Carlos Rodon lived up to his ability and the Yankees beat the Guardians 5-2 in Game 1 of the ALCS.
Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.
1. The Yankees gave Carlos Rodon a six-year, $162 million deal to pitch the way he did in Game 1 of the ALCS. (They also gave him all of that money to pitch well in the ALDS, but we can forget about that for now.) Rodon completely stifled the Guardians for five innings and left the game after allowing just one run on three hits over six innings.
“The goal was to just stay in control of what I can do, physically and emotionally,” Rodon said. “I thought I executed that well tonight.”
Rodon sounded like a completely different person from the pitcher who last week talked about his upcoming Yankees postseason debut and how he will control his emotions by saying, “It can propel me to very high highs and super low lows” and then followed that comment by acting maniacal on the mound.
Game 1 of the ALCS was the kind of performance every Yankees fan hoped to see in Rodon’s start in Game 2 of the ALDS, but Rodon was so emotionally, physically and mentally unstable in that outing that he let his stuff he described as “electric” fade once the slightest bit of adversity hit. In Game 1 of the ALCS, he kept his composure, didn’t walk around the infield after each strikeout with the demeanor and attitude of a professional wrestler, got 25 swings and misses and pitched the Yankees to a 1-0 series lead.
“He was very aware of what the last outing ended up being, how the emotions got away from him early,” Matt Blake said. “You could tell he was trying to stay steady and be neutral about it and just keep collecting outs.”
2. Rodon collected 18 outs and the Yankees’ offense clogged the base paths to score three of their five runs. No one loves traffic more than Aaron Boone and the Yankees’ offense made the bases look like the West Side Highway at 5:00 on a Friday against Alex Cobb and the Guardians’ bullpen. The Yankees put two on in the first, two on in the second, five on in the third and two on in the fourth. But the same way the Yankees failed to hit with runners in scoring position in the ALDS (and the same way they have failed to hit with runners in scoring position in every postseason of the last 15 years), they failed to do so again in Game 1.
Thank God for Juan Soto, Giancarlo Stanton and wild pitches. Soto gave the Yankees a 1-0 lead with a solo home run to lead off the third. It was the most predictable home run of all time as Soto entered the game 7-for-11 in his career against Cobb and then proceeded to single and homer off the righty.
“I was just locked in on that pitch,” Soto said of his home run. “He showed me the pitch three times, so I thought he wanted to get that pitch and land it, and I was ready for it.”
The Yankees managed to score two runs on wild pitches in the third as well, plated a fourth run on an Aaron Judge sacrifice fly in the fourth and added a fifth when Stanton hit a long home run off the back wall of the Guardians’ bullpen in the seventh.
Through five postseason games, the Yankees are still searching for that big hit that blows open a game. In Game 1 of the ALDS, they used bases-loaded walks to beat the Royals, lost Game 2 when they left a small village on base, won Game 3 on the back of Stanton and won Game 4 with only three runs. On Monday, they needed two wild pitches in the same inning to increase their one-run lead to three. I don’t know how much longer they can rely on odd and unusual ways to score runs and win games and I don’t want to find out.
3. Game 1 never felt in doubt. Not when Judge, Austin Wells and Stanton left Gleyber Torres and Soto on in the first. Not when the Yankees stranded two more in the second. Certainly not after the Yankees jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the third, made it 4-0 in the fourth and 5-1 after seven. But after all of the missed opportunities throughout the game (the Yankees were 0-for-7 with runners in scoring position), there was something in the back of my mind telling me they may regret it. Because through seven innings, it felt easy. A little too easy.
4. Boone made sure it wouldn’t be easy. After Rodon gave him six innings of one-run ball and Clay Holmes mowed down the middle of the order on 14 pitches in the seventh, the pitching formula and plan was unfolding exactly as desired: Rodon for six then Holmes, Tommy Kahnle and Luke Weaver each for one. Unfortunately, Boone deviated from the plan.
With a four-run lead and six outs to go, Boone decided to not go to Kahnle for the eighth, opting instead for Tim Hill. Why? I wish I knew. Actually, I’m glad I don’t know since I don’t want to know what goes on in the head of Boone when he makes decisions like that. It could have been because the Yankees had a four-run lead instead of a three-run lead. It could have been because Boone wanted to try to steal outs with Hill in Game 1, so he could have an even-more-rested Kahnle in Game 2. Whatever the reason, it was foolish, and for the first time all night, the Guardians had life.
5. Hill allowed three consecutive one-out singles and a run to score before being pulled. When he left the mound, the Guardians had runners at first and third and one out. They would have the chance to cut their now three-run deficit even more, and barring a double play, would have two cracks at tying the game with one swing with one of those cracks going to Jose Ramirez.
Boone’s plan blew up because he couldn’t then go to Kahnle to relieve Hill. Not with the Guardians threatening with the tying run at the plate. Now he had to go to his best arm in Weaver to get six outs instead of the planned three. Weaver stranded the two baserunners, retired Ramirez and pitched around a leadoff walk in the ninth to close out the game and save Boone from what could have been a disastrous loss to open the series. Boone needs to be better. He was able to get away with that decision because it’s the Guardians. If the Yankees are to advance, a decision like that against the Dodgers or Mets could be the season. Boone needs to change his thinking quickly.
6. He also needs to change the lineup for Game 2. Austin Wells can’t bat cleanup anymore. Wells was awesome from the end of April through the end of August, but he hasn’t been a cleanup-worthy hitter for six weeks now. He can’t serve as Judge’s protection. He can’t keep coming up in important spots and not coming through. He’s likely tired from his first first full major-league season and the fact he played nearly every day once Jose Trevino went down during the season and then had to play nearly every day once Trevino returned because the Yankees were battling the Orioles in September for the division. Take some of the pressure off of him, let him focus on catching and move him down. Move Stanton to fourth, Jazz Chisholm to fifth and Wells to sixth. It’s time. It’s more than time.
7. It’s also time for Chisholm to start hitting. Chisholm has reached base once (via a walk) since his “lucky” comments after Game 2 of the ALDS. He went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts in Game 1.
8. Anthony Rizzo looked better than expected at the plate in his return and postseason debut (singling in his first at-bat and later walking), however, his misplay of a ground ball in the eighth inning can’t happen. (Oswaldo Cabrera and Jon Berti make that play.) Rizzo was oddly pulled from the game for the ninth with Cabrera taking over first base. Boone said Rizzo was “physically and emotionally spent,” but I have no idea what that means. How is Boone measuring someone being emotionally spent? Did Rizzo ask to come out of the game? Were his fingers bothering him? Boone said Rizzo is expected to start Game 2, but who knows. It wouldn’t surprise me to see Rizzo out of the lineup given Boone’s history of saying one thing and having the complete opposite thing happen the following day.
9. With the Game 1 win, the Yankees need to just play at least .500 baseball over the six remaining games of the series against a team they’re 5-2 against this season to advance to the World Series for the first time since 2009. It’s hard not to get excited about that realization and think ahead, but the Guardians have been a pesky problem in the past. The Yankees needed a full series of games to eliminate them in 2022 despite being the superior team then as well. And in that 2022 ALDS matchup, the Yankees won Game 1 with similar ease and had an early lead in Game 2 before dropping that game and Game 3. For as easy as Game 1 felt, I doubt the Guardians will make it that easy each game.
10. “There’s still three to get,” Stanton said. “We know this is good, but in our eyes, we haven’t done nothing yet.”
They’re three wins away from doing something, something this group has never done and with Gerrit Cole pitching at home in Game 2 on Tuesday, they’re in a great position to be two wins away.
Four down, seven to go.
Last modified: Oct 22, 2024
