That’s more like it. A sweep of the Blue Jays (who had been 6-3 against the Yankees in 2021), the return of the offense and three games of ground made up in the division over the last three days. It’s been a wonderful few days to be a Yankees fan, even if it’s been a mostly miserable two-plus months to be one this season.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. The Yankees were fortunate to win one of the three games in Buffalo, let alone all three. In the series opener, Jordan Montgomery put them in a first-inning hole and they trailed by three runs entering the sixth. In the second game, Kyle Higashioka started over Gary Sanchez because Gerrit Cole started and because Aaron Boone is an idiot, and the Yankees needed Sanchez to save them with a two-run, pinch-hit home run in the seventh, and then needed Aroldis Chapman to escape a second-and-third, no-out jam in the ninth. In the series finale, Michael King was his usual awful self and needed a triple play as a result of horrible Blue Jays baserunning to escape the first inning, and the Yankees needed another seventh-inning comeback after Boone let Lucas Luetge give away the lead rather than giving Chad Green a clean inning to work with.

2. It was yet another forgettable series for Boone, who made idiotic lineup decisions, like continuing to pair Higashioka with Cole, and disastrous bullpen decisions, like allowing King and Luetge to start innings they should have already been pulled for. I have said it for years and I’ll say it again: the Yankees’ biggest obstacle to ending their championship drought is Boone. It’s not the Rays or Blue Jays or Red Sox or White Sox or A’s or Astros or Dodgers or any team, it’s their own manager. The Yankees’ offense has to overcome their own manager’s decision making, and because the offense has been so bad this season (worst in the American League before Thursday’s game), the Yankees are where they are at only four games over .500 through 68 games.

3. In the second game of the series, the Yankees loaded the bases with no outs in the first inning for Giancarlo Stanton. I went to read Goodnight Moon and I returned to Marcus Semien stepping on home plate after hitting a home run. I was confused, but then quickly realized the Yankees had once again failed to score more than one run with the bases loaded and no outs. I was happy they even scored the one run. But it took two pitches for Semien to tie the game against Cole, who continues to have serious issues with giving up home runs (two more on Wednesday).

The Yankees’ 17 runs in the three-game series (5.7 per game) were a welcome sight. (They now have a one-run lead on the Tigers to avoid being the worst offense in the American League.) But their inability to get runners in from scoring position with no outs is a major concern, and the reason their offense as a whole has been so bad, and the reason they are facing an extremely difficult uphill battle the rest of the season for a postseason spot.

4. King can’t continue to start or open. He really can’t. In his latest poor outing, he put seven baserunners on in 4 1/3 innings and if not for the most ridiculous and unexpected triple play, the game might have been over in the first inning with runners on second and third and the Blue Jays’ 3-4-5 hitters coming up. King started a game the Yankees won, but it had absolutely nothing to do with him as he allowed three earned runs and only recorded 13 outs.

Unless the Yankees’ offense returns to normalcy, it’s going to be hard for them to ever have an extended winning streak with both King and Jameson Taillon in the rotation. Not only are they both in the rotation, but they are lined up to start consecutively. The Yankees have enough trouble winning games started by Gerrit Cole, having both King and Taillon starting 40 percent of the games is a problem.

5. I don’t want to hear that Deivi Garcia hasn’t been good lately in Triple-A. King hasn’t been good … ever. If Garcia had started the season in the Yankees’ bullpen like King did before being inexplicably inserted into the rotation, then Garcia never pitches in Triple-A this season and then that can’t be used as an excuse for why he’s not starting the games started by King. King isn’t a starter. At least not a good one. He’s not an opener. Again, at least not a good one. Call up someone who can actually start, and who has had success starting games in the majors.

6. Boone is at the point where not playing Sanchez just because Cole is starting is going to cause him a lot of issues with the media. Cole’s next start is on Tuesday against the Royals, following a day off on Monday. If Higashioka is the starting catcher for that Tuesday game, Boone is going to have to answer for it, and he’s going to have to give an answer that makes sense. Unfortunately, there isn’t one.

Sanchez is up to 10 home runs on the season (third on the Yankees behind Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton) and has a .785 OPS. In 63 plate appearances since May 27, Sanchez is hitting .333/.397/.667 with four doubles, five home runs and 11 RBIs.

In 65 plate appearances since April 28, Higashioka is hitting .136/.215/.220 with two doubles, one home run and three RBIs.

7. Offense can’t be used as a reason by Boone. And on Wednesday, after Boone went to Sanchez over Higashioka in the seventh to win the game for the Yankees, Sanchez had to catch Cole in the seventh and eighth innings for the first time since Opening Day. How did it go?

Joe Panik: groundout on four pitches.
Lourdes Gurriel Jr.: Flyout on two pitches.
Cavan Biggio (who had hit a solo home run of Cole earlier in the game with Higashioka catching): Strikeout on six pitches.
Rowdy Tellez: Groundout on three pitches.
Marcus Semien: Groundout on six pitches.
Bo Bichette: Groundout on four pitches.

Six up, six down on 25 pitches, 19 of which were strikes to preserve a one-run lead.

As I have written and said all along, no catcher makes Cole great, he’s great all on his own. And because of that, unless he starts a day game after a night game that Sanchez had caught, it’s time to give up on the idea that Higashioka deserves any bit of credit for his success.

8. The Yankees recently designated Mike Ford for assignment. This led to the Yankees trading Ford to the Rays for cash considerations and a player to be named later. There’s a 100 percent chance this move will backfire on the Yankees.

I liked Ford. He was an easy guy to root for, had strong left-handed power and great plate discipline. He hadn’t been put in the best of situations this season and last with the Yankees’ poor roster construction and management, but he was someone I felt confident with at the plate becuase I knew he would put together a competitive at-bat. I can’t say the same for Rougned Odor, who is somehow still a Yankee, and will undoubtedly bat in the top half of the order and play every day if Gleyber Torres needs to miss time following Thursday’s injury.

The Rays have no money, so the idea that they were willing to give money to the Yankees to acquire Ford should tell you everything you need to know about this deal. If the Rays want one of your players, you know you’re missing something. The Rays rarely ever screw up in player evaluation and it won’t surprise me to see Ford batting fourth, fifth or sixth for them in the coming weeks and helping them win the AL East, while beating the Yankees in the process. I don’t want the Rays to do well, but I want Ford to do well. Here’s to missing his in-between-pitch routine and that sweet left-handed swing.

9. The eight-game road trip is over and the Yankees went an underwhelming 5-3. Now it’s home for six games, starting on Friday night against the A’s with a capacity crowd allowed at the Stadium for the first time since the Yankees won Game 5 of the 2019 ALCS.

James Kaprielian starts for the A’s in the series opener against Taillon. The matchup couldn’t be a better way to sum up Brian Cashman’s inability to trade for and away starting pitching in his tenure as general manager. The Yankees picked Kaprielian in the first round of the 2015 draft and traded him to Oakland in 2017 to acquire Sonny Gray. The Yankees traded Kaprielian, Dustin Fowler and Jorge Mateo for Gray. They ended up trading Gray after 2018 to the Reds for Shed Long. They then traded Long to the Mariners for Josh Stowers. Stowers was traded to the Rangers for Odor. The Yankees used Kaprielian (2.51 ERA and 35 strikeouts in 32 1/3 innings for first the first-place A’s) to acquire Gray (3.14 ERA and 1.148 WHIP in 52 starts for the Reds) and all they have to show for it is the .195/.267/.376-hitting Odor who the Rangers are paying $27 million to not play for them.

10. The A’s are good. Very, very good. They started the season 1-7 and have gone 42-20 since. They come to the Bronx riding a six-game winning streak and have won eight of nine. If it were October, I might not be scared of the Yankees playing the A’s, but right now, when the Yankees need wins and a lot of them more than ever, the A’s are a horrible matchup for the Yankees.

It was nice to see the Yankees’ offense go off in Buffalo, where every offense goes off, but this weekend against the A’s, a true contender, will be a great litmus test for the Yankees to see if the last three days against the Blue Jays were an anomaly or if the Yankees have finally turned the corner Boone has been searching for since April 1.

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After winning the first two games of the series against the Twins, the Yankees gave away the series finale, something they do far too often. The Yankees have now lost 11 of their last 16 games, are six games back in the division and 2 1/2 games back in the wild card.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. If you were feeling good about the Yankees after Tuesday’s win and Wednesday’s win, well, Thursday was a reminder of just how far this team has go to truly be considered a postseason team, let alone a championship team.

Sure, a nine-run outburst followed by an eight-run burst from the second-worst offense in the American League was nice to see, but it did come against the Twins, a team that has nothing to play for with 100 games left in their season. The blown three-run lead on Thursday erased any sense the Yankees might be turning their season around, as they let a chance to sweep a last-place team slip away and are now just 2-7 in series finales with a chance to sweep.

2. Thursday was a game the Yankees couldn’t afford to give away. They had a three-run lead four batters into the game and eventually lost. It had the same feel to it as the fourth game of the Indians series (April 25), the third game of the Astros series (May 6) and the third game of the most recent Orioles series (May 16).

When you can’t beat the Rays (5-8), Blue Jays (3-6) or Red Sox (0-3), and when you get swept by the Tigers, and somewhat struggle against the Orioles, you can’t only win series against a team as bad as the Twins. Winning two of three this week isn’t a positive, only sweeping the series would have been a positive.

3. The Yankees were off on Monday. They are off on Friday. They are off on Monday again. They only have two games this weekend against the Phillies, which will obviously include NL rules. That means there won’t be any Giancarlo Stanton this weekend unless it’s as a pinch hitter. The Yankees have a DH-only player on their roster, and he’s under contract for six more seasons after this one.

4. Stanton is finally hitting and is extremely hot right now. (Yes, hot and cold exist, regardless of what Aaron Boone and the Yankees believe.) He just hit three home runs and a double in 10 at-bats between Wednesday and Thursday for his first home run since May 6 and his first double since May 11.

Stanton is possibly the streakiest hitter I have ever seen (sorry, Brett Gardner), and when’s on a hot streak, you just hope it doesn’t end. Now the Yankees are going to end it themselves.

5. Here is an update on how Giancarlo Stanton’s days have gone since coming off the injured list on May 28:

May 28: 0-for-5, 4 K
May 29: Personal day off
May 30: 0-for-3, 2 BB, 2 K
May 31: 0-for-4, 2 K
June 1: Personal day off (0-for-1 as pinch hitter)
June 2: 1-for-3, BB, K
June 3: Personal day off
June 4: 1-for-3, BB
June 5: 0-for-4, 2 K
June 6: Personal day off (0-for-1 with a strikeout as a pinch hitter

June 7: Day off
June 8: 2-for-5
June 9: 3-for-5, 2B, 2 HR, 5 RBIs
June 10: 1-for-5, HR, RBI
June 11: Day off

Now it’s probably going to include:

June 12: Personal day off
June 13: Personal day off
June 14: Day off

6. Can we stop with Michael King starting or opening games? Please. He isn’t good in that role.

Last season, King pitched mostly as an opener for the Yankees and had a 7.76 ERA and 5.14 FIP. The last three times through the rotation (since May 30), he has been given a chance to start or open or whatever you want to call it. I call it pitching poorly: 11. 1 IP, 13 H, 10 R, 8 ER, 5 BB, 10 K, 1 HR, 6.35 ERA, 1.589 WHIP. The Yankees have lost all three games he has started.

Enough is enough. The Yankees can’t afford to keep losing games. Not when they have already lost 30 of 63. Not when the Rays seemingly never lose and not when the Yankees can’t beat the Blue Jays (3-6) or Red Sox (0-3). King’s spot in the rotation should go to Deivi Garcia. I don’t know why that’s so hard to understand and implement.

7. There’s never a good time for a closer to blow a game, but Aroldis Chapman couldn’t have picked a worse time to have the worst outing of his career. Single, home run, single, home run. Four runs without recording an out to first give up a two-run lead and then to give up the game ruined the Yankees’ chances at sweeping the awful Twins.

A rare bad night for Chapman is why the Yankees are in a bad spot in terms of the standings. There are going to be bad nights for Chapman. Even Gerrit Cole has had a few clunkers. The Yankees’ margin for error entering the season was slim with two other truly competitive teams in the division in Tampa Bay and Toronto, and now that Boston is still playing well, the margin error is that much slimmer. The Yankees can’t keep pissing away games to bad teams.

8. Miguel Andujar is hitting .313./.326/.506 over his last 86 plate appearances. The high average, the low on-base percentage and the power (five home runs in June) are all there. It’s the same Andujar who would have won the 2018 AL Rookie of the Year if not for someone being able to be both a starting pitching and middle-of-the-order bat in his same rookie class.

Andujar has hit his way into an everyday role. With the Yankees’ offense as being as anemic as it has been through 63 games, Andujar and his .832 OPS since May 14 have to be in the lineup. No, he doesn’t walk (two walks in 99 plate appearances this season). No, he isn’t very good at defense at any position. But what he can do is make contact, put the ball in play and rack up extra-base hits. That’s more than nearly every other Yankees hitter can do.

9. The optimal Yankees lineup right now is this:

In a perfect world, if every Yankees hitter was hitting to the best of their abilities of their career and healthy and able to play the field, this would be the optimal Yankees lineup:

1. DJ LeMahieu, 2B
2. Aaron Judge, RF
3. Giancarlo Stanton, LF
4. Gary Sanchez, C
5. Luke Voit, 1B
6. Gleyber Torres, SS
7. Miguel Andujar, DH
8. Gio Urshela, 3B
9. Aaron Hicks, CF

Instead, this is currently the optimal Yankees lineup:

1. DJ LeMahieu, 2B
2. Aaron Judge, CF
3. Gleyber Torres, SS
4. Giancarlo Stanton, DH
5. Gio Urshela, 3B
6. Miguel Andujar, LF
7. Gary Sanchez, C
8. Clint Frazier, RF
9. Chris Gittens, 1B

10. At the end of Joe Girardi’s tenure as Yankees manager, I thought it was time for a new manager. I just didn’t think it would be someone as incapable and inexperienced as Boone. If I knew the Yankees were going to hire Boone and knew how inept he would be at the position I never would have wanted Girardi to be replaced. It’s going to somewhat sad seeing Girardi in a Phillies uniform managing against the Yankees this weekend, while we watch Boone stumble his way through the intricacies of the NL rules and then stumble his way through his postgame press conferences. Maybe when the Yankees replace Boone they will hire someone worthy of the position.

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The Yankees have lost four straight and 10 of 13. They are in fourth place in the AL East, 2 1/2 games out of a wild-card spot, have the second-worst offense in the AL and just got swept at home by the Red Sox. They suck.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. The first question to Aaron Boone at the next postgame press conference (though it should have already been asked) should be: Why do you think you should keep your job as manager of the Yankees?

What would Boone say? I really need to know. I need to know why he thinks he should continue in his current role. Because there’s no one outside of his immediate family who can possibly think he deserves to be Yankees manager.

2. He does nothing well, whether it’s speaking with the media, creating the best possible lineup or managing his bullpen. The one thing he was heralded for when hired was his communication skills, and it’s clear he lacks whatever communication skills the front office thought he had. Just look at Luis Severino not knowing the start time of Game 3 of the 2018 ALDS or the disconnect with Gary Sanchez last season or his inability to understand the severity of inserting Scumbag Domingo German into the clubhouse without addressing his suspension.

3. My breaking point with Boone was the 2018 ALDS. It was clear for nearly all of the 2018 regular season that he was in over his head as Yankees manager with zero managerial or coaching experience. But in the 2018 ALDS it was obvious when his pitching decisions ended the Yankees’ season.

This past weekend seems like it was the breaking point for a lot of Yankees fans who were indifferent to Boone before. Watching him sit in the dugout while his coaches went wild on the incorrect strike call to Rougned Odor was too much for some Yankees fans. Those fans who now want the Yankees to have a new manager are three years late to the movement, but hey, better late than never.  

4. A few weeks ago, I wrote (mostly in jest) that I would sign up for the second wild-card spot right now for the Yankees. Well, there’s no more sarcasm in that declaration, and it’s certainly no longer a joke. A wild-card berth is the Yankees’ only way into the postseason.

Can a 6 1/2-game deficit in the division be erased over 102 games? Sure. The problem is the team that holds the 6 1/2-game lead (the Rays) has too good of a pitching staff to experience an extended losing streak, or to play even close to .500 baseball. And it’s not like the Yankees are only competing with the Rays for the division, they would have to pass both the Blue Jays and Red Sox as well. What exactly have they done over 60 games and 37 percent of the season that would make anyone think they are capable of doing so?

5. If the Rays were to play essentially .500 baseball over their remaining 101 games (51-50), the Yankees would have to go 58-44 (.569) to tie them, and hope it’s enough to be better than both the Blue Jays and Red Sox. There’s no way the Rays are playing .500 baseball for 101 games. They are a .623 team in 2021. They were a .667 in 2020. They were a .636 team in 2019 and a .556 team in 2018. If the Rays were to continue to play .623 baseball for the rest of this season, they would finish 101-61, and the Yankees would have to go 70-32 (.686) to tie them. So yeah, the division is lost.

6. When the Yankees were 12-14 at the end of April, the Rays gave them a second life by going 13-14 in the first month. I said on the Keefe To The City Podcast that the Yankees wouldn’t get a third opportunity if they were to continue to play poorly, and that’s exactly what they have done. Since May 1, the Yankees have gone 19-15, while the Rays have gone 25-9. The Yankees pissed away April and now they have pissed away the AL East.

It’s not like obtaining a wild-card berth is going to be easy either. The Yankees are currently 2 1/2 games out of the second wild-card spot being held by the Astros. (The Red Sox have the first wild-card spot.) The Yankees would need to jump the Blue Jays and Indians before getting to the Astros, and then outlast either the Astros or Red Sox.

7. If the Yankees were to earn a wild-card berth, it would be their fourth in seven seasons, and fourth in the last six full seasons. (They wouldn’t have earned any postseason berth if the standard format was used in 2020.) Since their last World Series win and appearance, the Yankees have gone 28-30 in the postseason, losing one wild-card game (2015), three ALDS (2011, 2018, 2020), four ALCS (2010, 2012, 2017, 2019) and have missed the postseason three times (2013, 2014, 2016). I don’t see how their championship drought ends if they are forced to use Gerrit Cole in a one-game playoff and then be without him for the first two or three games of the division series.

8. The Yankees’ schedule between now and July 4 is:

@ MIN (3)
@ PHI (2)
@ TOR (3)
vs. OAK (3)
vs. KC (3)
@ BOS (3)
vs. LAA (4)
vs. NYM (3)

After these 24 games the Yankees’ season will be 52 percent over. In order for me to change my opinion on the team, they will need to go at least 16-8 over these 24 games, which would have them at 47-37 going into the July 5 day off. That’s a lofty goal for a team that has a minus-4 run differential and the only team they have scored more runs than in the AL is the Tigers, but for the Yankees to turn their season around they are going to have to start achieving lofty goals and stacking wins.

9. Here is an update on how Giancarlo Stanton’s days have gone since coming off the injured list on May 28:

May 28: 0-for-5, 4 K
May 29: Personal day off
May 30: 0-for-3, 2 BB, 2 K
May 31: 0-for-4, 2 K
June 1: Personal day off (0-for-1 as pinch hitter)
June 2: 1-for-3, BB, K
June 3: Personal day off
June 4: 1-for-3, BB
June 5: 0-for-4, 2 K
June 6: Personal day off (0-for-1 with a strikeout as a pinch hitter)

10. I remember when the season got off to a bad start and the comparisons to the 1998 Yankees started. “Well, the ’98 Yankees started out 1-4” is what idiots said. The 1998 Yankees won 114 games. The 2021 Yankees would have to go 83-19 to accomplish that feat.

Anyone still think a slow start for the 2021 Yankees should be compared to the greatest team in baseball history?

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The Yankees aren’t very good right now. The last time I felt really good about the Yankees was right before Adam Ottavino’s first pitch in Game 2 of the 2019 ALCS. The Yankees had a 1-0 series and had a 2-1 lead in Game 2 over Justin Verlander, but Ottavino gave up a home run to George Springer, and since then, the Yankees have been a disappointment.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. At his end-of-the-season press conference last October following the Yankees’ ALDS elimination, Brian Cashman said the following about the Rays: “They are a better franchise right now than we are.”

Since then, the Rays have gone 8-5 against the Yankees outscoring them 64-37, and have a 4 1/2-game lead over the Yankees in the AL East, so they are clearly still better.

Cashman did nothing to close the gap between the teams in the offseason, either because he didn’t feel the need to or because ownership wouldn’t let him. Either way, the Yankees failed to get any better or change in any way.

Cashman turned Masahiro Tanaka into Corey Kluber (injured) and Jameson Taillon (ineffective), turned Adam Ottavino into Darren O’Day (injured) and Justin Wilson (ineffective) and brought back the same exact lineup that failed to hit in the postseason. And when you bring back the same team, you get the same results.

The Yankees team that went 33-27 in the shortened 2020 season is now 31-26  in 2021. The offense is the second-worst in the AL, having only scored more runs than the lowly Tigers, who just swept the Yankees. On days when the starting pitching isn’t lights out, and I mean lights out as in pitch black and complete darkness, the Yankees lose.

2. The Yankees celebrated Memorial Day Weekend by getting swept by the Tigers and then scored one run in the first game of the four-game series against the Rays. Here are the Yankees’ runs scored by series over their last seven series with the average per game for the series in parentheses:

Tampa Bay: 12 (3.0)
Detroit: 5 (1.7)
Toronto: 7 (2.3)
Chicago: 14 (4.7)
Texas: 13 (3.3)
Baltimore: 19 (6.3)
Tampa Bay: 5 (1.7)

3. The Yankees managed to win a game started by Tyler Glasnow because Glasnow momentarily lost control and walked in a run and then threw a wild pitch to score a second run on back-to-back batters. Without Glasnow handing the Yankees a pair of runs in the second game in the series, things might be even worse than they currently are for the Yankees.

The Yankees’ bullpen helped the Yankees with two games in the series. In the second and third games of the series, the bullpen combined to pitch to this line: 8.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 9 BB, 11 K, 0.00 ERA, 1.205 WHIP. Even Luis Cessa pitched one of those 8 1/3 innings with a pair of strikeouts.

After the Yankees won the second and third games of the four-game series, I foolishly thought ‘Maybe this is when they turn their season around.’ Once again, the Yankees made a mockery of wishful thinking.

4. Gerrit Cole turned in his second clunker in four starts, and even if he had been great, he would have had to be dominant because the Yankees only “mounted” (to use one of Aaron Boone’s favorite words) two runs in the game, both on solo home runs, and because you better believe Boone wasn’t going to use Jonathan Loaisiga, Chad Green or Aroldis Chapman in the game.

During the first inning on Thursday, Michael Kay and John Flaherty wondered on the broadcast who would be available for the Yankees out of the bullpen. It would seem impossible everyone wouldn’t be available for a game against the Rays with the Yankees trailing them by 3 1/2 games in the standings, but it was a very logical question to ask with Boone as manager.

Yes, Loaisiga, Green and Chapman had all pitched on Tuesday and Wednesday, but over the last 10 days they had each only pitched three times. None of them pitched from May 24 through May 26, all three pitched on May 27, and then none of them pitched from May 28 through May 31. Isn’t the idea of not pitching them in games the Yankees are losing, so they can pitch in games the Yankees are winning, regardless of whether or not they pitched two days in a row?

5. Two runs against Ryan Yarbrough, the average left-hander, who was supposed to be an opener and ended up throwing a complete game. Yarbrough has now shut the Yankees down in three appearances this season, while being awful against every other team.

Against the Yankees:
17.1 IP, 10 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 14 K, 2 HR, 1.56 ERA, 0.694 WHIP

Against all other teams:
48.2 IP, 53 H, 32 R, 26 ER, 10 BB, 39 K, 8 HR, 4.81 ERA, 1.294 WHIP

6. The next time Cole starts, Gary Sanchez needs to catch. The personal catcher experiment is over. When Cole is allowing five earned runs in two of four starts, to the last-place Rangers and the team that strikes out more than any other team in the Rays, it’s over. Higashioka isn’t hitting even close to enough to get as much playing time as he has been this season, and now the magic of he and Cole has worn out (because there never was any magic).

7. Miguel Andujar hit three home runs in the four-game series against the Rays. So why does he keep batting at the bottom of the order? How are Odor and Brett Gardner not the 8-9 hitters whenever they play? It shouldn’t be hard to fill out the lineup card, yet somehow it is every day.

8. Between Opening Day and May 13, Giancarlo Stanton had four personal days off for extra rest to prevent injury. He got injured anyway because there’s no way to prevent injury other than to not play. So apparently that’s what the Yankees are going to do: not play their highest-paid position player, who is making $179,012.35 per game this season. (Wait until his 2023, 2024 and 2025 when he’s 33, 34 and 35 years old and making $197,530.86 per game).

Since coming off the injured list on May 28, here is how Stanton’s days have gone:

May 28: 0-for-5, 4 K
May 29: Personal day off
May 30: 0-for-3, 2 BB, 2 K
May 31: 0-for-4, 2 K
June 1: Personal day off (0-for-1 as pinch hitter)
June 2: 1-for-3, BB, K
June 3: Personal day off

Stanton is only ever the designated hitter, yet somehow he gets injured more than players who actually play in the field. Considering he has struck out in nine of 19 plate appearances, he has walked to the plate and back to the dugout to sit and wait for his next at-bat 47 percent of the time since returning from the IL. He hasn’t scored a run since coming off the IL, so he has yet to actually round the bases or truly run or run hard.

Stanton doesn’t look like a player who needs to rest, he looks like a player who needs at-bats, having gone 1-for-16 with three walks and nine strikeouts since returning from the IL.

Stanton is having another underwhelming season, hitting .259/.331/.814 and has missed a combined 17 games due to injury and personal days off.

9. Mike Ford is no longer a Yankee … again. Well, he’s still with the Yankees, just not a Yankee in terms of being a major leaguer.

On his last day as his most recent stint in the majors, at 3:45 p.m. the Yankees posted their lineup with Ford batting fifth. Ford entered the game 18-for-131 dating back to the beginning of 2020, but that didn’t stop Boone from batting him in the exact middle of the lineup and ahead of Gary Sanchez, Clint Frazier and Miguel Andujar. Ford went 0-for-3 with three strikeouts in the game, and at 11:55 p.m., the Yankees announced he had been sent down to Triple-A. Good enough to bat fifth for the Yankees at 3:45 p.m., not good enough to be a Yankee at 11:55 p.m.

This isn’t the first time the Yankees have done something like this. Last season, they did it all the time. In a game against the Rays last year, Andujar was used as a pinch hitter for Mike Tauchman with two outs in the bottom of the ninth. Andujar didn’t get on base, and after the game he was sent to the alternate site. Good enough to pinch hit in the ninth, not good enough to be on the team after pinch hitting.

It happened with Ford as well. Ford was sent down at the beginning of September last year, deemed not good enough to be a Yankee for the last month of the regular season. But there was Ford on the postseason roster, and there he was pinch hitting with the season on the line over both Sanchez and Frazier in Game 5. Not good enough to be a Yankee in September, good enough to pinch hit in October.

10. This weekend, the Yankees need to get back on track and need to continue to send the Red Sox where they belong and that’s one place above the Orioles in the AL East standings. The Red Sox have a very challenging schedule coming up, having just played the Astros, they play the Yankees, a make-up game against the Marlins, then the Astros again, the Blue Jays and Braves.

It’s time the Red Sox leave the AL East race and the AL East becomes the three-team race I expected it to be in 2021. The Yankees have the opportunity to do that this weekend.

Do I expect the Yankees to suddenly start hitting and scoring runs at even a mediocre rate? No. But I have no choice other than to think it might happen at some point.

Subscribe to the Keefe To The City Podcast. New episode after every game during the season.

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The Yankees spent the first three weeks of May erasing all the damage they did to themselves in April. They have spent the last week undoing the first three weeks of May. As June begins, the April Yankees are here.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. If you have watched every pitch of every Yankees game in 2021, well, first, I’m sorry, and second, you have given this horrible team 149 hours and 43 minutes of your life. That’s six days, five hours and 43 minutes you will never get back. I apologize for that realization.

2. The Yankees are in trouble. A lot of trouble. They were allowed a mulligan for their disastrous April because the Rays and Blue Jays also had bad opening months, and no one ran away with the division. That’s no longer the case. The Yankees have fallen apart again, losing six out of seven, and their recent play has coincided with the Rays winning 16 of 17. The Rays are now 5 1/2 games ahead of the Yankees.

The Yankees are very close to playing for a wild-card berth. A 5 1/2-game Rays lead isn’t a mirage, the way it would be if the Red Sox had a 5 1/2-game lead. Even if the Yankees were to win two of the three remaining games against the Rays in the current four-game series, they would only cut one game off the deficit, and three more games would have come off the schedule and three more head-to-head games at that. The math is starting to work against the Yankees and they are a bad rest of the week against the Rays and Red Sox from being buried for good in the division.

3. I would gladly sign up for the second wild-card berth if I were the Yankees right now. To win the division, they will have to outlast the Rays (who already have that 5 1/2-game lead) and the Blue Jays (who are 6-3 against the Yankees). Two of those three teams will be playing for a wild-card berth. Add in the Red Sox, possibly the Indians and one of the Astros and A’s, and that’s five teams for two spots. So yeah, today on June 1, I would sign up for the Yankees going on the road for one game and burning Gerrit Cole for Game 1 of the ALDS. That’s how badly things have turned for the Yankees.

4. Losing two out of three to the Blue Jays last week for the third time this season was bad, but losing all three games in Detroit to the Tigers was simply unacceptable. The Yankees have now scored two runs or less in nine of their last 12 games, which seems impossible to do, but they have done it.

“This is just a bad ending to a terrible weekend,” Aaron Boone said after Sunday’s loss. “And we’ve gotta get better.

Boone repeats himself a lot, but there’s no phrase he has used more in 202 than “we’ve gotta get better.” It was used daily in April and it’s made a comeback here over the last week with the offense’s season-long disappearing act.

No shit the team has to get better. The Yankees have now played 54 games and one-third of the season and have as many runs scored as the Orioles, who have lost 14 straight and are on pace for 110 losses, and 71 runs less than the Rays, who don’t have near the names or payroll for position players the Yankees have. The offense to get better and they have to get better now. I don’t mean “now” in general to the near future. I mean “now” as in today.

5. On Friday, Boone used Aroldis Chapman with the game tied 1-1 in the ninth. Chapman had recently been sick and hadn’t pitched in five days. He threw 14 pitches in a scoreless ninth, but wasn’t brought back out for the fifth. Instead, Justin Wilson came in for the 10th with the Yankees holding a one-run lead. Wilson blew the game, allowing a walk-off home run, his fourth home run allowed in 13 innings.

After the game, Meredith Marakovits asked Boone, “Did you give any consideration to using Chapman in the 10th?”

“No,” Boone bluntly answered.

No? NO? NO?!?!?!? How did you not even “consider” that option? Because it was asking him to throw more than 14 pitches? In Chapman’s previous 19 appearances this season, he has thrown more than 14 pitches in 10 of them. Was it because he would have to sit and then get back up? There’s zero evidence that leads to injury or a drop in performance. Because he was recently sick? So he’s healthy enough to pitch, just not more than 14 pitches because he was recently sick. Is that what the Yankees’ injury prevention strategy book says?

6. After Monday’s 3-1 loss to the Rays, Boone was asked about the offense not showing up again. He didn’t blame his offense for another embarrassing performance, instead choosing to tip his cap to Rays starter Rich Hill.

“Well, first, Hill obviously shut us down and was real pitch efficient there through five.”

Boone had the same compliments for Casey Mize and Spencer Turnbull of the Tigers. He similarly complimented Hill earlier in the year, along with Michael Wacha, Matt Harvey, Joe Ross, Jordan Lyles, Steven Matz and every other starter who seems to always have their best stuff against the Yankees. In reality, they are mediocre and the Yankees make them look great.

The magic number for opposing teams against the Yankees is four runs. Opponents are 20-5 against the Yankees when they score at least four runs because of the Yankees’ lack of offense. The Yankees struggle to scratch across three runs in most games (they have scored runs two runs or less in nine of their last 12 games) and four seems like 10 (they have only scored double-digit runs once in 54 games). The offense has pissed away and has lost four starts from Gerrit in which he allowed two earned runs or less.

The Yankees scored seven runs in three games against the Blue Jays and then five runs in three games against the Tigers. They followed that up with one run in the series opener against the Rays.

7. In The Office, David Wallace asked Michael Scott his business philosophy. Here was his answer:

“My philosophy is, basically this. And this is something that I live by. And I always have. And I always will. Don’t, ever, for any reason, do anything, to anyone, for any reason, ever, no matter what, no matter where, or who or who you are with, or where you are going, or where you’ve been. Ever. For any reason. Whatsoever.”

After losing for the seventh time in 10 games against the Rays, Lindsey Adler asked Aaron Boone what the Yankees’ offensive philosophy is. Here was his answer:

“When you get done with us in a series, you know even if you’ve had success on a given day, or success in a given series where a guy’s pitched really well, you know we want you to feel like it was heavy, it was difficult, it was a lot to get through us.”

There’s no difference in the two answers.

8. What was Boone’s evaluation of Jameson Taillon’s latest loss?

“I thought he threw the ball well,” Taillon said. “I thought overall, I thought he threw the ball pretty well, and I thought stuff-wise was good today.”

The term and stat “quality start” is shit. Three earned runs in six innings is shit. A 4.50 ERA is shit. But if it’s going to be used as a measuring stick then Taillon isn’t coming close to being average. He has gotten an out in the sixth inning in just one of his 10 starts and has recorded one “quality start” in 10 starts. He doesn’t give the Yankees length and the amount of innings he does give them aren’t any good.

How could anyone think Taillon threw the ball well? The Rays had baserunners the entire day. Boone loves to use the word “traffic” to describe runners on base, well, it looked like FDR Drive at a 5 p.m. on a Friday against Taillon. At least, Boone’s streak of thinking his starting pitcher had “good stuff” is still alive.

9. This weekend, Boone offered his opinion on what needs to change to turn things around.

“We haven’t mounted enough and scored enough runs to win ballgames and we’re certainly capable of it,” Boone said. “That starts with me and the coaching staff making sure we’re putting these guys in the best position to be successful.”

It shouldn’t be hard to fill out the Yankees’ lineup card, yet not a day goes by that Boone doesn’t leave his lineup to be second-guessed. One day Rougned Odor will bat second then the next day ninth then the next day out of the lineup. Brett Gardner will bat ninth … or leadoff … or third. Sometimes they will both play against a lefty, sometimes neither of them will. Mike Ford rarely plays, but when he does, he bats fifth. Gary Sanchez bats behind both Odor and Ford. Kyle Higashioka continues to get regular playing time. None of it makes sense.

Boone rarely, if ever, puts his position players in the best position to succeed. The same goes for his bullpen. The only person in the world who thought Wilson should pitch the 10th inning on Friday was Boone. I’m sure Wilson himself wondered what Boone was doing when he was told to start warming up. Boone used Nick Nelson earlier in the season as if he were Chad Green, the same way he used to use Jonathan Holder. He does this because is truly has no idea what he’s doing.

10. Boone continues this player or that player will be fine. He continues to say his team will hit and they have to be better. They are only empty promises with no urgency behind them.

With three games remaining against the Rays this week and then three against the Red Sox, if there isn’t going to be urgency now, there will never be.

Subscribe to the Keefe To The City Podcast. New episode after every game during the season.

My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!