Sinking Yankees Lose Series, and Aaron Judge

The Yankees lost another series which capped a sloppy 2-4 week, and now they won’t have Aaron Judge for at least the next 10 days as he deals with an elbow injury. They will have two new players - trade acquisitions Ryan McMahon and Amed Rosario - but before the trade deadline Thursday, they have to add pitching or you can forget about a postseason berth. Lets get to it. 

Just another ho-hum weekend for the Yankees, right?

Let’s start with their play on the field, which was abysmal Friday and Saturday, and just good enough Sunday to avoid a sweep at the hands of the Phillies. But it was another sloppy week of baseball in which the Yankees lost four of six games, and because of that they are now a staggering 5.5 games behind the Blue Jays in the AL East.

I think it’s a safe bet to assume their division-winning chances are on life support. Seriously, how the hell are they gonna catch the red-hot Blue Jays playing like this? Sure, Toronto could go in the tank, but does anyone truly believe that after watching that team dismantle the Yankees this month?

It’s truly amazing how fast this season went into the shitter. From eight games ahead of Toronto on May 28 to 5.5 back in two months time. That’s eye-popping stuff there.

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Of course, the Yankees being the Yankees, they never think they’re out of anything, and to be fair, they are leading in the wild-card race. Thus, Brian Cashman was working the phones the past week in desperate search of roster replenishments, though the first two moves he made did not address the No. 1 problem on the team, the one that is chiefly the culprit for their rapid demise: The bullpen.

He traded two minor-league pitchers to the Rockies to get a new third baseman, Ryan McMahon, and I like the move. McMahon was a player I had hoped they would get last year because their third base situation was just as bad with Oswaldo Cabrera taking the bulk of the games. Instead they acquired second baseman Jazz Chisholm and told him to learn third base.

McMahon is a lefty bat which the Yankees don’t need, and he’ll fit right in with this team because strikeouts have always been a problem for him. However, even though he’s a .240 career hitter he has some pop in his bat (142 homers in 1,011 games) and he’s a very good defender, which we’ve already seen in the two games he played. Also, he is signed through 2027 so if he plays well, third base is now solidified moving forward.

“I mean, this is every kid’s dream,” McMahon said Saturday before his debut. “When you’re 9, 10 years old, hitting in the backyard, you’re picturing yourself, Game 7, World Series at Yankee Stadium. So it’s gonna be pretty cool … Couldn’t pick a better spot.”

Well, he may come to wince at those words. As I tweeted the other night, right now, going from the Rockies - who are on pace to produce the worst record in MLB history - to this shitty version of the Yankees might be a downgrade for him.

Next, Cashman acquired utility man Amed Rosario who has bounced around to seven teams, but spent the bulk of his MLB time with the Mets and Guardians. Most recently he was with the Nationals and he’s hitting .270 this season and has played third, short, second and the outfield, so if nothing else, the additions of McMahon and Rosario negate the need for Oswald Peraza and Jorbit Vivas, two players who have no business being on the team. This trade cost the Yankees disappointing reliever Clayton Beeter and outfielder Browm Martinez.

Now Cashman has to find a way to upgrade the bullpen with the trade deadline looming later this week. And he’s going to try to do it because of the news that came down following Saturday’s trainwreck loss. Aaron Judge did not play because he has had pain in his throwing elbow the past few days, and there was massive fear that it could be a UCL tear which would have meant Tommy John surgery.

Instead, Aaron Boone said the imaging revealed a flexor strain, so no surgery, and he’s on the 10-day injured list. Phew! The Yankees are hoping it won’t be much longer than that because while he might not be able to play the outfield right away, he should be able to bat, meaning DH. If that news had been season-ending Tommy John, the Yankees’ season would have been over and there would have been zero need for Cashman to seek bullpen help at the cost of sending away prospects.

The question now is what bullpen arms are going to be true difference makers, and who will it cost? Given how Spencer Jones has caught fire at Triple-A - though he missed the entire weekend of games in Rochester because of back spasms - I think he’s staying. So is top prospect George Lombard, and probably a few of their top pitching prospects like Cam Schlittler, Carlos Lagrange, Bryce Cunningham and Elmer Rodriguez-Cruz, but I would think anyone else in the system is in play.

July 25: Phillies 12, Yankees 5

➤ The latest in a string of deplorable nights in every respect as the bullpen got torched for 10 runs in the final three innings, the Little League defense made two more errors, and once again it was home run or bust for the offense.

➤ This was the Yankees fourth straight game where they did not have a run-scoring base hit. Every run they scored against Toronto came via the home run, and in this game they hit four meaningless solo homers and Judge had a sacrifice fly. Their last run-scoring hit that wasn’t a homer was Jazz Chisholm’s RBI double last Sunday against the Braves. That’s utterly ridiculous.

➤ Will Warren actually pitched OK. He made the one mistake, serving up Kyle Schwarber’s first two-run homer in the fifth. He ended up going 5.2 innings and was in line for the victory when Giancarlo Stanton hit the Yankees third solo homer - Cody Bellinger and Austin Wells hit the first two - for a 3-2 lead. And then the bullpen entered the fray.

➤ Tim Hill, Luke Weaver, Ian Hamilton and Scott Effross doused the game in gasoline and fired up a blow torch, exploding it to smithereens. Holy shit, what a travesty. A stupid error by Paul Goldschmidt allowed the tying run to score in the seventh, and then Weaver threw a meatball to JT Realmuto who crushed it for a three-run homer and a 6-3 Phillies lead.

➤ In the bottom half, Anthony Volpe homered and Ben Rice singled and later scored on Judge’s sacrifice fly to cut the margin to 6-5. But then Hamilton laid one in for Schwarber to kill for his second two-run homer in the eighth, and in the ninth, Effross - who was sent back to Triple-A after the game, though I would have voted for launching him to the sun - gave up four runs to make sure the Yankees were suitably blown out and embarrassed. This stiff threw 23 pitches and he gave up four hits and an intentional walk because for some reason, with a man on second and two outs, Boone was afraid of Max Kepler. Unbelievable. After that, single, double, triple, four runs. Nice job Boone.

What they said in Friday’s clubhouse

• Goldschmidt on how the Yankees can break their funk: “The easy thing is just to play better. Mistakes like I made tonight and other mistakes we’ve made, we got to cut those down. Those are conversations that we’re having, but we’ve made a few too many mistakes over the last however many games that if you’re down or up by a bunch, they can get swept under the rug. But we’ve played some close games, and some of those have cost us.”

• Wells on the bullpen implosion, sounding way too much like the idiot, blind manager: “I’m not too concerned. We made mistakes over the middle, and they hit it. Those guys have been great for us all year, and they’re going to continue to make great pitches for us.”

• Boone, making his usual excuses for the bullpen: “Those guys have been worked hard. It’s a challenge right now, but we got to have guys step up.”

July 26: Phillies 9, Yankees 4

➤ Unwatchable. I made it into the top of the fourth and decided, why the hell am I ruining my day off from Bills training camp watching this shit?

➤ Obviously, the day ended on a reasonably good note with the news that Judge doesn’t have a serious injury. Nothing else about the day was promising, though. I guess you can say McMahon’s debut went OK - he whiffed in his first two at bats, which is a worrisome part of his game, but then he had a single and a walk, and he made a tremendous diving play at third, which is also a big part of his game because he’s a plus defender. Otherwise, it was three-plus hours of getting rag-dolled again by the clearly better Phillies.

➤ Marcus Stroman got back to being Marcus Stroman after four decent starts. He had nothing against a quality offense as they raked him for four runs on five hits and four walks in 3.2 innings. Garbage. And then the bullpen gave up five more runs - one off Yerry De los Santos who was called up when the useless Effross was sent down; none off Jonathan Loaisiga though he walked two of the four men he faced; and then four off the useless Allan Winans, thanks in part to a Chisholm error.

➤ The Yankees' bullpen has a 5.20 ERA since June 1. Only the Nationals, Twins and Rockies have worse bullpen ERAs. Nice company.

What they said in Saturday’s clubhouse

• McMahon on his debut: “Honestly, it was weird. I’ve been in Colorado for 12 years, but I think once I calmed down, I realized how exciting this was going to be, and just got really excited to get up here. It’s calmed down, but off the bat, it definitely was a whirlwind. But I had a nice little drive up from Baltimore, had some time to get ready.”

July 27: Yankees 4, Phillies 3

➤ Hey, they managed to avoid a sweep, and because Toronto finally lost, the Yankees picked up a game in the standings while also staying one game ahead of the Red Sox who took two of three from the Dodgers at Fenway.

➤ It wasn’t looking good early when Carlos Rodon got tagged for solo homers by Nick Castellanos and Otto Kemp in the second inning, but the Yankees scored four times in the bottom of the second and that ended up being just enough to offset a second solo homer by Kemp in the fifth. Kemp is a rookie who had two home runs in his first 34 MLB games before Sunday.

➤ In their big inning, which was somewhat stunning because it came against Phillies ace Zach Wheeler, Stanton led off with a single and then Wheeler plunked both Chisholm and Jasson Dominguez to load the bases with no outs. Here, McMahon had his first big moment as a Yankee as he ripped a two-run double down the right to tie the score. It was the first extra base hit by a Yankees third baseman since Chisholm had a double on July 5, meaning more than three weeks ago. Austin Wells contributed a sacrifice fly and Trent Grisham had an RBI single that made it 4-2.

➤ The Yankees never scored again off Wheeler and two relievers and finished with just six hits including a single by McMahon, but it didn’t matter because the bullpen finally managed to deliver. Loaisiga, Weaver, Hill and Devin Williams covered the final 11 outs and allowed one hit and no walks.

What they said in Sunday’s clubhouse

• Boone on the bullpen: “That’s what you want it to look like right there. Really good, against a good lineup, to have four guys go out and kind of really slam it down.”

• Rodon on McMahon, and his own performance: “He has already been tremendous. I think it settles him in. Especially when you show up wearing the pinstripes, it takes time to adjust. But it’s good to see he’s having some success and he can build on that. I did enough today. Obviously, wish I was better on some pitches there to a couple of guys, but they had some good swings.”

Now the Yankees have to deal with the ever-annoying Rays for four games at Yankee Stadium, though they’re catching Tampa Bay at the right time. The Rays just got swept by the Red, they’ve lost four in a row and six out of seven and have fallen 10.5 games behind the Jays. Still, they always give the Yankees fits because they play the game the right way and usually make the Yankees pay for playing the game the wrong way.

➤ 1B Jonathan Aranda: An All-Star who leads the team with 21 doubles and has 51 RBI while hitting .312.

➤ 3B Junior Caminero: He’s on his way to becoming a star and leads the Rays with 26 homers and 68 RBI.

➤ DH Yandy Diaz: Another in a long line of Yankee killers, this season he has 18 homers, 19 doubles and 61 RBI with an .816 OPS.

➤ 2B Brandon Lowe: He has a .320 on-base with 19 homers, 50 RBI and an .800 OPS.

➤ RP Pete Fairbanks: The Rays closer has 17 saves and a 2.84 ERA.

The pitching matchups are scheduled to be:

• Monday, 7:05, YES: Cam Schittler (4.35) vs. Drew Rasmussen (2.93) who has been the Rays best pitcher all season, an All-Star with a 1.028 WHIP in 20 starts.

• Tuesday, 7:05, YES: Max Fried (2.62) vs. Joe Boyle (1.42) who has pitched in six games and this will be his second start.

• Wednesday, 7:05, Amazon Prime: Will Warren (4.82) vs. Zach Littell (3.72), another stud who has a 1.104 WHIP because he leads all MLB starters with just 1.2 walks per nine innings, but who has also yielded an MLB-high 26 homers.

• Thursday, 1:05, YES: Marcus Stroman (6.09) vs. Ryan Pepiot (3.42) who leads MLB with 22 starts and has 1.148 WHIP.