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Yankees in Boston Trip: Part III

The Yankees lost to the Red Sox again and I was more than ready to leave Boston after three cold, wet days and two losses.

Giancarlo Stanton

Here is Part I and here is Part II of my three-day, three-game trip to Boston.

I had a little extra pep in my step walking downstairs to the breakfast buffet on Thursday. Everyone else in our hotel seemed to be there for some sort on conference with badges hanging from their necks and looks of fatigue and wanting to go home on their faces. But not me. I felt great. The combination of the Yankees win and the bench-clearing brawl to reignite the rivalry had me walking around Boston like Joseph-Gordon Levitt after he sleeps with Zooey Deschanel for the first time in 500 Days of Summer.

The weather was finally nice in Boston. It had felt like winter for the first two games of the series, but now it felt like spring as we walked around Back Bay. The Yankees would be going for the series win later that night, and the anticipation of the game still several hours away had me pumped.

After a short pregame session at Cask N’Flagon, Brittni and I walked into Fenway, and shortly after game started, it started to rain as the Baseball Gods continued to punish Major League Baseball and its fans for starting the season on March 29. The beautiful day had turned into a disgusting night, and it might not have been as cold as the previous two nights, but the rain was an annoyance.

As the rain rapidly increased, so did Sonny Gray’s pitch count. He only needed 16 pitches to get through the first inning despite a single and hit by pitch that got the crowd’s attention after Wednesday night‘s events. But in the second inning, the wheels came off.

Eduardo Nunez singled to lead off the inning and then Gray walked Jackie Bradley Jr., who does everything in his power to not walk. Gray’s first pitch to Sandy Leon was wild, which allowed Nunez to move to third. Leon singled in Nunez and Bradley moved to second. Gray the  walked Brock Holt, who entered the game batting .077/.294/.077, to load the bases. Mookie Betts drove in Bradley with a sacrifice fly and then Andrew Benintendi drove in Leon with a fielder’s choice. An error on Tyler Wade allowed Benintendi to go to second. Mitch Moreland then singled to score Holt. Gray struck out J.D. Martinez and got Rafael Devers to ground out to end the inning, but the damage had been done. Four runs on three hits and two walks and 33 pitches. The Yankees had their work cut out for them thanks to another egg being laid by Gray.

The Yankees went down 1-2-3 again in the third as Rick Porcello remained perfect through three. Gray followed up his disastrous second by allowing back-to-back doubles to begin the third and make it 5-0. After a pair of strikeouts, a groundout scored the sixth run. The Yankees were down 6-0 after three, the rain wasn’t slowing down and I wanted to be back at the hotel bar eating a burger, drinking a beer and watching this awful game on TV along with the Stanley Cup playoffs.

Giancarlo Stanton got hit by a pitch in the fourth, which led to cheers at Fenway as if the crowd were riled up for Pearl Jam to come out for an encore. Unfortunately, that would be the only baserunner of the inning and the no-hitter was still intact.

Gray gave up a leadoff single to Moreland and Aaron Boone had seen enough. I had seen enough two innings prior, but unfortunately I’m not allowed to make pitching changes for the Yankees (though they would be better off if I were). Domingo German relieved Gray and retired the next three batters to end the inning.

The Yankees went down in order in the fifth and after the bottom of the fifth, the umpires called for the tarp. Great. A rain delay in the middle of a 6-0 game. I wanted to leave, but I also wanted to watch the heart of the order bat again in the event that they could put a rally together. Luckily, our tickets included the Royal Rooters club, so we hung out in there during the 45-minute rain delay.

The Yankees went down in order again in the sixth and now I was worried. Was I really going to  watch Rick Porcello (the worst AL Cy Young winner in history) of all pitchers no-hit the Yankees? I was nine outs away from watching the worst Yankees regular-season loss I had ever seen at Fenway Park.

Thankfully, Aaron Judge doubled to leadoff the seventh and save me from watching the Yankees get no-hit. Stanton followed the double with a single and i started to get excited. But the excitement didn’t last long as Didi Gregorius flew out and then Gary Sanchez and Aaron Hicks struck out to end the inning. It was time to go. The Yankees were down 6-0 with six outs to their name and I was drenched and hungry.

We got back to the hotel restaurant/bar and warmth and were enjoying some beer and food and playoff hockey when the bartender started to change the channel. She changed the channel to the Yankees-Red Sox, which meant something happened or was happening. Did the Yankees come back? Was there another brawl?

Sure enough, the Red Sox had brought in Marcus Walden with a six-run lead in the ninth and he proceeded to walk Judge, give up a single to Giancarlo Stanton and walk Gregorius. Sanchez had just hit a bases-clearing double and was standing on second when the bartender changed the channel. I was excited, but not excited in the event that they did complete a six-run, ninth-inning comeback and I had left early. 

Craig Kimbrel made sure I didn’t regret my decision to trade cold, wet, miserable Yankees baseball for food, beer and warmth. He got Hicks to ground out and the struck out Neil Walker and Wade, to no surprise, to end the game.

The Yankees had lost the game and the series and were now 4 1/2 games back in the division after just 13 games. After three days and three games in cold, wet weather, I was ready to leave Boston and I’m sure the Yankees were too.

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Yankees in Boston Trip: Part II

Tuesday night sucked at Fenway Park sucked. Wednesday night at Fenway Park couldn’t have gone any better.

New York Yankees at Boston Red Sox

Here is Part I of my three-day, three-game trip to Boston.

Tuesday night sucked. And to top off the 14-1 embarrassment, drinking Coors Lights for about five hours straight (and trying one or two of Brittni’s Angry Orchard Rosés) led to a brutal hangover on Wednesday. It didn’t matter that I had pizza from two different places, both near the end of the game and then again after the game. I crushed the breakfast buffet at the hotel and then took an afternoon nap. Then a few hours before the game, we went to Eataly where I had more pizza, and then it was time to get ready for the game.

We had to stop at my friend’s apartment on Comm. Ave. to pick up Brittni’s bag (it only had her whole life in it) that she left there the night before (Angry Orchard Rosé will do that to you) walking over to Fenway Park for the second game of the series.

Thanks to getting stuck by the slowest people in the slowest moving line in the history of event entrances, I was watching on a TV when Brett Gardner led off the game with a single and Aaron Judge walked before Giancarlo Stanton rocked a two-run triple to the deepest part of the park up against the 420 sign. At first I thought Stanton had struck out or grounded into a double play given the crowd’s reaction, but that’s just how many Yankees fans were in Fenway.

In recent seasons, there have been more and more “Let’s Go Yankees” chanting breaking out in Fenway, something I would have never imagined between my first Yankees-Red Sox game at Fenway in 1999 and 2004. Even in the few seasons after 2004, Fenway was still a scary place for Yankees fans to wear Yankees apparel, and the score would determine your safety after the game. But now people openly tell Jackie Bradley Jr. he sucks and yell obscenities at the Red Sox on their home field. It’s beautiful.

Somehow it was even colder than the night before. The wind was whipping around and in Section 34 in straightaway center field (the same viewpoint as what you see on TV), down below on Lansdowne Street, an aspiring musician or a crazy person with a few empty buckets (I’m going with the latter) drummed away the whole game. Drumming is actually not what he was doing, but rather just hitting the drum over and over like a metronome with no beat or rhythm. People in our section were pooling together money to throw down to him to make him stop, but the “drumming” lasted the entire game except for a few momentary breaks.

I didn’t think much of Tyler Wade’s groundout in the top of the third inning other than that maybe Tyler Wade isn’t very good and just an AAAA player. But then Tyler Austin and Brock Holt came together at second base as a result of that groundout and the benches cleared, and the “Yankees suck” chants began right on cue. Austin had slid a little to aggressively for Holt’s liking, and the two players barely hanging on to being Major Leaguers caused the benches to clear and hundreds of millions of dollars of baseball assets sprinting for second base. Both ownership groups were probably happy thinking about what a fight and a renewed rivalry would do for their wallets, while also worried about all of the money at stake in an actual brawl.

Austin had reached base on an RBI single that gave the Yankees a 4-1 lead. It was going to take a much more lopsided score for the Red Sox to throw at Austin if they really felt his slide was over the top. When Gary Sanchez crushed his second two-run home run of the game in the fourth, the Yankees had an 8-1 lead, and the Red Sox had the deficit they needed to throw at Austin.

Austin’s at-bat in the fifth came and went as he struck out against Heath Hembree on four pitches. In the bottom of the fifth, Masahiro Tanaka unraveled as the Red Sox scored five runs, including their second grand slam in as many nights, this one from J.D. Martinez. Suddenly, the lopsided Yankees blowout was now an 8-6 game. I wasn’t thinking about whether or not there would be a fight, I was thinking about how this game would join my list of bad Yankees games at Fenway Park. Losing this game would be the worst Yankees loss at Fenway Park for me since Game 5 of the 2004 ALCS.

Thankfully, the Yankees added two insurance runs in the sixth and Chad Green pitched a shutdown inning in the bottom of the inning to keep the Yankees’ lead at 10-6. Austin was due up in the seventh, but the game was still close.

Joe Kelly is a loser. I thought that long before Wednesday’s game. Wednesday’s game did nothing other than reinforce my opinion about him: loser. In 2015, Kelly told the media he would win the AL Cy Young award. It wasn’t said in jest. It was said in all seriousness and said a few times. Kelly made 25 starts in 2015, pitching to a 4.82 ERA and 1.444 WHIP. Cy Young indeed. He’s basically Nathan Eovaldi. All the velocity in the world and can’t strike anyone out.

Kelly tried to drill Austin, but his command is so bad that he missed, so he tried again, and this time he didn’t miss. Austin slammed his bat on the plate and then went right for Kelly as Kelly stood there with his glove begging Austin to come fight him. Kelly is 6-foot-1, 190 lbs. Austin is 6-foot-2, 220 lbs. Size isn’t everything in a fight, but knowing the demeanors of both, if Christian Vazquez hadn’t pulled on Austin’s jersey to trip him up right before he reached Kelly, Kelly’s career might be over. Luckily for Kelly, Judge came in to play referee and not play enforcer. He put Kelly in a headlock and with the help of Stanton, the two mammoth Yankees moved the entire pile of both teams across the infield.

“Yankees suck” filled the Fenway air as everyone tried their best to see who was throwing punches and who was taking punches. When the dust settled, the umpires took what felt like three hours to sort it all out as the temperature dropped. Phil Nevin came out to argue his ejection as the Fenway played “Let It Go” from Frozen. Brittni, wearing flats in the freezing temperatures, began to look like Anna near the end of Frozen (sorry for the spoiler), and the game still hadn’t restarted.

The game was long from over. Neither team scored in the seventh or eighth and the Yankees were once again scoreless in the ninth. With a four-run lead and desperately needing a win, Aaron Boone called on the highest-paid reliever in baseball to close out the game against the team he is barely ever able to close out a game against.

Here is what I wrote earlier in the season about Aroldis Chapman:

After watching Aroldis Chapman pitch for the Yankees for four months of 2016 and all of 2017, I know there are two Aroldis Chapmans. There’s the Good Aroldis Chapman, who comes in and there is actually a 0 percent chance anyone will reach base and close to a 0 percent chance that anyone might even make contact. Then there’s the Bad Aroldis Chapman, who comes in and need 30 pitches to get through the inning, if he even gets through the inning, as every triple-digit fastball is fouled straight back or hit for a line drive and every slider is sat on or misses the strike zone completely. This appearance was a combination of the two.

Bad Aroldis Chapman was in for the Yankees.

Jackie Bradley Jr., who is on his way out of the majors, singled to lead off the ninth, and then Christian Vazquez doubled to move Bradley to third. Fenway Park was on its feet and I felt like I was going to throw up all over myself. Here is what was at stake with a Yankees loss:

  1. A third straight loss to fall to 5-7
  2. A second straight loss to the Red Sox
  3. Blowing an 8-1 lead two games after blowing a 5-0 lead
  4. Losing a game in which the benches cleared twice
  5. Watching your $86 million blow a four-run, ninth-inning lead to your rival

(On top of that, I had a four team parlay and the Yankees were the last team I needed to win it.)

Thankfully, Sandy Leon flew out on the first pitch of his at-bat for the first out of the inning and I could breathe for a second. The runners on base meant nothing, as did the batter at the plate. Just keep the tying run out of the batter’s box, and never let the go-ahead run get to the plate.

Mookie Betts battled Chapman as Chapman looked gas and like he might walk the park. Behind 3-1 in the count, I felt like dry heaving with Rafael Devers on deck and visions of Devers home run off Chapman last season started to replay in my head.

Chapman threw the best two pitches he will probably throw this season to Betts for a called strike 2 and a swinging strike 3 and there were two outs in the inning.

Devers came up to the plate and a wild pitch from Chapman scored Bradley to make it 10-7. But Vazquez and Devers still meant nothing. Hanley Ramirez standing in the on-deck circle meant everything.

Chapman struck out Devers to avoid the worst Yankees regular-season loss of my lifetime (no exaggeration given everything at stake). Brittni got warm and she got some sushi and she promised to never wear flats to an April baseball game in Boston again.

The Yankees were back to .500 and the Red Sox’ nine-game winning streak had been stopped.

Part III of my three-day, three-game trip to Boston coming tomorrow.

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Yankees in Boston Trip: Part I

I have seen a lot of bad Yankees games at Fenway Park. April 10, 2018 can be added to the list.

Giancarlo Stanton

I have seen a lot of bad Yankees games at Fenway Park. A lot of bad games.

May 18, 1999: Joe Torre returns to the Yankees after missing the beginning of the season to battle prostate cancer. David Cone and Pedro Martinez go toe-to-toe, but trailing 3-2 late, Jason Grimsley can’t keep it close as he gives up three runs in the bottom of the eighth.

Oct 18, 2004: Game 5 of the 2004 ALCS, which also happens to be the third-worst night of my life. The second being Game 6 and the first being Game 7.

April 14, 2005: Randy Johnson gets lit up for five runs and Tom Gordon turns a 5-5 tie into an 8-5 loss with an embarrassing eighth inning. And to top it all off, Gary Sheffield brawls with some fans in right field.

May 1, 2006: Johnny Damon returns to Boston as Friendly Fenway’s center field gets littered with money. Tied 3-3 in the eighth, Tanyon Sturtze gives up the go-ahead run. With two men on and David Ortiz due up, Joe Torre calls for the Mike Myers, the lefty specialist and the man the Yankees acquired for the sole purpose of facing Ortiz. Ortiz cranks a three-run home run into the New England night.

April 22, 2007: After losing the first two games of the series, the Yankees take a 3-0 lead in the rubber match on Sunday Night Baseball. But after holding the Red Sox scoreless for the first two innings, rookie Chase Wright allows Manny Ramirez, J.D. Drew, Mike Lowell and Jason Varitek to go back-to-back-to-back-to-back on him to take a 4-3 lead. The Yankees would take the lead back in the sixth only to have Scott Proctor give up a three-run home run to Lowell in the seventh.

April 24, 2009: The Yankees lead 4-2 in the ninth with two outs and Mariano Rivera on the mound and Kevin Youkilis on first base. Jason Bay hits a 1-0 pitch over the wall in center to tie the game. In the 11th, Damaso Marte gives up a home run to Youkilis that landed just yesterday.

April 26, 2009: Hoping to salvage the final game of the series, Andy Pettitte falls apart in the fifth. Tied 1-1, Pettitte wakes David Ortiz up by allowing Ortiz to double home the go-ahead run. With Jacoby Ellsbury on third and Ortiz on second following the double, Ellsbury steals home on Pettitte and Jorge Posada and steals Pettitte’s pride, dignity and self esteem in the process.

(A period of a lot of Yankees wins.)

April 29, 2016: The Yankees have a 2-0 lead in the seventh inning. With two on and two outs, Masahiro Tanaka gives up a two-run double to Jackie Bradley Jr. to tie the game. In the eighth inning, Dellin Betances gives up a two-run home run to David Ortiz as the Yankees lose 4-2.

April 30, 2016: The Yankees lose 8-0 and Rick Porcello pitches seven shutout innings.

You can add April 10, 2018 to the list.

Thankfully, I’m up in Boston for all three games of the series because I was inside Fenway Park for a total of about 30 minutes on Tuesday night.

Last year on April 26, Luis Severino pitched a seven-inning shutout at Fenway. Then on July 15, he gave up one earned run over seven innings at Fenway. This start looked like his Aug. 12 start against the Red Sox at the Stadium when eight earned runs in 4 1/3 innings.

Severino didn’t have it from the start. Mookie Betts doubled, Andrew Benintendi walked and Hanley Ramirez singled. After three batters and 10 pitchers, it was 1-0 Red Sox with runners on first and third and no one out. With Chris Sale going for the Red Sox, the game was most likely over already. But just incase anyone thought the Yankees might still win, Severino made sure to erase those thoughts in the second inning.

Four more hits, including a two-run Benintendi triple and the Red Sox had a 4-0 lead. I knew it was game over, but I stayed anyway as I watched Brittni’s teeth chatter as she was somehow cold inside her long-sleeved shirt and two coats and hood. Two innings later when the Red Sox added a fifth run and the “Yankees suck” chants started to build with intensity, I had seen enough. I said, “Let’s go,” to Brittni and she moved like they were giving away puppies outside the park.

In the cab on our way to our friend’s apartment to catch up and drink away the pain of a loss to the Red Sox, I watched Aaron Judge homer (thanks to the FOX Sports Go app, which is the best invention of all time), and I thought it would really suck if I left this game early and the Yankees somehow come back. But I was frozen from my short time at the game and I knew better than to think the Yankees were going to mount a five-run comeback against Sale. I made the right decision.

At my friend’s apartment, I watched the bottom of the sixth inning unfold, which will hopefully go down as the worst inning of the 2018 season for the Yankees. If it doesn’t, then that’s going to be quite an inning.

Tommy Kahnle relived Severino to start the six. Here is how his performance went:

Groundout
Double
Walk
Walk
Double (two runs)
Sacrifice fly (one run)
Walk

Then the always reliable Chasen Shreve came in to get the last out of the inning. It took him a while:

Hit by pitch
E5 (one run)
Walk (one run)
Home run (four runs)
Groundout

That’s nine runs on three hits (all extra-base hits), four walks, one hit by pitch and one error. The Red Sox were up 14-1 and I was so pleased with my decision to leave the game in the bottom of the fourth inning for warmth and cheaper beer.

The loss put the Yankees back under .500 at 5-6 and 4 1/2 games out in the AL East, but at least it wasn’t a heartbreaking loss. Sure, this game is now on my list of Fenway Park disasters, but it wasn’t like the two losses to the Blue Jays or the Sunday loss to the Orioles. It was just a good, old embarrassing rout, and those are easier to shake off.

Part II of my three-day, three-game trip to Boston coming tomorrow.

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Opening Day in Toronto: Part II

The 2018 Opening Day Toronto trip continues with Masahiro Tanaka pitching for the first time since Game 5 of the ALCS.

Masahiro Tanaka

Here is Part I of my two-day, two-game trip to Toronto.

The winning feeling didn’t go away when I woke up on Friday. Thankfully, I hedged my Opening Day four-team parlay that Brittni’s Dodgers cost me and wound up even on the day.

After breakfast, news broke of Aaron Hicks heading to the disabled list with Billy McKinney headed to Toronto to make his Major League debut. One game into the season, and the Yankees’ very deep outfield depth had become very shallow. Hicks would join Jacoby Ellsbury and Clint Frazier on the DL, and the absence of Ellsbury suddenly became relevant. I would rather Ellsbury not be and have never been a Yankee, but if you’re asking me Ellsbury or McKinney? Well, I have to take The Thief.

The day was spent at the Hockey Hall of Fame (for me) and then at the aquarium (for Brittni) with first pitch not until 7:07, and a second stop at Wayne Gretzky’s was made for a late afternoon lunch.

***

The last time Masahiro Tanaka took the mound was to shut down the Astros in Game 5 of the 2017 ALCS. His line in that win: 7 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 8 K. Between that start and his start against the Indians in Game 3 of the ALDS (7 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 7 K), no longer were Yankees fans hoping Tanaka would opt out of his contract.

Aaron Boone decided (or the front office decided and he was instructed) to bat Didi Gregarious fourth for the second game of the season. To me, you want your best hitters hitting as much as possible, so I would never break up Aaron Judge-Giancarlo Stanton-Gary Sanchez part of the order. It had worked against the left-hander J.A. Happ on Opening Day, and it didn’t matter to me that a right-hander in Aaron Sanchez was starting the second game. Ask any Major League pitcher or catcher which order of hitters worries them more: Judge-Stanton-Sanchez or Judge-Stanton-Gregorius. I think it might be a unanimous decision. But Boone (aka Cashman and Co.) set a precedent in Game 2 of the season that a left-handed hitter would break up the most feared back-to-back-to-back hitters in Major League Baseball. If Greg Bird weren’t on the disabled list yet again, it would most likely be him in that spot, but for now it would be Gregorius.

I have apologized countless times for being wrong about Gregorius with the majority of that apology coming after the first inning of the 2017 Wild-Card Game and some more apologizing after Game 5 of the 2017 ALDS against Corey Kluber. Gregorius has turned into an All-Star-level shortstop and has seen his power numbers increase in each of his three seasons with the Yankees, but I still don’t want him batting fourth or ever batting ahead of Sanchez.

All of my lineup complaining on Twitter before the game (and there was a lot of it) was quickly silenced as Gregorius jumped on an 0-1 pitch with a line-drive triple to center field to lead off the second inning. A Sanchez grounder to third would display the weakest part of Gregorius’ game in his baserunning, as he was easily thrown out at home. With two outs in the inning, Billy McKinney picked up his first Major League hit with a seeing-eye grounder through the right side and new fan favorite Brandon Drury smashed a 2-1 pitch off the very top of the right-field wall to score Sanchez and give the Yankees an early 1-0 lead.

After working around a two-out double in the first, Tanaka gave up a one-out solo home run in the second to the powerful Randal Grichuk. Thanks to the low ticket prices in Toronto, I was able to sit behind home plate for both games, and Grichuk, in person, looks slightly bigger than Ronald Torreyes. Despite his stature, he jumped on the first pitch he saw from Tanaka and hit a bomb to left-center to tie the game.

Drury struck again in the fourth with a two-out RBI single to give the Yankees a 2-1 lead and Tyler Wade finally came through with a big hit in his young career with a two-out, two-run double in the sixth to give the Yankees a 4-1 lead.

Tanaka lasted six innings (LINE) and Tommy Kahnle came in for a perfect seventh. Kahnle returned for the eighth, but after walking Russell Martin to lead off the inning and getting up a long out off the bat of Kevin Pillar, David Robertson relieved him for the final two outs.

After watching Aroldis Chapman pitch for the Yankees for four months of 2016 and all of 2017, I know there are two Aroldis Chapmans. There’s the Good Aroldis Chapman, who comes in and there is actually a 0 percent chance anyone will reach base and close to a 0 percent chance that anyone might even make contact. Then there’s the Bad Aroldis Chapman, who comes in and need 30 pitches to get through the inning, if he even gets through the inning, as every triple-digit fastball is fouled straight back or hit for a line drive and every slider is sat on or misses the strike zone completely. This appearance was a combination of the two.

Josh Donaldson struck out on four pitches (all strikes) and Justin Smoak went down on three pitches. Seven pitches, all strikes and two strikeouts and the Yankees were one out away from starting the season 2-0. And then Steve Pearce pinch hit for Curtis Grandson.

Pearce was an awful Yankee. Yes, his time with the Yankees was a very small sample size of 12 games and 30 plate appearances, but in those plate appearances, he hit .160/.300/.280 with one home run and four RBIs. That was back in 2012 when the Yankees were trying to win the division and avoid the first year of the wild-card format, so his at-bats were going at a crucial time. Since then, Pearce has gone on to play for the Orioles, Rays and Blue Jays, moving around the AL East and destroying the Yankees at every opportunity. Here is how he has done against the Yankees since

2013: 2-for-6, .333/.333/.500, 2B

2014: 14-for-47, .298/.411/.553, 3 2B, 3 HR, 7 RBIs

2015: 5-for-34, .147/.256/.294, 2 2B, 1 HR, 3 RBIs

2016: 13-for-47, .333/.447/.590, 1 2B, 3 HR, 6 RBIs

2017: 10-for-28, .357, 2 2B, 3 HR, 6 RBIs

Aside from 2015, Pearce has essentially been a slightly less version of David Ortiz against the Yankees, and he was again against Chapman.

Pearce jumped on Chapman’s first pitch and drove a double to left field, and the Rogers Centre crowd started to come alive for the first time of the season. Chapman got ahead 0-2 on another former Yankee, Yangervis Solarte, but like every ex-Yankee, Solarte would succeed against them, and he crushed a double to right-center to score Pearce. Suddenly, the Yankees’ lead was 4-2 with the tying run at the plate in Grichuk, who had already homered in the game. The game had felt like a lopsided blowout, but now Grichuk was stepping in with a chance to destroy Tanaka and Wade’s day.

Rogers Centre had gotten loud and got even louder after a first-pitch ball. When Chapman missed the zone again with his second pitch, Rogers Centre was rocking. After four consecutive foul balls, I started to feel sick. I know what Bad Chapman looks like and after starting out the inning so strong, Bad Chapman was in the game and Randal Grichuk of all hitters was getting closer and closer with his timing.

Fortunately, Grichuk took the seventh pitch of the at-bat for a called third strike and Rogers Centre went quiet as if someone pressed mute on the entire stadium. Brittni and I made our way out of Rogers Centre surround by thousands of sad Blue Jays fans and across the street to The Rec Room for a postgame celebration.

***

Two games, two wins. A successful trip north of the border for me and a successful trip north of the border so far for the Yankees. In the morning it was time to head to the airport to fly back to New York and watch the Yankees on YES for the first time this season.

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Opening Day in Toronto: Part I

After the way 2017 ended and 2018 is expected to go, it felt necessary to head north for the first two games of the season.

Giancarlo Stanton

The last time there was baseball, or baseball that I cared about, was back in October in Game 7 of the ALCS. When the Yankees’ season ends, it’s saddening. When the season ends one win short of the World Series, it’s depressing. But now the depression is over. Real meaningful baseball cures it.

There’s no better feeling in the world than baseball being back. No better feeling. And after the way last season ended and the way this season is expected to go, it felt necessary to head north of the border for the first two games of the season. So I told Brittni to pack her bags, we dropped our dog Charlie off at my parents and made the trip to Toronto for Games 1 and 2 of 2018.

***

The Baseball Gods weren’t happy about Major League Baseball’s decision to start the season so early in March to incorporate more off days into the schedule. And they let it be known as they made sure it poured in the hours leading up to Opening Day. Of course there were no cabs available because for some reason there aren’t a lot of cabs in Toronto (and for another reason they are all different colors), and because Uber was even harder to come by at the time, it meant a mile walk from the hotel to Rogers Centre. Brittni wasn’t happy.

Normally, I hate the cold. I’m as soft as can be when it comes to the cold. I’m Jacoby Ellsbury when it comes to the cold. Well, my fingers are as soft as can be when it comes to the cold. The rest of my body is fine, but fingers aren’t, and once the cold hits them, I’m ruined. The coldest I ever was was at the Rangers-Islanders Stadium Series game at Yankee Stadium back in January 2014. The first period was fine, but once the Zamboni hit the ice for the first intermission, it was all downhill. After that game, I stood in the corner of my shower in my apartment on the Upper East Side, which was one-third the size of a regulation-sized shower, trying to hide from the hot water causing burning sensations in my hands and feet. It wasn’t that cold in Toronto on Thursday, but it was getting there and the rain was enhancing the cold. But it didn’t faze me. Baseball was back! Brittni, on the other hand, stepped in a Lake Ontario-sized puddle early into the walk, soaking her feet, and I tried my best not to make direct eye contact with her as her teeth chattered because I figured she might not just leave the walk and Toronto, but also me.

***

Rogers Centre is a much better dome experience than Tropicana Field, but I doubt there’s any worse dome experience than Tropicana Field. The roof of Rogers Centre is incredible in real life, hovering what seems like miles above the field. It would have been nice to have one game with it opened and one with it closed, but the Baseball Gods coupled with it being March 29 and 30 in CANADA(!) made sure that wasn’t going to happen.

My first look at Aaron Boone as Yankees manager was of him bringing the lineup card to home plate. Ten years earlier, I watched Joe Girardi in his Yankees managerial debut take the field at the Stadium to “JOE GIR-ARDI” chants (that was the first and last time he would ever hear those chants) only to have the game be called due to rain, so this tenure and season was already off to a better start.

Brett Gardner opened the game with a line drive to Curtis Granderson that the Grandy Man dropped. Aaron Judge made the first out of the inning and as Giancarlo Stanton stepped up to the plate for the first time in a Yankees uniform, a man who hadn’t missed a meal in a long time made his way to his seat directly in front of me. I stood up to change my viewpoint just as Stanton swung and connected. The ball kept carrying and carrying and carrying over the right-field fence, which didn’t seem like a possible result after such an effortless swing. Yeah, I think I’m going to like this guy on this team with this lineup.

From that moment on, the game felt over. Luis Severino showed up as the ace, dominating the Blue Jays lineup each inning for this line: 5.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 7 K. Stanton added an RBI double as well as a second home run, which might have hit our hotel if Rogers Centre weren’t enclosed, Gary Sanchez had an RBI double as well and Gardner showed off his power with a solo home run. Brittni got her beer and her hot dog and made small talk with the surrounding Canadians as she awaited her own Opening Day with Clayton Kershaw and the Dodgers later that night. It was a near-perfect Opening Day with the only blip of the game coming in the eighth inning.

The first pitch of the season thrown by Dellin Betances was turned around for a Kevin Pillar solo home run. Clearly, Pillar was sitting on a first-pitch fastball from Betances, he got it, and didn’t miss it. It was a shocking moment, considering how Betances finished last season and all the talk in the offseason about how he would rebound, but I don’t think anyone thought he would go to his breaking ball on his first pitch of the season, and apparently, Pillar didn’t either. I’m the biggest of Betances fans, and always will be. He’s a native New Yorker and homegrown Yankee, who was the only consistent bright spot and star for the organization from 2014 until June 22 of last season. I believe he will return to his pre-June 22, 2017 self and once again be the most dominant member of the Yankees’ bullpen. I’m not at all worried about Dellin Betances.

Betances retired the next three batters he faced and Aroldis Chapman pitched a perfect ninth, striking out Steve Pearce and Kendrys Morales to end the game.

***

I missed that feeling after a Yankees win. I hadn’t had that feeling since leaving the Stadium following Game 5 of the ALCS when the Yankees finally solved Dallas Keuchel en route to a 5-0 win. That was back on Oct. 18. I hadn’t had that feeling in 162 days.

I didn’t care that it was still pouring outside Rogers Centre. Luis Severino’s dominance and Giancarlo Stanton’s unbelievable power had me dreaming of what this season and future seasons might hold. Sure, it was only one game, but for now that’s all I have to go off of.

Brittni and I made our way down Blue Jays Way and to Wayne Gretzky’s, and it might have been better than the game. A restaurant and bar lined with memorabilia from The Great One’s life took me back in time and made me forget about the Yankees’ win momentarily. A few Coors Lights, nachos, a grilled chicken sandwich and being surrounding by the presence of 99 was the perfect end to the perfect start of the season.

Part II of my two-day, two-game trip to Toronto coming tomorrow.

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