Blogs – Page 86 – Keefe To The City

Sep 19, 2020

Yankees Thoughts: Yankees’ Good Luck Charm Cameron Is Here

My wife Brittni and I welcomed our first child Cameron this week, and he has never seen the Yankees lose a game and has never seen a Yankee get injured.

These thoughts are late. They were supposed to be posted after the Yankees swept the Blue Jays, but it’s been a busy week in the Keefe household where my wife Brittni and I welcomed our first child Cameron. I’m currently writing this on about five hours of total sleep over the last six days as this week has sort of just been one long day.

One thing that has helped with my lack of sleep between 20-minute naps has been the Yankees’ current nine-game winning streak. A week ago I was worried about the Yankees holding off the Orioles, Tigers and Mariners. Now I’m worried about them once again having home-field advantage for the best-of-3 wild-card series.

My son (when will that stop being weird to say?) has never seen the Yankees lose a game. Never. In his world, the Yankees are undefeated. All he has known are wins, record-setting home runs, making history and embarrassing the Red Sox at Fenway Park. I’m jealous.

Last season, I wrote the Off Day Dreaming blogs on every off day, but this season there aren’t many off days. There aren’t many games. So instead, I have decided to use the Off Day Dreaming format following each series. Yankees Thoughts will be posted after each series this season.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. I spent the majority of the week sleeping in a hospital chair and my back started to feel like Aaron Hicks’ after that 35-minute bus ride in spring training last year. I was able to quickly recover though, and my timeline wasn’t delayed by two-and-a-half months. I did manage to catch a quick nap in the actual hospital bed when the nurse briefly removed my wife from it, and in the moment, I would have signed off on a 10-year, $150 million deal for Tyler Wade for that nap. It was worth it. So worth it. Not only would I have been OK with a decade of Wade, I would have been OK with the Yankees retiring Nick Swisher’s number, giving him a monument in Monument Park and naming him manager.

Even as I was learning how to care for a newborn, changing my first diaper (I had been practicing on a stuffed animal, which is just a little easier than a human with no core melting down and crying) and trying to find the right amount of force for burping, I still managed to watch the Yankees-Blue Jays series. Those are the Yankees I thought we would see in 2020. Cameron Keefe hasn’t had to live in a world where Jordy Mercer is playing shortstop for the team with the highest payroll in the league. He hasn’t had to watch Michael King open a game, Luis Avilan try to protect a lead or Mike Ford bat third. He has only ever known winning and he has only ever known Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton as healthy and available players. What a world to live in.

2. Is Cameron the Yankees’ good luck charm? Since his birth, the Yankees are 4-0. They swept the Blue Jays on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and then beat the Red Sox on Friday. The Yankees outscored the Blue Jays 43-15 in the three games and then came back down four runs to improve to 8-0 against the Red Sox this season. I think he is.

3. Since Cameron was born on Monday night, the Yankees have gotten completely healthy. On Thursday, the Yankees had their first day of the 2020 season in which no players were on the 10-day disabled list. With newest Yankees fan Cameron in the world, the Yankees returned Judge, Stanton and Gio Urshela from the injured list. The Yankees are at full strength, which is something I never thought they would be this season.

4. Cameron’s birth has coincided with Aaron Boone finally figuring out how to create a lineup. On Friday, Boone put together this lineup:

DJ LeMahieu, 2B
Aaron Judge, RF
Giancarlo Stanton, DH
Luke Voit, 1B
Gleyber Torres, SS
Aaron Hicks, CF
Gio Urshela, 3B
Gary Sanchez, C
Clint Frazier, LF

It’s not perfect and I would make a few adjustments, but compared to what Boone ususally comes up with when the Yankees are healthy, it’s night and day. I’m proud of Boone. Maybe he is growing as a manager. Judge and Stanton batting back-to-back is something I expected to see for many years, and then the Yankees scrapped it early in Stanton’s Yankees’ tenure deciding it would be a good idea to separate their best hitters with Hicks or Brett Gardner. I’m happy to see Boone and the analytics department have come to their senses. (There’s a good chance that lineup will only be used against left-handed pitching and I will have to retract my praise for Boone.)

5. Cameron has been around for four games and he has already seen history as the Yankees hit 19 home runs over a three-game span, which had never been done in major league history. On top of that, the Yankees homered five times in an inning on Thursday, something no Yankees team has ever done.

6. As President of the Gary Sanchez Fan Club, I have long defended the oft-criticized Yankees catcher. I have gone out of my way to support a player who was hitting .127/.243/.322 through Sunday. Since Cameron was born on Sept. 14, Sanchez is 6-for-18 with two doubles, three home runs and nine RBIs. His double on Friday night ignited the Yankees’ comeback and his game-tying home run with two outs in the bottom of the ninth saved the game and their winning streak. Sanchez is batting .333/.368/.944 with Cameron here and looks like 2016-17 Sanchez. He can thank Cameron for that 1.313 OPS.

7. I don’t care about individual awards, except for the batting title. My care for the batting title comes from growing up needing to watch every Derek Jeter at-bat and needing to check the box score to see what he did in any games I missed. I was disappointed when DJ LeMahieu was unable to become the first player in history to win the batting title in both leagues last season after Tim Anderson won it despite missing 40 games. This season, though, LeMahieu is right there once again to accomplish the feat, and once again he will need to fend off Anderson to do so. Since Cameron was born, LeMahieu is 9-for-18 and leads Anderson .367 to .365 in the batting race. In addition to the .500 average over the last four games, LeMahieu has hit four doubles and four home runs with 10 RBIs to go with four walks. LeMahieu is awesome and an MVP candidate and was so before Sept. 14, but his game seems to have gone to another level since then.

8. The Yankees could win the next five World Series and Brian Cashman could retire some day with 10 rings as general manager, and trading Chasen Shreve and Giovanny Gallegos for Luke Voit and international bonus slot money will go down as the pinnacle of his front office career. Voit has had a glorious season and has been one of the season-long bright spots for the Yankees. But since Sept. 14? 7-for-19 (.368), one double, four home runs and 10 RBIs. Voit now leads the majors with 20 home runs and is on a 69-home run, 162-game pace.

9. I was a month old when my biggest fear came true: a Mets-Red Sox World Series. It’s a Yankees’ fan’s nightmare. There are no positive outcomes. One team has to win. Thankfully, I don’t have memories of it, and thankfully, it hasn’t happened again. I’m sure as a Yankees fan my dad was disappointed for his second son’s first World Series to be between the two most hated teams. Cameron will be spared the same matchup this October with the Red Sox having been eliminated in the first week of the season and the Mets having had another Mets season.

10. Winning in September is fun and all, but winning in October is what matters. Right now, Cameron thinks his father is always happy watching baseball and that the team in home pinstripes or with “New York” written across their chest on their road gray uniforms always wins. Well, he would think that if he knew I wasn’t just a guy who brings him a bottle when he cries and struggles to change his clothes or if he knew what baseball was or if he knew what pinstripes were or if he could read.

Cameron will be in for a rude awakening in 10 days when the real season begins and when the guy who brings him bottles when he cries and struggles to change his clothes is no longer enjoying the colorful lights on the black rectangle on the wall. He will be surprised when the laughter of the Yankees going back-to-back-to-back against Blue Jays pitching is replaced with fear when the opposing team gets the leadoff runner on in any inning.

Cameron is a Yankees fan. He was born into it. Here’s to him experiencing as much winning being one as I have.

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Subscribe to the Keefe To The City Podcast. New episodes after every game throughout the season.

***

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

Blogs • Giants • NFL • NFL Picks

Sep 17, 2020

NFL Week 2 Picks

This week has been wild, so the picks are going to be short and sweet, which doesn’t leave much for me to congratulate myself on a 8-7-1 start to the season.

This week has been wild, so the picks are going to be short and sweet, which doesn’t leave much for me to congratulate myself on an 8-7-1 start to the season. Week 2 is the hardest week of the entire season because everything you thought you knew about the league’s 32 teams was likely changed in Week 1 and now you only have one week of information to base your opinions and picks on.

(Home team in caps)

CLEVELAND -6 over Cincinnati
If the Browns can blow out the Bengals at home on a short week then it’s going to be another long season for them.

NEW YORK GIANTS +5 over Chicago
Can the Giants avoid 0-2 for the fourth straight season and the seventh time in the last nine? I doubt it. But I think they can keep the game close enough to possibly pull of an upset.

San Francisco -7 over NEW YORK JETS
There will be a time this season when the line gets so high that I will have to pick the Jets to cover. We aren’t there yet.

Atlanta +5.5 over DALLAS
We might see a 7-9 team could out of the NFC East this season. The Giants, Eagles and Cowboys all lost in Week 1 with only the Redskins winning. The Giants and Washington Football Team will likely lose in Week 2, the Eagles could lose and the Cowboys could as well. The Giants could be 0-2 and be a 1/2 game out of first. Go Falcons!

MINNESOTA +3.5 over Indianapolis
Kirk Cousins is so unbelievably bad that he has to be the most overpaid athlete relative to performance. The Vikings’ window might have already close, but I’m willing to give them another week for me to find that out.

TAMPA BAY -8 over Carolina
I would like to know how many times Tom Brady has lost back-to-back games. I could look it up, but I know it’s a low number. It might be even once. It’s not happening here.

Rams +1.5 over PHILADELPHIA
The Eagles blew a 17-0 lead to Washington and cost me a four-team parlay. I still hadn’t learned that you can’t trust the Eagles, but now I know.

Buffalo -6.5 over MIAMI
The Bills’ defense is enough for me to possibly not pick against them all season.

GREEN BAY -6.5 over Detroit
The Lions blew yet another game under Matt Patricia and the Packers continued where they left off last season after going to the NFC Championship Game. Per usual, I have a hard time believing in the Lions.

PITTSBURGH -6.5 over Denver
The Broncos aren’t good. That’s all.

TENNESSEE -7.5 over Jacksonville
I really like the Titans. I would like them more if Ryan Tannehill weren’t their quarterback, but Mike Vrabel (my favorite head coach in the league) has turned him into an actual quarterback and an actual threat. The Titans’ defense against Gardner Minshew seems almost too easy.

Arizona -7 over WASHINGTON
I like this Cardinals team and I like them even more after their upset win on the road over the 49ers. As for Washington, they cost me a monetary win last week, but they hand the Eagles an all-important divisional loss if the Giants are ever able to compete for a postseason berth this season.

Kansas City -8.5 over LOS ANGELES CHARGERS
There will never be a day when I pick Tyrod Taylor to cover a spread against Patrick Mahomes. The Chiefs could be -28 and I would take them and would be fine with losing the pick if they didn’t cover.

Baltimore -6.5 over HOUSTON
I won’t be picking the Texans to cover against any even somewhat decent team this season. Against a Super Bowl contender? Nope.

New England +4 over SEATTLE
It’s so weird to see Cam Newton in a Patriots uniform and not see Brady as their quarterback. It will never not be weird. It’s also weird to see the Patriots as much as four-point underdogs.

New Orleans -5.5 over LAS VEGAS
I hate picking Saints games. I either pick them to cover and they screw me, or I go against them and they screw me. After last week’s win I don’t have a choice.

Last week: 8-7-1

Blogs • Yankees • Yankees Thoughts

Sep 14, 2020

Yankees Thoughts: Yankees Finally Playing Like Yankees Again

After five straight wins, the Yankees finally look like the team that was once 10 games above .500 with the best record in baseball.

Three days ago, the Yankees were barely better than the Orioles. They were barely better than the Tigers or Mariners. They were a .500 team hanging on to the eigth and final postseason spot. After five straight wins, they finally look like the team that was once 10 games above .500 with the best record in baseball.

Last season, I wrote the Off Day Dreaming blogs on every off day, but this season there aren’t many off days. There aren’t many games. So instead, I have decided to use the Off Day Dreaming format following each series. Yankees Thoughts will be posted after each series this season.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. This weekend clinched the Yankees a postseason berth. No, not officially, and no, they shouldn’t start giving multiple players unnecessary rest per game again, but the Yankees are going to the postseason. At 26-21, the Yankees have 13 games remaining. If they were to play under .500 baseball and go 6-7 (.462), they would finish at 32-28. To pass them, the Mariners would have to go 11-3 (.786), the Orioles would have to go 13-2 (.867) and the Tigers would have to go 13-2 (.867) as well. Yes, the Yankees could only win six of their 13 remaining games given their inconsistent play this season, but it’s unlikely with six games left against the Red Sox and Marlins. It’s even more unlikely any of those three teams would win at their needed rates if the Yankees were to go 6-7.

2. The Yankees’ five-game winning streak has them a 1/2 game back of the Blue Jays for second in the AL East and an automatic postseason berth. It has also moved them ahead of the Indians and into seventh place in the AL postseason standings. As of now, the Blue Jays would be the 5-seed and play the 4-seed Twins. The Yankees would be the 7-seed and play 2-seed Rays. I don’t think any Yankees fans needs to be told the difference in magnitude in playing a best-of-3 against the Twins versus playing a best-of-3 against the Rays.

3. It’s still impossible to know which seed to root for the Yankees since the postseason standings change daily, though if I had to rank the seven other AL teams in order of which I want the Yankees to most play to least play, it would go like this:

Twins
White Sox
Blue Jays
Indians
Astros
A’s
Rays

Nothing needs to be said about the Twins. I don’t care that the White Sox are currently in first place in the AL. They’re not the best team in the AL and they’re certainly not the best built or the most feared. They have a solid rotation, an OK bullpen and a free-swinging lineup. The Blue Jays’ pitching sucks. After those three teams, I wouldn’t feel confident against any of the other four.

4. Supposedly, Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton will return next week, in time to get a week’s worth of at-bats before the postseason. How much a week’s worth of at-bats will be is unknown since I could see the Yankees playing them on alternating days as the designated hitter in the organization’s latest attempt to prevent injuries. When asked on Sunday about how the return of Judge and Stanton will affect Clint Frazier, Boone said, “I think Clint is very much in the mix.” What? “Very much in the mix?” Frazier is the mix. He has been the one that has actually played this season. He has been the one that has stayed healthy. He has been the one that carried the offense along with DJ LeMahieu and Luke Voit.

5. As I said last week, if Frazier doesn’t play because two guys who never play finally return, I will actively root against the Yankees. That’s not a joke. I will root as hard as I normally do for them to win, for them to lose. I will go as far as to buy apparel for whichever team they face in the playoffs if I have to.

6. If Judge and Stanton do come back (and I will believe they are back when I see them playing in real games), the Yankees will have some lineup decisions to make. They’re not hard decisions to make. At least not to me. However, I could see the Yankees struggling to make these decisions and inevitably making the wrong decisions.

7. This should be the Yankees’ postseason lineup if the entire offense is healthy:

DJ LeMahieu, 2B
Aaron Judge, RF
Luke Voit, 1B
Gleyber Torres, SS
Giancarlo Stanton, DH
Clint Frazier, LF
Aaron Hicks, CF
Gary Sanchez, C
Gio Urshela, 3B

But I think the Yankes will either do this:

DJ LeMahieu, 2B
Aaron Judge, RF
Luke Voit, 1B
Giancarlo Stanton, DH
Aaron Hicks, CF
Gleyber Torres, SS
Clint Frazier, LF
Gary Sanchez, C
Gio Urshela, 3B

Or this:

DJ LeMahieu, 2B
Aaron Judge, RF
Aaron Hicks, CF
Luke Voit, 1B
Giancarlo Stanton, DH
Gleyber Torres, SS
Clint Frazier, LF
Gary Sanchez, C
Gio Urshela, 3B

A left-handed hitter doesn’t need to bat third. I repeat: A left-handed hitter doesn’t need to bat third.

8. I know it doesn’t mean much, but Gary Sanchez’s at-bats have been much better the last few games. It has nothing to do with his two-game benching since he looked horrible immediately after that. He has looked more confident at the plate, is drawing walks, and the outs he puts in play seem to be rockets lined right at fielders. Sanchez can’t finish the shortened season with respectable numbers. All he can do now is focus on having the best possible postseason he can have because everyone gets a clean slate in October, and a big October from Sanchez will make all of his critics forget and forgive his regular season.

9. It was nice to see Gerrit Cole pitch like Gerrit Cole on Friday. I said on the Yankees Podcast on Friday that Cole needed to go out and pitch all seven innings of the first game of the doubleheader, and he did just (7 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 9 K), dominating the Orioles in a game the Yankees had to win. The win was Cole’s fifth of the season and the seven shutout innings lowered his ERA to a more Cole-like 3.20. It’s going to be tough for him to cover my preseason prediction that he would have a sub-2.50 ERA this season since he will only get two more regular-season starts, but I don’t care about that. I care about him building off this start and continuing to pitch like that before he gets the ball in Game 1 of the best-of-3.

10. J.A. Happ can keep pitching the way he pitched against the Blue Jays and the Orioles and it doesn’t matter, he’s not getting a postseason start. He can’t get a postseason start. Under no circumstances is he getting a postseason start. Shutting down the Orioles is nice. Who would feel good about Happ against the offenses of the White Sox, Astros or A’s? Cole in Game 1, Masahiro Tanaka in Game 2 and Deivi Garcia in Game 3. As of now, that’s what it has to be.

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Subscribe to the Keefe To The City Podcast. New episodes after every game throughout the season.

***

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

Blogs • Yankees • Yankees Thoughts

Sep 10, 2020

Yankees Thoughts: Deivi Garcia Is Yankees’ Best Pitcher

The Yankees finally won a game. All it took was a 21-year-old starting pitcher who hadn’t appeared in a major league game 12 days ago to prevent the team from falling under .500 for the first time this season.

The Yankees finally won a game. All it took was a 21-year-old starting pitcher who hadn’t appeared in a major league game 12 days ago to prevent the team from falling under .500 for the first time this season.

Last season, I wrote the Off Day Dreaming blogs on every off day, but this season there aren’t many off days. There aren’t many games. So instead, I have decided to use the Off Day Dreaming format following each series. Yankees Thoughts will be posted after each series this season.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. After benching Gary Sanchez didn’t work to end the Yankees’ losing streak and Brian Cashman traveling with the team didn’t work to end the Yankees’ losing streak and a team meeting didn’t work to end the Yankees’ losing streak, it ended up being Deivi Garcia that did work to end the Yankees’ losing streak. Garcia is the Yankees’ best pitcher. That’s not an exaggeration. Right now, he’s the team’s best pitcher. It’s certainly not Gerrit Cole, who has lost three straight starts and has allowed more home run than any other pitcher in the league. You could make a case for Masahiro Tanaka, but he only just started to give the Yankees any length in his starters. And obviously it’s not Jordan Montgomery, J.A. Happ or Michael King.

Aside from watching DJ LeMahieu try to win a batting title, Luke Voit become one of the best hitters in baseball and Clint Frazier finally put his entire game together, Garcia has been the only other part of the Yankees worth watching this season, and he’s only made three starts. In 17 2/3 innings, he has struck out 18 against just two walks and has looked every bit as good as I hoped he would if he ever made it to the Yankees without getting traded first.

If the Yankees reach the postseason (again I can’t believe not making it is a possibiliy), Garcia has to get the ball in Game 3 (if the Yankees are able to reach a third game of the postseason). Cole will get the ball for Game 1 and Tanaka for Game 2, but there’s no other option in Game 3. Screw James Paxton if he comes back. I don’t want him anywhere near the mound in the postseason. He wasn’t good before he got hurt and now he’s being rushed back and will at best could be an opener. No thank you. Montgomery hasn’t been nearly good enough, and Happ and King would be lucky to even be on the postseason roster.

I knew I would be excited to see a new Yankees pitcher pitch every five days in 2020, I just thought it was going to be Cole, not Garcia.

2. Aaron Boone’s genius plan to bench Sanchez didn’t fix the Yankees’ problems, stop their losing streak or help Sanchez. The Yankees benched Sanchez for two games, scapegoating him for their issues, and they still went 0-2 as part of their five-game losing streak. Since Sanchez has come back, he’s gone 0-for-7 with a walk. It’s almost as if sitting on the bench and not getting at-bats doesn’t help a former star player break out of a horrendous slump. Who could have known?

Like everyone, I wish I knew what was wrong with Sanchez other than the fact he clearly can’t catch up to middle-middle fastballs or recognize a breaking ball. If Sanchez had always hit like this, it would be easy to chalk it up as a typical catcher who can’t hit since almost all of them can’t hit. But everyone knows Sanchez can hit, or used to be able to hit. He hit 53 home runs in 175 games over 2016 and 2017, batting .284/.354/.568. After a rough 2018 regular season (.697 OPS), he single-handedly won the only game of the 2018 ALDS that the Yankees won with a two-home run performance. Last season, he struggled to hit for average (.232) and get on base (.316), but he still managed an .841 OPS with 34 home runs. I don’t know that we’ll ever see 2016-17 Sanchez again, but can we at least get 2019 Sanchez?

3. You might never see an inning as bad as the sixth inning on Monday from the Yankees ever again. The Yankees had a four-run lead and all of their “elite” relievers completely rested.

Chad Green entered for the sixth, and for the third time in two weeks, he didn’t have it. After two walks, a single and a Voit error, the Blue Jays had cut the Yankees’ lead to 6-3 and had the bases loaded and one out. Boone pulled Green and turned to Adam Ottavino, and he didn’t have it either. Ottavino faced six batters and didn’t retire any of them. Three singles, two walks and a grand slam later against Ottavino and the Blue Jays had a 12-6 lead in what was a 10-run inning.

Green and Ottavino combined to produce this line: 0.1 IP, 5 H, 10 R, 9 ER, 4 BB, 0 K, 1 HR. The Blue Jays didn’t swing-and-miss at any of their 58 pitches.

4. I was scared the Yankees were going to blow their lead on Wednesday night as well, but thankfully, Zack Britton and Aroldis Chapman managed to pitch a scoreless eighth and ninth respectively to end the five-game losing streak. I don’t trust anyone in the Yankees’ bullpen right now, but if I had to give my Level of Trust Rankings on a scale of 1-10, this would be it:

Zack Britton: 7.1
Chad Green: 6.4
Aroldis Chapman: 5.8
Adam Ottavino: 3.7

That’s it. No one else is even good enough to make this list. I purposely didn’t put Clarke Schmidt as an option because he’s not a reliever and doesn’t belong coming out of the bullpen.

5. I guess Schmidt (the Yankees’ top pitching prospect) is now the mop-up man on this awful team? That’s how Schmidt was used in his second career appearance, asked to clean up the mess left by Green and Ottavino. Rather than let Schmidt start, which is basically all he has known as a professional pitcher, the Yankees would rather continue to start Happ, who should have run out of chances to start a long, long, long time ago, or King who isn’t any good, having allowed eight earned runs in 10 2/3 innings as a starter and never going more than four innings and giving the team length.

You would think by now the Yankees’ rotation would include both Garcia and Schmidt, but nope. The Yankees want to continue to pitch Happ because of money owed and want to continue to let King start because of … I have no idea why they want to continue to let King start. Maybe at some point this season Schmidt will get to show why he’s the top-ranked pitching prospect in the organization and even higher than Garcia. I just hope it’s not too late before he’s given that chance.

6. Mike Tauchman can’t play anymore. He just can’t. For as good as Tauchman was last season for six weeks, he’s been that bad this season, looking every bit like the player the Rockies gave up on. He has a .647 OPS and five extra-base hits (all doubles) in 95 plate appearances. I have the same amount of home runs as Tauchman this season. On top of his lack of production, his baseball IQ is horrible as he frequently makes awful decisions on the bases and at the plate, whether he’s trying to advance a base on balls in front of him or swinging at 3-1 pitches high and away after the pitcher walked the previous three batters.

I’m sick of seeing Tauchman in the lineup. The only way he should play is if one of Frazier, Aaron Hicks or Brett Gardner is injured.

7. This should be the Yankees’ lineup every night with their current roster:

DJ LeMahieu, 3B
Luke Voit, 1B
Gleyber Torres, SS
Clint Frazier, RF
Miguel Andujar, DH
Aaron Hicks, CF
Gary Sanchez, C
Brett Gardner, LF
Thairo Estrada (preferably)/Tyler Wade, 2B

Unfortunately, Boone would never allow for five right-handed hitters in a row at the top of the lineup, and he would never allow for three of the last four hitters potentially being left-handed. He certainly wouldn’t hit two lefties back-to-back if Gardner were eighth and Wade were playing and ninth. But that’s what the lineup should be.

8. If the Yankees ever get healthy, this is what the lineup should always be:

DJ LeMahieu, 2B
Aaron Judge, RF
Gleyber Torres, SS
Luke Voit, 1B
Giancarlo Stanton, DH
Clint Frazier, LF
Aaron Hicks, CF
Gio Urshela, 3B
Gary Sanchez, C

9. The Yankees were once 16-6. Now they’re 22-21. They were once in first place in the AL East. Now they’re in third place. They were once the 1-seed in the AL playoffs. Now they’re the 8-seed. The Yankees have fallen apart this season to the point that I’m watching the Orioles’ and Tigers’ scores as much as I’m watching the Yankees. I said the Orioles and Tigers! Do you know ridiculous that is? The Orioles lost 108 games last season and the Tigers lost 114, and somehow a year later, the 103-win Yankees are playing at their level. It’s disgusting.

10. I didn’t think a four-game series in September against the Orioles would be a crucial series for the postseason, but here we are as if it’s 2012. There’s 17 games left, and the Yankees need to win all of them. Had they played with urgency earlier in the season when they were OK with giving away games in Philadelphia and Tampa, they wouldn’t be hanging on to dear life for the final postseason berth in the AL. But the Yankees chose to treat a 60-game season like a 162-game season and the injuries piled up in this 60-game season like they did in last year’s 162-game season and the “Next Man Up” mantra was greatly exposed.

The Yankees have to find a way to hold off the Orioles and Tigers and simultaneously get healthy over the next 20 days. The current team should be good enough to win enough to remain in a postseason spot until the everyday lineup is available. The current team, however, isn’t good enough to compete in October, and if the Yankees don’t get healthy and don’t get Judge and Urshela back (I gave up on Stanton coming back long ago), they aren’t going anywhere in the postseason.

***

Subscribe to the Keefe To The City Podcast. New episodes after every game throughout the season.

***

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

Blogs

Sep 10, 2020

NFL Week 1 Picks

The first week of football is special. Keeping up with the games, parlays, teasers and fantasy teams all at once, while drinking and eating thousands of bad calories for nearly 11 straight hours 17 times a year is magical.

Football is back, and it’s weird. Baseball began less than two months ago, and my brain is telling me we’re not even one-third of the way through the baseball season, so it’s hard to process the idea that football begins this week. For nearly four months, there weren’t any sports, and now all four major sports are active.

With the beginning of football, my seasonal depression also begins. The fact it’s getting cold at night and the temperatures have started to fluctuate enough from day to day that I will have to actually check the weather to see what I should be wearing saddens me. I hate that summer is over. I hate it. But like every year at this time, I’m happy that football is back.

The first week of football is special and the anxiousness at 1:00 p.m. on the first Sunday of the season is indescribable. Keeping up with the games, parlays, teasers and fantasy teams all at once, while drinking and eating thousands of bad calories for nearly 11 straight hours 17 times a year is magical.

In order to avoid a down week from a financial standpoint I have come up with some personal gambling rules to prevent any emotional or illogical decisions this season.

1. Don’t Be Tricked by Week 1
Week 1 is my favorite week to pick and wager on because your decision making is based on your own knowledge and feel for how the season will play out. Week 2, on the other hand, is a reaction and a lot of times an overreaction to what happened in Week 1. (If I could, I would sit out Week 2. I guess I technically could sit out Week 2, but we all know that’s not going to happen.)

I spend the entire offseason coming up with an opinion on each team, and then Week 1 happens, and some of those opinions, and at times a lot of those opinions, are destroyed or proved wrong. Except they aren’t.

Don’t let the results of Week 1 influence your original opinions on teams for Week 2. The Week 2 lines are the most reactive lines of the season because there is only one game of information to go off of.

I need to set a calendar reminder to read this paragraph when I write the Week 2 picks blog.

2. Be Careful with Thursday Night Football
It’s not so much about Thursday Night Football in September and October as it is in November and December when baseball is over and the time between Monday Night Football and Thursday Night Football feels like an eternity.

The Thursday Night Football game generally sucks. Generally might be too generous. It sucks nearly every single week. The Opening Night Thursday game doesn’t count and neither do the Thanksgiving games since those are unlike the other Thursday games. When it comes to the Thursday game, just because there hasn’t been a game on on in 72 hours, it doesn’t mean it needs to be wagered on.

3. Beware of the Bs
Last season, I said “Beware of the Non-Bears Bs” after their 2018 season. A lot of good that did me. The Bears are back with the rest of the Bs in not being able to be trusted.

The Bears, Browns, Bengals, Buccaneers, Broncos and Bills are not your friend. Don’t get enticed by any high-point spread or any glowing money line. The Bears are still starting Mitch Trubisky. The Browns … well, they’re the Browns no matter what offensive names they have. The Bengals have a rookie quarterback. The Bucs have tried to build a Pro Bowl team from a few seasons ago. The Broncos are nowhere close to being good. And the Bills are expected to win the AFC East and contend for a championship, and the only thing worse than believing in the Bills is believing in a Bills team that has expectations for the first time since the ’90s.

4. Don’t Bet on the Giants
I have had some memorable runs with the Giants, especially their money lines over the years, but we are long past the point of where I have lost money overall on the Giants. Long past the point. If the point is Mischa Barton on The OC in 2003 then I’m Mischa Barton on The Hills.

I’m over thinking the Giants are going to be good or are going to eventually be good each week. I’m over it. I need to accept the Giants aren’t going to be good and need to realize no one really knows the next time they will be good. They have reached the playoffs once in eight years, and as a Giants fan, I need to expect the worst each week and not let inexplicable turnovers, undisciplined penalties and nonsensical in-game coaching decisions affect my life. I need to treat the Giants the way they have treated me in all but two years over the last 13 years: like I don’t care.

On top of this all, I need to somehow talk myself into thinking John Mara and David Gettleman have any idea what they’re doing and won’t further separate the Giants from contention. I need to talk myself into believing in Daniel Jones, the rest of Gettleman’s draft picks and the vision he has about building a team around a running back in a league which has drastically changed every rule to promote and help the passing game. I need to believe that the third time’s really a charm and that the organization finally got the head coach right in Joe Judge in their third try since unnecessarily moving on from Tom Coughlin

I won’t be betting on the Giants in 2020 because I’m suspending myself from betting on the Giants for all of 2020. (As a remminder, can someone please send me that last sentence every 15 minutes up until the Giants’ Week 1 kickoff?)

(Home team in caps)

KANSAS CITY -9 over Houston
Fans or no fans, a full Arrowhead Stadium or limited capacity, it’s always hard to pick against the Chiefs at home. Add in them raising their championship banner, it being the first game of the season and the fact the Texans couldn’t stop them in the playoffs and have only gotten worse since then and this game is a lay-up.

BALTIMORE -7.5 over Cleveland
I’m a little scared of the Browns’ offense actually putting it together with Baker Mayfield, Odell Beckham, Jarvis Landry and Nick Chubb. But Mayfield has shown nothing to suggest he will be anything other than average in the league and your quarterback can’t be average when playing at Baltimore. If you’re Progressive, you can’t feel good about how much money you have dumped into Mayfield for your commercials. If I’m a prospective customer looking for an insurance provider, I have to cross Progressive off the list because they have Mayfield as the face of their company and the last thing you want is mediorcre insurance coverage. Until Mayfield proves he’s not the latest first-overall bust, I can’t get myself to back the Browns.

Indianapolis -8 over JACKSONVILLE
I was an Indianapolis believer last season after the run the team went on the season before. I wrongfully thought the drop off from Andrew Luck to Jacoby Brissett wouldn’t be as significant as it was, and my picks and bank account paid for it. The Colts were bad (7-9) and Brissett’s play forced the Colts to sign Philip Rivers. While I don’t trust Rivers at all, and don’t trust him to cover an eight-point spread in the first game with his new team, I trust the Jaguars less. This will be the last chance I give Frank Reich after his team burned me in the 2018 playoffs against the Texans and last season with their horrific play. If the Colts can’t go into Jacksonville and beat up on a very bad Jaguars team, I’m done with them.

Philadelphia -6 over WASHINGTON
There’s no good pick here. Either I picked the hated Eagles and they screw me the way they did in last season’s opener when they trailed Washington 17-0 in the second quarter and 20-7 at halftime before coming back to win 32-27, or I pick the hated Washington Football Team and I’m quickly reminded why you don’t pick Dwayne Haskins to cover a spread. The only answer is to go with the better team, and hope they are a touchdown better.

BUFFALO -6.5 over New York Jets
If the Jets are as bad as everyone thinks they will be and the Bills are as good as everyone thinks they will be, this might be the easiest game of the week.

NEW ENGLAND -7 over Miami
I always thought Bill Belichick would walk away from coaching when Tom Brady retired, for fear of not winning with Brady and for the grind of starting over, but that was without ever thinking Brady would play for another team. Once Brady left, Belichick had to stay. He had to stay to put a dent in Brady’s legacy. If Belichick can win with Cam Newton and a Patriots roster depleted by opt-outs, it will futher prove Belichick is the best coach in the history of the league and it will also prove he has been the most important part of the Patriots’ dyntasy and not Brady.

DETROIT -2.5 over Chicago
The second Matt Nagy named Trubisky as his starting quarterback, I knew who I was picking in this game.

MINNESOTA -2.5 over Green Bay
I think the Vikings missed their window of opportunity to win it all. If the window hasn’t closed, this season is likely their last chance to get to the Super Bowl with the current group, or what’s left of it after they turned over most of their defense. Following the NFC Championship debacle against the Eagles, the Vikings greatly overpaid for Kirk Cousins. It’s not Cousins’ fault the front office idiotically gave him a $96 million contract over three years, which has produced a season in which the team missed the playoffs completely and then were routed by the 49ers in the playoffs the following years. It’s that Cousins isn’t good, and he has done more harm than good for the Vikings. Maybe this season he can prove his contract wasn’t the worst investment the team could have made at the worst possible time.

ATLANTA -1 over Seattle
Ah, the battle of the two idiots who each single-handedly gave the Patriots a Super Bowl win as head coaches of their respective teams. I hate both teams and I hate both head coaches. Give me the home team.

Las Vegas -3 over CAROLINA
The best thing to ever happen to the Giants was the Panthers overpaying Matt Rhule and taking the Giants out of the equation. If Judge sucks, the Giants can look for the next guy as they continue to try to find a rightful heir to Coughlin. When you give a coach a six-year, $60 million deal like the Panthers gave Rhule, you better hope you picked the right guy because there’s no getting out of that. The Panthers aren’t going to eat that money if Rhule is a disaster, and I think he’s going to be a disaster. Giving a first-time NFL head coach and a moderately successful college head coach that kind of money is dumb.

Los Angeles Chargers -3 over CINCINNATI
I don’t care that the Chargers are starting Tyrod Taylor, even though the right play is to play Justin Herbert from the beginning. I’m sure four or five weeks into the season, Taylor will be on the bench, and the Chargers will have wasted a month or more valuable game experience Herbert could have gained. From a developmental standpoint, it’s a bad decision. From a picks decision, it’s a good one.

NEW ORLEANS -3.5 over Tampa Bay
I don’t want the Saints to beat the Buccaneers in Week 1, I want them to humilate them. I want the happy-go-lucky Brady Bucs to come crashing back to reality with the Saints running them out of the Superdome. Ultimately, I don’t want either Belichick or Brady to experience anymore success. For this week, let’s start with Brady getting knocked down adn then the attention can be turned to knocking Belichick down (though Newton might do that all by himself).

Arizona +6.5 over SAN FRANISCO
I can’t get the thought of picking against the the 49ers, who were the NFC’s best seven months ago, out of my head. I also can’t get the thought of Kyler Murray, DeAndre Hopkins and Larry Fitzgerald having their way with the 49ers’ defense. It’s extremely difficult to be great in back-to-back seasons in the NFL let alone repeat as conference champions in back-to-back seasons. I think the 49ers could regress this season, though that might just be the part of me that remembers watching Kyle Shanahan continuously call for passing plays with the Falcons holding a 25-point lead in the Super Bowl. I want the 49ers to be bad under Shanahan, and so I will root for that outcome.

LOS ANGELES RAMS +2 over Dallas
This season of Hard Knocks made me dislike the Rams more than I did after their vaunted offense no-showed in the Super Bowl against the Patriots and scored three points. For as much as HBO made me not like the Rams and their coaching staff, it could never make me dislike them more than the Cowboys.

NEW YORK GIANTS +6 over Pittsburgh
I’m very worried about this line because the Steelers aren’t any good and they’re giving six points to the Giants on the road. That’s not a good sign for the new-look Giants. It’s not a good sign for me as a Giants fan who wants the team to get back to the postseason for the second time in nine years. It’s a new season and I can’t pick against the Giants and turn on them yet. I will at least wait until they’re 0-2 (like they always are) to do that.

TENNESSEE -3 over Denver
I hated Mike Vrabel as a player. Vrabel as a head coach though? Well, that’s a different story. Between turning Ryan Tannehill into a viable NFL starter, ending the Brady-Belichick era, outsmarting Belichick with his run-down-the-clock play in the postseason, and knocking off both the Patriots and Ravens to reach the conference championship with essentially only a running back on offense, I have grown to love Vrabel. I wish he could be the head coach of the Giants. Unfortunately, I’m stuck with needing the Giants to have finally picked right with Judge.

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