1. The Athletics showed up in New York giving up nearly six runs a game and the Yankees eked out a win on Tuesday because one of their bench bats hit two home runs, then they got one-hit from the second inning on in a loss on Wednesday and got one-hit in a 1-0 loss on Thursday.

2. The ‘Run It Back’ offense is doing exactly what I feared it would. It’s heavily reliant on the top of the order carrying it, and when the top of the order isn’t hitting (as it currently isn’t) then the Yankees can’t win. At 8-4, the start of the season looks great, but the Yankees are a Paul Goldschmidt home run, an eighth-inning rally against the Marlins and the Amed Rosario game from it being much different.

3. Getting one-hit from the second inning on in Wednesday’s loss was embarrassing enough, but the Yankees took embarrassing to a new level on Thursday when they were one-hit for the entire nine innings, and if not for a seventh-inning single by Ben Rice, the Yankees may have been no-hit by Jeffrey Springs.

The Yankees stocked their bench with right-handed bats that have a history of destroying left-handed pitching, so that they couldn’t be shut down by left-handers anymore. So much for that. All of the platoon bats were stifled by Springs. The Yankees have faced two left-handed starters this season in Springs and Robbie Ray and both have shut down the platoon bats.

4. It’s been October and postseason weather in the Bronx since the Yankees returned home last week and they have played like they do in October and the postseason. Trent Grisham and Jazz Chisholm are nowhere to be found, Aaron Judge hasn’t done anything since his first-inning home run against the Marlins a week ago, the bottom of the order remains automatic outs, the starting pitching has been spotty, the bullpen shaky and Aaron Boone is making questionable choices.

5. “Look, we got shut down today,” Boone said.

Actually, you got shut down on Wednesday and Thursday and everyone aside from Rosario got shut down on Tuesday.

“We didn’t generate much,” Boone said. “We have a few guys struggling to get on track a little bit.”

A few guys? Let’s check in on each player’s OPS so far this season with their career OPS in parentheses.

Ben Rice: 1.155 (.803)
Paul Goldschmidt: .967 (.882)
Amed Rosario: .941 (.709)
Giancarlo Stanton: .811 (.873)
Aaron Judge: .758 (1.025)
Cody Bellinger: .746 (.817)
Trent Grisham: .597 (.719)
Jazz Chisholm: .511 (.764)
Austin Wells: .486 (.709)
Jose Caballero: .362 (.646)
Ryan McMahon: .319 (.735)
J.C. Escarra: .100 (.579)
Randal Grichuk: .000 (.762)

Just a few guys!

“Hopefully, we’ll get things going,” Boone said.

“Hopefully?” Boone is one to tell you they will get things going. That a corner will be turned. That everything is always right in front of them. Now he’s resorting to “hopefully” after 12 games? That’s not a great sign.

6. Boone talked about the weather in New York impacting the offense. I guess the A’s were playing in different weather when they were batting. While the A’s may have not been lighting up the scoreboard with runs, they were still able to generate hits. They outhit the Yankees 17-5 in the last two games of the series and 16-2 from the second inning of Wednesday through the end of Thursday.

7. “I can’t feel my hands right now,” Chisholm said. “And when you can’t feel your hands, it’s hard to swing.”

Chisholm also talked about how he told the media last year he isn’t good until the weather warms up.

“I’m not using that as an excuse,” Chisholm said.

Sounds like an excuse to me.

“I said the same thing last year,” Chisholm said. “As soon as the weather heats up, I heat up. That’s what it is.”

The Yankees play half of their games in New York and New York weather is typically cold for all of April and sometimes most of May. They plan to play games in October when it’s also very cold. So Chisholm is saying he’s worthless for at least the first month of the season at home and also in the postseason since it’s cold during both months. Yes, please give him a long-term contract after this season.

8. Ryan Weathers (8 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 7 K) was great for the first time as a Yankee, but his superb outing was wasted by the offense. At least he was able to give the bullpen a break since no starter had given any real length over the last week and the bullpen is fatigued and showing it.

9. The loss on Thursday moved the Yankees to 0-4 in one-run games this season and 8-0 in all other games. I’m sure it’s just a coincidence that this team, which lacks smart, situational hitters, has a shaky bullpen and has a manager in his ninth season of having in-game difficulties is 0-4 in one-run games. Just bad luck!

10. The Yankees head to Tampa where the games are played inside in a controlled environment. So the “Boohoo, it’s cold!” excuse is gone for the next three days. If the Yankees’ bats can’t wake up at Tropicana Field, they won’t have Mother Nature to blame.

The Rays are starting Steven Matz on Friday and Shane McClanahan on Sunday, so that’s two more lefties for the Yankees’ righty-heavy lineup to show they can actually hit left-handed pitching. Luis Gil will make his season debut on Friday after being left out of the rotation and off the Opening Day roster. If he wants to remain in the rotation ahead of Weathers and Will Warren when Carlos Rodon and Gerrit Cole are healthy (and if everyone else remains healthy) then pitching well immediately would be a good idea.

1. The Yankees had a 1-0 lead with the bases loaded and one out against former Yankee Luis Severino (who they have destroyed twice in two starts since leaving the organization) in the first inning on Wednesday night. It looked like the game could quickly become a laugher. It didn’t. The Yankees scored one more run in the inning and then only produced one more hit for the rest of the game in an eventual 3-2 loss to the Athletics.

2. It was a dismal offensive performance, but nothing uncommon to this team this season. Yes, the Yankees are 8-3 with the best record in the American League and tied for the best record in baseball, but as I have written many times in these Thoughts, when I write about the Yankees, it’s not simply based on the last game or the last week, it’s with the big picture in mind. And right now, the big-picture perspective for this offense is why the ‘Run It Back’ lineup construction kept me up many nights this offseason.

3. It’s not good that Amed Rosario hit as many home runs in three at-bats on Tuesday as Trent Grisham, Cody Bellinger, Giancarlo Stanton, Jazz Chisholm, Austin Wells, Ryan McMahon and Jose Caballero have combined for this season. I’m not worried about Bellinger or Stanton finding their power. I’m very worried about Chisholm’s mental state as an impending free agent and a player who says he’s chasing a 50/50 season. I’m very worried about Grisham who was paid $22 million because of one outlier season. I’m worried that the Yankees’ plan to hope Wells (and Anthony Volpe when he returns) could take the next step offensively isn’t working out and that the team’s internal belief they could be the ones to unlock McMahon as a hitter was a foolish task to take on.

4. McMahon isn’t just bad, he’s pretty much the worst hitter in baseball right now. There are 256 players in the majors with at least 30 plate appearances this season and McMahon ranks 255th in batting average, 255th in slugging percentage, 251st in OPS and 250th in strikeout percentage. (Stat provided by Katie Sharp.) McMahon is 2-for-the-season. Two! It’s not much better for the other guys at the bottom of the order either: Chisholm has eight hits, Caballero has six, Wells has five and J.C. Escarra has zero. ZERO! And yet, in the Yankees’ last two losses (on Sunday and Wednesday), Escarra was allowed to hit in the bottom of the ninth in one-run games. But Escarra aside, of all the automatic outs in the Yankees’ lineup, right now McMahon is the most automatic.

“If I knew, I don’t think I’d be in the slow start,” McMahon said after he went 0-for-2 with a walk and two strikeouts on Wednesday. “I’m grinding. I’m not happy about it.”

I’m not mad at McMahon for being unable to hit because that’s who he has always been. He didn’t ask to be traded to the Yankees. He doesn’t put himself in the lineup every day. He has come to the plate 4,042 times in the regular season over his decade-long career and is a .238 hitter, who has been nine percent worse than league average during that time. He’s never been able to hit, so while he’s been worse this season than at any other point in his career, he’s not going to suddenly figure it out and become even an average hitter. At some point he will do better than he is now as the worst hitter in baseball, but his ceiling is that of a below-league-average hitter.

What I am mad about is that he will be given a frustratingly-long leash because he’s a veteran, he’s making $16 million this season and the Yankees are stubborn about personnel choices that make their trade and free-agent choices look bad. Rosario could start hitting like Judge when he plays (the MVP version of Judge, not the version of Judge we have seen this year) and it wouldn’t matter. McMahon is going to play. Even though I thought Boone would bench Rosario after his two-homer game for McMahon on Wednesday, even Boone knew he couldn’t do that. So instead, he benched Caballero and put McMahon right back in there to do nothing.

This isn’t an “It’s early!” or “It’s only been 11 games!” case either. You can use that for explaining why Judge hasn’t looked like himself or why Stanton only has one home run. It’s not a valid reason for McMahon or the rest of the bottom of the order sucking. They have always sucked! This isn’t small-sample-size noise. This is who they are. The Yankees believed they could be better, and they aren’t.

5. The Yankees losing two of their last three and needing late-game rallies to avoid additional losses on Friday and Tuesday isn’t all on the offense. It’s on the starting pitching too. Ryan Weathers was bad (for the second time in as many Yankees starts) on Friday, Max Fried struggled against a weak Marlins offense on Sunday, Will Warren once again couldn’t give length on Wednesday and it took Cam Schlittler 84 pitches to get through five innings on Tuesday. The starters need to be better because over the last week their lack of length is forcing the Bullpen of Question Marks to be overworked and it’s showing. After pitching in multiple games in the World Baseball Classic and then being needed for nearly two 40-pitch saves in the last week, David Bednar is struggling to put away hitters. He’s been shaky this season and on Wednesday he allowed the A’s to break the 2-2 tie in the ninth.

“I was able to get ahead of guys, but I wasn’t able to put them away,” Bednar said. “It can’t happen.”

6. There is very little trust in the bullpen right now. I don’t trust Bednar because he’s been overworked over the last month. I don’t trust Camilo Doval because he’s been untrustworthy since the moment he became a Yankee. I don’t trust Fernando Cruz because he could strike out the side on nine pitches or walk the bases loaded on 12. I trust Tim Hill the most and Brent Headrick the second most. That’s not a great place to be.

7. It’s also on the defense. The Yankees will tell you Escarra could start for a lot of other teams in the league even though he can’t. Yes, he’s so good that the Yankees were OK with sending him down for a lot of last season and going with Rice as their backup catcher. He’s so good that he’s hitless this season and takes swings like he’s blindfolded. On Wednesday, not only did he put another 0-for, but he was unable to block a Warren breaking ball in the dirt that led to the A’s tying the game.

Rice, who has looked much better in the field this season, looked like his old self on Wednesday. He booted a routine ground ball, couldn’t pick a ball that any major-league first baseman should be able to pick and also dropped a pickoff throw with the runner caught leaving early.

Add in the couple of miscues from Caballero at short so far, McMahon’s new habit of throwing every ball in the dirt to first and Chisholm’s nonchalant play last Friday (which he negated with his amazing diving catch on Wednesday) and you have the type of defensive baseball the Yankees have always played during the Boone era.

8. Yes, the Yankees are 8-3. Yes, they are still waiting for Judge to really get going and for Stanton to start hitting the ball over the wall. Yes, they are getting closer to having Carlos Rodon and Gerrit Cole in the rotation. But there are still a lot of flaws on this team. Flaws that existed last season, weren’t addressed in the offseason and haven’t gotten better this season. Even when Judge and Stanton get going (and hopefully Grisham and Chisholm too), the bottom of the order is still going to be a problem. Even when Rodon and Cole come back, the trustworthy options in the bullpen still won’t exist. Again, it’s not early and it’s not only 11 games because when you run it back with the same team from one year to the next, one year to the next becomes a continuation, not something new.

9. The Yankees will face their first left-handed starter on Thursday since last Tuesday in Seattle. That means the righty-heavy lineup will be used. Boone didn’t come close to using the best possible lineup I provided on Wednesday to face Severino, but here’s the best possible lineup to go against Jeffery Springs on Thursday.

Amed Rosario, 3B
Aaron Judge, RF
Cody Bellinger, CF
Giancarlo Stanton, DH
Paul Goldschmidt, 1B
Randal Grichuk, LF
Jazz Chisholm, 2B
Jose Caballero, SS
Austin Wells, C

(In reality, Boone will use Goldschmidt to lead off instead of Rosario.)

10. Weathers gets the ball for the third time as a Yankee. He has done nothing to prove he should keep his rotation spot once Rodon is ready, and I don’t have high expectations for him on Thursday. I don’t have any expectations for him as a hard-thrower who has no idea where the ball is going when it leaves his hand. It’s going to be cold again like it was in his start on Friday, which clearly rattled him, and the A’s have a lineup that can make you pay if you’re not careful. It’s going to be a tough rubber game to win before the Yankees head to Tampa.

1. Through 10 games this season, Aaron Boone has pushed the right offensive lineup change button twice, which I think equals his total from his first eight seasons as manager.

In the fifth game of the season, Boone gave Giancarlo Stanton the day off against George Kirby in Seattle despite Stanton being 10-for-20 at the time. Boone played Paul Goldschmidt and hit him fifth in the lineup even though one of the best right-handed starters in the game was on the mound. It was an odd decision since Goldschmidt has been bad against righties for a long time now and because Boone chose not to play Goldschmidt against Tyler Mahle four days earlier, a lesser right-hander than Kirby and one Goldschmidt has absolutely owned in his career. Goldschmidt looked overmatched against Kirby in his first two at-bats — striking out both times — before hitting a long, three-run home run in his third at-bat, which was the difference in a Yankees win.

On Tuesday against the Athletics, Boone started Amed Rosario over Ryan McMahon at third base despite the right-handed Aaron Civale starting. Rosario hit a solo home run in his first at-bat to give the Yankees a 1-0 lead and hit a go-ahead, three-run home run in the eighth inning to carry the Yankees to a 5-3 win.

2. The three-run blast came against former Yankee Mark Leiter Jr. who owed the Yankees a meltdown like that (and a few more) for his performance as a Yankee over the last two seasons. It felt really good to be on the positive end of a Leiter Jr. appearance, especially one that decided the game.

“Although I’m not playing every day, I try to not let that affect me mentally,” Rosario said. “Over the years, I’ve been able to create a routine to help me do my job.”

3. McMahon was on the bench because he has been atrocious this season, going 2-for-23 with 11 strikeouts. He drove in two runs on Opening Day with a seeing-eye single and hasn’t done anything since. Even his defense has been shaky with nearly every throw of his across the infield bouncing in the dirt. But all Yankees fans know how Boone and the team operates and you can bet McMahon will be back in the lineup on Wednesday and Rosario — the hero from Tuesday — will be back on the bench.

4. Rosario should continue to play until he stops playing well because that’s how playing time should work and be earned. Boone mentioned “competition” being “a good thing” after the win, but we all know it’s bullshit. He said the same thing last September about shortstop and then Jose Caballero doubled Anthony Volpe’s OPS for the month and still found himself on the bench for the entire postseason. The Yankees think they can be the ones to fix McMahon at the plate (they aren’t) like they always think they can fix everyone and McMahon makes $16 million this season and Rosario makes $2.5 million. That’s why Rosario will go back to not playing and McMahon will go right back into the lineup as if he isn’t one of the worst everyday bats in the majors.

5. Cam Schlittler allowed his first runs of the season in what was his shortest start of the season: 5 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 7 K. (Still no walks this year.) Schlittler retired the first six A’s of the game with three strikeouts, but ran into trouble in the third after a leadoff, swinging-bunt single, a line-drive single and a two-strike sacrifice bunt put runners on second and third with one out. The A’s then went double, strikeout, double against Schlittler and took a 3-1 lead. Schlittler kept the damage there and retired six of the next seven batters to end his night with a season-high 84 pitches. The combination of Jake Bird, Brent Headrick, Fernando Cruz and David Bednar threw four scoreless innings in relief and the Yankees improved to 8-2 on the season.

6. Rosario had the two home runs, Aaron Judge had a walk, Cody Bellinger had a hit, Ben Rice was on base three times, Giancarlo Stanton had a big line-drive single in the eighth, Jazz Chisholm had a hit and Austin Wells and Jose Caballero both had doubles. Trent Grisham (0-for-5 with a now-.561 OPS) was the only Yankees starter to not reach base.

7. Grisham is the next guy that I want to see take a seat on the bench. Even the biggest Grisham fan (if those exist?) knew he wouldn’t hit 34 home runs again, but many were upset by the qualifying offer to him, which would cost $22 million, prevent the team from spending the money elsewhere and block a non-injury path to the majors for Jasson Dominguez and Spencer Jones. Grisham is hitting .147/.326/.235 with no home runs, and while the on-base percentage isn’t the worst at .326, it needs to be much better for the hitter being given the most at-bats on the team, and for the hitter who bats in front of Aaron Judge. It’s time for Grisham to take a seat for at least a game.

8. Old favorite (of mine) Luis Severino will start against the Yankees on Wednesday. Severino has made two starts against the Yankees since leaving as a free agent after the 2023 season and they have both been disasters. Here are his lines from those two starts:

May 11, 2025: 4 IP, 9 H, 8 R, 8 ER, 2 BB, 2 K

June 29, 2025: 3.2 IP, 5 H, 7 R, 5 ER, 3 BB, 3 K, 2 HR

Put them together and you get: 7.2 IP, 14 H, 15 R, 13 ER, 5 BB, 5 K, 2 HR

9. Based on matchups and success against Severino, this is the best possible lineup for Wednesday with each player’s career numbers against Severino in parentheses:

Jazz Chisholm, 2B (5-for-11, 2B, 2 HR, BB)
Aaron Judge, RF (3-for-5, 2B, HR, BB)
Cody Bellinger, CF (3-for-9, 2B)
Paul Goldschmidt, 1B (2-for-5, 2B, HR, 3 BB)
Ben Rice, DH (0-for-3)
Randal Grichuk, LF (2-for-6, HR)
Austin Wells, C (1-for-2)
Amed Rosario, 3B (2-for-11, HR)
Jose Caballero, SS (0-for-1, 2 BB)

That puts Grisham on the bench and keeps McMahon on the bench. Again, this is the best possible lineup the Yankees could have on Wednesday, so the lineup Boone will construct will look nothing like this.

10. Will Warren gets the ball for his third start of the season. It’s funny because I would classify his first two starts as just OK, and yet, he has a 2.70 ERA and 1.100 WHIP. (Max Fried and Schlittler set the bar so high for what is considered “good.”) Warren faced the A’s twice last year and put together this line: 12.1 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 5 BB, 14 K. He may not need to pitch that well if the Yankees continue their dominance over Severino, but if he does, the Yankees should have their fourth straight series win to begin the season.

1. The Yankees erased a four-run deficit to beat the Marlins 9-7 on Saturday and then blew a three-run lead to lose to the Marlins 7-6 on Sunday. The Yankees won the series, have won all three series to start the season and are an AL-best 7-2. Their two losses were both one-run losses: one in which they were walked off with their second-to-last reliever on the mound in Seattle and one (on Sunday) in which they had the tying run on second and the winning run on first when the game ended. The Yankees have either won or nearly won all nine games this season. You can’t ask for much more than that.

2. What you can ask for though is for Aaron Boone to not use J.C. Escarra as his pinch-hit option like he did on Sunday with two outs in the ninth inning of a one-run game with the tying run on second and the winning run on first. I don’t care about lefty-righty in that spot. There’s no way Escarra was a better option than Jose Caballero (who he hit for) or Paul Goldschmidt (who hit a three-run home run off one of the best right-handed pitchers in the majors four days earlier) or Randal Grichuk or Amed Rosario. Escarra wasn’t good enough to be a Yankee for a lot of last season when the Yankees sent him down to use Ben Rice as the backup catcher. He’s only on the team now because Rice is the everyday first baseman. He is the last position player on the roster and the worst offensive player on the roster. And yet, Boone decided he was better than the starting shortstop, a borderline Hall of Famer and two other veteran bats because of what hand he hits with. Escarra struck out on three pitches against Anthony Bender and the swinging strike to end the game was a tier below Todd Frazier’s famous swing from the 2017 ALCS.

“Our lefties put some tough at-bats on Bender,” Boone said.

That’s why Boone used Escarra, because he watched other lefties have good at-bats against Bender. Here are the lefties that had good at-bats against him: Cody Bellinger, Ben Rice and Jazz Chisholm. Now which one of these things is unlike the others: Bellinger, Rice, Chisholm, Escarra. Three middle-of-the-order, major-league bats and a guy who is barely on the roster.

3. Chisholm hit a two-run double off Bender for his second hit of the series and his second and third RBIs of the season. Chisholm is now hitting .194/.237/.278 on the year as an impending free agent looking to get paid and someone who claimed he was going for a 50/50 season.

“We don’t think the game is over until the last out,” Jazz Chisholm said. “We always go out there battling until the last minute.”

Odd quote there from Chisholm, who the night before took his sweet time on a ground ball in the ninth inning that led to an infield “single” and nearly cost the Yankees the game. (Also, there are no “minutes” in baseball, Jazz.)

“He just kind of laid back on it,” Boone said of Chisholm’s lackadaisical effort. “When he’s got to close on it, we’ve got to make that one.” (It was about as critical as it gets for Boone, considering he first “credited” the runner for running hard instead of saying anything negative about his second baseman’s effort.

4. The Yankees trailed in the ninth because Max Fried had his worst start of the season following a three-hour-and-35-minute rain delay. He couldn’t throw strikes, walked three and allowed three earned runs in 6 2/3 innings. Following Fried, Fernando Cruz also couldn’t throw strikes and then Jake Bird couldn’t throw the ball anywhere near home plate.

“I gave them freebies,” Jake Bird said. “That’s not big league baseball. It’s not good.”

After the Yankees traded for Bird and he was awful, he was sent to Triple-A for the remainder of last season. After the Yankees traded for Camilo Doval, he was awful and was knocked way down the bullpen pecking order. Both guys went into this season with advanced roles and so far they have both been the same disappointments they were last season. Bird ruined Sunday’s game and Doval has allowed four earned runs on five hits and a walk over his last two outings and one inning total.

5. Since the dominant showing in San Francisco, the Yankees’ Bullpen of Question Marks is starting to show why no Yankees fan had trust in them going into the season. Doval looks like the pitcher the Giants gave up on and Bird looks like the pitcher the Rockies gave up on. David Bednar is being forced to throw 40-pitch saves and then is shut down for multiple days because of it. Cruz looks unhittable one moment and then like the 36-year-old who didn’t break into the league until he was 32 the next. Nothing can be expected from Paul Blackburn and Ryan Yarbrough as veteran innings eaters. The trustworthy names in the bullpen are Bednar (until the World Baseball Classic and early-season workload catch up with him), Brent Headrick (who should be the eighth-inning guy moving forward since Boone needs set innings for his relievers) and Tim Hill. It’s not great.

6. But it could be better. At some point you have to think Carlos Lagrange will be added to the bullpen to solidify this messy corps. And if the starter who loses out on the fifth spot ends up there, then that’s another arm and right now that arm looks like Ryan Weathers.

On Saturday, Weathers showed how you can be a left-handed, 26-year-old, who throws 100 mph and be on your third team in four years. He lasted only 3 2/3 innings against the Marlins, giving up three earned runs and putting nine runners on. He has put 15 runners on in eight innings across two starts, and Brian Cashman’s 0-for-his career in trading for a young, controllable starting pitcher who pitches well will remain an 0-for.

“I was ahead in the counts and just couldn’t put guys away,” Weathers said, summing up his career.

7. Because of Weathers’ short start, the Yankees used six relievers to get them to a win. The Marlins greatly outhit the Yankees 15-6, but the Yankees drew 10 walks, a day after drawing 11 in the home opener. They drew another nine on Sunday for a series total of 30, the franchise’s most ever in a three-game series.

“It’s a scoring competition,” Boone said, “not a hit competition.”

8. The Yankees drew 30 walks and scored 23 runs in the series (and somehow didn’t sweep), but it wasn’t a total team effort offensively. The offense is still limited to the first five hitters in the lineup. Chisholm’s ninth-inning double on Sunday was nice and hopefully the start of him breaking out, but it was pretty much his offense for the season. As for 7 through 9 in the lineup, well, it’s the worst 7 through 9 in the entire majors. That’s not sarcasm. Statistically, it’s the worst bottom-third of any lineup in all of baseball.

Austin Wells has a .452 OPS, Ryan McMahon a .363 and Jose Caballero .335. Boone pretty much said in spring training that even if Caballero hit like Judge while Anthony Volpe was out, Volpe would still be the starting shortstop when he returned. With the offensive output Caballero has provided so far, unfortunately, it will be easy for him to return to the bench once Volpe is ready. Getting pinch hit for by Escarra was as bad as it gets.

As for McMahon, so much for the Yankees fixing his swing in the offseason and unlocking a player who has never finished as even a league-average hitter. It’s great that McMahon is great defensively (and so far he hasn’t even been that with every throw to first in the dirt), but at some point, defense isn’t enough. With each 0-for, “some point” draws closer.

9. I’m not worried about Wells because I don’t have any expectations for him. I figure he’ll end up with 20-ish home runs and will be a just-below-league-average hitter. So be it from your catcher in this era of baseball. But the Yankees can’t have three automatic outs in the lineup every game. At some point the top of the order will go cold and other parts of the lineup will need to carry the team offensively. As of now, no other part of the lineup other than the top half is capable of carrying the team, or even providing a big hit or RBI. McMahon had two RBIs on Opening Day and none since. Caballero drove in the first run of the season and none since. Wells hasn’t driven in a single run.

10. The Yankees won’t need to score more than a few runs if the starting rotation gets back to utterly dominating the opponent like they did in the first two series of the season. Who better to do that than Cam Schlittler? Schlittler will get the ball on Tuesday to open the series against the A’s and as enjoyable as it was watching Fried pitch when he’s at his best, watching Schlittler pitch is another level of enjoyment. The Giants had never seen him and he blew them away on a limited pitch count. The Mariners saw him in his first major-league start and he did the same to them on a limited pitch count. The A’s have never seen him, so I expect another masterpiece from him on what should be an 85-plus pitch limit.

1. I was worried about this home-opening series with the Marlins because everything has been going a little too well for the Yankees and because the Marlins have been as good as any team in the majors since last September. Add in the trauma from last August’s disastrous sweep in Miami and my concern seemed valid. It took a Trent Grisham walk and an Aaron Judge two-run home run to quell those fears. After Will Warren allowed the first home run against Yankees pitching in 2026 with one out in the first, the Yankees answered right back with Judge’s third of the season to take a 2-1 lead and never looked back.

2. The Yankees loaded the bases from walks in the second and scored twice to increase their lead to 4-1 without putting the ball in play as Grisham drew a bases-loaded walk and Judge was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded. The Marlins got a run back in the fifth with another solo home run off Warren, but the Yankees responded with a run on a wild pitch in the sixth, a Ben Rice solo home run in the seventh and a Rice two-run double in the eighth to carry them to an 8-2 win. The Yankees’ cleanup hitter has lived up to expectations through the first week-plus of the season.

3. “Benny can really hit,” Boone said. “I think he’s a middle-of-the-order hitter and is going to be for a long time.”

Well, I’d hope you think he’s a “middle-of-the-order hitter” since you hit him fourth in the lineup.

Rice is hitting .409/500/.864 through six games with four doubles, two home runs and a league-leading eight RBIs. The Yankees went into this season believing he could be the second-best hitter on the team and he has been that. His defense also appears to be much improved from where it was last year. He has already made a handful of plays I was stunned to see him complete after watching his defense in the past.

4. Tim Hill, Jake Bird, Brent Headrick and Ryan Yarbrough closed out the game with 3 1/3 hitless innings as the bullpen full of question marks continues to impress. Hill only threw two pitches to end the sixth in what was still a two-run game at the time. Three games ago, Camilo Doval only threw two pitches in what was a tie game at the time.

5. Grisham drew three walks, Judge had a single, home run and walk, Cody Bellinger had a double, Rice had the big day with the home run and double, Jazz Chisholm had a double and a walk and Austin Wells, Jose Caballero and Ryan McMahon combined for five walks. The only Yankee to not reach base was Giancarlo Stanton, which was inevitable after he was cooled off with a day off on Wednesday in Seattle. The Yankees had only six hits in the game but a ridiculous 11 walks (and a hit by pitch). They went 1-for-13 with runners in scoring position and still managed to score eight runs.

7. The Yankees are now 6-1, and with the Blue Jays losing to the White Sox (they are 1-3 against the Rockies and White Sox), the Yankees have a two-game lead in the division with the best run differential in the AL at plus-24. The next-best run differential in the AL is the Astros at plus-6. I would like for the team to run away and hide with the division and make this summer as easy and enjoyable as possible. (Unlike last summer when they blew an eight-game lead over the Blue Jays.)

“It’s early, but you love the fact that you get off to this kind of start,” Aaron Boone said after another easy day of managing. “Wins are precious. The guys are obviously pitching as well as they are, but I think they’re also playing well, the all-around game.”

8. Warren was pretty good: 5.2 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 6 K, 2 HR. As David Cone said during the broadcast, “You want to have a Catfish Hunter mentality pitching in the Bronx where solo home runs won’t beat you,” and Warren followed that.

“Solo homers aren’t going to beat us,” Warren said.” If we attack early, the odds are in our favor.”

Warren limited the damage to a pair of solo home runs, which wasn’t nearly enough to beat the Yankees. Here is Warren’s line through two starts: 10 IP, 9 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 9 K, 2 HR, 2.70 ERA, 1.100 WHIP.

9. When Carlos Rodon is healthy, someone is coming out of the rotation — if everyone else is also healthy. At the moment that someone is Luis Gil, considering the Yankees didn’t think enough of him to have him in the rotation out of spring training. But when Gerrit Cole returns, someone else will come out of the rotation — if everyone else is also healthy. That someone will be Warren of Weathers.

10. I would think Warren is the front-runner to keep his spot because the Yankees pitched him in the third game of the season ahead of Ryan Weathers. But Brian Cashman has never successfully traded for a young, controllable starting pitcher in his career and desperately wants Weathers to end that narrative instead of being the latest in the long list that includes Jeff Weaver, Javier Vazquez, Michael Pineda, Nathan Eovaldi, Sonny Gray, James Paxton and Jameson Taillon. Weathers will have his second opportunity to showcase his ability on Saturday against his former team in his first start wearing pinstripes.