Will Aaron Judge's return be enough to get the Yankees to the postseason?

The Yankees just keep plodding along, one step up, one step back, as they managed a pretty sleepy split with the Mets to complete the Subway Series. They’re still sitting in last place in the AL East as the calendar is about to flip to August, but hey, perhaps the savior is returning?

It looks as if the much-needed and long-awaited return of Aaron Judge is going to happen Friday night when the Yankees open a three-game series against the first-place Orioles at Camden Yards.

The question now becomes, does it even matter? Can the return of one player - even one as dynamic as Judge - really lift an offense as bad as the Yankees’ to a level where they can get back into the fight for a postseason berth? I’m sorry, but I have my doubts because here’s the thing: This is not like a starting quarterback returning from injury, a player who has a role in every single play. Judge can only bat for himself, it’s not like he can also bat for Anthony Rizzo and Giancarlo Stanton and … name any other underperforming guy you want on this team.

And Judge most likely won’t be playing the outfield so the Yankees will continue to trot out guys in the corners who are about as terrible as I’ve ever seen in the major leagues at merely catching fly balls. Sure, it will be great to get Judge back, but to expect the Yankees to suddenly catch fire and make a run at a wild-card berth seems like wishful thinking unless a whole bunch of others start coming to life.

During Judge’s absence, the Yankees’ offense was mind-numbingly abysmal. They went 19-23, averaged only 3.9 runs per game while hitting .220 with an OPS of .671, sickly numbers by any measurement. Not only that, they went from solidly in a wild-card position to last place in the AL East and currently 2.5 games out of the six-team AL side of the postseason tournament.

Here’s another thing: Judge definitely won’t be 100 percent and there’s a very good chance his injured toe is going to give him trouble. It sounds silly because we aren’t talking about a knee, an ankle, or a shoulder; it’s his big right toe, but the reality is that it’s a pretty essential part of the anatomy for a right-handed slugger like Judge because of the pressure he puts on it while swinging.

Judge has already admitted it’s still bothering him and now it’s all about being able to manage the pain. Read: It’s gonna hurt every time he swings, but he’s trying to come back as soon as possible because he knows his team is on the verge of evaporating from contention.

“We definitely need him,” Rizzo said before Wednesday’s 3-1 victory over the Mets which enabled the Yankees to split the four games of the 2023 Subway Series. “Just for him to be him and the morale, it’s like acquiring (a top player at the trade deadline). Hopefully he comes back and just gets right back to it.”

Judge hasn’t played since June 3 when he got hurt at Dodger Stadium, so you would have to expect he’ll have some rust to knock off, and given what the Yankees are facing in the next week and a half, it won’t be easy. Three games at Baltimore, then a homestand that includes three against the Rays and four against the Astros. Those are perhaps the three best teams in the AL, and by the time this segment of the schedule is over, the Yankees could legitimately be toast in the playoff race.

“It's gonna be a tough week right here and we need to take care of business,” Isiah Kiner-Falefa said. “I think we’re getting the big guy back, so really excited and we’ll see what happens.”

Let’s hope Judge comes back with a vengeance and makes the difference that the Yankees need him to make, but I’m not getting my hopes out of whack.

Here are my observations on the two games against the Mets.

July 25: Mets 9, Yankees 3

➤ All the things that are wrong with the Yankees reared their ugly head in this supremely ugly loss to their crosstown rival. And it was just another night when you realize this team isn’t playoff worthy and even if it did somehow sneak in, it would take a veritable miracle to win a World Series.

➤ Let’s start here. Domingo German is a maddening pitcher. When he’s on, he can be, well, perfect as he was against the A’s. But when he’s not on, he’s a guy who gives you no chance to win. In this game, he managed to be both. He struck out nine men and produced 15 swings and misses in six innings, but he also gave up three home runs, all of them on horrible meatballs down the middle of the plate. He ended up permitting six runs on a walk and seven hits, and the three bombs raised his season total to 20, tied for 11th-most in MLB.

➤ Then there’s the fielding. I can’t recall a worse fielding outfield than this group of Yankees. In the major leagues, fly balls almost always get caught. I mean almost always, right? But with the Yankees, every fly ball seems to be an adventure, and some inexplicably don’t get caught. Tuesday, two balls that should have been caught found grass, and it led to four runs, four runs that would never have scored with a competent outfield.

➤ In the first inning, Pete Alonso hit a blooper that had a 90% catch probability for Billy McKinney in left-center, but he didn’t make the play and neither did Harrison Bader who had less of a chance, but still a chance. Then in the third, Francisco Lindor blooped one down the left-field line and again, McKinney got a bad break and it fell for an excuse me two-out double. German then compounded matters by walking Jeff McNeil and throwing an 0-2 changeup to Alonso who whacked it into the seats to make it 4-0. Anthony Volpe made a throwing error in the seventh which led directly to the Mets seventh run, and in the ninth Bader misplayed a ball that helped another run score. You can’t win playing defense like that.

➤ And of course, what would a Yankee game be without awful hitting. Justin Verlander has owned the Yankees for about 16 years, no matter what uniform he’s wearing, and he dominated them again - six innings of two-hit shutout ball though he did walk four. His stuff is no longer great, but it was more than good enough against these Yankees who hit like they have toothpicks for bats. They went 0-for-6 with runners in scoring position and two of their runs came home on outs that more importantly helped to kill promising rallies - a Stanton sacrifice fly and a Ben Rortvedt bases-loaded groundout. They finished with five hits, four of those singles.

➤ Lastly, after the Yankees pushed across a couple runs to get within 7-3, the bullpen failed again, something that is happening way too often these days. Ron Marinaccio came in for the ninth and made sure there would be no miracle victory as he faced four batters, three reached and two scored. Marinaccio is literally printing his bus ticket back to Scranton.

BOX SCORE

July 26: Yankees 3, Mets 1

➤ I didn’t think Carlos Rodon was particularly good, but he was good enough against a Mets team that is even more disappointing than the Yankees this season. After their big night in the opener, the Mets managed only one run on four hits as they did an outstanding impression of the Yankees offense.

➤ Rodon pitched 5.2 innings and gave up just the one run on four hits and three walks with four strikeouts. There was traffic on the bases all night, but he did a nice job to avoid disasters. He got out of the third after the Mets had men on second and third with no outs, limiting the damage to just a Brandon Nimmo sacrifice fly. He was lucky, though, that Alonso just missed a way-too-juicy pitch that he could have launched for another home run. Instead it was a line drive right to Kiner-Falefa in left and, hey, he caught it! Progress. Rodon also had two men reach base in each of the fourth and fifth innings but he made pitches when he needed, including a big strikeout of Alonso.

➤ The Yankees were nearly as anemic against Mets starter Jose Quintana. They wasted a great chance in the first inning, first and third with no outs and didn’t score. But in the second LeMahieu walked, Bader doubled him to third, and then Volpe walked to load the bases with no outs. But again, no one could deliver a big hit as the Yankees’ two runs scored on outs. Yeah, it was two runs, but that could have been a bigger inning. The only other run came in the third as Bader singled and took second on a throwing error and scored on Volpe’s single. Then came four zeroes to end the game. For the series the Yankees managed 11 hits and went 1-for-17 with runners in scoring position. It just never gets better.

➤ Nice night for Bader, 3-for-4 with two runs. He took a chance in the second on a shallow fly to right, tagging and scoring as he executed a great slide to avoid the tag. They need more of that from Bader. But hell, they need more of that from everybody.

➤ Outstanding job by the bullpen as Michael King, Wandy Peralta, Tommy Kahnle and Clay Holmes retired all 10 men they faced, a perfect 10. Kahnle was particularly great as he mowed down Lindor, Alonso and Tommy Pham in the eighth.

BOX SCORE

 ➤ July 27, 1988: Tommy John has quite a place in baseball history. Sadly, his very good and very long 26-year career - during which he won 288 games and compiled a 3.34 ERA - gets overshadowed by the elbow surgery he underwent in the 1970s that now bears his name.

But hey, it’s better being known for a revolutionary operation than what happened on this day 35 years ago when John became the first pitcher since 1898 to commit three errors in one inning. And not only that, he committed all three in a single at bat in a game the Yankees would ultimately win 16-3 over the Brewers.

“Embarrassed?” he said. “If you play this game long enough, stranger things can happen.”

Here’s how this crazy play unfolded: With the Yankees already up 4-0 in the top of the fourth, Milwaukee’s Jim Gantner was on first base with one out when Jeffrey Leonard tapped one between the mound and first. John charged in to field it but bobbled it for the first error, then compounded matters by throwing the ball past Don Mattingly and into right field for the second error.

Dave Winfield tracked the ball down and fired home trying to nail Gantner, and he probably would have had him by 10 feet, but John cut off the throw. “I had no idea what he was doing there,” catcher Don Slaught said. No one else did, either. John then wheeled and threw wildly past Slaught allowing Gantner to score, and when the ball went into the Milwaukee dugout, Leonard was awarded home for a Little League home run.

“It got into the back of my hand and I never should have thrown it,” John said of the throw to first. “I shot-put it past Donnie. I threw it to the ballboy, and he got out of the way. Then I got it back and threw it to the (Brewers) trainer. I must have had a metal cup on. It glitched the ions in the air.”

When told the last pitcher to commit three errors in one inning was a guy named Jay Bentley Seymour of the New York Giants, the 45-year-old John quipped. “Knew him well. Pitched against him in the Eastern League.”

Manager Lou Piniella could laugh about it because the Yankees won in a rout with John defying his age with his eight-inning outing. “Tommy John pitched a great ballgame except for what you’d call … I don’t know how to describe that play,” Piniella said. “All I know was, the ball was hit about 15 feet and they scored two runs.”

Asked if he had been teased on the bench, John said, “No, but Mel Allen will on ‘This Week in Baseball.’”

Here’s the video:

Ordinarily I’d say this a huge series on tap for the Yankees as they head to Baltimore for three games against the first-place Orioles. But when you’re sitting in last place, is it really a big series? It’s pretty incredible how the fortunes of these two teams have changed in the last calendar year.

The Orioles went from being a team that hasn’t finished better than fourth in the AL East since 2016, a team that lost at least 108 games in three seasons during that span, to the top rung on the division ladder this year at 62-40. The Yankees have gone from winning 99 games and reaching the ALCS in 2022, to a team that this season is 8-1 against the truly horrific A’s and Royals, and 46-47 against all their other opponents.

Baltimore has envious young talent in catcher Adley Rutschman, third baseman Gunnar Henderson, outfielders Cedric Mullins and Anthony Santander, first baseman Ryan Mountcastle, and pitchers Felix Bautista, Yennier Cano, Dean Kremer, Grayson Rodriguez, Tyler Wells and Kyle Bradish. I would trade rosters with the Orioles in a heartbeat given the exciting future they have.

The Orioles rank eighth in MLB in runs per game at 4.89, they’re 11th with an OPS of .739 and 16th in on-base at .319. And on the pitching side, they’re 16th in ERA at 4.19 and 19th in WHIP at 1.40 so the numbers don’t really blow you away. However, they find ways to win and that’s what matters.

The pitching lines up this way: Friday at 7:05 p.m. on YES it’s Gerrit Cole (2.78) against Rodriguez (6.91); Saturday at 7:15 on FOX it’s Clarke Schmidt (4.33) against Wells (3.65); and Sunday at 7:10 on ESPN it’s Luis Severino (6.46) against Kremer (4.59). Yeah, three games on three networks this weekend.