Yankees – Page 117 – Keefe To The City

Jul 31, 2020

Yankees Thoughts: Yankees Beat Orioles Again, No Thanks to Aaron Boone

Two games against the Orioles meant two wins for the Yankees as they finally finished their wild season-opening road trip.

The Yankees played the Orioles the last two nights, so without checking, we all know the Yankees won the last two nights. The winning streak against the Orioles from 2019 has carried over into 2020, and I don’t know if it will end until 2021.

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. Last season, the Yankees beat the Orioles on Opening Day before losing two straight to them. That was the last time the Yankees lost to the Orioles. The Yankees finished the season by winning 16 straight against the Orioles and going undefeated at Camden Yards. After these last two days, the Yanekes have now won 18 straight against the Orioles and 12 straight at Camden Yards. The Orioles are bad, very, very, very, very bad, and this trend of the Yankees beating up on them isn’t going away anytime soon. At some point, the Yankees will lose to the Orioles to break the streak, but in terms of beating up on them for 13-plus wins a season, that’s going to happen for at least the next few years. The Yankees have eight scheduled games left against the Orioles this season. Normally, visualizing a perfect 10-0 record against an opponent is outlandish, but I don’t think it is here. I think anything less than 8-2 against the Orioles this season is unacceptable, and that might be setting the bar too low.

2. Gerrit Cole wasn’t sharp again in his second Yankees start. He walked the first batter of his night and gave up a run in the first inning. Whenever someone reaches base against him, it feels weird. When a run is scored against him it feels almost fake. But in his first two starts, Cole hasn’t looked like himself, hasn’t thrown like himself and hasn’t resembled the pitcher who became the best pitcher in the world last year. Despite not being anywhere near the level he can and will be at, this is his line after starts against Washington and Baltimore: 11.2 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 3 BB, 12 K, 2 HR, 3.09 ERA, 0.686 WHIP. It’s rather frightening that Cole has pitched as “bad” as he will pitch all season and has put together numbers like that. His ability to grind out very good performances when he doesn’t have his best stuff is what separates him from nearly every other pitcher in the world, and it’s why these two starts from him are about as “bad” as it will get for him.

3. Why was Cole sent out for the seventh inning with a six-run lead and nine outs to get against the awful Orioles? Each pitcher has so many pitches in their arm over their career and the Yankees shouldn’t be willing to waste any of Cole’s, especially with a lead like that against a team like that. Cole was at 90 pitches, and while he didn’t look tired, this is what would have been his line had he been done after the sixth: 6 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 7 K. Instead he finished with this line: 6.2 IP, 4 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 7 K, 1 HR. It wasn’t necessary for him to return for one more inning, not when the Yankees currently have 11 relievers on the roster. If Aaron Boone was somehow worried about the Orioles scoring six runs before making nine outs, he could have turned to Chad Green, Adam Ottavino, Tommy Kahnle or Zack Britton, who had all pitched once so far this season, and who had all pitched once since Game 6 of the ALCS on Oct. 19, 2019. Boone wasn’t worried about blowing the lead though even after the Orioles made it a three-run game as he went to Luis Avilan after Cole.

4. Can Boone and the Yankees play the everyday lineup every day? Is it that hard? This isn’t a six-month, 162-game grind. It’s a two-month, 60-game sprint. While I get that the change to the postseason format made it virutally impossible for the Yankees to miss the postseason, playing more games at Yankee Stadium than on the road in October isn’t nothing. You would think after settling for not having the best record in the American League many times over the lazt 11 years, in which this team hasn’t won a championship and hasn’t even been to the World Series would change the Yankees’ mind about having regular-season urgency, but it hasn’t.

5. Not even this wild, pandemic-threatened season can change the Yankees’ mind. After unexpectedly having Monday and Tuesday off because of the threat of the Phillies being sick, the Yankees had as many off days as games played this season (three) and still don’t feel the need to play their everyday expected lineup every day. Maybe things would be different if the league didn’t change the postseason format to allow 53 perent of the teams into the postseason. Maybe then the Yankees would be playing like winning the division and finishing with the best record is worth something (which it is). I don’t think they would though.

6. Now in his third year as Yankees manager, Boone hasn’t improved with his bullpen managment at all. He actually might have gotten worse. In the second game of the series, leading by a run, Boone turned to Jonathan Loaisiga for the sixth inning following the rain delay. Fine. Loaisiga walked the first two batters he faced, but got out of it with a strikeout and double play. Then he went back to Loaisiga for the seventh. OK. Loaisiga put up another zero. Then he went back to Loaisiga for the eighth. Nope. Loaisiga gave up a two-run home run and the Yankees had blown a 5-0 lead. Ottavino had been used before the rain delay, so he wasn’t available. But that meant there were still nine relievers available aside from Ottavino and Loaisiga. Three of those relievers were Green, Kahnle and Britton, who had all pitched in one game this season, and again, one game since Game 6 of teh ALCS. Boone reported after the game that Kahnle wasn’t available, so that gets him off the hook for not using Kahnle, but not for not using Green. Thankfully, Aaron Judge hit a three-run home run in the top of the ninth and the Yankees retook the lead and went on to win when Britton finally came in and ended the game, but Boone’s bullpen management shouldn’t be forgotten because it’s this exact type of management that cost the Yankees the 2018 ALDS and could cost them again in the postseason. Boone stayed on 16 with the dealer showing a 10, and when the dealer turned over a 5 and pulled an 8 to bust, Boone won and so he thought he made the right decsion. I’m happy the Yankees won. I’m not happy that today Boone believes he made the right call because Judge saved him.

7. The Yankees have a starting pitching problem. Through five games, Cole pitched twice, James Paxton pitched and was pulled in the second inning, the Yankees had a bullpen game and Happ lasted four innings and was awful. Jordan Montomgery will finally pitch on Friday, and he was very good in spring training and Summer Camp, but again it’s spring training and Summer Camp, and Masahiro Tanaka will pitch on Saturday, and I trust him completely. But the Yankees kind of need Montgomery to be good because I don’t know when or if Paxton will bounce back after his back procedure and Happ might have a good start here and there along the way, but he’s finished. Back in February, the Yankees had the best offense and bullpen in baseball and a rotation of Cole, Severino, Paxton, Tanaka and Happ/Montgomery. Tanaka was going to be the fourth strarter! Now they have a rotation of Cole, Tanaka, hope Montgomery is good, hope Paxton can figure out how to throw hard again and hope Happ can give you a handful of quality starts. I have a bad feeling it will be another October of debating who to start in Game 3 because after Cole and Tanaka the Yankees might not have a third starter yet again.

8. DJ LeMahieu is so good it’s absurd. There hasn’t been a time when LeMahieu has been bad as a Yankee. Even with only a 1-for-5 peformance on Thursday, LeMahieu is batting .412 with a 1.059 OPS, and he does it so quietly. RBI single here, base knock there, solo home run here, clutch hit there. With the game so much about strikeouts and home runs these days, it’s refreshing to have a hitter on your team who rarely strikes out, is so hard to get out in general and can put just about any ball in play, and oh yeah, can play nearly everywehre on the infield. D(erek) J(eter) LeMahieu has been a perfect Yankee.

9. As President of the Gary Sanchez Fan Club (and possibly the only remaining member of the club with his start to the season), I’m going to refrain from commenting on Sanchez’s offense through five games. I’m going to refer to the five-game sample size for now, but with each passing day without a hit and another game with multipe strikeouts, it’s becoming harder and harder to defend Sanchez. To put it as nicely as possible, his at-bats have been ugly. He’s had a few line drives that have been hit right at fielders, but for the most part it’s been swinging and missing, and it feels like he’s 0-2 before he steps in the box. I don’t know what Sanchez’s plan at the plate is, and right now, it doesn’t look like he has one other than to hope he gets a mistake fastball, even if what he thinks looks like a mistake fastball ends up being a slider low and away. Fortunately for Sanchez, the Yankees are winning because Sanchez is a popular target for criticism even when the team is winning, so if the Yankees were 2-3 or 1-4, he would be hearing it to the point that those who thought Austin Romine should start over him because of his defense would think Kyle Higashioka should start over him for his offense.

10. Sanchez isn’t the only hitless one on the team as Brett Gardner is also hitless, but got Thursday night off, though I’m guessing we will see Gardner back in the lineup on Friday. I’m not worried about either Sanchez or Gardner. They will come around. If I had to pick between the two for who I’m more worried about, I would pick Gardner based on his age and his decline over the last few years (minus the inflated home run numbers because of the super baseball). It would be nice if the two broke out on Friday or at least got a hit, so Michael Kay could stop talking about them being 0-for-2020.

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

Podcasts • Yankees • Yankees Podcast

Jul 30, 2020

Yankees Podcast: Play the Everyday Lineup Every Day

The Yankees played the Orioles, so the Yankees won another game. But there are still questions about the team.

After two unexpected days off, the Yankees played again on Wednesday night and won again, beating the Orioles 9-3 to improve to 3-1 on the season. Gerrit Cole wasn’t his dominant self for his second straight start to open the season, but he was good enough, and the Yankees’ power carried the team to another win.

Why was Cole out for the seventh inning at 90 pitches with a six-run lead and nine outs to go to a win? And why is the team not playing the everyday lineup in a season in which they have already had three days off in a week and could have additional days off at any point during this season? Why isn’t the everyday lineup playing every day in a 60-game season after having just had four months off and having not have played real game in nine months? Yes, the Yankees won again, but these are relevant questions for a team that needs to finish first in the American League and get back to and win the World Series for the first time in more than a decade.

At the 10:14 mark, former major league reliever Carter Capps joined me talk to about his baseball career, his famous delivery which caused MLB to implement a rule against it and his post-playing career on the analytics and mechanics side of pitching.

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

Podcasts • Yankees • Yankees Podcast

Jul 26, 2020

Yankees Podcast: James Paxton Forces Back-to-Back Bullpen Games

The Yankees need James Paxton to be a front-end starter and they can’t afford for him to have many other starts like his first.

For as good as the Yankees were and are expected to be this season, Saturday night proved why I still have my doubts about them in the postseason. Without Luis Severino this season, the Yankees need James Paxton to be a front-end starter and they can’t afford for him to have many other starts like his first.

Paxton was awful on Saturday with diminished velocity and no put-away pitch. Six of the nine batters he faced reached base, including all five in the second inning. He left the game with two runs in and the bases loaded and no outs, and for him, it’s a miracle his ERA wasn’t ruined for the shorteneed season in the second inning in what is a free agency year for the left-hander. The Yankees’ decision to open the season with a bullpen game in the third game meant that Paxton needed to give them length in the second game. He didn’t and now the Yankees are scrambling to make roster moves and get fresh arms to the majors for the third game of the season.

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

Podcasts • Yankees • Yankees Podcast

Jul 24, 2020

Yankees Podcast: Life Feels Somewhat Normal

Scott Reinen of Bronx Pinstripes joined me to talk about the Yankees’ season-opening win over the Nationals.

Yankees baseball returned with a 4-1 win over the defending champion Nationals. It wouldn’t have been the first baseball game of 2020 without it being shortened due to rain. But it was a real, meaningful baseball game and the Yankees won.

Scott Reinen of Bronx Pinstripes joined me to talk about the Yankees’ season-opening win over the Nationals, Brett Gardner batting fifth in the lineup, Gerrit Cole’s Yankees debut, the new-look Giancarlo Stanton, Tyler Wade’s best game in the majors and the expanded postseason field.

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

Blogs • Yankees

Jul 24, 2020

Yankees’ Season-Opening Win Felt Easy

On Thursday night, the Yankees won a game in July, and for the first time in a long time, life felt somewhat normal.

My initial thought when Giancarlo Stanton made contact with a first-inning pitch from Max Scherzer, which resulted in a two-run home run and 2-0 Yankees lead: Game over. Sure, it might have been a bit premature to think the Yankees had already clinched a victory in the first few minutes of the first inning of the first game of the season against the defending champion Nationals with the Nationals having yet to bat, but it really wasn’t. Not when you know the Yankees have Gerrit Cole pitching. Thursday night’s season-opening, rain-shortened 4-1 win for the Yankees felt even easier than their 2019 Opening Day win over the eventual 108-loss Orioles felt, and it was all because of the combination of scoring first and having Cole on the mound.

Michael Kay frequently mentions the old adage that a starting pitching will have great stuff in one-third of their starts, bad stuff in one-third of their starts and will have average stuff with the need to grind through the other one-third of their starts. I don’t know that Cole ever truly has “bad” stuff, and the adage clearly didn’t apply to him in 2019 with Houston when he finished the season 16-0, but on Thursday night, Cole was teetering on the border of having bad stuff and needing to grind though the start, and somehow he finished the game by allowing one hit and one earned run over five innings.

For as weird as it was to see Cole wearing the Yankees’ road gray uniform, it was even weirder to see him unable to throw strikes. Cole was missing with every pitch early on, going to a 3-1 count against the Nationals’ leadoff hitter Trea Turner before Turner helped him out by swinging at what would have been ball 4. Cole then fell behind Adam Eaton 2-0, and after evening up the count, Eaton was able to barely stay alive by just making contact on a third straight foul ball. The seventh pitch of the at-bat ended up in the seats for a home run.

For a brief moment, I had flashbacks of CC Sabathia losing in Baltimore on Opening Day 2009 in his Yankees debut before remembering Anthony Rendon is no longer a National, Juan Soto is currently out and Starlin Castro would be batting third in the game. Even though Cole would throw a first-pitch ball to three of the four hitters in the first inning (Castro, like always, swung at the first pitch of his at-bat), he was able to get through the inning and the top of the Nationals lineup (though their “top” was exactly a top) with just the one mistake to Eaton.

In the second, Cole hit Eric Thames with a slider, but after that hit-by-pitch, Cole only allowed one baserunner over the game’s final four innings (a fifth-inning Asdrubal Cabrera walk). Cole never really looked like himself or like the pitcher who became the best pitcher in the world with the Nationals. (Sorry, Mets fans.) Cole’s final line: 5 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 5 K, 1 HR. That very well could be the worst Cole looks all season and he still managed to allow one hit and one earned run over five innings.

It feels good to once again have a pitcher who, when given any sort of lead, has essentially won the game before the game has ended. The Yankees haven’t had that in more than two years when Luis Severino was the best pitcher in the league for the first half of 2018, and before Severino, the Yankees hadn’t had that since the first four seasons of Sabathia’s Yankees career. But for as good as Severino was that season and has been at times and for as great as Sabathia was from 2009-2012, it feels different with Cole. While, the other two felt like sure-thing wins every fifth day, Cole feels like an automatic win every fifth day, with the game being played out as a formality.

The early lead Cole was given was increased by an Aaron Judge RBI double and a Stanton RBI single. I know there’s a lot being made about Stanton being slimmer in an attempt to stay healthy and increase production, and it showed in the first game of the season, even if it’s the smallest of sample sizes. I want the weight loss and physique adjustment by Stanton to be real and I want him to be the player the Yankees thought they were being handed by the Marlins before 2018, but I was in Toronto on Opening Day 2018 and saw him hit two majestic home runs and got lost in the idea of him being a perennial MVP presence in the middle of the order for the Yankees. I won’t let myself fall for that again, especially given everything that happened with him last season. For now, I’m cautiously optimistic the real Stanton could be on the 2020 Yankees.

The Yankees started the season with a win, Cole dominated with nowhere close to his best stuff, not only did Stanton play, but he provided power and clutch hitting, and even Tyler Wade looked like a major leaguer.

On Thursday night, the Yankees won a game in July, and for the first time in a long time, life felt somewhat normal.

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