The Yankees played a series against the Blue Jays, and that means the Yankees lost a series since they can’t seem to beat the Blue Jays in 2021. It was the Yankees’ first series loss in their last 10, but it came as no surprise as the offense once again failed to show up.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. Goodbye, Corey Kluber. After straining a shoulder muscle in his first start following his no-hitter, Kluber won’t throw for four weeks. That brings us to the end of June. Then he will need about four to six weeks to get built up to return. That brings us to the beginning or middle of August. That’s if everything goes right.

Seeing how Kluber pitched one inning last season before suffering a shoulder injury which needed surgery coupled with the Yankees’ history of properly diagnosing, treating and handling injuries and I would say there’s a better chance Kluber doesn’t throw another pitch in 2021 than there that he returns sometime in August. It’s unfortunate because Kluber had looked like his former Cy Young-winning self over his previous five starts, but this was always a risk in signing the 35-year-old Kluber coming off his last two seasons.

2. Kluber’s injury opens the door for Deivi Garcia to join a rotation he should have been in to begin the season. This should be Garcia’s job moving forward. Not Michael King. Not an opener. Garcia and Garcia only. Garcia proved himself last season and the Blue Jays proved on Thursday afternoon what happens when you give your high-end prospects a chance at the major league level: they just might succeed.

3. Alek Manoah became the latest starting pitcher to shut down the Yankees, and he shut down the entire lineup except for Miguel Andujar, who was able to get a broken-bat single and a blooper to fall in. 6 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 7 K.

When the Blue Jays announced they would be calling up Manoah to face the Yankees, there was a story on MLB.com essentially saying that while Manoah had dominated in three Triple-A starts this season, Triple-A isn’t Yankee Stadium. Well, it might as well be. Because you can add Manoah and his 35 professional innings entering his Thursday start to the list of starting pitchers that have stifled the Yankees this season, a list that includes Michael Wacha, Matt Harvey, Joe Ross, Jordan Lyles and Steven Matz.

4. I guess this wasn’t the series the Yankees’ offense decides to show up for good in 2021. Maybe it will be the next series or the series after that or the series after. Most likely it won’t be, but Aaron Boone keeps telling us it’s going to happen!

Seven runs in three games. It was the latest atrocious performance from a lineup that continues to one-up itself with each new series. The Yankees have scored two more runs that the Orioles and 63 less runs than the Rays. It’s embarrassing, but the Yankees don’t seem to mind. They continue to give regular at-bats to Mike Ford and Brett Gardner and Tyler Wade and Rougned Odor.

5. Every day Odor is a Yankee is a day I’m embarrassed to be a Yankees fan. It’s bad enough the Yankees traded for him to be a bench player, but he has been an everyday player for the Yankees, and he’s been about as a good as a player who was released by a last-place team despite being owed $27 million like he was by the Rangers.

In Tuesday’s series opener, Odor went 0-for-3 with a walk and three strikeouts, batting in the 6-hole. On Thursday, in the first game of the doubleheader, Odor was batting second. Second. Second! SECOND! A place usually reserved for Aaron Judge and Odor of all players was batting there. He rewarded Boone for his inexplicable trust in him by going 0-for-2 with a walk and two strikeouts.

6. During Odor’s second at-bat (after he had struck out on three pitches in his first at-bat), YES showed the graphic with his stat line for the season and his abysmal batting average, which led Michael Kay to say the following: 

“Rougned Odor hasn’t hit with the consistency that you’d expect.”

What? Odor has hit .212 in his last 2,008 plate appearances since the start of the 2017 season. So over five seasons he has been a .212/.278/.414 hitter and Kay doesn’t think his numbers as a Yankee (.160/.269/.333) are what should be expected.

6. Estevan Florial was called up for the doubleheader and doubled in one of his three at-bats. Then he was sent down after the game as the Yankees don’t feel he’s ready for the majors. Based on what?

Gardner has one double in his last 51 plate appearances and two in his last 105, has no home runs this season and can’t catch up with fastballs over 92 mph. Odor last hit a home run in April and has two doubles in 93 plate appearances as a Yankee. Wade has barreled two balls in his major league career. Ford has no doubles this season and one home run in the last month. Are any of those guys ready for the majors in 2021?

7. OK, so Florial supposedly isn’t ready for the majors. That doesn’t change the fact the Yankees need a new everyday center fielder, now that it’s official Aaron Hicks won’t play again in 2021. (It was actually official the moment it was announced he had a wrist injury.) It doesn’t matter Hicks is under contract through at least 2025 and then will need to be bought out in 2026. When he was unnecessarily extended for SEVEN years at $10 million per, it was with the caveat that it wasn’t a franchise-crippling amount of money, and they could afford to pay him to go away. The hope was that wouldn’t happen until 2023. It has happened in 2021.

Hicks can’t be trusted for 2022 and beyond, and planning to pencil him as the everyday center fielder in 2022 will be a regrettable decision the Yankees can’t afford to make. The Yankees need to trade for someone between now and the July 30 trade deadline or hope they hit on either Florial or Jasson Dominguez at some point. They will likely have to trade for someone now and hit on one of those two as well.

8. The Yankees had Monday off. They had had Wednesday off. That didn’t stop Boone from playing Gio Urshela in only one of the two games on Thursday. Urshela sat out the first game and the Yankees were two-hit and shut out.

In the second game, Urshela batted fourth and produced an RBI double in his first at-bat. I guess playing 16 innings of baseball is all he could handle in a four-day span. Good thing he couldn’t have played in a second shortened seven-inning game on Thursday. The Yankees might have won, and everyone knows unnecessary rest is more important than wins.

9. The Yankees are now 3-6 against the Blue Jays with 25 runs scored in the nine games. That’s on top of the 3-6 they are against the Rays with 25 runs scored in those nine games. The Yankees are 6-12 against their direct competition for the division and 23-9 against everyone else. Both the Rays and Blue Jays scare the shit out of me, and I think both teams are better than the Yankees, even if only the Rays have a better overall record than the Yankees.

I would sign up for the second wild-card berth right now if I were the Yankees, and yes, that means playing a one-game playoff on the road and losing Gerrit Cole for Game 1 of the ALDS. I just don’t know if the Yankees can outlast both teams in for the division title and then outlast one of two as well as the Red Sox and Astros or A’s for a wild-card spot. With this Yankees offense, the second wild card sounds pretty good right about now.

10. The Yankees have a chance to pick up wins this weekend, and likely three of them. The Tigers are a disaster with the second-worst record in the AL, only to the Orioles (who the Yankees have trouble beating). The Yankees swept the Tigers in New York to open the month and now they have a chance to sweep the Tigers in Detroit to close the month.

After another series loss to the Blue Jays and with a four-game series against the Rays and a three-game series against the Red Sox next week, three games against the Tigers are exactly what the Yankees need.

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The Yankees swept the team that used to have the best record in the American League. The Yankees had been 1-6 when they had a chance to sweep a series, but now they’re 2-6, having won six straight games with a big series against the Blue Jays up next.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. Going back to last Monday when Gerrit Cole was rocked by the Rangers, I was very scared about the next six games. The Yankees’ offense has been non-existent all season, Cole had just been lit up by a last-place team and wouldn’t pitch again until Saturday, and the 2021 Yankees were starting to look like the 2019 Yankees in terms of injuries. I thought there was a very real chance the Yankees could get swept by the Rangers after Cole lost the series opener and then get swept by the then-best team in the American League in the White Sox.

It looked like this might happen when Jameson Taillon put the Yankees in a 3-0 hole the night after Cole laid an egg, but then the Yankees rallied with a five-run fifth inning and haven’t looked back. Since Cole’s worst start as a Yankee last Monday, the Yankees haven’t lost. They took the final three games in Texas and then completely shut down the White Sox, allowing five runs in three games, and finally closing out a sweep.

2. I said all offseason the Yankees or White Sox will represent the AL in the 2021 World Series, and I still believe that. The White Sox have the better chance since they are a guarantee to win their division, getting to play 78 games against the Indians, Royals, Twins and Tigers. The White Sox’ record is truly a product of an awful, and I mean awful AL Central as they are already 17-9 against. Meanwhile, the Yankees will have to battle the Rays, Blue Jays and possibly the Red Sox all season just to avoid the one-game, wild-card playoff. It’s unfair, but it’s the way it’s set up.

The White Sox are overrated. White Sox fans can whine about not having Luis Robert or Eloy Jimenez, however, they just got swept by a Yankees team that didn’t have Giancarlo Stanton or Aaron Hicks, didn’t have Clint Frazier until the series finale, and had way too much of Mike Ford, Tyler Wade and Rougned Odor in the lineup.

3. Goodbye, Hicks. Hicks opted for surgery to repair his wrist sheath, and we won’t see him again in 2021. There is supposedly a chance he could return very late in the season, but we’re talking about Hicks here, and he has never returned from an injury before or on schedule.

Hicks will be 32 later this year, and if he doesn’t play in another game in 2021 (which he won’t), he will have played in 493 of 870 regular-season games as a Yankee, or 57 percent. He will now have a surgically-repaired wrist to go along with a surgically-repaired elbow, a balky back, and he has had issues with both obliques, a hamstring and his intercostal muscle. The seven-year extension for Hicks was a mistake the second it was announced and it looks like an even bigger mistake now that he has experienced three significant injuries since it was signed: a back injury, Tommy John surgery and now wrist surgery. Even if Hicks is ready to go for Opening Day 2022, this doesn’t seem like an injury that he’s going to bounce back from right away and be fine at the plate. He has barely ever been fine at the plate in his career, anyway.

4. Hicks will be a Yankee through at least 2025 (he will be bought out for 2026), and that’s four more season after this one. For a player who was never healthy in his 20s and hasn’t been in his early-30s, I’m not sure how the Yankees think he’s going to be for his age 32, 33, 34 and 35 seasons.

The Yankees need a center fielder, and no, not Brett Gardner. I mean a real center fielder. Someone who can play against both right-handed and left-handed pitchers, which Gardner can no longer do. I’m sure the Yankees will trade for someone to fill that role this summer, though they need a long-term solution since Hicks can’t be trusted to be that. That’s where Jasson Dominguez comes in, and he better be as good as he’s been hyped to be.

5. Gleyber Torres hit .234/.327/.287 in April. In May, he’s hit .375/.434/.521. The power still isn’t there (just three extra-base hits in 53 plate appearances in May), but his overall approach and offense is there.

This is the player who nearly came from behind to win the 2018 AL Rookie of the Year award and the player who hit 38 home runs in 2021 (even if everyone was hitting 25-plus home runs). This is the player who was supposed to become the Yankees’ No. 3 hitter for years and eventually the team’s best and most important player. I don’t know where he was for the 2020 shortened season and for the first month of 2021, but it’s good to have him back.

6. Aaron Judge played in all 13 games in the last 13 days, starting 12 of them. That’s as good as it will ever get for Judge when the Yankees play 13 games in 13 days. And what do you know? Judge hit .457/.537/.804 with five home runs and eight RBIs in 54 plate appearances and added his first career walkoff with the walkoff walk on Sunday. It’s almost as if Judge doesn’t need unnecessary rest and personal days off. It’s almost as if the Yankees are better with their best overall player in the lineup and in the game (they went 10-3 in the 13 games) than if he’s inexplicably on the bench so he can have preventative rest.

7. When Jordan Montgomery strikes out 11 over seven shutout innings (like he did on Friday) and Jameson Taillon shuts out a team over five innings (like he did on Sunday), you know things are going your way. Having those two going against the White Sox scared me and they combined for 12 shutout innings and 15 strikeouts. Right now, I think this is how the Yankees would set up their rotation for a postseason series:

Game 1: Gerrit Cole
Game 2: Corey Kluber
Game 3: Jordan Montgomery
Game 4: Scumbag Domingo German

I don’t think Taillon would get a postseason start. I also really need Luis Severino to return and be his old self, so that he, Cole and Kluber can pitch Games 1-3 and only one of Montgomery or Scumbag German is needed for Game 4. I don’t trust Montgomery, Scumbag German or Taillon, and I’m not sure when or if I will.

8. It’s time the Yankees send every runner home from second a base hit to the outfield with no outs. I can’t watch the team strand runners at third with no outs anymore, or get nothing from second and third with no outs or nothing from the bases loaded and no outs. It’s always been a problem with these Yankees and it will continue to be a problem with these Yankees because everyone on the team with the exception of DJ LeMahieu and Gio Urshela is trying to hit a 500-foot home run in every at-bat, and they are unable to simply put the ball in play in a productive way. Mostly, when the 2021 Yankees have put the ball in play with the bases loaded and no outs, it has resulted in a double play. The Yankees lead the majors in ground into double plays, but at least it was somewhat evened out with the triple play they were able to turn on Friday when it looked like they were going to give away a winnable game.

The Yankees had Monday off after playing 13 games in 13 days, and now they’ll play another 12 games in 13 days, except these 13 game are doing to be much harder. Sandwiched around three games in Detroit are three against the Blue Jays, four against the Rays and three against the Red Sox.

9. We’re still waiting for the offense to show up in 2021. Sure, there have been a few games where the Yankees will score seven runs, like they did on Tuesday in Texas, or on Saturday against the White Sox, but in the other five games last week, they scored 13 runs total. As of now, the Rays have scored 60 more tuns than the Yankees in two more games played. That’s absurd. The Yankees have become a the glorified Rays with bigger names and a much bigger payroll. They have the same style of play, relying on their pitching and hoping to scratch across three or four runs. I don’t hate it. I would rather the Yankees have better pitching than hitting since we have seen where having an overpowering regular-season offense and mediocre pitching has gotten them since 2004, but this team is supposed to have both.

10. I keep thinking maybe this will be the series the offense finally breaks out, and it keeps not being the series. But maybe this will be the series the offense breaks out since they are avoiding Hyun Jin Ryu and the Blue Jays have lost six straight and seven of 10. If it’s not, I’m sure the Yankees will beat up on the Tigers this coming weekend to end the month like they did to begin the month, and everyone will think the offense has finally arrived, but then on Memorial Day, they begin their fourth series of the season against the Rays and we’ll see whether the offense will be attending the third month of the season after being absent for the first two.

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The Yankees’ season-long, three-city, 10-game road trip ended with a 7-3 record, three series wins and three straights wins. Now it’s back to the Bronx, where the Yankees will play the best team in the American League: the White Sox.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. I’m happy with the road trip. I wanted a 7-3 road trip and the Yankees provided it, winning all three series. They managed to play .700 baseball despite only outscoring the Rays, Orioles and Rangers 37-35. They were able win seven of 10 because they won a 3-1 game, a 1-0 game and two 2-0 games.

The offense is still a problem, and it’s going to continue to be a problem because one-third of the expected everyday lineup is currently injured (Giancarlo Stanton, Aaron Hicks and Clint Frazier), and while Frazier isn’t on the injured list like the other two, he hasn’t played since Monday. Gary Sanchez was removed from Tuesday’s game, Gleyber Torres just returned, Gio Urshela is dealing with a lingering knee issue and Aaron Judge seems to always be dealing with something.

2. Remember when the Yankees overhauled their entire training staff following 2019 and hired Eric Cressey and he was going to prevent the amount of injuries the Yankees had recently suffered? So much for that. That isn’t a knock on Cressey either. He was hired to do an impossible job: keep the Yankees healthy. It’s impossible because the Yankees’ roster is full of injury-prone and soft players. There’s no fixing that. Cressey notably changed the offseason workout routines of Judge and Stanton, and Judge has already missed four games due to injury and held out of others for fear of getting injured, while Stanton had four personal day off to prevent injury and still ended up on the injured list with a quad issue. The Yankees aren’t quite to the level of the 2019 Yankees when it comes to injuries, but they are on their way.

Because of the injuries, Brett Gardner, Rougned Odor, Mike Ford, Tyler Wade and Ryan LaMarre (until he was also injured) have become somewhat everyday players. It’s 2019 all over again with replacement players placing, minus the consistent production from the replacement players.

3. Given the Yankees’ disappointing loss in the series opener in which Gerrit Cole looked like Nick Nelson, I thought the Yankees were headed back to where they were in April. Instead, the Makeshift Yankees came through with a five-run rally on Tuesday to overcome the most recent deficit Jameson Taillon has put his team in, got a no-hitter from Corey Kluber on Wednesday and a combined shutout from Scumbag Domingo German, Chad Green and Aroldis Chapman on Thursday.

Cole had easily his worst start as a Yankee (5 IP, 7 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 2 BB, 7 K, 2 HR) and likely what will end up being his worst start of 2021 (at least I hope it is). When Cole is on (like he mostly is), it’s hard to envision any team ever hitting him, let alone the way the Rangers did with five extra-base hits in five innings. Cole gets a pass because of how good he is and because there’s no way (just knocked on wood) he will have back-to-back bad starts. He laid an egg and it’s over with. Now he gets the best team and best lineup in baseball on Saturday afternoon, and a chance to get back on track.

4. You know who doesn’t get a pass? Taillon. He has run out of passes. Another start in which he was unable to go five innings (five times in eight starts). Another start in which he allowed four earned runs (four times in eight starts). Another start in which he aallowed a home run (seven of eight starts). Another start in which he couldn’t put away hitters with two strikes.

Taillon is Phil Hughes. He looks like Hughes, throws like Hughes and can’t put anyone away with two strikes, allowing countless two-strike fouls, like Hughes. His stats also resembles Hughes’. Taillon has a 5.73 ERA, a 1.274 WHIP, has allowed nine home runs in only 37 2/3 innings and batters have an .806 OPS against him.

The season is more than a quarter complete at 27 percent and Taillon has been had for essentially all of it. I know, I know, he hasn’t pitched in two years. And yes, that’s a valid excuse, but there’s no time for excuses because of the Yankees’ horrific start to the season they are still trying to undo and because the top four teams in the AL East are all separated by one loss. The Yankees can’t wait around for Taillon to figure it out, and the same goes for Jordan Montgomery. They have to figure it out now, or the Yankees need to give Deivi Garcia a chance to.

5. Kluber has figured it out.

Back on Jan. 7, before Kluber became a Yankee, I wrote a blog titled Corey Kluber Is Perfect Low-Risk, High-Reward Candidate. In that blog, I wrote:

What I do see is the Yankees signing Corey Kluber. Rather, I want them to sign Kluber. I will go pick him up if needed.

Kluber faced three batters in 2020 before going down for the season. In 2019, he only threw 35 2/3 innings because of injury. But from 2014 through 2018 he was the best pitcher in the American League, pitching to a 2.85 ERA and 1.016 WHIP, while averaging 218 innings per season and 10.1 strikeouts-per-nine innings.

If the Yankees sign Kluber and he’s his 2018 self (20-8, 2.89 ERA, 0.991 WHIP, 9.3 K/9), well then they have Gerrit Cole, Kluber and potentially Luis Severino as their 1-2-3.

Over his last five starts, Kluber has looked every bit like his 2018 self. The Yankees have won all five of his starts, he has given the team length going at least 5 2/3 innings in all five starts and has pitched to this line: 35.1 IP, 21 H, 7 R, 7 ER, 9 BB, 36 K, 1 HR, 1.78 ERA, 0.850 WHIP.

I have never been worried about Kluber’s performance, just about his health. Even when Kluber didn’t look like himself early in the season, I still had an odd sense of confidence and comfort when he was on the mound, always thinking he would figure it out.

It took him nearly a month, but he has figured it out, and so far, the Yankees have hit on their low-risk, high-reward candidate.

6. After Cole’s clunker, I thought the Yankees could be looking at potentially getting swept by the last-place Rangers. The Yankees had once again only scored two runs in a game on Monday, and Aaron Boone put out this lineup on Tuesday:

DJ LeMahieu, 3B
Brett Gardner, CF
Aaron Judge, DH
Gio Urshela, SS
Rougned Odor, 2B
Gary Sanchez, C
Miguel Andujar, LF
Mike Ford, 1B
Ryan LaMarre, RF

That’s an early-March spring training lineup. Taillon put the Yankees in a 3-0 hole, but a shocking (mostly) two-out rally in the fourth inning saved the game.

With one out, Judge singled and Urshela doubled in Judge. Then with two outs and Urshela on first, Sanchez doubled in Urshela, Andujar singled in Sanchez, Ford singled, LaMarre walked and LeMahieu doubled in Andujar and Ford. The Yankees batted around in the inning, and Gardner made two of the inning’s outs.

7. The next night, the offense didn’t show up again. I thought there was a real chance Kluber could throw nine no-hit innings and the Yankees would eventually lose in extra innings because of the offense’s inability to do anything against Hyeon-Jong Yang. Thankfully, a Kyle Higashioka single and Tyler Wade triple, yes triple, gave the Yankees the lead. I didn’t know Wade was capable of hitting a line drive into the gap because he has never done it before in any of his five seasons with the Yankees. It was a more improbably feat than Kluber throwing a no-hitter, and I would bet a Yankee throws another no-hitter before we see Wade barrel a ball again.

8. The Yankees entered Thursday’s afternoon, getaway day game with an 0-5 record in weekday afternoon games and a 2-7 record in getaway day games, and for the first six innings we saw why. The Yankees hit into a couple more double plays to increase their league lead, ran into a couple of more outs on the basepaths, as if they think they have to be pegged by the ball to be out on, and also made Dane Dunning look like a star, allowing him to throw six shutout innings. With the Yankees’ offense enduring a season-long slump and missing one-third of its expected everyday members (Stanton, Hicks and Frazier), Boone decided to give Judge and Urshela the day off. Judge had only DH’d the previous two games, so he was getting a day off from only batting, and Urshela was just given Friday off, before being needed to hit a pinch-hit, three-run home run.

9. Urshela was needed again on Thursday after being unnecessarily given the first six innings of the game off for the second time in seven games. And for the second time in seven games, he delivered a go-ahead pinch-hit. With a 1-0 lead and Sanchez on second and Urshela on first, Boone then called on Judge to pinch hit. He singled in Sanchez to give the Yankees a 2-0 lead. It’s a good thing Urshela and Judge both had the first six innings of the game off with the offense in its current state and the amount of everyday major leaguers available on the roster.

10. This weekend is going to be tough. The White Sox are the best team in the American League with a deep, balanced lineup and a strong rotation. All offseason I wrote and said the White Sox would be the Yankees’ biggest obstacle to reaching the World Series (aside from Boone), and that has proven to be true through the first nearly two months of the season. 

The Yankees will see Carlos Rodon (1.47 ERA), Dylan Cease (2.41 ERA) and familiar for Dallas Keuchel (4.44 ERA) this weekend. (Keuchel doesn’t scare me the way he once did after the Yankees finally solved him for good in the 2017 ALCS.) The Yankees will send Montgomery, Cole and Taillon to the mound. Their best starter sandwiched between their worst two. I expect Cole to pitch well, especially after his most recent start. I don’t expect much from either Montgomery or Taillon, and will be surprised if they are able to successfully navigate their way through the White Sox’ lineup.

The Yankees are 19-8 in their last 27 games and are 7-0-1 in their last eight series (and 7-0-2 if you count the two-game series against the Braves). It won’t be easy, but I want the Yankees’ current unbeaten series streak continue this weekend. That means winning two of three against the best team they have played this season.

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The Yankees won another series. Another series they had a chance to sweep and didn’t, but another series win nonetheless. The Yankees took two out of three in Baltimore and are 6-0-1 in their last seven series.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. The Yankees keeping putting themselves in favorable situations to sweep series, but aside from their sweep of the Tigers, they keep failing to win each series finale. I understand the old adage “It’s hard to sweep,” but it shouldn’t be when you have a multi-run lead or when you have possibly the best pitcher in the world on the mound or an elite reliever entering a game. Those are the situations the Yankees have had in the last three series in which they were one win away from a sweep, and each time they came up short.

The Yankees won the first two games against the Astros two weeks ago, had a 3-1 lead in the third game and were nine outs from a sweep with Cole on the mound and Chad Green then coming in when they blew it. Two series later, they won the first two games against the Rays in Tampa and then scored one run in the series finale (in the ninth inning). They had a 4-0 lead before Jordan Montgomery took the mound on Sunday, and he gave it all away in three innings.

The Yankees lost a lot of winnable games in April and they have had many opportunities to erase all the bad they did last month, yet they keep blowing each chance. Yes, they have won 16 of 23. It could have and should have been more.

2. Gio Urshela won Friday night’s game with a three-run home run in the seventh inning. It was his first at-bat of the game as he pinch hit for Tyler Wade. Why was it his first at-bat of the game? Because Aaron Boone felt it would be best to give Urshela the night off due to knee soreness. The “night” turned into six innings and Urshela was brought off the bench to prevent the Yankees from losing a second straight game.

Urshela produced a nine pitch at-bat in which he would off tough, near-perfect cutters away until he finally got one he could put in play and he crushed it for an opposite-field home run. The at-bat proved Urshela didn’t need the night off if he was capable of putting together an at-bat of that caliber and able to hit a home run and not just a home run, but an opposite-field home run. It was completely unnecessary for Urshela to not start the game, and had he, maybe the Yankees aren’t trailing in the seventh inning and in desperate need of a three-run home run to take the lead.

3. The unnecessary rest didn’t end there. Aroldis Chapman was unavailable to pitch in a one-run game despite having had the previous day off. Why? Because he had pitched two consecutive days prior to that day off, and he had pitched in two of the three days before that. So Boone made Chapman unavailable in a one-run game.

To recap Chapman’s last week-plus:

Thursday: Didn’t pitch
Friday: Didn’t pitch
Saturday: Pitched
Sunday: Pitched
Monday: Didn’t pitch
Tuesday: Pitched
Wednesday: Pitched
Thursday: Didn’t pitch
Friday: Unavailable

4. To make matters worse, Boone decided to go batter-to-batter in the ninth inning. He let Wandy Peralta start the inning even though Jonathan Loaisiga was ready. Peralta gave up a leadoff single to put the tying run on base, and then Boone went to Loaisiga. Why not go to Loaisiga to begin the inning? Why does Boone always have to try to get cute and think he’s so damn smart and smarter than everyone else? It shouldn’t be this hard to beat the Orioles. It shouldn’t be this hard to write out a lineup card and to properly manage a bullpen with the Yankees’ roster.

5. On Saturday, the Yankees jumped out to a three-run led in the first and made it 5-0 in the second. In the sixth it was 8-0 and they went on to win 8-2. It was a nice, easy, comfortable win. It’s the kind of game the Yankees should have against the Orioles.

After homering twice on Friday, Judge homered again on Saturday, and then again on Sunday. He has five home runs in his last 25 plate appearances and six games and has 12 on the season, while hitting .298/.399/.611. He’s been awesome.

My criticism of Judge has never been about his ability. I love Judge. My criticism has been about his inability to stay healthy and his seemingly need to go to Boone with any little ache or pain that then puts him on the bench for a couple of days. Judge is great and easily the Yankees’ best player when healthy and most important part of their lineup. Health has always been the issue with him. He’s been mostly healthy in 2021, though he has needed a few unnecessary days off. I’m sure he will get at least another one off in the final four games of this season-long, 10-game road trip. Thankfully, he’s healthy enough to play, unlike his fellow oft-injured teammates.

6. Aaron Hicks going down with a tear in his wrist at the same time Giancarlo Stanton went down with quad tightness was almost too perfect given the amount of time those two have missed since 2019.

I’m not surprised Hicks is hurt again. He has been injured his entire career. For a player who missed so much time in his 20s, giving him a seven-year extension to take him through his mid-30s was ill-advised. He’s going to be 32 in 2021 and has missed time as a Yankee with injuries to both obliques, a hamstring strain, shoulder bursitis, a strained intercostal, he’s playing with a surgically-repaired elbow, and now might have a surgically-repaired wrist to go along with it. And oh yeah, he missed the third two months of 2019 after suffering a significant back injury. If it seems like Hicks’ body is being held together with Elmer’s glue, Scotch Tape and Silly Putty, it’s because it pretty much is. At least he’s only signed for another four years after this one and then in 2026, the Yankees will pay him to not play for them. Jasson Dominguez better tear through the minors.

7. As for Stanton, no surprise there either. I’m more surprised when Hicks and Stanton are healthy than when they aren’t. The Yankees have now played 40 games and Stanton has had four of them off for personal rest and has missed three due to quad tightness. So he has already not played in 18 percent of the season. Good thing Aaron Boone gave Stanton those four days off as it prevented him from getting injured.

At the same time Boone announced Stanton would be out with quad tightness, he said he had been recently thinking of putting Stanton in the outfield. BULLSHIT, cough, cough. Of course, Boone says this at the same time he announces Stanton has a quad issue. Because now there’s no way Stanton will play the outfield and Boone will use this latest injury as the reason. Boone was never going to put Stanton in the outfield. Never.

8. If you thought Jordan Montgomery might have taken a step toward becoming more than what he has been in his career with his dominant performance against the Rays, well, Sunday’s disaster against the Orioles was a good wake-up call. Montgomery was given a four-run lead before he ever took the mound on Sunday, and immediately, he gave two runs back. When he took the mound in the third inning, he had a three-run lead, and he erased that too with a pair of doubles, a single and a walk. He lasted only three innings, allowed five earned runs and eight baserunners, and his ERA is up to 4.75 this season. “Crooked Number” Montgomery appears to be back. Don’t let that one start at the Trop fool you.

9. Gary Sanchez continues to quietly turn his early-season slump around. His two-run home run in the first inning on Sunday prevented the Yankees from destroying yet another bases-loaded, no-out situation. It was Sanchez’s third home run in 26 plate appearances, and he now has a .351 OBP and .885 OPS in May, reaching base safely in eight of the nine games he has played this month. 

Meanwhile, for Kyle Higashioka, who briefly became the “full-time” catcher, he has only played in three of the last nine games, as he’s hitting .077/.200/.231 over his last 30 plate appearance, and that slugging percentage is only that high because of his solo home run off Max Scherzer. Higashioka isn’t an everyday catcher. Apparently, it took Boone nonsensically taking away at-bats from Sanchez to realize that.

10. The Yankees are now 4-2 on the road trip, and once again, it could have and should have been more. I’m happy with them winning two out of three in Tampa, but blowing a four-run, first-inning lead in Baltimore is unacceptable. Six runs against the Orioles should be more than enough to get a win, and that’s a game the Yankees likely wish they could have back. Then again, there’s been a lot of games through the first 40 I’m sure they wish they could have back.

Now it’s off to Texas, where the last-place Rangers await, who have lost six straight. The Rangers suck. They are already seven games back in the AL West and their season is over and it’s the middle of May. This is a team the Yankees should easily handle, and with Gerrit Cole on the mound in the series opener, it’s hard not to once again think about the potential of a big series in terms of wins.

The Yankees should return home having gone no worse than 7-3 on this road trip. Anything less than winning three out of four in Texas will be an enormous disappointment.

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The Yankees did what they rarely ever do by beating the Rays on Tuesday and Wednesday this week. Not only did they beat the Rays, but they won a series against them at Tropicana Field.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. The series opener in Tampa was the best start of Jordan Montgomery’s career. The Yankees needed a big performance from someone other than Gerrit Cole, needed to set the tone for the three games and needed to beat the Rays. Montgomery was great, allowed only one run (a Mike Zunino solo home run since Zunino has to homer in every series against the Yankees) and struck out a career-high nine. He avoided the crooked number inning which has been a staple of his career, didn’t give up a lead (another staple of his career) and gave the Yankees six great innings. His next start comes on Sunday in Baltimore against the Orioles, who he has pitched well against in two starts this season (11 IP, 10 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 8 K, 1 HR, 1.64 ERA, 1.000 WHIP), so I expect him to have another big day at Camden Yards.

The only thing that worries me is Sunday will be the sixth game in six days for the Yankees as part of this season-long, 10-game road trip. A Sunday getaway day game before going to Texas for four straight games means we are going to see something resembling a spring training lineup from Aaron Boone in the series finale in Baltimore. Montgomery better have his “A” stuff because he might not get much run support.

2. No Yankees starter is really getting any run support. The Yankees scored five runs in the three games in Tampa (1.7 per game). The series prior they scored “11” runs against the Nationals, but three of those runs were a result of the automatic runner at second base in the 10th and 11th innings, so they really only scored eight runs in that series (2.7 per game). Even against the Astros, three of their 17 runs came on an Alex Bregman throwing error.

The Yankees’ offense is nowhere near having arrived in 2021. They are fourth in the division in runs (only ahead of the last-place Orioles by five), and only ahead of the Orioles and Tigers in the entire American League.

3. “I’m not worried about our offense,” DJ LeMahieu said after Thursday’s loss. “We’re in a good place.”

Three “everyday” Yankees are below the Mendoza line in Gary Sanchez (.197), Aaron Hicks (.194) and Clint Frazier (.141), as are Brett Gardner (.182), Rougned Odor (.164) and Mike Ford (.095). Miguel Andujar doesn’t have a hit in 13 at-bats and Luke Voit doesn’t have one in six.

LeMahieu himself is only hitting .264 with a .716 OPS. He has three home runs on the season and two of them came in the same game. Aaron Judge has been inconsistent, Giancarlo Stanton’s crazy two-week run has ended, Gleyber Torres has been mostly bad and Gio Urshela has been pretty good, but is hurt again, and probably won’t play on Friday.

Ronald Acuna has a league-leading 12 home runs. That’s two more home runs than LeMahieu, Frazier, Ford, Torres, Andujar, Gardner, Voit and Tyler Wade have combined. Even if you had in Jay Bruce (who retired after playing in 10 games and still has as many home runs as Torres) and Mike Tauchman (who was traded to the Giants two weeks ago), Acuna still has one more home run than all of those players combined.

The offense was supposed to be a sure-thing in the regular season until the lineup only faces elite pitching in the postseason, and the starting pitching was supposed to be the team’s biggest concern (it was, but it’s been much better of late). It’s been the opposite through 37 games and 22 percent of the season.

4. Cole has never been a concern. Cole dominated the Rays on Thursday to clinch the three-game series for the Yankees with eight shutout innings and 12 strikeouts. If not for the magical catching powers of Kyle Higashioka, I don’t know that Cole would be capable of the season he’s having, currently leading the league in wins (5), FIP (1.11), WHIP (0.684), walks per nine (0.5) and strikeouts per walks (26). Somehow, even with a 1.37 ERA over 52 2/3 innings, the Yankees are only 5-3 in his eight starts, and had to win 1-0 in his most recent start.

The offense has scored 31 runs in Cole’s eight starts (3.9 per game) and 10 of those came in one game (10-0 win on April 30 against the Tigers) when he only needed one run to work with because of his six shutout innings. Take away that game, which is the only time the Yankees have scored double-digit runs this season, and it’s 21 runs across seven games. If any other Yankees starter was given the run support Cole has been given, the Yankees would be much worse than the 5-3 they are in Cole’s starts.

5. In theory, Jameson Taillon is good. He’s 6-foot-5, 230 lbs., a former second-overall pick, throws hard and has a devastating curve. On top of that, he’s an easy guy to root for given his health and injury history. In reality, Taillon hasn’t been good as a Yankee. Sure, he’s only made seven starts, but he hasn’t given the team length (four of seven starts have been less than five innings and six of seven have been five innings or less), and the performance has been mediocre at best (5.40 ERA and 4.45 FIP).

I didn’t expect more from Taillon. He’s giving me what I thought he would as a guy who has barely pitched in two years. To me, he’s Phil Hughes. He looks like Hughes on the mound, throws exactly like Hughes with his new short-arm delivery and can’t put away hitters with two strikes, just like Hughes couldn’t. If this is what Taillon is going to be full time, then OK, he’s a solid No. 5 starter. However, that’s not what he was advertised as or traded for to be.

6. Luke Voit made his 2021 season debut on Tuesday. He played on Tuesday and on Wednesday. On Thursday, he wasn’t in the lineup. Why? A planned day off, according to Boone. A planned day off after having had already had the first month-plus of the season off. To make matters worse, the Yankees faced a lefty in Rich Hill and could have used Voit’s right-handed bat in the middle of the order.

There is no medical fact or any science behind giving a player a day off after playing two games following knee surgery. The only way to prevent a player from an injury is to not play. Ever. Does Voit having Thursday make it any less likely he won’t get hurt on Friday or Saturday? Of course not. All it did was make it so he wouldn’t get hurt on Thursday. If the Yankees have solved injury prevention as an organization then why do they hold the single-season record for most players placed on the injured list and why do all of their players keep getting hurt?

7. Aaron Hicks wasn’t in Thursday’s lineup because of wrist soreness, requiring an MRI. This comes after Hicks was held out of Tuesday’s lineup because he fouled a ball off his leg on Sunday. (He was healthy enough to play through the foul ball and finish the game on Sunday, and healthy enough to be in the original lineup on Tuesday, though not healthy enough to actually play on Tuesday.) As a Yankee, Hicks has had every injury imaginable, and this wrist issue is the latest to be added to the long list. There wasn’t an update on Hicks following the game, which isn’t good, and I expect to him at least go on the injured list. It wouldn’t be baseball season without Hicks landing on the IL at least once.

8. Gary Sanchez is quietly coming out of his slump. He’s 4-for-13 with a double, two home runs and three walks in his last four games. His average still sucks (.197), however, nearly Yankees batting average sucks.

Sanchez’s on-base percentage is up to .351 and he has walked in 15 of the 24 games he has played in, including six of the last seven. Even in Sanchez’s 33-home run 2017 season, his on-base percentage was only .345 and in his 34-home run 2019 season, his on-base percentage was .316. The power hasn’t completely been there (though four home runs in 24 games is a 27-home run pace over 162 games), but we are seeing good things out of Sanchez at the plate.

9. Meanwhile, Higashioka who briefly took over the majority of the catching duties is hitting .087/.192/.261 over this last 26 plate appearances. Thankfully for him, one of his two hits in that time was a home run (the one off Max Scherzer), otherwise his .453 OPS would be even worse than it is, and it doesn’t get much worse than that.

Again, I like Highashioka. But he’s not a starting catcher and he’s not better than Sanchez. He doesn’t have magical powers that make starting pitchers better, and he has zero to do with Cole being one of the best two or three pitchers in the world, if not the best pitcher in the world. It was only a matter of time until Higashioka gave way to Sanchez again, and it happened even faster than I thought it would.

10. The Yankees have won 14 of 20 and are 5-0-1 in their last six series. If they continue to play like they have over their last 20 games, they will be where they want to be at the end of the season and that is as AL East champions with the best record in the AL and home-field advantage throughout the playoffs.

The easy way to achieve that is to beat up the bad teams in the AL, and there are a lot of them. The Yankees have gone 7-3 against the Orioles and the Tigers this season, which is good, but not good enough (because of their play against the Rays and Blue Jays), considering they are only 4-3 against the Orioles. This weekend in Baltimore presents another chance for the Yankees win another series and beat up on a bad team before going to Texas for four games against another bad team.

The hard part of the 10-game road trip is over and the Yankees did what they needed to do in Tampa. A 5-2 record in Baltimore and Texas isn’t too much to ask. It shouldn’t be too much to ask.

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

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