Yankees Thoughts: Running in Place 

The Yankees failed to win a four-game home series against a .500 Rays team looking to sell.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. On Friday, I wrote:

For better or worse, Yankees baseball is back. The break is over. The vacation is often. The physical, mental and emotional escape is over. When Gerrit Cole throws the first pitch of Friday night’s game against the Rays, the stretch run will be under way. The last 64 games with Juan Soto under contract as a Yankee will be under way. The glaring issues and problems from the first “half” and from the last four seasons will still be there. We’ll find out is this group handles them differently.

Well, we found out this group doesn’t handle them differently, because it’s the same group. The Yankees faced a .500 Rays team for four games at home after four days off and continued to play the uninspiring baseball they began to play in mid-June.

After winning the series opener 6-1 on Friday behind Gerrit Cole’s best start of the season (6 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 8 K, 1 HR), the Yankees fell right back into being the team that crawled to the All-Star break.

Over the All-Star break, the delusional Nestor Cortes tweeted this:

“Everyone talks down about the yanks but they wanna be us. It’s a privilege to wear pinstripes. Every year we are in contention. I’m blessed to be able to compete for a playoff spot and always be contenders at the end.“

Then in his first start since that tone-deaf tweet, Cortes turned in his worst start of the season: 4.1 IP, 8 H, 6 R, 6 ER, 2 BB, 1 K, 3 HR. A bottom 5 team in runs scored and home runs, the Rays had no problem teeing off on Cortes 

“When you walk … the bottom of the lineup, you give it the chance to turn over, “Cortes said. “That’s not ideal. I just have to be better.”

The Rays’ 9-hitter Alex Jackson entered the game 7-for-85 on the season. He walked and hit a three-run home run off Cortes. 

“It’s tough to pitch in the big leagues when you don’t have your good stuff” Corted said. Early on, it was pretty good and I lost a little bit … and I was behind in the count a lot.’

Aaron Boone knew he couldn’t tell the media Cortes had “good stuff” and not sound like a complete asshole considering Cortes himself said he didn’t have good stuff. So Boone went to his thesaurus for “good stuff” with his evaluation of Cortes.

“I thought the profile of the stuff was there,” Boone said.

In Cortes’ previous start, he put 10 runners on in 4 1/3 innings in Tampa and Boone said he thought Cortes “pitched well” that day. On Saturday, Cortes had the same outing (10 baserunners in 4 1/3 innings), but this time Boone was only willing to say “the profile of the stuff was there.” That’s 20 baserunners, 11 earned runs and four home runs for Cortes in his last two starts, both against the anemic Rays offense.

Cortes didn’t give the offense a chance, but they weren’t going to do anything anyway. Ben Rice led off the game with a double and was stranded and the Yankees didn’t pick up another hit until the eighth inning. Their lone run came on a meaningless RBI groundout down nine in the ninth. Taj Bradley stifled them, pitching seven one-hit, scoreless innings.

2. On Sunday, Boone sat DJ LeMahieu in favor of Oswaldo Cabrera. When you make $15 million per year and are getting benched for the .638 OPS utility man, you know things are bad, and things are bad for LeMahieu.

“It hasn’t given me much hope the last month or so,” LeMahieu said. “As long as I’ve played this game, whatever challenges have presented itself, I’ve always come out of it one way or another.”

I love LeMahieu. I was all for re-signing him after 2020 for what he did in 2019 and 2020. He deserved to be re-signed. After posting a .922 OPS in his first two seasons with the Yankees, he has a .702 since. He suffered season-ending injuries in 2021 and 2022, played through injuries last year and missed a large portion of this season because of injuries. It fell apart quickly for LeMahieu after 2022 and while there have been moments over the last three-plus years where he looks like himself, they are only moments, nothing consistent or frequent. On a team full of unplayable names, he is the most unplayable of them all. But because of all of those other unplayable names and because he’s owed about $41 million through 2026, he’s going to keep getting opportunities to prove his career isn’t over.

While last Sunday’s loss in Baltimore was the worst loss of the season, and Saturday’s loss was disappointing, Sunday’s loss was disturbing.

Marcus Stroman allowed a leadoff home run to begin the game as the Rays clubbed their fifth home run of the series with the Yankees still yet to hit one.

Trailing 1-0 in the bottom of the first, the Yankees loaded the bases with one out for Gleyber Torres and Alex Verdugo. Torres swung on the first pitch he saw with the swing of someone behind 0-2 in the count and just trying to put the ball in play and hit a shallow fly ball that wasn’t deep enough to score a a run. Alex Verdugo followed with a lineout to first. Three runners left on.

In the second, still trailing 1-0, the Yankees loaded the bases again with one out, but this time Soto was due up. Rice walked on four pitches to bring Soto up and Shane Baz got behind Soto 3-0. Seven straight balls. Knowing Soto’s eye I was confident the Yankees would at least tie the game in his plate appearance and possibly break it wide open. Soto got a fastball away and rather than go with it to the opposite field like he loves to do or take the borderline pitch and continue his plate appearance, he pulled it to second base for an inning-ending, 4-6-3 double play. The Yankees had gone from bases loaded with one out and Soto and Aaron Judge due up to leaving three more runners on.

In the third, Judge walked to lead off the inning and never moved. Seven runners left on.

In the fourth, with two outs, Stroman hung a slider on 1-2 slider to Randy Arozarena and he hit his third home run of the series as the Rays increased their series home run lead to 6-0. Torres booted a ground ball that would have ended the inning, and a stolen base and a line-drive single on an 0-2 hanging slider later and the Rays had a 3-0 lead.

In the bottom of the fourth, the Yankees drew two walks to begin the inning. Neither scored. Nine runners left on.

In the seventh, Jake Cousins got tagged for a two-run home run by Jose Siri who stared at it for about 15 seconds and then essentially walked around the bases at an even slower pace than Arozarena “trotted” on any of his three home runs in the series.

The Yankees finally got on the board in the seventh when Judge hit his 35th home run a mile into the left-field bleachers. In response to Arozarena and Siri’s long trips around the bases, Judge did the same. The problem is the Yankees were still losing after Judge’s home run in what was the latest failed attempt at trash talking from the captain, a trait that started six Octobers ago when he unfortunately played “New York, New York” on a boombox while leaving Fenway Park after Game 2 of the 2018 ALDS. The Yankees would leave their 10th runner of the day on when Torres hit into an inning-ending double play.

In the ninth, Jose Caballero hit the Rays’ seventh home run of the series to extend their lead to 6-3. The Yankees scored a run on a Soto double in the bottom of the ninth, but that was all they would get as they would leave an 11th runner on in the 6-4 loss.

To summarize: The Yankees failed to score a run despite loading the bases with one out in both the first and second inning. The seven hitters not named Soto and Judge went 4-for-25 with seven strikeouts. Stroman got ahead of Richie Palacios 1-2 before eventually giving up a home run to him, gave up a home run to Arozarena on a 1-2 pitch and allowed an RBI single to Caballero in an 0-2 count. The combination of Jake Cousins and Luke Weaver gave up three earned runs and only recorded seven outs. The Yankees left 11 runners on base.

3. One day closer to Torres no longer being a Yankee is what I told myself after he halfheartedly swung at the first pitch he saw with the bases loaded in the first inning. One day closer. Torres committed an error that led to the Rays’ third run, hit into an inning-ending double play representing the tying run in the eighth and finished the day 0-for-4 with a strikeout. It was the latest spectacular performance in a season full of them for Torres.

4. Since June 15, for hitters with a minimum of 90 plate appearances, Verdugo is last in the majors in batting average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage and OPS. He has been the worst everyday player in the entire league for five weeks.

Prior to Sunday’s game, when asked about Verdugo sucking, Boone said, “I think there’s really good out in front of him. Nothing’s changed.” Boone was right: nothing changed. Verdugo went 0-for-4 with a strikeout. 

Boone was ejected in the sixth inning for arguing a called strike against Verdugo for his fifth ejection of the season.

“My hips have been flying toward the first-base side,” Verdugo said. “We’re not trying to hit ground balls.”

It certainly looks like Verdugo is trying to hit ground balls since he has hit more balls on the ground to first base and second base than any other player in the majors this season.

5. Boone spewed his typical bullshit after the loss. He implied that bad luck was the reason the Yankees didn’t score in the first and second innings and that bad luck has been the reason the team has lost more than two-thirds of its game since the middle of June.

“Dugie hits one 103 [for a] line-drive out, Soto has the right at-bat,” Boone said. “We just gotta get one to fall.”

A franchise and brand built on winning has resorted to praying a ball with runners in scoring position drops in. I can see the YES in-game promo now:

(Paul Olden’s voice) Fans, come on out to the Stadium on Sunday, Aug. 11 as the Yankees host the defending-champion Rangers for Anthony Volpe Gold Glove Bobblehead Day, and see if the Yankees can get one to fall. The first 18,000 guests will receive an Anthony Volpe bobblehead presented by T-Mobile.

But with the bases loaded, praying to plate even a single run is all the Yankees can do. Pray for a hit by pitch or wild pitch or passed ball or catcher’s interference or an error or that a ground ball finds a hole. That’s the only way this team is capable of scoring outside of Soto and Judge extra-base hits.

6. Torres isn’t suddenly going to hit like a true middle-of-the-order bat. Verdugo for his career has a 102 OPS+ in 2,968 plate appearances, so the absolute best version of him is slightly above league average. The two of them along with LeMahieu, Cabrera, Trent Grisham, Volpe and Austin Wells are all below league average.

If the non-Soto and Judge bats were just league average, the Yankees would have run away with the division. But they can’t even be that. Average. That’s all anyone is asking. Just be average. And yet, they aren’t even close to being that.

The other day Luis Severino told reporters he is in a group chat with his former Yankees teammates and they have been chirping him about not starting against them in the Subway Series. “They talk trash about me, they say, ‘Oh, you’re afraid of us.’ I’m not afraid. Right now, you only have two good hitters. I can walk those two guys.” I always liked Severino.

7. On Sunday, Boone benched Torres. I’m sure it was only for a day and Torres will be right back in the lineup and batting in the middle of the order on Tuesday against the Mets since was only 10 days ago that Brian Cashman sat in the visitors’ dugout at Tropicana Field and told the media how good Torres was last year and how he’s waiting for him to return to being that player again.

In the series finale, the Yankees won a game started by Carlos Rodon for the first time since June 10. Sicne then Rodon has made roughly $5 million to provide the Yankees with zero wins in six starts, zero quality starts, a 9.67 ERA and a 1.963 WHIP.

After allowing four first-inning runs to the Rays two weeks ago, Rodon only allowed one earned run over seven innings in this one with a season-high 10 strikeouts. A $162 million pitcher shutting down the third-worst offense in the American League? What a concept.

8. The Yankees shockingly scored first in the bottom of the second with back-to-back home runs from Wells and Volpe. Yes, Volpe homered. It was his first home run since May 16. It was the first time he pulled the ball in the air to left field since June 20, which is simply outrageous.

In talking about Volpe, Meredith Marakovits reported he recently said, “If I believe in the process … I know the power is going to come.” Ah, the process. The old more-than-two-months-between-home runs process.

The Yankees added two more runs in the fourth when a Cabrera ground ball when off the glove of a sliding Brandon Lowe at second base. We just gotta get one to fall! (Cabrera went 4-for-8 over the last two games of the series, so there’s no way he should be out of the lineup come Tuesday since those two multi-hit games gives him more multi-hit games than Torres has in July.)

After another Siri home run for the Rays in the top of the fifth, LeMahieu answered in the bottom half with his first home run of the season, ending an 0-for-18 slump.

The Yankees added a run in the seventh on a Soto solo home run and added three more in the eighth on a Soto three-run home run in an eventual 9-1 win. They finished the season series 7-6 against the Rays.

9. The Yankees scored eight runs against the Braves on June 22 and then lost four straight. They scored 16 runs against the Blue Jays on June 28 and then lost the next day. They scored eight runs on June 30 against the Blue Jays and then lost four straight at home. They scored 14 runs against the Red Sox on July 6 and then got shut out the next day, losing the next two. The nine runs on Monday is the most the Yankees have scored since those 14 on July 6. Will it actually be the start of something or just another random outburst that leads to nothing?

I so badly want Sunday to be the start of something, but it’s hard to be optimistic that it was anything other than an anomaly given how the last nearly six weeks have gone. The Yankees spent the four games against the Rays running in place. I guess that’s better than how they spent the previous 28 games.

10. The Yankees are 11-21 since June 13. Their lead on a postseason spot is down to three games in the loss column. On June 14, that number was 13 games in the loss column.

It was a wasted four-game home series against a Rays team reportedly willing to sell and call it a season. Four more games off a schedule that is down to just 60.