Yankees Spoil a Potentially Perfect Weekend With Incredible Meltdown

This should have been a glorious weekend for the Yankees, but they managed to douse the fire they created in the first two games against the Orioles with a Sunday afternoon loss that defied description. The All-Star break is upon us, and man, all of us need a break, too. Lets get to it.

Writing this newsletter was supposed to be so easy today because I should have been trumpeting a tremendous weekend for the Yankees after what should have been their stunning sweep at Camden Yards. And then the bottom of the ninth inning happened Sunday, and god damnit, everything changed.

Thus, just like that, you’re gonna get angry Sal, and I think you know by now that while angry Sal might be a little irrational (I admit this), he’s also usually spot on correct and justified in his rage.

It’s rather incredible that in the span of about 15 horrifying minutes, the Yankees essentially eviscerated all the goodwill they built up while winning the first two games of their showdown series against Baltimore. In that bottom of the ninth inning, as they put forth as colossal a choke job as one could imagine to lose 6-5, they reminded us that they are not a team that can be taken seriously as a World Series contender. They are paper tigers.

Sure, they have a nice record of 58-40 and they’re only a game behind the Orioles in the AL East. They have some impressive statistics and a couple players who are having great seasons. But that’s the very definition of what paper tigers are. They give off the impression that they’re tough and fierce, but in reality, they’re weak and meek.

You can call me an idiot for taking that stance - people do it every day on Twitter - and remind me that if they had won this game they would have been in first place at the All-Star break. But I refuse to believe this is a championship-caliber team, no matter how much bullshit Aaron Boone spews. You can’t win a division title, let alone a world championship, with the types of players the Yankees have on their roster and this game served up more proof.

The game was broadcast on the Roku Channel and I’m betting that the vast majority of you did not have access to it. Sadly, I did, and all I can say is be glad you didn’t. I watched it live, and then I re-watched the highlights (actually, the low, lowlights) this morning just to confirm that I hadn’t been in some dreamscape nightmare and that it didn’t happen. Alas, it happened and I still can’t believe how they blew this game.

At the end of each game recap below I include the link to the YouTube highlights, but do yourself a favor and once you see Ben Rice’s dramatic go-ahead homer in the ninth, stop watching. Really, it was that bad, another insidious loss that defies description, and for someone like me who makes his living with words, to admit anything defies description is quite a thing.

“That’s a killer. Let’s acknowledge that. It’s been a rough several weeks here for us,” Boone said, maybe the first thing I actually agree with him on.

Of course, Boone quickly shifted back into delusional mode and said, “The reality is, last couple of games in Tampa and going into there, I feel like we were competing our asses off and starting to turn the corner and see the signs we want to see as we turn this thing around. While acknowledging that, the other reality is, we’re in a great spot. Even through some rough, rough stretches, it’s all right there in front of us. We’ve got the pen, we get to write this amazing script, and that’s because we’ve put ourselves in that position.”

OK dude, whatever. Keep believing that when your players continually make mistakes that Little League kids would be ashamed of.

Thank God the All-Star break is here. I need a break from this insanity and I’ll bet some of you do, too.

July 12: Yankees 4, Orioles 1

The Lead: The Fake Brawl Game

And to think, the series began so well for the Yankees.

What happened in the bottom of the ninth Friday night was pretty ridiculous, but I could also see exactly what Orioles manager Brandon Hyde was trying to accomplish. With the Yankees up 4-1 and one out, Clay Holmes - doing what he does best which is turning the ninth inning into unparalleled drama - hit Heston Kjerstad in the head with a pitch. Thankfully the kid was able to get up and he looked fine, though he did get placed on the seven-day concussion list Saturday. It’s scary when guys get hit in the head, no doubt.

Obviously, there was no way Holmes was trying to hit Kjerstad in that situation, especially in the head. It had just started raining and it was clear to everyone - probably even to Kjerstad and his teammates - that the pitch simply got away from Holmes as he tried to throw inside. Now yes, there has been some plunking taking place this season between the Yankees and Orioles, and honestly, more Orioles have been hit by pitches than vice versa.

Whether any of those were intentional, I don’t know, but I kind of doubt it. This isn’t the 20th century when that was perfectly acceptable; the game has changed and teams rarely throw at people on purpose these days. Certainly this one was not intentional, but after Kjerstad was attended to, Hyde started barking at Holmes and then the Yankees dugout and before you know it, there was a typical fake baseball “brawl” happening at home plate. Pushing and shoving and screaming and swearing, but no punches because there was no reason to be punching anyone.

Why? Because the Orioles were in the midst of their worst stretch of the season, on their way to their fourth straight loss, all at home, and Hyde was looking for a way to fire up his guys so he stirred the pot. It was stupid, and given that the Orioles lost again Saturday and should have lost Sunday, it sure didn’t work. “I was emotional,” Hyde admitted. “My guy got hit in the head, and I might have said some things that, at the time, I reacted to it.”

Game notes and observations:

➤ Gerrit Cole delivered the best start of his abbreviated season as he went six innings and gave up just one run on five hits and one walk with seven strikeouts. The first two men in the first reached base before he retired the next three to get off to a good start. He made a mistake in the second as No. 9 hitter Ramon Urias hit a two-out triple on a 3-2 pitch for Baltimore’s only run, but then he struck out Gunnar Henderson to limit the damage. From there, Cole was great as he allowed only two singles over his last four innings.

➤ The bullpen also continued its recent run of success as Tommy Kahnle, Luke Weaver and Holmes each had a scoreless inning to close it out with only two men reaching base.

➤ Boone put DJ LeMahieu into the leadoff spot which was simply unreal. Not surprisingly, he went 0-for-5. In the second inning, Anthony Volpe singled and scored on Jose Trevino’s double, and then Jahmai Jones singled home Trevino for a 2-0 lead. Still no outs, but LeMahieu took care of that with another of his patented rally-killing double plays. LeMahieu is unplayable at this point, but for some reason, Boone keeps trotting him out there with his .188 average and .284 on-base percentage. Batting him leadoff was criminally negligent.

➤ Aaron Judge snapped out of his funk with his first home run since July 2 to make it 3-1 in the third, and then in the ninth, Trevino led off with a double and after LeMahieu failed to drive him in, Juan Soto delivered an insurance RBI single.

➤ While he was scoring in the ninth, Trevino pulled a quad muscle and he’s now on the injured list, likely for quite a while. It’s truly amazing how many times Yankees players get hurt just by running. To replace him, they called up 25-year-old catcher Carlos Narvaez from Triple-A. Narvaez has never played in the majors but he has played 472 games in the Yankees’ system. This year he’s been very good with nine homers, 47 RBI, and an OPS of .829.

July 13: Yankees 6, Orioles 1

The Lead: Back-to-Back Baby

Breaking news early Saturday evening: There was an assassination attempt on former president Donald Trump. Oh, and the Yankees won consecutive games for the first time since June 11-12 and thus won the series after having not won any of their previous eight, so yeah, a pretty newsworthy day.

For the second game in a row, they took advantage of an opponent that was really going through some struggles as this was Baltimore’s fifth consecutive loss, and the Yankees did so by flipping the script that has killed them lately: They took a big first-inning lead and never looked back.

Against one of Baltimore’s best pitchers, Grayson Rodriguez, Alex Verdugo led off with a single, Judge walked, and after they advanced on a wild pitch, Gleyber Torres came through with a two-out RBI single. That apparently shocked Rodriguez, as it should have, and he was unable to put away Austin Wells who, on the ninth pitch of his at bat, crushed a three-run homer to right and onto Eutaw Street for a 4-0 lead.

“Big-time,” Judge said of Wells’ homer, and the first inning explosion. “We came out and made a statement. I think that was the biggest thing, especially after everything that transpired (Friday) night. For us to get that first run early and then him to have a great at-bat against a tough pitcher and get the one mistake and let it leave the ballpark, that was big-time.”

This was the Yankees’ first series win over the Orioles since April 7-9, 2023, which also was the last time the Orioles had lost any series to an AL East opponent, an MLB-record streak of 22 straight non-losing series.

Game notes and observations:

➤ Armed with that four-run lead, Luis Gil was able to pitch more freely and he came through with his second straight strong outing which hopefully has him back on track after that brutal stretch he went through. He wound up with the exact same line as Cole on Friday: Six innings, one run on five hits and a walk with seven strikeouts. He worked around two singles in the first, and the only blemish came in the fourth when Ryan O’Hearn led off with a triple and scored on a groundout. Gil then gave up two singles but escaped further trouble by retiring Urias on a grounder to keep it at 4-1.

➤ The Yankees then turned to two of their newest relievers, Tim Hill and Jake Cousins, to cover the final three innings and they did so beautifully - no runs on three hits with no walks. Cousins has really been a nice surprise since he joined the team. It would be quite a pleasant surprise if he turns out to be one of the bullpen arms this team really needed to find before the trade deadline.

➤ Soto and Judge hit back-to-back homers in the fifth to provide some breathing room. It was Judge’s 34th which set a new Yankee record for most homers before the All-Star break. It’s also tied for seventh most in MLB history before an All-Star break, trailing Barry Bonds (39 in 2001), Chris Davis (37 in 2013), Reggie Jackson (37 in 1969), Mark McGwire (37 in 1998), Luis González (35 in 2001) and Ken Griffey Jr. (35 in 1998). Frank Howard also had 34 in 1969.

July 14: Orioles 6, Yankees 5

The Lead: An All-Time Choke Job

There’s not much more I can add to what I already wrote above. I don’t like to use the word choke because that’s pretty harsh, but seriously, how else can I describe what Holmes, Volpe and Verdugo did to lose this game?

Harsh or not, choke is exactly what they did and they handed the Orioles a completely undeserved victory, one that jumped Baltimore back into first place by a game. Right now, I’d rather swim with sharks than watch the Yankees.

Game notes and observations:

➤ Let’s start with Carlos Rodon. At least the game wasn’t over in the first inning so that was progress for him, though in retrospect, that would have saved us from the horror that came three hours later. Still, it was a failed outing for him. He managed to last just four innings because it took him 98 pitches to record 12 outs. He’s a disaster, plain and simple. The two runs he allowed came in the third when he walked the No. 9 hitter, James McCann, and then threw a nothing slider over the middle of the plate which Henderson launched for a two-run homer and a 2-1 Orioles lead.

➤ The Yankees’ first run came when Volpe doubled with two outs (shocker) and scored on Trent Grisham’s single (shocker). Then in the fifth, Grisham homered (another shocker) to tie it at 2-2 which got Rodon off the hook. Enter Kahnle who has been unreliable and was again as he immediately got crushed for a long solo homer by Anthony Santander that made it 3-2 Orioles.

➤ It stayed that way until the ninth because Michael Tonkin, Weaver and Cousins blanked Baltimore, setting the stage for all the craziness. In the top half, facing Orioles closer Craig Kimbrel who has been great the last two months after a poor start, the Yankees got right to work. Grisham and Oswaldo Cabrera walked and Ben Rice - who had been 2-for-27 since his three-homer game against Boston more than a week ago - hit a dramatic go-ahead three-run homer. It was as big a wow! moment as the Yankees have had all season. It should have been the game-winning hit, the sweep-clinching hit, the ultra-clutch hit that put the Yankees into first place at the break even after all the horrible baseball they’ve played the past month.

➤ Instead, the most horrible baseball they’ve played was about to happen. I sat here saying out loud to no one since my wife wasn’t home that surviving the bottom half was going to be a total crapshoot with Holmes. I know that’s not exactly a leap, but I knew it. He’s been terrible for so long that I kind of expected him to melt down. What I didn’t expect was the help he received in melting down.

➤ Pinch hitter Kyle Stowers led off with a single and yes, I said to myself, “Here we go.” He got a forceout on a ground ball that was hit too slowly to be a double play. Then he walked O’Hearn to put men on first and second before striking out the Orioles’ best player, Henderson, on a called third strike. Was I feeling good yet? Are you kidding? He walked Rutschman to load the bases, and then, what happened next was unfathomable. Holmes got Ryan Mountcastle to hit a grounder right to Volpe, as easy a play as the Gold Glover could have had in that situation. He booted it, everyone was safe and a run scored. “To me, that’s a routine ground ball. The game’s got to be over,” Volpe said.

➤ Then Holmes got Cedric Mullins to hit a line drive to left. Easy play for Verdugo, ballgame over again, right? Nope. Verdugo for some reason was playing way too shallow in a situation where you absolutely cannot let a ball get over your head. That was his first incredible gaffe. Then, as the ball was coming to him, he inexplicably took a step in, realized he misread it, and as he tried to scramble back he tripped over his feet and fell as the ball sailed past him and two runs scored. Now the ballgame was over. According to Statcast, the liner had a 99% catch probability, yet Verdugo didn’t catch it. “It’s the wrong first step,” said Verdugo. “I take a lot of pride out there defensively. This one’s on me.”

➤ So yes, this wasn’t all on Holmes, but how about this - don’t give up a hit and two walks and put yourself in that tenuous situation. How about trying that for once. How lousy is Holmes, who is on his way to the All-Star Game, likely embarrassed that he was selected because there are probably 20 other relievers who deserved it more? In his last 10 appearances covering 9.2 innings, he has given up 12 runs (eight earned), has blown three saves (he now has six this year) and the Yankees are 3-7 in those games. Thanks largely to Holmes, the Yankees have now lost four games this season when they were leading by multiple runs in the ninth inning or later, most in MLB.

The All-Star break is here. For weeks, so many in the media have been saying that getting to the break will be great for the Yankees because it will give them a chance to get some rest and to reset. Of course, every other team gets the same rest and reset, so why this is supposed to be such a big deal for the Yankees is beyond me.

When they get back from the break with a four-game wraparound series at home against the Rays - one that starts Friday and goes through to Monday - they’ll be the same deeply flawed team that we just saw piss away a game Sunday in the most egregious way possible.

Nothing is going to change for this team until the trade deadline, if, and only if, Brian Cashman makes truly meaningful and impactful deals that change the makeup of this roster. Then we’ll see where this season goes, but as we take a few days off from swearing at the TV, my confidence level regarding their chances of doing anything special in 2024 remains pretty low.