The Yankees’ weekend in Baltimore started off with their manager doing what he’s done for five-plus seasons: manage the team to losses in winnable games. Thankfully, Jhony Brito was on the mound on Saturday, and the Yankees bounced back to win the final two games of the series.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. Another series, another series win for the Yankees. That’s three series, three series wins and a 6-3 record. The Yankees have been slow starters in the Aaron Boone era in the first couple of weeks of March/April, so to be three games over .500 and playing as well as they have has been enjoyable.

The Yankees have lost three games and in all three games they were in it and had a chance to win in the ninth inning. They have yet to lose a laugher or get blown out. On the other hand, they never seem to lose laughers or get blown out. It would be nice if they would just lose like every other team and not make it so painful right down until the final pitch, keeping you hooked and making you think they will come back.

2. By now all Yankees fans should know that unless the Yankees outpitch and outhit their own manager, he’s not going to help them win. After some illogical decisions in the second game of the season (and first loss of the season) and after giving away the fourth game of the season (in what was the second loss of the season), Boone had an all-time Boone game in the seventh game of the season on Friday night.

Clarke Schmidt wasn’t very good in his second start (3.1 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 3 BB, 3 K) and after putting the Yankees in a 4-0 hole, the offense fought back to take a 5-4 lead in the sixth. With one out in the sixth, Oswaldo Cabrera was at third. Franchy Cordero was due up to face the left-handed Danny Coulombe, so Boone went to the bench for a pinch hitter. That pinch hitter? Isiah Kiner-Falefa.

3. How the Yankees got to a place where Kiner-Falefa is the Yankees’ right-handed pinch-hit option off the bench is quite the embarrassment. Aaron Hicks was available, and was certainly the better option no matter how lost he may be or seem to be, but Boone would rather eat from a Manhattan restaurant with a “C” health rating than play Hicks any more than he has to. (The best part about the decision was after the game Boone said he went with Kiner-Falefa over Hicks because the Yankees needed a base hit there and not a walk. Yes, he really said that. He thinks getting more people on base and increasing the amount of runs the team may score is not a good idea.)

There was only one way Kiner-Falefa’s at-bat was going to end and it was without him getting the runner in from third with one out. I wasn’t sure if he was going to strike out, ground out weakly or pop one up in the infield, but the end result was inevitable. Kiner-Falefa went with the old infield popup, hitting it to the first baseman.

4. In the bottom of the sixth, Ron Marinaccio relieved Ian Hamilton to face the top of the order with a runner on first and one out. Jorge Mateo stole second on Marinaccio and moved over to third on a Cedric Mullins ground out. Mateo was now at third representing the tying run with Adley Rutschman at the plate.

The Yankees had first base and second base open. Walking Rutschman would have meant facing Anthony Santander with two on, but if that at-bat wasn’t going well, he also could have been put on to face the right-handed Ryan Mountcastle. It was as if Boone was looking at Google Maps and he had the fastest possible route, a route with a similar ETA and then a route with a 43-minute delay for road work and a detour involved. He chose the last option.

Boone had Marinaccio face Rutschman. Fine. Marinacco went fastball, fastball, changeup, changeup and fell behind 3-1. At this point, putting Rutschman on made the most sense. Why risk throwing a changeup that could catch too much of the plate or a fastball that could do the same? Four pitches and four fastballs later (that Rutschman had now seen six times), he singled to left to tie the game. The next batter, Santander, struck out on four pitches and swung through two Marinaccio fastballs.

5. Boone sent Marinaccio back out for the seventh with the game tied at 5. He walked Mountcastle on five pitches and then struck out Gunnar Henderson while Mountcastle stole second. The go-ahead run was now in scoring position with one out. Removing Marinaccio was the right move, if it meant bringing in Jonathan Loaisiga or Wandy Peralta or even Michael King despite King looking awful in the first week of the season. Boone chose Jimmy Cordero. (We would find out later that Loaisiga was unavailable and would end up on the injured list.)

Cordero’s first pitch was wild, allowing Mountcastle to go to third, and his second pitch was an RBI double for Ramon Urias to give the Orioles a 6-5 lead. Cordero got Adam Frazier to ground out, moving Urias to third, and then threw another wild pitch to allow Urias to score. It gets worse.

6. In the top of the eighth, the Yankees opened the inning with a double and back-to-back singles. The Orioles’ lead was now one run at 7-6 and the Yankees had first and second with no one out. They could tie the game by just making out. Well, the right kind of outs.

Jose Trevino came up and with the whole world knowing he was going to bunt, he didn’t care about showing the whole he was going to bunt and got into a bunting position before Bryan Baker even started his delivery. Baker missed badly on the first two pitches, so Trevino now had a 2-0 count. Trevino could wait and take a strike and the wild Baker might walk him to load the bases with no outs or he could continue to look for a strike to bunt. Boone had other ideas. He took off the bunt for Trevino and Trevino swung away at the 2-0 pitch, hit a grounder to Urias at third who stepped on third and threw to first four a double play, destroying the Yankees’ rally.

Kiner-Falefa followed Trevino and with a chance to redeem himself and drive in the game-tying run he swung through a couple of middle-middle fastballs in his at-bat and struck out.

7. With the Yankees trailing 7-6 in the bottom of the eighth, Boone then turned to Peralta. Yes, Boone had passed over Peralta for Cordero with the game tied at 5 in the seventh, and now wanted him to pitch with the Yankees trailing by a run in the eighth. There’s nothing Boone likes doing more than holding back his elite relievers from tie games to use them when the team is trailing. Now watching him in his sixth season continue to implement this ridiculously moronic strategy, I really, truly don’t want things like this from him to upset me anymore, but they do. Peralta pitched a scoreless eighth because he’s awesome, but the Yankees ended up losing 7-6.

8. Saturday was Johnny Brito day and I love Brito. After shutting out the Giants for five innings his in major-league debut, Brito didn’t have his best stuff with him right from the start on Saturday and faced first and third with no outs and the Orioles’ 3-4-5 hitters in the first. Brito had created a shitstorm for himself two batters into his night, and it seemed like maybe he wasn’t going to run away with a rotation spot after all.

But Brito reset after a mound visit initiated by Anthony Rizzo (and not the dugout) and got a fly ball and two ground balls to limit the damage to a run to get out of the inning. That was all he would allow all night in what was another impressive performance: 5 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K.

Brito is the heavy, heavy favorite right now to remain in the rotation when and if Carlos Rodon and Luis Severino return. I love how he attacks the zone and doesn’t nibble, believing in his stuff to be enough and not trying to make the perfect pitch every pitch. On a night when he didn’t have his best stuff, he kept his composure, battled and grinded through five innings. Put Schmidt or Domingo German in that first-inning situation and the game is likely over. I look forward to his next start.

9. It was a beautiful Easter made possible by Nestor Cortes, who did his thing and Aaron Judge, who did his thing. Not only was Cortes solid (5.1 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 5 K) and not only did Judge hit two more home runs (3-for-4), but Franchy Cordero also had a day, banging his second of the season.

Cordero came to the Yankees as the left-handed Wily Mo Pena, who would hit a 700-foot home run every few weeks, and in between the mammoth blasts would be non-competitive strikeouts. So far as a Yankee, Cordero is 5-for-14 with a double and two home runs and seven RBIs. Cordero is tied with Judge for the team lead in RBIs.

I thought Cordero getting designated for assignment once Harrison Bader returned was inevitable, but right now it can’t be. There’s a lot of time for Cordero to regress to the player he has always been, and if he doesn’t, he has already given the Yankees more than I thought he ever would. I’m rooting for him to be this season’s out-of-nowhere fan favorite. Having the same amount of RBIs as Judge in just 39 percent of the plate appearances is certainly a way to start seeing Cordero shirseys popping up on River Ave.

10. Up next, it’s off to Cleveland where the Yankees last were in Games 3 and 4 of the ALDS. (Game 3 was a Boone special.) The Guardians are pesky and a tough group, and they will get to face Domingo German and Schmidt in two of the three games in the series. (Gerrit Cole is going to need to pitch as well as he did in his first two starts in the second game of the series on Tuesday.)

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Two series into the season for the Yankees and two series wins. The Yankees took two of three from the Phillies at the Stadium and their only loss came in a game Aaron Boone gave away with his lineup.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. Monday’s game was the Brandon Marsh game. If not for Marsh misplaying DJ LeMahieu’s leadoff line drive into a triple and running into the third out on the bases in the fifth inning the game may have been a whole lot different. Instead, the Yankees won easily, 8-1, in what was a game that was starting to seem like one of those games where the Yankees have a chance to end the game early, but don’t, and eventually lose. Thanks to Marsh, it never got to that point and the Phillies extended their season-opening losing streak to four straight.

2. The streak wouldn’t get to five, and the way Yankees fans can thank Marsh for Monday night’s win, Phillies fans can thank the Yankees manager for getting them their first win of the season on Tuesday night.

Tuesday’s game was over before it started. The moment Boone posted the lineup, the Phillies had won. This was the lineup:

DJ LeMahieu, 1B
Aaron Judge, DH
Gleyber Torres, 2B
Giancarlo Stanton, RF
Josh Donaldson, 3B
Aaron Hicks, LF
Isiah Kiner-Falefa, CF
Kyle Higashioka, C
Anthony Volpe, SS

No Anthony Rizzo. A 5-6-7-8 of Donaldson-Hicks-Kiner-Falefa-Higashioka? Irresponsible.

3. It was the fifth game of the season. The Yankees had last Wednesday off. They had last Friday off. They will have a day off before the start of the Orioles series. In nine days, they will have have had three full days off. That’s not counting coming from Florida the previous six weeks for spring training which isn’t exactly bootcamp and having nearly four months off prior to that since Game 4 of the ALCS.

I understand the concept of “lose the battle to win the war,” but the Yankees haven’t won the war in a long time. Unnecessary days off, extra rest and load management has helped extend their championship drought to 13 years (and going on 14 if it isn’t ended this year).

4. It came as no surprise that the 5-6-7-8 hitters combined to go 0-for-13 with four strikeouts. And it was no surprise the Yankees were being shut out until the bottom of the ninth when a LeMahieu solo home run erased the zero. The Yankees had an opportunity to tie the game in the bottom of the ninth when Josh Donaldson came up with two on and two outs, but weakly flew out to end the game. Donaldson left four on in the game, got hurt the following day and is potentially headed for the injured list after going 2-for-16 with six strikeouts to begin the season.

This is what Boone said about Donaldson this offseason: “I think you’re crazy to think that a bounceback is not in there offensively. This guy still has bat speed and, again, is super talented.”

I guess everyone in the world is crazy other than Boone. Donaldson is as washed up offensively as washed up gets, and if he weren’t owed $29.75 million he would be doing something other than playing baseball for the Yankees. There’s no bouncing back. There’s no bat speed left, made obvious by his 1-for-13 with six strikeouts against righties. He’s now an automatic out that continues to bat fifth and be treated like an MVP rather than a former MVP of eight years ago.

5. Donaldson isn’t the only one Boone made outrageous and outlandish remarks and wildly inaccurate evaluations about. A little over a week ago, Boone had this to say about Aaron Hicks: “I really have liked what I have seen from Hicks especially the last couple weeks of spring training, where I feel like the at-bats, the edge, everything has been there.”

There’s lying and then there’s that quote from Boone. If Boone really liked what he saw from Hicks, why didn’t he start any of the games and receive just one pinch-hit at-bat in the Giants series?

6. Boone made good on his promise and started Hicks on both Monday and Tuesday after Hicks complained about his playing time on Sunday morning. After whining about not being an everyday player, Hicks went 0-for-6 with a walk and two strikeouts and heard boos from a Stadium crowd that likely listened to or read about his playing time comments from the weekend. A crowd that hasn’t forgotten how he played the outfield against the Rays last September.

On Wednesday, Hicks was left out of the lineup for the fourth time in six games. His limited playing time to date this season coupled with the vitriol from his own home crowd must have been embarrassing enough, but things would get worse in a game he wasn’t even playing in.

In the bottom of the eighth, with the Yankees hanging on to a 4-2 lead and Gleyber Torres on second with two outs, the left-handed Franchy Cordero came to the plate to face the left-handed Gregory Soto. With Giancarlo Stanton on the bench for having had an unnecessary day off, he seemed like the option Boone would call on. If not Stanton, then surely the switch-hitting Hicks would bat for Cordero, who has enough trouble hitting major-league pitching, let alone left-handed pitching. Boone chose to not use Stanton and give him a full day off. He also chose to not use Hicks. Boone let Cordero bat for himself and he struck out on three pitches in what Michael Kay called on the broadcast a “non-competitive at-bat.” I don’t know that it will be topped in terms of being non-competitive by another Yankee this season even with 156 games remaining.

The move was an indictment on both Boone and Hicks. Boone for going against everything every statistical figure in the world said about the matchup, and Hicks for being so bad that he can’t even be trusted to bat for Cordero against a lefty.

7. In less than one week, we have learned that Hicks is not part of the current “A” outfield configuration despite Brian Cashman and Boone saying they expected Hicks to be the team’s starting left fielder. (Once Harrison Bader returns, Hicks will be further removed from playing time.) We learned the Yankees only view Hicks as a left fielder as Kiner-Falefa (with now two games of outfield experience to his name) started two games in center field with Hicks starting zero. (The Yankees gave Hicks a seven-year, $70 million extension to play a position he’s now not allowed to play.) We learned that Boone would rather have a helpless Cordero face a lefty than let Hicks get any additional plate appearances. With Cordero getting the same amount of starts as Hicks this season (2), and with Cordero getting that at-bat on Wednesday, we learned Cordero is higher on the Yankees’ outfield depth chart than Hicks. We officially learned that Hicks is only still a Yankee because he’s owed $30,357,144 for this year and the next two years and then $1 million to not play for the Yankees in 2026 for a total of $31,357,144.

8. I don’t know why Hicks isn’t playing playing over Kiner-Falefa, who isn’t a major-league player. I don’t know why Boone didn’t use Hicks as a pinch hitter for Cordero. The only thing I can think of is that the Yankees are trying to make it so if they are unable to trade Hicks before his 10-5 rights kick in (they won’t be able to) that he won’t block a trade if they are somehow able to move him once they do kick in (though they won’t be able to trade him once they kick in either.) As I wrote after the Giants series, the only way this ends is in his release.

After the 2018 season when Cashman regrettably passed on Bryce Harper because he had an outfield plan of Judge, Stanton, Hicks and Clint/Jackson Frazier, he turned around and extended Hicks for seven years and $70 million, saying, “He has more gas in his tank. He has more mountains to climb.” There is no gas left in the tank. There are no more mountains.

9. Through the first two series and six games, the Yankees have been carried by who you would think. Gerrit Cole has allowed one earned run in 12 innings (as the result of a pitch timer violation) and 19 strikeouts; Aaron Judge has a 1.032 OPS, Stanton has a couple of home runs, Rizzo has been his normal self, LeMahieu’s hard-hit ability has returned and the bullpen has been dominant (outside of Michael King). But the one player who has exceeding first-week expectations is Torres.

Through six games, Torres is batting .421/.560/.789 with a double, two home runs, six RBIs, and six walks to two strikeouts. He has been the Yankees’ best hitter, which is kind of ridiculous, since again, Judge has a 1.032 OPS.

I have called for the Yankees to trade Torres since the end of the 2021 season, having given up on him. One week isn’t going to change my mind, but it’s a start. I wish the Yankees could figure out a way to make an infield of Torres, LeMahieu, Rizzo, Volpe and Oswald Peraza work, but that would entail releasing Donaldson and moving on from Kiner-Falefa, and neither of those things are likely to happen.

For now, I’m cautiously optimistic that I will be wrong about Torres. I want to be wrong about him. I don’t want him to be who he was in 2020, 2021 and for long stretches in 2022. I want him to do well and be a star because that helps the Yankees win, and the Yankees winning helps my overall health.

10. The Yankees’ schedule is about to get a little tougher. Yes, going to Baltimore is tougher than hosting the mediocre Giants and the banged-up Phillies. The Orioles were a dropped fly ball from opening the season with a series winning in Boston and then took two of three from the Rangers in Texas. The Orioles you could count on for 16 or 17 Yankees wins each season are gone. While they aren’t close to being a contender, they are certainly going to be on the bubble for a postseason berth, and if they ever get starting pitcher, they would finally be out of their near-decade hole of historical losing.

The Yankees are about to start a stretch of 10 straight games without a day off, so if you think the unnecessary rest and spring training-looking lineups from this past week were bad, get ready.

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