), gave up a two-run single, walked two, threw a wild pitch, and allowed all three inherited runners to score and it wasn’t even his worst outing of the season. His ERA came down as he only screwed over Britton’s, and Nelson now has a respectable 9.45 ERA and 2.175 WHIP.

8. The Yankees somehow won a game Asher Wojciechowski, in which Justin Wilson, Nick Nelson and Brooks Kriske also pitched. Reminder: Nelson and Kriske were kept by the Yankees over Garrett Whitlock, who has 1.34 ERA and 1.043 WHIP for the Red Sox, and has thoroughly dominated the Yankees in four appearance: 7.1 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 9 K.

9. “Kinda building on, frankly, his last couple outings,” Boone said of Wilson. “He gave a home run in his last outing, the time before that I think he gave up a run. But it’s different, it’s a different guy than what we saw before.”

I like how Boone says Wilson has been a “different guy” of late, and then says all the bad he has done of late. Wilson did pitch 1 1/3 scoreless innings on Wednesday, after walking the first hitter he faced. In his July 16 apperances, he allowed one earned run in one inning. On July 8, he retired the only batter he faced. On July 3, he allowed four hits, a walk and five earned runs without recording an out. I’m not exactly sure when Wilson became a “different guy” over his previous three appearances, but OK.

“It’s been a fun brand of baseball here the last few days,” Boone said after the first win of the series, in what was one of the only truthful things he has said in 2021 going back to his first press conference in spring training.

10. It’s been a fun brand because the Yankees are winning, and they need to keep winning. On Thursday, the Yankees begin a 10-game, 11-day road trip against the Red Sox (4), Rays (3) and Marlins (3). The Yankees need to win seven of these 10 games, and if they have any aspiration of reaching the postseason as the AL East winner, three of hose seven wins will need to come this weekend in Boston.

“There’s no denying the importance of it,” Boone said of the road trip. “It’s a tough road trip … We understand the importance and urgency of every day.”

I understand the importance and urgency of this road trip. I think the Yankees players understand the importance and urgency of this road trip. I’m not sure if Boone understands the importance and urgency of this road trip. If he does, he won’t manage like he did on Wednesday night.

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The Yankees beat the Red Sox. It only took until their eight game against them of the season, but they did it. The Yankees won the weekend series and have now won six of nine to inch closer to holding a postseason spot.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. The weekend didn’t start well. A rainout on Thursday caused a postponement, though that was far from the worst Yankees news to begin the second half of the season. Luke Voit was placed on the injured list for a third time this season, and Aaron Judge, Gio Urshela, Kyle Higashioka, Jonathan Loaisiga, Nestor Cortes and Wandy Peralta were placed on the COVID-19 IL and would be out at least 10 days. Add in Clint Frazier still being out with vision issues, Miguel Andujar’s absence for a wrist strain, a finger contusion for Michael King and Darren O’Day’s season-ending hamstring injury and the 2021 Yankees had become the 2021 RailRiders. (To make matters worse, Tim Locastro tore his ACL in left field on Friday and then Trey Amburgey suffered a hamstring injury on Sunday.)

This type of injury bug and protocol misfortune is “adversity,” a word Aaron Boone has used frequently and improperly this season to define the team’s horrific play against the Red Sox, Rays, Tigers, Mets and all of their improbable losses, of which there have been too many to keep track of. None of that was adversity. That was just a bad team playing badly and being managed badly. Adversity is the lineup used on Sunday, featuring Amburgey, Chris Gittens, Ryan LaMarre and Greg Allen, and a roster that now has Rougned Odor being as important as Robinson Cano once was compared to some of the other names the Yankees are turning to.

2. On Friday, against a left-handed starter, Boone batted Odor third. Then 48 hours later, against a left-handed starter, with less roster options and inferior personnel, Boone batted Odor seventh. Nothing the Yankees manager does makes sense. Nothing.

3. The Yankees losing all of these players made it easy to understand how they were shut out on Friday, dominated once again by Eduardo Rodriguez, who gets knocked around by every other team he faces. The Yankees produced three hits, gave Jordan Montgomery yet another game without any run support and fell to 0-7 against the Red Sox. After Friday’s game, if the Yankees hadn’t played a game against the Red Sox this season, they would have been only one game back in the loss column. Instead, they were eight. The Red Sox, of all teams, have single-handedly ruined the Yankees’ season to date.

Both Trey Amburgey and Hoy Jun Park made their major league debuts on Friday night. In typical Yankees fashion, Park played right field, a position he has NEVER played professionally. That’s just Boone putting his players in the best possible position to succeed again.

4. The Yankees should have traded Luke Voit in the offseason. His value was never going to be higher than it was after leading the league with 22 home runs in the shortened 2020 season. Now he’s on the IL for the third time this season, though when he has played this season, he’s been pretty awful: .241/.328/.370.

Voit played in 118 games in 2019, hurting himself while unnecessarily going for two in London then was left off the postseason roster after his performance declined following the injury. He managed to play in 56 of the 60 games in 2020, but this season, he has played in 29 of 92 games (32 percent). Next season, Voit will turn 31 before spring training, and as an oft-injured, right-handed first baseman who’s not good defensively, the Yankees really missed the opportunity to get something for him and to move one of their abundance of right-handed bats.

5. I believe the Red Sox aren’t good. Their starting pitching makes the Yankees look like mid-90s Braves, their lineup has three hitters and their bullpen is far from reliable. On Saturday and Sunday, we saw the Red Sox I feel are the real Red Sox, a team that lost both games to the Makeshift Yankees and scored only two runs in 15 innings.

6. It turns out Gerrit Cole can pitch to Gary Sanchez. Amazing. Not only that but Cole was infinitely better with Sanchez catching him against the Red Sox (6 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 11 K) than he was with Kyle Higashioka catching him a few Sundays ago in Boston (LINE).

Cole needing to have his security blanket in Higashioka always catch him (and yes, it’s Cole’s decision, not Boone’s), has made me think less of him since someone of his stature and ability and reputation shouldn’t need a personal catcher. It was good to finally see the best pitcher on the team throwing to the best catcher on the team, and it working out yet again. It worked out because it doesn’t matter who catches Cole. No catcher has that much of an impact (if any at all) on a pitcher’s ability, and certainly not one of Cole’s level.

7. The rain-shortened game on Saturday may have saved the Yankees’ season. It was a miracle they scored three runs in the game, and had the game continued, Cole would have come out following a delay (because of the delay and because he was at 96 pitches), and the Yankees’ bullpen would have had to get nine outs to hold a two-run lead with one viable option (Chad Green). If the rest of that game gets played, there’s a good chance the Yankees lose, fall to 0-8 against the Red Sox, lose yet another series and suffered their third straight loss since the debacle in Houston on July 11. If the Yankees go on to reach the postseason or doing anything special this season, we can look back at the six-inning win over the Red Sox that made it possible.

8. Boone mismanaging the sixth inning on Sunday night was inevitable. Two times through the order, Taillon had shut out the Red Sox, and even though the 2-3-4 hitters were due up in the sixth and even though the numbers against Taillon a third time through the order look like Mickey Mantle’s 1956 season, Boone was fooled by what he had seen to that point in the game, completely disregarding the numbers and everything Taillon has done in a Yankees uniform.

Taillon was able to strike out Alex Verdugo, the most inferior of the heart of the Red Sox’ order, but J.D. Martinez singled on an 0-2 pitch and then on the seventh pitch of his at-bat, Xander Bogaerts doubled to right field. Suddenly, the Red Sox had second and third and no outs and the tying run at the plate in Rafael Devers, who owns the Yankees. While all of this unfolded, Green was warmed up and ready to enter game.

Boone decided to go to Green for Devers, bringing him into a rather unpleasant situation, rather than just giving him a clean inning. Thankfully, he struck out Devers and got Hunter Renfroe to ground out to end the inning.

The majority of Boone’s nonsensical bullpen management has been hidden since 2018 because he has been able to call on Green or Zack Britton or Aroldis Chapman or Dellin Betances or Adam Ottavino or Tommy Kahnle. The Red Sox didn’t score in the sixth inning on Sunday, but that doesn’t mean Boone made the right call. Far from it.

9. Giancarlo Stanton’s presence on the Yankees is a problem. Not only because of his immovable contract, but because he isn’t good and he can only be the designated hitter, which means when someone needs a “half-day off” they have to come completely out of the lineup. Over teh weekend, Boone said Stanton playing the outfield is “on the horizon” as they continue to stretch him out to play nine innings of a baseball game in the outfield, in which he may not actually have to do anything. You would think Stanton is training to run a marathon.

Stanton sucks. It’s painful watching his at-bats and him running into a middle-middle fastball and hitting it 500 feet every other week isn’t nearly enough. I don’t know how this is going to go on for the next six years.

Stanton was 0-for-12 with five strikeouts against the Red Sox over the weekend, and is now 3-for-30 (all singles) with 15 strikeouts against them this season.

In 18 games from April 1 to April 25, Stanton hit .186/.250/.414. Then in eight games from April 26 to May 5, he hit .571/.595/.943. In the 46 games he has played since May 6, he has hit .220/.342/.719. On the season, he’s hitting .258/.350/.462. Those numbers aren’t good and are the only somewhat respectable because of those eight games at the end of April and beginning of May. Stanton has been good for an eight-game stretch in 92 games. Six more years of this.

10. The Yankees won the series against the Red Sox and have now won three straight series, going 6-3 over their last nine games. It’s a start, but it can’t end. They now need to do to the Phillies what the Phillies did to them in Philadelphia in two games and then go to Boston and beat the Red Sox again. The Yankees need to win four of the six games they play this week. There’s no alternative. In order to keep their postseason aspirations alive, they can’t do any worse than that, and they will have to do it with the most Makeshift Yankees lineup since mid-2013.

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