Yankees Drop Series to Blue Jays and Shaky Umpiring Plagued One Game

Thanks to Gerrit Cole, who probably cemented the AL Cy Young Award with another great outing Thursday, the Yankees salvaged the finale of their three-game set with the Blue Jays. But before I give you the recaps, I have some thoughts on the future of umpiring. Remember, please help me spread the word about the newsletter. If you know Yankees fans who would enjoy it, please pass along the subscribe link where they can type in their email and join the group. That link is: https://salmaiorana.beehiiv.com/subscribe. Thanks for your help. Let’s get to it.

Not all of Aaron Boone’s seven ejections this season - tied for the most in MLB with David Bell of the Reds - have been truly worth it because at least for a few of them it seemed like he was just trying to get thrown out as a way to perhaps perk up his lifeless team.

That wasn’t the case Wednesday night. Oh, the Yankees were lifeless, that’s for sure, but Boone had a legitimate gripe about home plate umpire Lance Barrett’s wide strike zone. So did Blue Jays manager John Schneider, though he managed to make it through all nine boring innings without getting tossed.

Boone wasted no time getting on Barrett. He started chirping in the second inning when Barrett called a strike on Anthony Volpe that was clearly low, and then another one that was way too low on Oswald Peraza and both batters eventually struck out. Barrett apparently was in no mood and wasn’t giving Boone any leeway so he ran him out of the game.

Therefore, Boone was watching on TV in the clubhouse when, in the eighth inning, Barrett called a strike on Toronto’s Kevin Kiermaier that was way too low, and one to Daulton Varsho that was outside. So yes, Barrett was missing for both teams.

There were 15 men behind the plate around the country for games Wednesday and no one had a worse performance than Barrett according to umpirescorecards.com. The website tracks every pitch thrown using the same technology that we see on our TVs with the strike zone boxes, then puts out a report card and Barrett clearly had a rough night.

He mis-called 16 of the 189 pitches that were taken for either balls or strikes, a 92% accuracy rate which is about 2.5% below this year’s league average. His big problem came on what he deemed were strikes as 12 of the 68 taken strikes were actually balls, an 82% rate that is 6% below the season-long league average.

Here’s the thing: Barrett did not have a good night, and yet he still called - at least according to the technology - 173 of 189 pitches correctly. Folks, 92% is pretty good. A sampling of some other games Wednesday: Chris Segal missed only three calls for a 98% success rate in the Mets-Marlins game; Jeff Nelson and Lance Barksdale missed only five; Jeremie Rehak missed six; Brian Knight missed seven; and Jansen Visconti and Adam Hamari missed only eight.

I set all this up to veer this story to a place that may surprise you: I don’t want the computer strike zone to come to MLB. What I want is for MLB to institute the challenge system where each team can ask for a review on three calls, and if it wins the challenge, it retains it.

For those of you who have attended Triple-A games this season, you know that in each six-game series they’re using the computer strike zone for three games and the challenge system for the other three. I’ve seen it in action multiple times in Rochester and I love the challenge system.

If the ump calls a strike and the batter disagrees, or the pitcher throws a ball and the catcher disagrees, they can challenge. The ump calls time, the computer does its thing, and the result is shown on the scoreboard showing exactly where the pitch went which creates a fun little drama in the crowd. This generally takes about 10 seconds, no one argues about the result, and the game continues. It’s an excellent system.

My issue with the full-time computer strike zone is threefold. First, a little controversy on balls and strikes has been part of the fabric of the game for a century and a half, and as I just pointed out, for the most part MLB umps are outstanding. Second, computers don’t have feelings so there’s no common sense regarding what’s happening in the game. Lastly, the technology still needs plenty of tweaking when it comes to approximating the exact strike zone of every batter in MLB, while also adjusting for the batters’ stance.

What I mean by no common sense is that an umpire will call things a little differently in a blowout game in order to expedite the conclusion; or in a close game he’ll reward a sharp pitcher with a smidge more off the plate, and he won’t be as generous to the guy who’s struggling with his command. This has been going on forever, but it would end with a computer making the decisions.

I know, maybe I’m being an old fart about this, and some of the younger subscribers here think I’m nuts and believe that if the technology is there to get every call right, then we should use it. It’s the same argument for the use of instant replay in all sports.

I get it, but I’m just saying that the challenge system would give us the best of both worlds. We’d get the human element, and if there’s a call that’s clearly wrong - like several of the ones Barrett made Wednesday - then technology can be used to correct it.

Here are my observations on the three games against the Blue Jays.

Sept. 19: Blue Jays 7, Yankees 1

➤ When the series began, some overly optimistic fans probably believed that if the Yankees could sweep this series, and then do the same next week in Toronto, they’d have a chance to earn the third and final wild-card spot. As you might imagine, being the realist/pessimist that I am, I was not believing that was possible. The Yankees then began showing everyone why.

➤ What a dud of a night. The Yankees matched George Springer’s leadoff homer in the first with a run of their own in the bottom half when Aaron Judge singled and raced home on Gleyber Torres’ double. And then Giancarlo Stanton whiffed, Anthony Volpe grounded out, and the Yankees never threatened to score the rest of the night. Eight more pathetic innings to tack on to a season that includes more than a thousand pathetic innings.

➤ Hell of a night for Stanton. His four at bats resulted in six outs - two strikeouts and two double plays. Why this guy is still playing, as opposed to any of the young kids that are up right now, is beyond me.

➤ Clarke Schmidt’s post All-Star break problems continued. For a while there it looked like he had really turned a corner, but in 11 starts since the break his ERA is 5.21. After the Springer homer he was doing OK, but he gave up a run in the fourth thanks in part to a throwing error by Peraza, and then in the fifth he got the first two men out and had Springer 0-2 but then threw four straight balls. And of course that burned him because Bo Bichette followed with a two-run homer. The Jays then piled on three runs in the ninth against Zach McAllister.

BOX SCORE

Sept. 20: Blue Jays 6, Yankees 1

➤ If you thought the first game was a dud, oh, the Yankees had an even worse showing in this one. The offense mustered just five hits and the only run came in the ninth when it was already 6-0 as Austin Wells hit his first career home run. He also had a double, bumping his average up to a robust .163 which means he has fit into this team perfectly.

➤ Boone’s lineup had a bottom six featuring an average no higher than .220, that by Oswaldo Cabrera. Four players - Wells, Stanton, Peraza and Estevan Florial - were below .200. I was driving for part of this game and on the radio John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman made the prescient observation that after Torres in the 3-hole, there’s no one on the team that can hit. They’re right.

➤ Like they have so many times this season, usually with Cole, the Yankees wasted an outstanding pitching performance. Michael King, who is clearly making a push to be in the Yankees rotation next year, set new career highs for innings (7), pitches (101) and strikeouts (13) but he left trailing 1-0. It was such a shame that these bums did nothing for him, but ask Cole about that.

➤ The only run King allowed came after two were out in the third as Kiermaier and Springer singled and then Bichette hit one up the middle off King’s leg that went for an RBI infield single. With Kevin Gausman mowing down the Yankees, it was only a matter of time before the Jays blew it open once King was out.

➤ Tommy Kahnle and Ian Hamilton were horrible. Kahnle walked four men and threw two wild pitches and Hamilton relieved and promptly walked another which gifted the Jays two runs on no hits. Then in the ninth, Hamilton threw batting practice as the Jays rapped out four hits and took another walk to score three times.

➤ That meant the stadium was mostly empty by the time Wells hit one to the second deck in right for his homer, meaningful to him, meaningless to everyone else.

BOX SCORE

Sept. 21: Yankees 5, Blue Jays 3

➤ Wednesday night after his latest 0-for-4 which extended his current slump to 2-for-39, Stanton told reporters that in the offseason he has a lot of work to do. I wish he would sign his retirement papers and spare us the misery of having to watch him play anymore. Instead, he said, “Can’t produce like this season, so gotta change. A lot of things I’ve got to work and adjust on. But if you guys think I’m just showing up and going out there and not working, then I don’t know what to tell you.” No one says he’s not working. By all accounts, he works hard. The problem is that he’s washed as a player. Nothing is going to fix him at this point - not his God-awful swing and approach at the plate, and especially not his paralyzing lack of athleticism which has rendered him useless in the field and on the rare occasions when he’s on base. Thankfully, he was out of the lineup for the finale and wouldn’t you know it, the Yankees won.

➤ Of course they won because Cole was brilliant, again. He had a perfect game through five and wound up throwing eight innings of two-hit, one run ball with no walks and nine strikeouts. The only run he allowed came in the eighth when he uncorked a wild pitch that allowed Matt Chapman, who had doubled, to race home. In three starts so far against Toronto this year - he’s scheduled for one more next week - Cole has given up just one run in 19.2 innings. He now leads the AL in ERA (2.75), innings pitched (200), starts (32) and WHIP (1.02).

➤ This is what Boone said of Cole: “It’s been everything you could’ve hoped for. I admire how important it is to him to represent his team, this organization, being the ace of the staff for the New York Yankees. He takes that very seriously and he lives that.”

➤ Naturally, because Cole was the starter, all of his great work was nearly undone by Clay Holmes and some fielding mishaps by the maddening Torres. Two singles and a walk loaded the bases with one out and Vlad Guerrero Jr. came up as a pinch hitter as the potential tying run. So yeah, nervous time. Here, Holmes got the DP grounder he needed, but Torres made a lousy throw to first on the relay which pulled LeMahieu off the bag as a run scored. And then Torres fielded a grounder up the middle by Chapman that should have ended the game, but he threw that one too low and LeMahieu couldn’t scoop it, so another run scored. Finally, Holmes got Spencer Horwitz to tap weakly to LeMahieu to end it.

➤ The Yankees had 10 hits, which was somewhat amazing. They started great as LeMahieu and Torres singled and Jake Bauers - replacing Stanton - crushed a three-run homer. It was his first extra-base hit since Aug. 5. Not much happened for a while, but then in the sixth Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Florial ripped two-out doubles to make it 4-0. And in the seventh, LeMahieu walked, stole his first base of the season, and scored on a double by Judge. It looked like an easy night, until the needless drama in the ninth.

BOX SCORE

 ➤ Sept. 21, 2008: The opening of Yankee Stadium in 1923 could not have been more different than the year when the grand ballpark officially closed its turnstiles on this day 15 years ago. That 1923 team led by Babe Ruth won the franchise’s first World Series, but the 2008 team failed to make the postseason for the first time in 14 years.

By the time the final game was played against the Orioles, the Yankees had already been eliminated from the playoff race, but in a weird way, it was actually a good thing because unencumbered by the prospect of needing to win to stay alive, the Yankees were able to pay a little more attention to the chapter in team history that was being written.

Appropriately, the Yankees won the stadium farewell 7-3 with Andy Pettitte getting credit for the victory. Johnny Damon hit a three-run homer and Jose Molina hit a two-run shot. After the game, a sellout crowd of 54,610 stuck around for the closing ceremony which featured the entire team taking a lap around the field to acknowledge the fans, and then captain Derek Jeter making an impromptu speech.

“I wanted to acknowledge the fans. All the memories here are because of the fans, so that’s the message I wanted to get across,” he said. “From all of us up here, it’s a huge honor to put this uniform on every day and come out here and play. Every member of this organization, past and present, has been calling this place home for 85 years. There’s a lot of tradition, a lot of history and a lot of memories. The great thing about memories is you’re able to pass them along from generation to generation.

“Although things are going to change next year and we’re going to move across the street, there are a few things with the New York Yankees that never change. That’s pride, tradition, and most of all, we have the greatest fans in the world. We’re relying on you to take the memories from this stadium and add them to the new memories we make at the new Yankee Stadium and continue to pass them on from generation to generation. We just want to take this moment to salute you, the greatest fans in the world.”

The Yankees had the chance to play spoiler against the Jays but they managed to win only one of three. Now they get another chance to inflict some damage on a contender as they host the Diamondbacks in the final three home games of this forgettable 2023 season. Arizona (81-72) comes in sitting in the second wild-card spot in the NL with the Cubs, Marlins and Reds all within 2.5 games. Only two of those four teams will make it.

The Diamondbacks are typically one of the most unrecognizable and irrelevant teams in the league, except for 2001 when they beat the Yankees in the World Series. They’ve been a franchise since 1998 and they’ve made the playoffs just six times, only once since 2012.

They lost 110 games in 2021, then 88 last season, but now they’ve got things on track with a lineup led by young, exciting players like probable NL rookie of the year outfielder Corbin Carroll who has 25 homers, 50 stolen bases and an on-base percentage of .363. First baseman Christian Walker has 30 homers and 94 RBI, ex-Blue Jays outfielder Lourdes Gurriel has 24 homers and 81 RBI, and catcher Gabriel Moreno is batting .292 and is considered a future star.

Where they have struggled is on the mound with a team ERA of 4.54 that’s 20th in MLB. Zac Gallen is a stud who has won 16 games with a 3.60 ERA, and Merrill Kelly (3.37) has been very good, but there’s not much else.

The pitching matchups are as follows: Friday at 7:05 p.m. on YES it’s Luke Weaver (6.77) making his second Yankees start against Brandon Pfaadt (5.86); Saturday at 1:05 on YES it’s Carlos Rodon (5.90) against a TBD; and Sunday at 1:35 on YES it’s Clarke Schmidt (4.65) against a TBD.