DJ LeMahieu went from the bench on Opening Day to becoming the Yankees’ MVP all season and he was once again worthy of that title in Game 1.
The wait between Game 162 of the regular season and Game 1 of the ALDS felt like sitting in a doctor’s office waiting room all week. It’s been a long time since the Yankees had such the extended layoff between the end of the regular season and the start of the postseason because it’s been a long time since they reached the postseason without playing in the wild-card game.
It’s also been a long time since the Yankees played a meaningful game. The division was essentially won back at the end of June and with the organization’s half-hearted attempt in September to win home-field advantage, the Yankees have essentially been playing exhibition games since shortly before the All-Star break. Nearly the entire regular season was a formality — the way it was many times between 1995-2012 — and the last six-plus months have been about preparing for Friday night and the postseason.
I got to my seat in Yankee Stadium just in time to see the sad sight of Dellin Betances hobbling to the first-base line on crutches. The second-best relief pitcher in Yankees history and the one true bright spot on the team during the dark years between 2013 and 2016 deserved to be able to pitch in his free-agency year and in these playoffs. I felt sad for Betances on a night that would be stressful and hopefully end in happiness. But outside of James Paxton’s pitching performance, I wouldn’t be sad again.
I wanted the rotation to be Luis Severino in Game 1 followed by Paxton in Game 2 and Masahiro Tanaka in Game 3. I wanted Severino in the first game because he’s the team’s best pitcher and innings-wise his arm is in early April when he’s at his best. There’s no fatigue with Severino after a season of 30-plus starts and he looked like his usual self in his three short starts in September. I wanted Tanaka in Game 3 because I trust him more than the other two to make adjustments mid-game (the guy completely changed the grip of his signature pitch which has made his career) and not get rattled on the road. I would then have slotted Paxton second because he’s the lone lefty to give a different look between the righties and because of his post-July success.
Paxton’s first-inning troubles returned at the worst time. He allowed a solo home run to Jorge Polanco in the first, but settled down with a scoreless second before allowing a two-out solo home run to Nelson Cruz in the third. As Cruz walked to the plate, I joked that he scares me more than David Ortiz, and then Cruz sent the first pitch of the at-bat over the right-field wall, coincidentally tying Ortiz with 17 postseason home runs.
Paxton wasn’t good in his 4 2/3 innings aside from racking up eight strikeouts. He allowed three earned runs, six baserunners and two home runs. Yes, the Twins have a deep and dangerous lineup and he gave the team two more outs than they probably felt they needed, but three earned runs in 4 2/3 innings isn’t going to work this month unless the offense is going to hit the way it hit last night.
It’s crazy to remember DJ LeMahieu wasn’t in the Opening Day lineup. He has been the team’s best and most valuable player since the first weekend of the season and continues to impress with each game. I expect LeMahieu to come through in every at-bat at this point, and he always seems to. Thankfully, his odd second-inning error didn’t result in any Twins runs, but he more than made up for it anyway with a home run, which gave the Yankees an important insurance run in the sixth, and a bases-loaded, bases-clearing double to break the game open in the seventh. He was the team’s most valuable player all season and was again in Game 1 of the ALDS.
I recently joked about ending up in the emergency room if the Yankees batted Brett Gardner third in the playoffs. It was one thing (though still ridiculous) to bat Gardner third in May when the entire team was on the injured list, but in the playoffs? Sure enough, there he was, batting third for Game 1. Gardner probably wouldn’t even be in the lineup if Aaron Hicks were healthy, and outside of Didi Gregorius, he’s the worst hitter on the team, yet somehow is batting ahead of Edwin Encarnacion, Giancarlo Stanton, Gleyber Torres and Gary Sanchez. Just because he bats left-handed doesn’t mean he has to bat third, and there’s no need to have to break up all of the righties. Gardner hit a solo home run and the Yankees won, so I’m sure he will be back in the 3-hole for Game 2, but that doesn’t mean it’s the right move, especially long-term in these playoffs.
The quick hook on Adam Ottavino all season and again in Game 1 continues to be puzzling. I have been scared of Aaron Boone’s faith in Tommy Kahnle and lack of faith in Ottavino and have worried about Kahnle blowing a playoff game and he was on his way to on Friday. Thankfully, Boone didn’t have any say or impact on the game because the offense put up 10 runs and no type of bullpen management could ruin a blowout win. If only the Yankees could score 10 runs every game in October and take their manager out of the game.
For all of the postseason wins over the Twins since 2003, they have mostly come as a result of late-game heroics or wild comebacks. There haven’t been many “easy” wins, especially in Game 1.
I have always felt the division series should be more than a best-of-5 because after a six-month grind to reach the postseason, your season could essentially be over in 24 hours if you have two bad games. The Yankees have a chance to essentially end the Twins’ season on Saturday in Game 2, and it will be Masahiro Tanaka and his 1.50 ERA in five postseason games who can put the Yankees up 2-0.
The grace period with these Yankees is over. This season is the first season of the window of opportunity for this core to win a championship.
No one expected the 2016 Yankees to be any good. And they weren’t.
They got off to a 9-17 start, and it was obvious they had to tear apart the team and play prospects, and this time, every fan wanted them to do just that. Free agency had been the Yankees’ strategy since the early 2000s and a way for the team to plug holes on their sinking ship. It worked at times as they were able to tread water, have winning seasons and reach the playoffs, but over the previous 15 years, they had won one championship. Eventually you need to start over. Eventually you need a new boat. The game had changed and the Yankees needed a new boat. Yankees fans wanted a new boat.
At the end of play on July 6, 2016, the Yankees were 41-43 and it looked like they would certainly be sellers at the deadline in three weeks, but ownership wasn’t on board. The Yankees then went on an 11-5 run through July 26, and were now in striking distance of a wild-card spot — only four games back — and ownership hadn’t budged on selling and giving up on the season for future seasons. The expectation was that the Yankees would go out and acquire more patches for their old, under-performing, beat-up roster.
The Yankees then lost their next four games, one in Houston and a three-game sweep in Tampa Bay. It was the best thing to happen to the organization since the Astros, Indians, Expos, Orioles and Reds passed on Derek Jeter in the 1992 draft, allowing the Yankees to select him with the sixth-overall pick. The losing streak pushed the Yankees out of reasonable contention, ownership gave Brian Cashman the green light to trade his veteran assets and begin what the Yankees were calling a “transition”.
Andrew Miller (Indians), Aroldis Chapman (Cubs), Carlos Beltran (Rangers) and Ivan Nova (Pirates) were all traded, and Alex Rodriguez and Mark Teixeira announced their retirements. Gary Sanchez and Aaron Judge were called up to become everyday players, and in the process, Brian McCann was relegated to backup duty, which would lead to his offseason trade to the Astros. The Yankees had finally decided to show off the depth in their farm system, and thanks to that four-game losing streak at the end of July, the depth only got deeper with the top prospects they received in return.
The 2017 Yankees weren’t supposed to be good either, picked by many to finish near or at the bottom of the AL East in what was certainly going to be a rebuilding season. There ended up not being any transition or rebuilding. The Yankees seemingly hit on every prospect who reached the majors and the team went from preseason dud to postseason bound, winning 91 games and putting up a plus-198 run differential.
The 2017 Yankees overcame a 3-0 first-inning deficit in the wild-card game. They overcame an 0-2 series hole to the 102-win Indians to advance to the ALCS. They overcame another 0-2 series hole to the Astros to bring a 3-2 series lead to Houston for Games 6 and 7. Ultimately, they came one win shy of reaching the World Series for the first time in eight years.
For 2018, the Yankees essentially replaced Chase Headley, Starlin Castro and Jacoby Ellsbury with Giancarlo Stanton (the reigning NL MVP), Miguel Andujar, Gleyber Torres and the Aaron Hicks who was drafted in the first round. Once again, they came up short in the postseason.
The 2017 postseason loss wasn’t crushing. It was an exhilarating ride, being back at a raucous Stadium seemingly every night in October and watching a young, homegrown core get within a game of the World Series. The 2018 postseason loss, on the other hand, was crushing. After falling into and winning the wild-card game, and taking a game in Boston, the Yankees became the favorite in what had become a best-of-3 with two games at the Stadium, where they didn’t lose. Not only did they lose both home games, they were embarrassed in every facet of the game, especially managing, and their rival celebrated on their field en route to a championship season.
Because of the way the season ended and the team it ended against, 2018 is viewed as a disaster, and rightfully so. But if you go back to 2016, 2017 and 2018 were never supposed to be about the Yankees. They were supposed to be about the Indians and Astros and Red Sox and Cubs and Dodgers, and they were. The timeline Yankees fans were given and expected prior to Opening Day 2016 was always 2019, these Yankees just happened to arrive early. The 2017 and 2018 Yankees gave us two unexpected years of championship contention even if it didn’t end with a championship.
This season could have and probably should have been a disaster. When you set the single-season record for most players placed on the injured list, you’re not supposed to win your division or 103 games. You’re not supposed to sustain success with backups becoming everyday players and backups to the backups carrying the team for weeks at a time. The Yankees got 49 plate appearances from Miguel Andujar, 18 games from Giancarlo Stanton and 59 from Aaron Hicks; Gary Sanchez missed six weeks and Didi Gregorius and Aaron Judge each missed two months; Luis Severino pitched 12 innings and Dellin Betances faced two batters; James Paxton and Brett Gardner made trips to the injured list and CC Sabathia made several. Despite these injuries and more, the Yankees won the AL East.
It’s nearly impossible to predict who will and won’t perform in the postseason, with the goal being to get there and then hoping things go your way. The Yankees achieved that goal, winning the division for the first time since Robinson Cano, Curtis Granderson, Russell Martin and Nick Swisher were Yankees. The next goal is to eliminate the Twins for sixth time in 17 years, win the pennant and get back to the World Series, a place they haven’t been since Hideki Matsui, Johnny Damon, Melky Cabrera and A.J. Burnett were Yankees. The championship grace period for the organization is over. It’s long over. It’s been a decade of Octobers since the Yankees last reached the World Series and last won it.
The grace period for these Yankees is over as well. This season is the first season of the window of opportunity for this core to win a championship. There’s no more consolation prize for coming within a game of the World Series and losing or having another 100-win regular season and getting eliminated in the first round. From here on out, every season with this group which doesn’t end with a championship will be a missed opportunity.
These Yankees were expected to truly contend in the 2019 postseason and it’s here. This is supposed to be their time.
***
My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!
Last week was certainly forgettable, but thankfully, there’s another week ahead to get back to winning, and 13 more weeks to erase this under-.500 record.
The Giants have done exactly what I thought they would do. They have turned a lost 0-2 season into a reel-Giants-fans-back-in 2-2 season. But after playing two easy opponents (though no opponent for the Giants is easy), they now have the Vikings on Sunday followed by the Patriots on Thursday. Winning one of the two next games would be a major accomplishment and would continue to keep this season alive. Losing both would send the season right back to where it was before the Daniel Jones era began.
I haven’t bought into this Giants team as one that has turned their season around and is going to truly battle for a postseason berth. It’s hard to when their defense got worked over for the first three weeks of the seasons, and one of their two wins was a direct result of a kicker missing two extra points and a game-winning, 34-yard field-goal attempt. The only game the Giants looked convincingly better than their opponent was against the Redskins last week, and the Redskins are winless and were forced to play their rookie quarterback who had yet to play because the head coached deemed him not ready.
After the Vikings and Patriots, the Giants also have to play the Cowboys, Eagles twice, Bears and Packers. Since no opponent is “easy” when it comes to the Giants, let’s assume the following opponents aren’t “easy” but rather “easier” than the others: Cardinals, Lions, Jets, Dolphins and Redskins. (I included the 2-1-1 Lions who are extremely close to being 4-0 with the “easier” group because they don’t belong with the first list of teams.) That gives the Giants seven challenging games and five “easier” games to play.
It’s quite possible the Giants could fight for a seven- or eight-win season, which would be a successful season considering how the last two seasons went, most of the games will have been started by a rookie quarterback, the absence of Saquon Barkley for multiple weeks, the state of the defense and that Pat Shurmur is their head coach. I would sign up for 7-9 or 8-8 right now because that would mean the team is actually making progress rather than deteriorating and continuing to go in the wrong direction. It would also mean I cover my over six wins prediction for the Giants.
The next two weeks will tell us a lot about what to expect from the Giants for the next three months. Two losses and they haven’t changed. One win and there’s reason to be intrigued. Two wins and … if the Giants beat both the Vikings and Patriots to improve to 4-2 on the season and 4-0 with Daniel Jones, I book a hotel room in Miami for the Super Bowl. But let’s start with them winning one of the two games and go from there.
***
Well, it’s going to be tough to climb out of this hole. After a nice, solid 9-7 Week 3, Week 4 was an absolute disaster at 5-10. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one losing teasers involving the Colts, Rams, Texans or Vikings, and I’m sure a lot of survivor pool dreams were crushed by the Rams’ lack of defense against a Buccaneers which lost to the Giants. Underdogs went 10-5 against the spread with eight of them winning outright.
Week 4 was certainly forgettable, but thankfully, there’s another week ahead to get back to winning, and 13 more weeks to erase this under-.500 record.
(Home team in caps)
Los Angeles +1 over SEATTLE I never like taking the road team on Thursday Night Football and I don’t usually like taking any team at Seattle, but there are exceptions to everything. The exception here is that the Rams suffered an embarrassing loss at home to a Buccaneers team which had to fly across country reeling from a loss to the Giants. The Rams will be looking for redemption on the short week.
CINCINNATI -3 over Arizona After the hard-to-watch Monday Night matchup, which was so hard to watch, I watched it for less than five minutes, we get another winless matchup early on Sunday.
TENNESSEE -3 over Buffalo I was high on the Titans coming into the season and their Week 1 blowout win over the Browns validated my being high on them. Then they went out and back-to-back games and I figured they were the same old .500-ish Titans. But they were able to beat the Falcons (not exactly a great accomplishment) last week and now I’m ready to ride them again.
Chicago -6 over OAKLAND The Colts should be embarrassed for the way they played on Sunday, allowing the Raiders to go down the field on their defense with ease. I can’t envision them having them offensive success this week going against the best defense in the league, even if they are at home. Derek Carr better have his head on a swivel in Khalil Mack’s return to Oakland, where he will want to put on a show for his former fans and for the team who thought it was a good idea to not pay him.
NEW ORLEANS -3.5 over Tampa Bay That’s two starts for Teddy Bridgewater and two wins for the Saints. It’s almost as if the Vikings should have kept Bridgewater, so they wouldn’t now be wasting their championship window on the Kirk Cousins era in which they are 10-10 with nearly $100 million in guaranteed money tied up with a mediocre-at-best quarterback.
NEW YORK GIANTS +5.5 over Minnesota My wife is a Vikings fan. Yes, a Vikings from Los Angeles. Long story. Do I really believe the Giants’ winning streak will reach three games and they will be able to score against the Vikings’ defense like they did against Tampa Bay and Washington or that they will be able to play defense against Dalvin Cook, Adam Thielen and Stefon Diggs? No. But I can’t pick against them with so much on the line at home.
PHILADELPHIA -13.5 over New York Jets Will the Jets’ offense score a touchdown coming out of their bye week? I don’t think so since the Eagles are also essentially coming out of a bye with a 10-day layoff. This has to be the most pick survivor pool game of the week with the Dolphins on their bye.
Baltimore -3.5 over PITTSBURGH I couldn’t have been more wrong about the Ravens last week and thinking they were in the level just below the Patriots and Chiefs in the AFC. Teams in that level don’t get run out of their own building. But in actuality, that level doesn’t even exist this season. It’s the Patriots and Chiefs and then everyone else is much, much far behind the two. The AFC is essentially the NBA in that we already know how the playoffs will unfold.
New England -15.5 over WASHINGTON The Patriots have failed to cover back-to-back weeks after a defensive touchdown gave the Jets a backdoor cover over them in Week 3 and a missed extra point allowed the Bills to cover in Week 4. After watching the Redskins blow a sizable lead to the Eagles in Week 1 and then get routed by a Giants team which shouldn’t rout any team, I think it’s safe to say the Patriots will get back to covering this week.
CAROLINA -3.5 over Jacksonville Last week, I wrote:
I have never listened to North Carolina sports radio, but if Kyle Allen plays well again, I think I’m going to have to check it out. I want nothing more than for there to be a quarterback controversy with the Panthers.
I think it’s time to tune into North Carolina sports radio because if there isn’t already talk of a quarterback controversy with the Panthers, there should be. The Panthers are 2-0 with Allen and 0-2 with Cam Newton. I don’t know how Newton expects to be the starter when he eventually returns, and I don’t know how he possibly could be the starter with the way Allen has played. If Allen continues to play well and the Panthers continue to win, there won’t be a debate. Newton will be on the bench.
HOUSTON -5 over Atlanta If it always feels like the Texans should be better than they are, it’s because they should be. They have the quarterback and offensive and defensive personnel to be a playoff team each year, but somehow they continue to struggle to score points and win games. Scoring 10 points at home is something that should only happen with teams like the Redskins and Dolphins, certainly not with the Texans. That trend can’t continue at home against the Falcons.
Since the Falcons blew a 25-point, second-half lead in the Super Bowl, they have lost in the first round of the playoffs, gone 7-9 and are now 1-3. If that’s not enough to get a head coach fired who should have been fired the second that awful Super Bowl ended, I don’t know what will be enough.
LOS ANGELES CHARGERS -6.5 over Denver The Dolphins turned in their best performance of the season in Week 4, a 20-point loss to the Chargers. After seeing how bad the Dolphins were in the first three weeks of the season, it was a letdown performance from the Chargers. It’s somewhat understandable since the Chargers never play well outside of the Pacific Time Zone, or California really, but only beating the Dolphins by 20 is a bit of a red flag. Luckily for the Chargers, they return to California and the Pacific Time Zone this week to face a second straight winless opponent in the Broncos.
Green Bay +3.5 over DALLAS Here’s what I wrote last week about the Cowboys:
The Cowboys have yet to be tested after getting the awful defenses of the Giants and Redskins in Weeks 1 and 2 and then the Dolphins, who might be the worst team in the history of the NFL, in Week 3. The Cowboys are good, but they’re not undefeated, class-of-the-NFC good. Right now, they’re riding high, and probably thinking they’re the cream of the crop in the NFC, as their fans are, but this week in New Orleans should be a nice wake-up call for them after having the easiest opening schedule through Week 3 in the league.
The Cowboys might be able to pick up easy wins against the Giants, Redskins and Dolphins, but their schedule is too hard for them to bully their way into the playoffs. At some point they’re going to have to win against the league’s better teams to reach the postseason since nine of their 12 remaining games are against Green Bay, Philadelphia, Minnesota, Detroit, New England, Buffalo, Chicago and Los Angeles Rams. As a Giants fan, I hope they extend Dak Prescott before the losing gets too out of hand for the Cowboys.
KANSAS CITY -11 over Indianapolis I know each week in the NFL season is essentially a one-week season and you can’t put a lot of stock into what you see from week to week. But it’s hard for me as someone who watched most of Raiders-Colts last week to not think the Chiefs might be able to tell their punter to stay home on Sunday.
SAN FRANCISCO -3.5 over Cleveland So far, the Monday Night Football games have been Texans-Saints, Broncos-Raiders, Browns-Jets, Bears-Redskins and Bengals-Steelers. Outside of Texans-Saints, it will be nice to once again have a Monday night game with two teams worth staying up for.
I was completely wrong about the Ravens last week against the Browns, as the Ravens turned out to be the same frauds who were humiliated in the playoffs last year. I wasn’t necessarily wrong about the Browns though, since I still believe they are a seven- or eight-win team. If I’m going to be right about that, they’re going to need to continue to be the .500 team they are, and that means losing to equal or better opponents.
Like I did last October, I’m giving Aaron Boone a clean slate for the postseason. Hopefully, he won’t make me regret it the way he did last year.
The moment the Yankees won the 2018 American League Wild-Card Game, I started over with Aaron Boone. After failing to win the division and avoid the wild-card game and have a free pass to the ALDS, the Yankees survived the one-game playoff and were going to the first round. I erased the six months of questionable lineup decisions, nonsensical bullpen moves and head-scratching in-game maneuvers because the Yankees had reached the actual postseason. I agreed to only judge Boone on his managing in the real October.
Boone quickly reminded me why I was so critical of his managing throughout the regular season. In Game 3 of the ALDS, he let Luis Severino return to the mound with the Yankees already in a three-run hole and every Red Sox swing resulting in a line drive. He doubled down on his egregious decision to stick with Severino by allowing the clearly-fatigued righty (who was also somehow late to warm up for a postseason game) to load the bases with no outs before finally removing him. Needing a strikeout to begin to hope to limit the damage in the inning and save the game, Boone called on the last pitcher on the postseason roster and the worst strikeout numbers in the bullpen.
The Red Sox routed the Yankees, handing them the worst home postseason loss in franchise history and completely destroying the idea these Yankees couldn’t lose at home in the postseason after winning all six home games in 2017 and the first one in 2018. The raucous Stadium crowd, which had been present since the first pitch of the 2017 wild-card game, eagerly waiting the team’s return to glory, was silenced for the night and the Red Sox had pushed the Yankees to the brink of elimination.
The next night, Boone once against had too long of a leash for his starting pitcher, as he let CC Sabathia go through the Red Sox’ lineup a second time. His reasoning? He liked the matchup of Sabathia against Jackie Bradley who was the Red Sox’ 9-hitter, so he allowed Sabathia to face the entire lineup to get to the last hitter in it. Maybe Boone was hesitant to pull Sabathia because of their history as friends and former teammates, or maybe it was because he truly believed his logic was sound. Either way, the Yankees were eliminated.
This regular season, we saw much of the same from Boone with more odd lineup decisions and unfathomable bullpen choices, but the Yankees won 103 games anyway, despite setting the single-season record for most players on the injured list and despite Boone causing six months of unnecessary blood pressure spikes across the Tri-state area. Though most of those wins can be attributed to the majority of Major League Baseball not caring to be competitive with 10 teams losing at least 90 games, including four which lost at least 103, it can’t be denied that the Yankees have had regular-season success under Boone, even if there would be no change in performance with a different manager managing this roster against this league.
This postseason, I’m scared of the Yankees’ offense getting shut down by right-handed power pitching the way it did in Games 6 and 7 of the 2017 ALCS in Houston and Games 3 and 4 of the 2018 ALDS against Boston, and I’m nervous that the starting pitching concerns will make an appearance against the best opposing lineups in the league, but I’m also worried Boone will ruin a game or games by letting the inning dictate who pitches and not the situation. How can you not be worried about this? We have seen Boone manage the same way for two full regular seasons and one postseason, choosing lesser relievers in high-leverage situations because of the inning number.
I have joked in the past that since Brian Cashman is so good at trades and so bad at free agency, the Yankees should have Cashman conduct the trades and have a second general manager handle free agency, the way some NFL teams have a kicker for kickoffs and another for field goals. I have also joked that the Yankees should follow this setup for their manager as well. Boone can be the clubhouse manager since he was hired for his personality and ability to communicate with the players. He can be the one who jokes in the room and keeps things loose with his impressions of the team’s roster. He can go out drinking with the guys after games, set up dinner plans on road trips and lead the card games on the team plane. Then, the Yankees can hire an actual game manager.
Cashman built Boone a super bullpen last October, featuring Dellin Betances, Aroldis Chapman, David Robertson, Zack Britton and Chad Green. But in the most important bullpen spots in the postseason, Boone either went to his bullpen too late or went to Lance Lynn instead. Buying someone a Ferrari doesn’t make sense if they either don’t know how to drive or are going to opt to drive their old, beat-up Acura anyway. Boone demonstrated all of last season he didn’t know how to manage a bullpen and it reared its ugly head at the worst possible time. This season, he has made the same egregious mistakes as last season with the same type of bullpen, and I’m petrified he could be the Yankees’ most-feared opponent in October.
If the Yankees lose this October because the offense performs its third annual disappearing act at the worst possible time or the starting pitching gets rocked or the elite relievers can’t protect leads, so be it. It will suck and I will be upset, but it will be easier to accept. If the Yankees lose because of Boone, well, that’s something I won’t be able to accept.
I’m willing to give Boone a clean slate to begin the postseason for a second straight year. Let’s see how long it lasts.
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My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!
The regular season is over and that means the over/under predictions for the Yankees are over as well. Before the postseason begins, let’s look back at my over/under predictions from the season and see where I went right and wrong.
The regular season is over and that means the over/under predictions for the Yankees are over as well. Before the postseason begins, let’s look back at my over/under predictions from the season and see where I went right and wrong.
Part of the write-up from March is italicized. (This season’s win total in parentheses)
Gary Sanchez: Under 13.5 passed balls (7): WIN Last season, Gary Sanchez led the majors with 18 passed balls despite only catching 76 games, 74 which were starts and 67 which were complete games. The year before, he led the league with 16 passed balls in 104 games caught, 99 which were starts and 91 which were complete games. Somehow, Sanchez increased his passed ball total despite appearing in 28 last games. No, that’s not ideal.
But I’m optimistic when it comes to Sanchez and think he will be better behind the plate in 2019, as long as he isn’t struggling offensively since I believed that affected his defensive work either. It would be nice to see him less, let’s say lazy, when he’s got his gear on and not letting fastballs go by him to advance base runners. Sanchez has to be better in 2019. I can’t go another season of listening to idiots call for Austin Romine to be the team’s starting catcher.
After leading the league in passed balls in back-to-back seasons, Sanchez only had seven this season. He caught 14 more games than he did in 2018 and 14 less than he did in 2017, but significantly cut down his passed ball total.
Miguel Andujar: .299 batting average (.143): LOSS For a long time, having a .300 hitter on the Yankees wasn’t unusual, considering they had Derek Jeter for two decades and during his years also had some pretty good players. But since Jeter aged and Robinson Cano left, it’s been a while since you could look at the big screen in center field at the Stadium and see .300 next to a Yankee late in the season. Andujar’s rookie season and his contact ability are the perfect combination to believe that will change.
Technically, this is a loss, but I feel like it should go down as an incomplete. Andujar only played in 12 games, and played with a significant injury in nine of them, posting a .143 batting average (6-for-47).
It’s going to be interesting to see what the Yankees do at third base in 2019 when Andujar returns after Gio Urshela’s breakout season at the plate. Unfortunately, it’s a storyline that’s not going to go away this offseason or in spring training or in the regular season next year unless one of them is traded.
Aaron Hicks: Under 145 games played (59): WIN Everything about the Aaron Hicks contract extension is great except that he could be playing center field for the Yankees as a 36-year-old in 2026, and I’m not about to go back to 2013-16. The good news is if he sucks then or really at any point in this deal, it’s not an overwhelming amount of money the Yankees owe him or would have to eat. At $10 million per season for a starting center fielder in this center field climate, it might be the best contract the Yankees have ever had on their payroll.
The biggest problem with Hicks is that he can’t stay healthy, which he is showing once again as he won’t be ready for Opening Day and probably not for more than a week into the regular season. Hicks needs to find a way to avoid his one to two injured list stints per seasons. It’s the last piece of the puzzle for a player who saved his career and was awarded life-changing money.
Hicks didn’t ended up missing the first series of the season or the first week, he ended up missing the first six-plus weeks. Then after coming back from the long and weird back injury, Hicks hurt his elbow in early August and hasn’t played since, finishing the season with 59 games played.
Hicks turns 30 tomorrow and the Yankees have him for six more seasons. For a player who never played a full season in the majors in his 20s, I don’t expect him to be healthier on the other side of 30. Thankfully, his contract won’t prevent the team from making necessary moves in the future.
Gleyber Torres: Over 25 home runs (38): WIN The Yankees have Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton and their best player in 2019 and possibly beyond might be Gleyber Torres. The 22-year-old middle infielder was an All-Star in his first season, carrying the Yankees for the first few weeks of his arrival before hitting a wall in the dog days of the season.
As excited as I am for this Yankees season and the first season in what was always expected to be the first season of this window of opportunity, I’m especially excited to see how Torres grows and adjusts to a league that will certainly have adjusted to him after what he did last year. A sophomore slump for Torres? I don’t see it.
Torres laughed at the idea of a sophomore slump or teh league adjusting to him as he batted .278/.337/.535 with 38 home runs and 90 RBIs, easily covering the home run total set here. Aaron Boone finalyl relized it wa s time to stop batitng TOres ninth and moved him up int othe top half othe order and there’s a chance he could be hitting as high as third in the postseason.
James Paxton: Under 160 1/3 innings (150 2/3 innings): WIN When you look at James Paxton’s numbers, you see a pitcher with not a lot of miles on his arm and just 582 1/3 innings as a now 30-year-old. The reason there isn’t a lot of miles on his arm is because there’s other problems with his arm, and his shoulder and his back, and so on.
In theory, Paxton is a great fit as a power left-hander pitching half of his games in Yankee. The problem is Paxton’s career high for starts is 28 and innings is 160 1/3, and they both came last season. It would be a miracle if Paxton were to get through the 2019 unscathed to start 32 times and give the Yankees 200 innings. Until he has a season in which he’s able to avoid the injured list even once, it’s hard to believe it will happen.
Paxton finished the season at 150 2/3 innings, thanks to his annual injured-list trip, which came early in the season. Paxton was solid in his first season as a Yankee after a 10-game winning streak to end the season (minus his last start) saved his overall numbers. He had a 4.72 ERA at the end of July, but finished with a 3.82 and 15 wins in 29 starts.
There were great moments and awful moments, in a season which was really two seasons for the left-hander: Opening Day through the end of July and August through September. It was exactly the type of season I expected from an inconsistent left-hander with “great stuff”.
Aaron Judge: 118.5 walks (68): LOSS The number most people care about when it comes to Aaron Judge is home runs. and rightfully so. But after that it should be walks.
Judge led the league with 127 walks in 2017 and was on a 110-walk pace last season if not for the broken wrist (he ended up with 76). When Judge is getting his walks, you know he’s going right, and he’s setting the table for the guys behind him and tiring the pitcher on the mound for Giancarlo Stanton and Gary Sanchez.
If were up to me, I would bat Judge leadoff. I get that Aaron Hicks is a solid leadoff candidate, but he’s not Judge. Judge has a .409 on-base percentage over the last two seasons and seems to always be in full counts. He’s not going to give away an at-bat or swing at the first pitch and ground out to short. I want the best hitter on the team to get the most at-bats over the course of a season and the best hitter on the team is Judge. It’s certainly not Brett Gardner.
You can’t plan for injuries and for the second straight season, Judge missed significant time, which caused this number to go under at 68. After last season’s broken wrist, Judge landed on the injured list for two months with an oblique injury. Judge missed the end of the 2016 season with a oblique injury, played through a shoulder injury in the second half of 2017, had the broken wrist in 2018 and then the oblique injury in 2019. Can we get a full healthy season of Judge? Especially with the current state of the baseballs.
Masahiro Tanaka: Over 13.5 wins (11): LOSS Masahiro Tanaka has never thrown 200 innings in the regular season for the Yankees. He came within one out (199 2/3 innings) in 2016, but aside from that his best season was 178 1/3 in 2017.
Another thing Tanaka hasn’t done is win more than 14 games. He’s won 13, 12, 14, 13 and 12. And while I’m not big on pitcher’s win totals since it’s more of a team effort and a lot more is needed that the pitcher simply going at least five innings and pitching well, it’s definitely shocking Tanaka has been unable to reach even 15 wins in what has been a very good career in the majors (64-34 with a 3.59 ERA in 132 starts).
Tanaka needs to give the Yankees quality starts (and starts period), especially at the beginning of the season with two-thirds of the rotation out. If he does that, with this offense, against the crap teams they will see in April, Tanaka will be well on his way to crushing this win total.
When Tanaka had a 1.47 ERA through his first three starts I thought he was well on his way to crushing the over. Then he made a habit of blowing leads with a single crooked-number inning each start and the offense gave him little to no run support in other starts and he finished with 11 wins.
Tanaka received a decision in six starts in which he went at least six innings and gave up two earned runs or less, and that was the difference in him going over the win total. But as long as Tanaka pitches in October the way he has in five previous October starts, that’s all I care about.
Brett Gardner: Under .340 on-base percentage (.325): WIN Gardner looked finish last season. He finished at .236/.322/.368, which are catcher-like numbers for a guy who was given the chance at the most at-bats by the team for the first five months of the season. I didn’t want Gardner back in 2019 and wanted the team to go in a different direction like Michael Brantley, who the Astros signed, and will undoubtedly have a big hit or hits against the Yankees in the postseason. Because Clint Frazier would need time to get back to playing baseball every day after losing most of the 2018 season, the Yankees couldn’t go into 2019 thinking he would be a full-time Major Leaguer. So they brought Gardner back on a one-year, $7.5 million deal, thinking his veteran leadership and clubhouse presence were needed and that his sharp decline last season wasn’t indicative of what he has left in the tank.
Gardner enjoyed a career resurgence with the new baseball, hitting an astonishing 28 home runs in season win which he wasn’t supposed to play every day and a season in which he started out looking like he was more than finished as a major leaguer. Now he’s most certainly going to be back with the team in 2020.
But even though Gardner experienced a power surge, he didn’t experience an on-base surge and was unable to return his old self when it comes to getting on base. Yes, his OPS went from .690 to .829, but his on-base only went from .322 to .325, the second-worst of his career. As long as Gardner continues to hit home runs, his on-base percentage dipping won’t matter, but if he regresses power-wise, he’ll turn back into the player who lost his leadoff spot and job completely in 2018.
Giancarlo Stanton: Under 200 strikeouts (24): WIN Giancarlo Stanton was OK in his first season as Yankee. Yes, a .266/.343/.509 hitter with 38 home runs and 100 RBIs was just OK.
Here are the most common excuses from the Stanton fan club heard last season:
1. He’s with a new organization 2. He’s in a new league and has to learn new pitchers 3. He’s playing his home games in colder weather at the beginning and end of the season 4. He needs to get acclimated and adjusted to living in a new city
Maybe some or all of those are true, but they are no longer valid. Not in Year 2, not in 2019. Unfortunately, we can’t go back and redo what happened in October, we only know it can’t happen again. As a Marlin, Stanton would supposedly go to Europe during the MLB postseason since it was too painful to watch. Well, he better change his approach at the plate and with runners on or he’s going to being going to Europe a lot during the World Series as a Yankee.
If I’m going to take a chap loss on Andujar’s batting average, I’m going to take the cheap win on Stanton’s strikeout total. Stanton only played in 18 games, so it was impossible for him to not go under. In those 18 games, he struck out 24 times, so if he had kept that pace for 162 games, it would have translated to 216 strikeouts, but you have to figure he wouldn’t have played all 162 games. The number would have been close had Stanton been healthy all season, but I’ll gladly take the win here. Now it’s up to Stanton to redeem himself in the postseason for his forgettable 2018 postseason.
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My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!
