The Yankees won back-to-back games and a series for just the second time since mid-June. After beating the Red Sox 11-8 on Saturday and 8-2 on Sunday, the Yankees have stabilized their collapse for the time being.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. With two outs, trailing by one run and Trent Grisham in an 0-2 count against Kenley Jansen on Saturday night, it was hard to like the Yankees’ chances of tying the game, even with the tying run on second base. Down to their last strike, the Yankees were on the verge of losing a fourth straight game and watching what was a 13-game lead in loss column for a playoff spot on June 14 fall to just one game. But Grisham battled back, fouling off a pitch and taking back-to-back cutters that nearly grazed the bottom of the zone before hitting a game-tying double off the Green Monster. The Yankees went on to win the game 11-8 in 10 innings for their best and most important win of the season.

2. Eight innings before Grisham improbably tied the game, the Yankees had staked Marcus Stroman to a three-run, first inning-lead. Alex Verdugo singled (it should have been a double, but he didn’t run out of the box thinking he hit a home run) and Juan Soto and Aaron Judge followed with back-to-back home runs. Five batters into the bottom of the first, Stroman had erased the early 3-0 lead. He ended up putting together his worst start of the season (3.1 IP, 9 H, 5 R, 3 ER, 1 BB, 0 K, 1 HR), allowing 10 baserunners in just 3 1/3 innings and not getting a single swing-and-miss on any of his 60 pitches.

Stroman has given the Yankees one quality start (June 22 against the Braves) in his last nine starts going back to May 31. In that time he has pitched to a 5.28 ERA with opponents hitting .291/.373/.514 off him.

3. A few hours before Stroman laid an egg at Fenway Park, the Yankees traded for Jazz Chisholm. The slightly-above-league-average career hitter (102 OPS+) wasn’t going to come and single-handedly save the Yankees’ sinking ship, but he was going to make them better, faster and more versatile, something that the old, slow, station-to-station team desperately needs. The shortstop-turned-second baseman-turned center fielder is still only 26 and is under contract through 2026.

The trade for Chisholm was both a trade for now as well as 2025 and 2026. Gleyber Torres is a free agent after this season as is Alex Verdugo, and DJ LeMahieu is now unplayable. Chisholm makes the 2024 Yankees better and gives the roster some stability going into next season and the one after.

Since Torres’ benching at the beginning of July and with the trade deadline approaching, the impending free agent having a miserable season is hitting .321/.410/.509 in his last 14 games and 62 plate appearances. It’s almost as if having consequences for poor play and needing to be accountable for your performance work as motivational tools.

The same goes for Verdugo. With talks he would go to the bench for Chisholm or Jasson Dominguez or be traded, Verdugo went 7-for-15 with five runs and three doubles over the weekend. Maybe Verdugo is finally going to get back being the league-average hitter he has been for his career, or maybe he’s just a great Fenway Park hitter. (Likely the latter.)

“Get a couple of guys at the trade deadline that are going to freshen it up in here,” Verdugo said, “and we’re excited man.”

I hate to break it to Verdugo, but there’s a very good chance he will be traded for one of the “freshen”-it-up guys. Because even with the recent upticks in performance from Torres or Verdugo, I do think one or both of them should be traded before Tuesday’s deadline. The Yankees are going to need to replace names on the major-league roster to create roster space for the return of Giancarlo Stanton, eventual call-up of Dominguez and potential returns for Anthony Rizzo and Jon Berti.

4. Brian Cashman has opened admittedly to trying to trade Torres at past deadlines and that was before Torres had 55 games left in his contract. However, the Yankees will likely buy into Torres’ recent rebound, thinking he will finish the season strong and play well in the postseason, when in all likelihood, the moment the deadline passes he will revert back to being an absolute nothing at the plate and a disaster on the field and on the bases. (Just two weeks ago, Cashman sat in the visitors’ dugout at Tropicana Field and said Torres was the Yankees’ second-best hitter last season and they are “waiting for him” to be that player again.) On Sunday night, it was Torres’ two-run single in the first inning that extended the Yankees’ early lead from 1-0 to 3-0, but of course he had to get thrown out trying to advance to second to end the inning. He always has to negate a positive in some way.

I have long said Torres is a losing player, and he is. On Sunday, Aaron Boone said he would like both Torres and Chisholm to take balls at third base to get acclimated with the position since the Yankees don’t have an everyday third baseman.

Here is how the newly-acquired Chisholm responded:

“I went out there and played center field for the first time last year. It was pretty difficult at first, but I feel like I can go and play anywhere and help my team win. Especially a winning team, if they’re asking me to go somewhere and help them win, I’m definitely going to do it.”

Here is how Torres responded:

“I don’t like it. I’m a second baseman. I play second.”

The Yankees reportedly had concerns about Chisholm’s personality before trading for him, and yet, they continue to roster and play Torres, who they apparently have no personality issues with. Again, Torres is a losing player.

5. Torres came up as a shortstop. He started playing third base in 2017 to set himself up for an eventual call-up because Chase Headley was so bad, but then Torres blew out his arm at home plate and missed the rest of the season. He made his major-league debut as a second baseman in 2018, and played the position through 2019. Then in 2020 he was moved to shortstop through mid-September 2021 until the Yankees finally gave up on him there and moved him back to second. He only plays second because he couldn’t handle short, and he’s barely capable of playing second. I would like for nothing more than for him to no longer be a Yankee by 6 p.m. on Tuesday.

6. The Yankees haven’t lost since trading for Chisholm, sitting at a perfect 2-0. To make room for Chisholm on the roster, the Yankees designated J.D. Davis for assignment. To continue with the tradition of Yankees who provided little-to-no value getting released or designated for assignment, here is Old Timers’ Day 2034:

Michael Kay: “This next Yankee was only in pinstripes for a short time. After being released by the Giants in March 2024, the last-place A’s gave up on him in June of that year, but the Yankees were waiting with open arms. He appeared in seven games as a Yankee, at times serving as the cleanup hitter and protection for Aaron Judge. He went 2-for-19 in those seven games with nine strikeouts, grounded into two double plays and posted a .385 OPS. Please welcome back, J.D. Davis!” (Stadium organ plays.)

Five days ago, Boone was asked about using Davis as protection for Judge and benching Ben Rice. Boone said, “This is a guy that recently has had a good amount of success.” Boone also gave this nonsensical, ridiculous answer when asked about playing Davis over Rice for a second straight day:

“Yeah, I mean, also want to get where you’re trying to leverage situations. I think you look at Manaea too, pretty small sample like you look at his career, it’s pretty stark the other way. So you kind of peel the onion back a little bit and is that what he’s going to be moving forward? We’re not trying to predict what happened yesterday. We’re trying to what happened moving forward, and the reality is we brought J.D. Davis, especially when Rizz went down, to be this kind of, and this is a guy that recently has had a good amount of success. So, but also trying to get young players in positions to where they can be successful as well. And to have, you know, leverage situations as the game unfolds too.”

On Tuesday and Wednesday, Boone and the Yankees thought Davis was worthy of hitting cleanup and being a starter. By Saturday afternoon, he was no longer worthy of being on the team. It makes complete sense.

7. After taking a month off from earning his $800,000-per-start paychecks, Carlos Rodon shut down the Rays last Monday (7 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 10 K, 1 HR) and then held down the Red Sox on Sunday (6.1 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, 2 HR). Rodon is still giving up way too many home runs, having give up at least one in each of his last seven starts and 12 overall in that time, but it’s nice to see him stop his season ERA from climbing with each consecutive start.

8. Is it too early to start a Jake Cousins for Closer petition? Cousins is the only Yankees reliever capable of consistently getting strikeouts and given Clay Holmes’ performance since mid-May, it’s completely acceptable to want someone else in that role. I don’t think the Yankees should have a set closer, but since they are going to, it should be someone other than Holmes, even if he did his job on Saturday night.

9. Judge and Soto continue to do their jobs (a combined 8-for-23 with eight runs, a double, three home runs, nine RBIs and nine walks over the weekend), as does Austin Wells. Wells is hitting .269/.354/.487 since April 27. An .841 OPS with great defense for a catcher for three months? Take your time healing, Jose Trevino. Take all the time you need.

10. The mood as a Yankees fan today is much different than it would have been had Grisham not battled back to save the game on Saturday night against Jansen. Two straight wins and just the second series in in more than six weeks has me feeling like the Yankees are on a 12-game run. It’s a dangerous feeling because the roster still needs vast upgrades by Tuesday at 6 p.m. and because three games with the Phillies over the next three days await. Momentarily stopping the free fall that began on June 14 is enjoyable, but stopping it completely is what’s needed.

The Yankees played a game, which means the Yankees’ season loss total increased by one.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. On Friday afternoon, I found myself wondering if the Yankees were to lose all six games against the Red Sox and Phillies over the next six days, would Aaron Boone still be the manager next Friday? The Yankees’ season has free fallen to the point where losing six straight to those two teams is a realistic result. Six straight losses would mean an eight-game losing streak, and it would mean the Yankees no longer hold a playoff spot.

2. The opposing starters for those six games would be Brayan Bello, Kutter Crawford, Tanner Houck, Aaron Nola, Zack Wheeler and Christopher Sanchez. The worst of the six starters the Yankees would face would be Bello, who is having a down year after a breakout season a year ago. If the Yankees couldn’t win the series opener at Fenway Park against Bello, the six-game road trip could unravel into an unfixable disaster.

3. The Yankees didn’t win that game. They lost 9-7 despite holding a three-run lead with eight outs to go. Their two “most trusted” relievers in Luke Weaver and Clay Holmes imploded and allowed five runs between the seventh and eighth inning and the Yankees lost another game and lost another game to the Red Sox.

4. The loss dropped the Yankees to 2-5 against the Red Sox this season. It was their third straight loss overall. It was their fifth loss in seven games since the All-Star break. It was their 13th loss in 19 games in July. It was their 24th loss in 35 games since June 13. On June 14, the Yankees held a 13-game lead in the loss column for a playoff spot. After Friday’s loss, it’s down to two games.

5. Nestor Cortes was awful again. He couldn’t make it through five innings (4.2 IP, 9 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 2 BB, 5 K) for the third straight start and fourth time in his last five starts. He put 12 runners on base in 4 2/3 innings, and yet, he didn’t think he pitched poorly, saying, “I threw a lot of good pitches.” He then went on to blame “soft contact” for the loss. He sounded a lot like Luis Severino talking about exit velocity after Alex Bregman’s home run in Game 2 of the 2022 ALCS. Why aren’t any of the Yankees accountable for their performances? Why are they always making excuses based on soft contact, exit velocity, catch probability and domed stadiums having the roof open? Maybe it has something to do with the way they hear their manager speak?

6. Two starts ago, Cortes put 10 baserunners on in 4 1/3 innings. Boone said, “He pitched well.”

Last start, Cortes put 10 baserunners on in 4 1/3 innings again, and Boone said, “I thought the profile of the stuff was there.”

On Friday, Cortes put 11 baserunners on in 4 2/3 innings, and Boone again said, “I thought he threw the ball well.” Cortes thought he pitched well. Boone thought he pitched well. I guess a 7.71 ERA and 2.355 WHIP is pitching well. Who am I to argue?

During the All-Star break, Cortes tweeted the following:

“Everyone talks down about the yanks but they wanna be us. It’s a privilege to wear pinstripes. Every year we are in contention. I’m blessed to be able to compete for a playoff spot and always be contenders at the end.“

I hoped and prayed a Red Sox fan had hacked his account and posted that message, but no, it was Cortes himself. And when you hear him speak after each miserable start it’s obvious he’s as delusional as anyone in the Yankees clubhouse, including his manager. Since that tweet, here is Cortes’ line: 9 IP, 17 H, 10 R, 10 ER, 4 BB, 6 K, 3 HR, 1 HBP, 10.00 ERA, 2.333 WHIP. Yes, everyone wants to be the Yankees.

7. Weaver is slowly turning back into the Luke Weaver the Royals waived, the Mariners let go, the Reds released and the Mariners let go again. The Luke Weaver who has a 4.93 career ERA.

After pitching to a 0.00 ERA from Opening Day through May 19 thanks to impeccable control (four walks in 20 innings), good fortune (line drives turning into double plays) and exceptional defense behind him, Holmes has been atrocious since. Since May 20, he has put 35 baserunners on in 20 2/3 innings and has pitched to a 5.66 ERA and 1.645 WHIP. Opposing batters are hitting .315/.361/.461 against him.

8. “It’s hard obviously, but I’m not going to keep talking about how hard it is and tough,” Boone said, apparently unwilling to discuss his team’s collapse.” “We’ve gotta close out games, and I’m absolutely confident we will.”

“This is when you find out a lot about your team, a lot about your individual players when you go through it,” Boone said, “who’s tough enough to withstand it.”

Well, this is the third straight season the Yankees have endured a mid-June-on collapse, and considering the roster is virtually the same, we know no one who was on the team the last two years is tough enough to withstand it.

9. “We’re in compete mode,” Boone said, “and I thought we competed really well tonight.”

I need to know what “compete mode” is. And if the Yankees are in “compete mode” now, what mode were they in prior to being in this mode? Were games before Friday’s not important? Did they not count the same? What was different about Friday than Wednesday or last week or last month that the Yankees entered “compete mode” on Friday?

If the Yankees “competed really well” and still allowed nine runs and lost by two runs then I think it’s time to pack up the bats and balls for the year. If “competing really well” is only good enough to get the Yankees their latest late-game collapse and latest season-crushing loss then how can anyone possibly think the season is going to turn around?

10. Boone refrained from saying, “It’s right in front of us,” after his team’s latest loss. He used the phrase on Wednesday, had Thursday off and then didn’t use it on Friday, so if the Yankees lose on Saturday, get ready to hear it again.

Instead, Boone went with a new one: “There’s definitely an end in sight and we’re gonna get there.”

Yes, there is. It’s looking like the end for the 2024 Yankees will be Game 162 of the regular season with no postseason baseball for a second straight year. That’s what in front of the Yankees right now if they keep playing the way they have since mid-June.

The Yankees were embarrassed by the Mets in a 12-3 loss and finished this season’s Subway Series without a win. They have lost four of six since the All-Star break and 23 of 34 dating back to June 13.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. Another game, another loss. At this point I expect the Yankees to lose every game the way a Rockies fan expects their team to lose every game. (Ironically, the worst team in the National League scored 20 runs against the Red Sox on Wednesday and won a series against them, something the Yankees have been unable to do.) The Yankees are 11-23 over their last 34 games, a .324 winning percentage over 21 percent of the season. In their last 40 games, they have a slightly better .375 winning percentage over a period of time equal to 25 percent of the season. Whether you want to look at it from a standpoint of one-fifth of the season or a quarter of the season, the Yankees have been a bad team for a long time.

2. That’s because collectively, the team is a group of losers led by the biggest loser of all in their manager. Outside of Juan Soto, of course. The generational superstar continues to produce in all situations and boasts a .306/.414/.571 slash line in late-and-close situations. (For comparison, Aaron Judge is batting .216/.322/.431 in late-and-close situations). Soto is a proven winner, having helped lead the Nationals to a World Series win over the Astros in 2019, a series in which he hit .333/.438/.741 with three home runs. (The Yankees as a team hit three home runs against the Astros in the 2022 ALCS.) He’s the only Yankee excused from criticism for this season.

3. On Wednesday night, having lost 22 of 33 since June 13, having lost three of five since the All-Star break and having lost every game to the Mets this season, you would think the Yankees, behind their so-called ace, would play, pitch and manage with urgency. They didn’t.

A day after Boone posted the worst lineup imaginable because of a left-handed opposing starter, he abandoned that lineup despite facing another left-hander. If the lineup he posted on Tuesday was what he thought was the best possible lineup to beat a lefty, why didn’t he go back to that same lineup on Wednesday?

4. Jahmai Jones was on the bench, J.D. Davis was oddly bumped down from cleanup to seventh, and Austin Wells and Oswaldo Cabrera were back in. Boone made sure to keep Ben Rice out though. He can start against Chris Sale or take the last plate appearance of a game against Jake Diekman, but he can’t face Jose Quintana or Sean Manaea.

5. Boone decided to use Davis as his designated hitter for this one. Most teams use a slugger in that role, the Yankees use Jones and Davis. Why did Boone choose Davis over Rice? Here is his answer:

“Yeah, I mean, also want to get where you’re trying to leverage situations. I think you look at Manaea too, pretty small sample like you look at his career, it’s pretty stark the other way. So you kind of peel the onion back a little bit and is that what he’s going to be moving forward? We’re not trying to predict what happened yesterday. We’re trying to what happened moving forward, and the reality is we brought J.D. Davis, especially when Rizz went down, to be this kind of, and this is a guy that recently has had a good amount of success. So, but also trying to get young players in positions to where they can be successful as well. And to have, you know, leverage situations as the game unfolds too.”

You may think I made a few typos or forgot to include some words in there. Nope. That’s exactly how Boone answered the question of “What made Davis the call over Rice today?” The person with that thought process is in charge of the culture, clubhouse, lineup card and in-game decisions for the New York Yankees.

6. Gerrit Cole melted down in a big game on a big stage in spectacular fashion, which is what he does best. Cole started two of the four Subway Series games this season, lost both and allowed seven home runs. On Wednesday, he gave up three of those home runs and six earned runs in total, yet his manager had the balls to say, “I thought stuff-wise and fastball profile [were] good.”

7. The offense took another night off. It was the eighth time in July (18 games) the Yankees scored three runs or fewer. When the Yankees score four runs this season they are 53-13, an .803 winning percentage. Four runs. That’s all. Four measly runs and they have an 80 percent chance to win. And yet, in more than one-third of their games to date they weren’t able to do that.

8. Soto went 2-for-3 with a double, home run and walk and Gleyber Torres hit a home run and produced just his second multi-hit game of July. The rest of the offense went 2-for-25.

9. The two AVs — the Golden Boy Anthony Volpe and the unbenchable Alex Verdugo — combined to go 0-for-9 with four strikeouts. I keep hearing about how good Volpe has been since the All-Star break as if there isn’t 1,060 plate appearances worth of data of his suggesting a few good games isn’t him suddenly figuring out. And it was just last week Boone said Verdugo would “go on a heater” after the All-Star break. He’s 2-for-25 since the break.

10. Boone is a dreamer. A dreamer, a believer, a bullshitter and a delusional, happy-go-lucky, comfortable-with-losing moron all rolled into one. As the losses mount, the more agitated he gets that he has to answer questions about the losses. It’s as if he should only have to meet with the media when the team wins.

Following Wednesday’s humiliating 12-3 loss, Boone was as annoyed, frustrated and angry as he’s ever been as Yankees manager. He followed the lead of his general manager’s expletive-filled tirade over the winter by dropping expletives of his own, using “shit” twice in different tenses. Boone refrained from dropping an F-bomb, but did manage to throw in “frickin” two times in his response to a question about the team’s 11-23 collapse.

“We’ve got to play better. OK?”

Yes, yes you do.

“We have it right in front of us.”

Ah, the old “right in front of us.” Boone dropped his favorite phrase for the first time in 2024 on July 7. He used it for the first time last season on July 15, and in 2022, he used it on August 20. Once Boone resorts to telling everyone the season is still in their control, the season never recovers.

“We’re a really good team that has played shitty of late.”

A really good team? I wonder where he got that idea from? Maybe from his boss, the team’s general manager who told the media in the offseason the Yankees “are pretty fucking good” despite posting an 82-80 record, missing the postseason and being the worst Yankees team in more than three decades. Really good teams don’t go 11-23 during any part of the season.

“Of late” means this has only been a recent thing. The Yankees’ collapse dates back to June 13. That’s 21 percent of the season.

“We need to be better.”

We know. You keep saying that. Your captain keeps saying that. Your players keep saying that. Your pitchers keep saying that. And yet, no one is playing better.

“I’m not going to define stretch, this or that.”

I will define it. The Yankees have been a bad team since mid-June. Whether you want to go back 34 games or 40 games, they haven’t been good for at least one-fifth of the season.

“We gotta go win, right?”

That is the objective of the sport.

“And we’re right there. We’re watching other teams struggle around us.”

And there it is! The excuse! The Yankees think because the Orioles haven’t been playing well and because they are only three games behind them in the loss column that it excuses their own play since mid-June.

“We know we’ve got to be better. OK?”

Please stop saying this.

“We’re pissed off in there.”

Yes, I’m sure you’re really pissed. You told us the 2022 and 2023 teams were pissed too. Where did that lead to? In the first instance it led to you using “highlights” from the 2024 ALCS as motivation for your team in its own ALCS, and in the second instance, it led to you managing a team to a playoff-less season, despite 40 percent of the league making the playoffs.

“We got a lot of pride in there.”

That’s nice.

“We have a lot of expectations in there.”

No you don’t. Listen to yourself. Listen to any of your players talk after losses. All you and they talk about is tomorrow and the next game until there aren’t any tomorrows or games left. There’s no urgency and there certainly aren’t any expectations.

“So stretch, slump, recent. I don’t give a shit.”

Clearly, you don’t give a shit, considering you used a guy with a career 48 OPS+ as your designated hitter and leadoff hitter on Tuesday, and used a player released by both the Giants and A’s this season (who is 1-for-16 with eight strikeouts as a Yankee) as your cleanup hitter on Tuesday and then played him again on Wednesday.

“It’s, we’ve got to play better the rest of the way.“

For the last six weeks you have been saying you need to play better and you have only played worse.

“And it’s right there. I’ve said it’s right in front of us. It is.”

Yes, a third straight season collapse is right there.

“It’s right in front of us. Right?”

Yes, you just said that.

“For as bad as it’s been, we’re also in a great position.”

A great position? On June 14, you had a 13-game lead in the loss column on a postseason spot. It’s down to three games.

“And we’ve got to go play baseball the way we’re capable of playing.“

I think you’re playing baseball the way you’re capable of playing.

The Yankees lost another game and lost another game to the Mets. But they didn’t really have a chance in the 3-2 loss thanks to their manager.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. “You can’t predict baseball,” John Sterling famously said on the radio for decades. Unfortunately, John, sometimes you can.

The Yankees lost to the Mets four hours before the game started on Tuesday when they posted their lineup for Game 103 of the season at 3:05 p.m.

Jahmai Jones, DH
Juan Soto, RF
Aaron Judge, CF
J.D. Davis, 1B
Anthony Volpe, SS
Gleyber Torres, 2B
Alex Verdugo, LF
Carlos Narvaez, C
DJ LeMahieu, 3B

There were some dark lineups during the 2013 season when Eduardo Nunez, Ben Francisco, Kevin Youkilis, Travis Hefner, Lyle Overbay, Vernon Wells, Jayson Nix, Chris Stewart, Reid Brignac, Brendan Ryan, Brent Lillibridge and David Adams were Yankees, but Tuesday’s lineup would go toe-to-toe with any of those.

Boone thought loading up with seven right-handed hitters against the left-handed Jose Quintana would throw off the 35-year-old veteran, completely disregarding that every right-handed Yankees hitter other than Judge sucks.

And yes, this was Boone’s lineup. After the 2020 ALDS loss to the Rays, when asked if he’s a puppet for the front office, Boone said, “Ultimately, I’m writing out the lineup and I’m making these decisions.” Prior to the 2022 season, on CC Sabathia’s podcast, Boone said, “No one’s ever made a lineup for me. I make the lineup.” Any Yankees fan who has watched Boone mismanage and ruin countless games in his six-plus years as Yankees manager knows this was his lineup. There’s no Ivy League graduate, analytics guru or data scientist who would ever come up with, support or defend a lineup like Tuesday’s. 

2. After going 4-for-8 on Sunday and Monday, Oswaldo Cabrera was on the bench. The Yankees’ third-best hitter in Austin Wells (.844 OPS over the last two months) was also on the bench. Trent Grisham and his Gold Glove defense and ability to run into one was next to Cabrera and Wells on the bench (earlier this season Boone justified using Grisham against a lefty because he said Grisham is a reverse splits guy). Ben Rice, who was allowed to start against Chris Sale, would have apparently been overmatched by Quintana, so he too was on the bench.

A day after the Yankees plated their most runs (nine) in more than half a month, Boone couldn’t just let things stay as they were. If used, I didn’t expect the lineup from Monday to put up nine runs again since Monday’s game was likely just the type of random outburst the 2024 Yankees provide and nothing more, but couldn’t we at least find out?

3. Boone penciled in Jones as his leadoff hitter. The 26-year-old with a career .535 OPS and 48 OPS+ who entered the game with just 44 plate appearances in 102 games this season was going to set the table for Soto and Judge. He hit a weak ground ball to third in his first at-bat, struck out on four pitches in his second and struck out again in his third. When his spot came up a fourth time, Boone had seen enough and removed him for a pinch hitter.

4. Protecting Judge, Boone decided the best man for the job would be Davis. Davis was released by the Giants in spring training. He then signed with the A’s and was released by them on June 23 after hitting .236/.304/.366. The A’s are on pace to lose right around 100 games again. Do you know how bad you have to suck to get released by them? Davis entered the game 1-for-13 with six strikeouts as a Yankee and hadn’t started a game since July 3. He struck out in his first at-bat, hit into an inning-ending double play in his second and struck out in his third. Guess what happened in his fourth trip to the plate? Boone removed him for a pinch hitter.

5. Carlos Narvaez got his first major-league start behind the plate. After singling in his first major-league at-bat over the weekend, he went 0-for-2 with two strikeouts. He was also pinch-hit for.

All three of Jones, Davis and Narvaez were removed early for pinch hitters. The trio went a combined 0-for-8 with six strikeouts and one double play.

6. “We’ll get the middle of the order settled here in the comings days,” Boone said. “It changes the equation a little bit.”

Certainly having Giancarlo Stanton bat behind Judge is a better option than Davis, but Stanton isn’t going to come save the season. The Yankees aren’t getting 2018 Stanton. And while Stanton has been good this season, it’s already been more than a month since he last played, so who knows how he will be for the remainder of the season, and if he will even be healthy for the rest of the year.

7. Soto and Judge were held down, and when that happens the Yankees don’t have a chance when the players who should be playing are playing, let alone when Boone gives away a game with an early-March, spring training lineup. Soto went 0-for-4 with a walk and the Mets walked Judge four times. In the one plate appearance in which they pitched to Judge he didn’t do anything.

That one plate appearance came in the ninth inning. Soto walked with one out against the wild lefty Jake Diekman and with Soto on first, the Mets couldn’t walk Judge and put Soto into scoring position as the tying run. Diekman’s first pitch to Judge was a 96-mph fastball in the zone and Judge took it, likely surprised that the Mets were pitching to him and that Diekman was able to throw a first-pitch strike after walking Soto on four pitches. Judge took a changeup for a ball, fouled off a changeup, took a fastball for a ball, and then at 2-2, took a second 96-mph fastball for strike 3 on the inner half.

Judge is a .216/.322/.431 in late-and-close situations this season (plate appearances in the seventh inning or later with the Yankees tied, ahead by one or with the tying run at least on deck). He’s a .325/.447/.662 hitter when the Yankees lead by more than four runs.

8. Was Boone surprised the Mets pitched around Judge in his first four plate appearances with Davis as his protection?

“Different teams, different approaches,” Boone said in an annoyed manner.

Yes, different teams, different approaches, indeed. While the Mets are willing to put Judge on first base and make someone else beat them, the Yankees are more than happy to continue to pitch to Rafael Devers and let him single-handedly beat them. In all four of Judge’s walks, he never reached second base.

9. The problems the Yankees went in to the All-Star break with thinking they would be magically resolved after a four-day layoff are still present. After splitting a home series against the willing-to-sell Rays, the Yankees remain winless against the Mets (0-3) in the 2024 Subway Series. The Orioles and Royals lost, but the Red Sox won, so the Yankees’ loss-column lead on a postseason spot is three games. It was 13 games on June 14.

10. After Wednesday’s season series finale against the Mets, the Yankees have Thursday off before heading out on the road for six games against the Red Sox and Phillies. The Yankees are 11-22 since June 13, and for as bad as things have been since then, they could get a lot worse if the offense doesn’t show up over the next seven games, or if the manager doesn’t allow it to.

The Yankees failed to win a four-game home series against a .500 Rays team looking to sell.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. On Friday, I wrote:

For better or worse, Yankees baseball is back. The break is over. The vacation is often. The physical, mental and emotional escape is over. When Gerrit Cole throws the first pitch of Friday night’s game against the Rays, the stretch run will be under way. The last 64 games with Juan Soto under contract as a Yankee will be under way. The glaring issues and problems from the first “half” and from the last four seasons will still be there. We’ll find out is this group handles them differently.

Well, we found out this group doesn’t handle them differently, because it’s the same group. The Yankees faced a .500 Rays team for four games at home after four days off and continued to play the uninspiring baseball they began to play in mid-June.

After winning the series opener 6-1 on Friday behind Gerrit Cole’s best start of the season (6 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 8 K, 1 HR), the Yankees fell right back into being the team that crawled to the All-Star break.

Over the All-Star break, the delusional Nestor Cortes tweeted this:

“Everyone talks down about the yanks but they wanna be us. It’s a privilege to wear pinstripes. Every year we are in contention. I’m blessed to be able to compete for a playoff spot and always be contenders at the end.“

Then in his first start since that tone-deaf tweet, Cortes turned in his worst start of the season: 4.1 IP, 8 H, 6 R, 6 ER, 2 BB, 1 K, 3 HR. A bottom 5 team in runs scored and home runs, the Rays had no problem teeing off on Cortes 

“When you walk … the bottom of the lineup, you give it the chance to turn over, “Cortes said. “That’s not ideal. I just have to be better.”

The Rays’ 9-hitter Alex Jackson entered the game 7-for-85 on the season. He walked and hit a three-run home run off Cortes. 

“It’s tough to pitch in the big leagues when you don’t have your good stuff” Corted said. Early on, it was pretty good and I lost a little bit … and I was behind in the count a lot.’

Aaron Boone knew he couldn’t tell the media Cortes had “good stuff” and not sound like a complete asshole considering Cortes himself said he didn’t have good stuff. So Boone went to his thesaurus for “good stuff” with his evaluation of Cortes.

“I thought the profile of the stuff was there,” Boone said.

In Cortes’ previous start, he put 10 runners on in 4 1/3 innings in Tampa and Boone said he thought Cortes “pitched well” that day. On Saturday, Cortes had the same outing (10 baserunners in 4 1/3 innings), but this time Boone was only willing to say “the profile of the stuff was there.” That’s 20 baserunners, 11 earned runs and four home runs for Cortes in his last two starts, both against the anemic Rays offense.

Cortes didn’t give the offense a chance, but they weren’t going to do anything anyway. Ben Rice led off the game with a double and was stranded and the Yankees didn’t pick up another hit until the eighth inning. Their lone run came on a meaningless RBI groundout down nine in the ninth. Taj Bradley stifled them, pitching seven one-hit, scoreless innings.

2. On Sunday, Boone sat DJ LeMahieu in favor of Oswaldo Cabrera. When you make $15 million per year and are getting benched for the .638 OPS utility man, you know things are bad, and things are bad for LeMahieu.

“It hasn’t given me much hope the last month or so,” LeMahieu said. “As long as I’ve played this game, whatever challenges have presented itself, I’ve always come out of it one way or another.”

I love LeMahieu. I was all for re-signing him after 2020 for what he did in 2019 and 2020. He deserved to be re-signed. After posting a .922 OPS in his first two seasons with the Yankees, he has a .702 since. He suffered season-ending injuries in 2021 and 2022, played through injuries last year and missed a large portion of this season because of injuries. It fell apart quickly for LeMahieu after 2022 and while there have been moments over the last three-plus years where he looks like himself, they are only moments, nothing consistent or frequent. On a team full of unplayable names, he is the most unplayable of them all. But because of all of those other unplayable names and because he’s owed about $41 million through 2026, he’s going to keep getting opportunities to prove his career isn’t over.

While last Sunday’s loss in Baltimore was the worst loss of the season, and Saturday’s loss was disappointing, Sunday’s loss was disturbing.

Marcus Stroman allowed a leadoff home run to begin the game as the Rays clubbed their fifth home run of the series with the Yankees still yet to hit one.

Trailing 1-0 in the bottom of the first, the Yankees loaded the bases with one out for Gleyber Torres and Alex Verdugo. Torres swung on the first pitch he saw with the swing of someone behind 0-2 in the count and just trying to put the ball in play and hit a shallow fly ball that wasn’t deep enough to score a a run. Alex Verdugo followed with a lineout to first. Three runners left on.

In the second, still trailing 1-0, the Yankees loaded the bases again with one out, but this time Soto was due up. Rice walked on four pitches to bring Soto up and Shane Baz got behind Soto 3-0. Seven straight balls. Knowing Soto’s eye I was confident the Yankees would at least tie the game in his plate appearance and possibly break it wide open. Soto got a fastball away and rather than go with it to the opposite field like he loves to do or take the borderline pitch and continue his plate appearance, he pulled it to second base for an inning-ending, 4-6-3 double play. The Yankees had gone from bases loaded with one out and Soto and Aaron Judge due up to leaving three more runners on.

In the third, Judge walked to lead off the inning and never moved. Seven runners left on.

In the fourth, with two outs, Stroman hung a slider on 1-2 slider to Randy Arozarena and he hit his third home run of the series as the Rays increased their series home run lead to 6-0. Torres booted a ground ball that would have ended the inning, and a stolen base and a line-drive single on an 0-2 hanging slider later and the Rays had a 3-0 lead.

In the bottom of the fourth, the Yankees drew two walks to begin the inning. Neither scored. Nine runners left on.

In the seventh, Jake Cousins got tagged for a two-run home run by Jose Siri who stared at it for about 15 seconds and then essentially walked around the bases at an even slower pace than Arozarena “trotted” on any of his three home runs in the series.

The Yankees finally got on the board in the seventh when Judge hit his 35th home run a mile into the left-field bleachers. In response to Arozarena and Siri’s long trips around the bases, Judge did the same. The problem is the Yankees were still losing after Judge’s home run in what was the latest failed attempt at trash talking from the captain, a trait that started six Octobers ago when he unfortunately played “New York, New York” on a boombox while leaving Fenway Park after Game 2 of the 2018 ALDS. The Yankees would leave their 10th runner of the day on when Torres hit into an inning-ending double play.

In the ninth, Jose Caballero hit the Rays’ seventh home run of the series to extend their lead to 6-3. The Yankees scored a run on a Soto double in the bottom of the ninth, but that was all they would get as they would leave an 11th runner on in the 6-4 loss.

To summarize: The Yankees failed to score a run despite loading the bases with one out in both the first and second inning. The seven hitters not named Soto and Judge went 4-for-25 with seven strikeouts. Stroman got ahead of Richie Palacios 1-2 before eventually giving up a home run to him, gave up a home run to Arozarena on a 1-2 pitch and allowed an RBI single to Caballero in an 0-2 count. The combination of Jake Cousins and Luke Weaver gave up three earned runs and only recorded seven outs. The Yankees left 11 runners on base.

3. One day closer to Torres no longer being a Yankee is what I told myself after he halfheartedly swung at the first pitch he saw with the bases loaded in the first inning. One day closer. Torres committed an error that led to the Rays’ third run, hit into an inning-ending double play representing the tying run in the eighth and finished the day 0-for-4 with a strikeout. It was the latest spectacular performance in a season full of them for Torres.

4. Since June 15, for hitters with a minimum of 90 plate appearances, Verdugo is last in the majors in batting average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage and OPS. He has been the worst everyday player in the entire league for five weeks.

Prior to Sunday’s game, when asked about Verdugo sucking, Boone said, “I think there’s really good out in front of him. Nothing’s changed.” Boone was right: nothing changed. Verdugo went 0-for-4 with a strikeout. 

Boone was ejected in the sixth inning for arguing a called strike against Verdugo for his fifth ejection of the season.

“My hips have been flying toward the first-base side,” Verdugo said. “We’re not trying to hit ground balls.”

It certainly looks like Verdugo is trying to hit ground balls since he has hit more balls on the ground to first base and second base than any other player in the majors this season.

5. Boone spewed his typical bullshit after the loss. He implied that bad luck was the reason the Yankees didn’t score in the first and second innings and that bad luck has been the reason the team has lost more than two-thirds of its game since the middle of June.

“Dugie hits one 103 [for a] line-drive out, Soto has the right at-bat,” Boone said. “We just gotta get one to fall.”

A franchise and brand built on winning has resorted to praying a ball with runners in scoring position drops in. I can see the YES in-game promo now:

(Paul Olden’s voice) Fans, come on out to the Stadium on Sunday, Aug. 11 as the Yankees host the defending-champion Rangers for Anthony Volpe Gold Glove Bobblehead Day, and see if the Yankees can get one to fall. The first 18,000 guests will receive an Anthony Volpe bobblehead presented by T-Mobile.

But with the bases loaded, praying to plate even a single run is all the Yankees can do. Pray for a hit by pitch or wild pitch or passed ball or catcher’s interference or an error or that a ground ball finds a hole. That’s the only way this team is capable of scoring outside of Soto and Judge extra-base hits.

6. Torres isn’t suddenly going to hit like a true middle-of-the-order bat. Verdugo for his career has a 102 OPS+ in 2,968 plate appearances, so the absolute best version of him is slightly above league average. The two of them along with LeMahieu, Cabrera, Trent Grisham, Volpe and Austin Wells are all below league average.

If the non-Soto and Judge bats were just league average, the Yankees would have run away with the division. But they can’t even be that. Average. That’s all anyone is asking. Just be average. And yet, they aren’t even close to being that.

The other day Luis Severino told reporters he is in a group chat with his former Yankees teammates and they have been chirping him about not starting against them in the Subway Series. “They talk trash about me, they say, ‘Oh, you’re afraid of us.’ I’m not afraid. Right now, you only have two good hitters. I can walk those two guys.” I always liked Severino.

7. On Sunday, Boone benched Torres. I’m sure it was only for a day and Torres will be right back in the lineup and batting in the middle of the order on Tuesday against the Mets since was only 10 days ago that Brian Cashman sat in the visitors’ dugout at Tropicana Field and told the media how good Torres was last year and how he’s waiting for him to return to being that player again.

In the series finale, the Yankees won a game started by Carlos Rodon for the first time since June 10. Sicne then Rodon has made roughly $5 million to provide the Yankees with zero wins in six starts, zero quality starts, a 9.67 ERA and a 1.963 WHIP.

After allowing four first-inning runs to the Rays two weeks ago, Rodon only allowed one earned run over seven innings in this one with a season-high 10 strikeouts. A $162 million pitcher shutting down the third-worst offense in the American League? What a concept.

8. The Yankees shockingly scored first in the bottom of the second with back-to-back home runs from Wells and Volpe. Yes, Volpe homered. It was his first home run since May 16. It was the first time he pulled the ball in the air to left field since June 20, which is simply outrageous.

In talking about Volpe, Meredith Marakovits reported he recently said, “If I believe in the process … I know the power is going to come.” Ah, the process. The old more-than-two-months-between-home runs process.

The Yankees added two more runs in the fourth when a Cabrera ground ball when off the glove of a sliding Brandon Lowe at second base. We just gotta get one to fall! (Cabrera went 4-for-8 over the last two games of the series, so there’s no way he should be out of the lineup come Tuesday since those two multi-hit games gives him more multi-hit games than Torres has in July.)

After another Siri home run for the Rays in the top of the fifth, LeMahieu answered in the bottom half with his first home run of the season, ending an 0-for-18 slump.

The Yankees added a run in the seventh on a Soto solo home run and added three more in the eighth on a Soto three-run home run in an eventual 9-1 win. They finished the season series 7-6 against the Rays.

9. The Yankees scored eight runs against the Braves on June 22 and then lost four straight. They scored 16 runs against the Blue Jays on June 28 and then lost the next day. They scored eight runs on June 30 against the Blue Jays and then lost four straight at home. They scored 14 runs against the Red Sox on July 6 and then got shut out the next day, losing the next two. The nine runs on Monday is the most the Yankees have scored since those 14 on July 6. Will it actually be the start of something or just another random outburst that leads to nothing?

I so badly want Sunday to be the start of something, but it’s hard to be optimistic that it was anything other than an anomaly given how the last nearly six weeks have gone. The Yankees spent the four games against the Rays running in place. I guess that’s better than how they spent the previous 28 games.

10. The Yankees are 11-21 since June 13. Their lead on a postseason spot is down to three games in the loss column. On June 14, that number was 13 games in the loss column.

It was a wasted four-game home series against a Rays team reportedly willing to sell and call it a season. Four more games off a schedule that is down to just 60.