Sevy's Smoke & Judge's Single Mess With Texas

I thought I had more time to do this one. I thought the early-season-locked-forced doubleheader was tomorrow, not today. Oh well.

Last night, the Yankees started their final series of the regular season, against the Texas Rangers at the new (3rd season) Globe Life Field in Arlington. They didn't get what they wanted, a 62nd home run from Aaron Judge, as he collected only a leadoff single in 4 at-bats. Kyle Higashioka singled home a run in the 5th inning, while Marwin González and Giancarlo Stanton hit home runs (not back-to-back) in the 8th.

That was all Luis Severino needed in his start. He almost became a huge story himself, as he threw serious smoke, pitching a no-hitter for 7 innings. His only baserunner came when he walked Josh Smith in the 3rd, but he was erased on a double play. As Corey Kluber (now with the Tampa Bay Rays) did with a no-hitter in this same stadium last season, Sevy messed with Texas.

Aaron Boone took him out after 7 innings and 94 pitches, not wanting to risk renewed injury to his recently-returned arm. History or no, it was the right thing to do, especially since the Yankees will need every healthy pitcher they can get for the Playoffs. Who knows, with the injuries to the bullpen, Severino might be shifted into it. Miguel Castro was rusty in the 8th, and put the game back into doubt, but got out of it, and Scott Effross pitched a perfect 9th to end it.

Yankees 3, Rangers 1. WP: Severino (7-3). SV: Effross (4). LP: Martín Pérez (12-8).

Today, it's a doubleheader. There are 3 games left for Judge to get Number 62.

That Loss Hurt, In More Ways Than One

Just when we thought the Yankees had hit their way out of the slump that began before the All-Star Break, they've stopped hitting again.

This game, against the Milwaukee Brewers at American Family Field in Milwaukee, hurt -- in more ways than one. In the top of the 3rd, Marwin González, the Yankee 1st baseman in this game, batted for the 1st time, and when Brewer catcher Victor Caratini tried to throw the ball back to his pitcher, Brandon Woodruff, it hit González in the side of the head!

This was the Brewers, not the Boston Red Sox, so it can be safely presumed that it was a mistake and an accident. Still, González had to leave the game. He is listed as day-to-day. Aaron Hicks was sent up to pinch-hit, and struck out.

So, for the bottom of the 3rd, manager Aaron Boone had to do some rearranging. Oswaldo Cabrera was moved from right field to 1st base, Aaron Judge was moved from center field to his natural position of right, and Hicks was put in center.

Jameson Taillon had gotten through the 1st 2 innings allowing only 1 baserunner, a walk. But now, well, you know what leadoff walks can do. He allowed one -- and, as it turned out, the leadoff hitter was Caratini. After striking out Garrett Mitchell, he allowed a single to Christian Yelich, and a home run to Willy Adames. (Every time I see his name, I think of Eight Is Enough and Charles In Charge actor Willie Aames.) It was 3-0 Milwaukee.

Josh Donaldson led off the top of the 4th with a home run, but the Yankees only got 1 more hit the rest of the way, by the much-maligned Hicks, of all people. Brewers 4, Yankees 1. WP: Woodruff (11-4). SV: Devin Williams (13). LP: Taillon (13-5).

The series concludes this afternoon. Gerrit Cole starts for the Yankees, and Jason Alexander for the Brewers.

Sadly, no, not that Jason Alexander.

Winning Is Welcome

It's too soon to say that the Yankees have snapped out of their 2-month funk. It is right on time, however, to say that these last 2 wins have been welcome.

Jameson Taillon started, and went 5 innings, and for the 1st 4 innings, he was fine, pitching shutout ball, allowing 2 hits and a walk, and there was also an error. He had a 2-0 lead, because Aaron Judge doubled in the 1st inning, and was singled home by Josh Donaldson (but he was out trying to stretch it to a double, which could have come back to haunt us); and Marwin González, uncharacteristically, hit a home run in the 3rd.

But Taillon began the top of the 5th by giving up a walk and a home run -- to former Yankee Gary Sánchez. (It's not always the ex-Yankees who do it to us, but it happens a lot.) He got into more trouble, but Aaron Boone trusted him to get out of it, and he did. Maybe there's a lesson there.

In the 6th, Judge hit a home run, his 54th of the season. He's now on a pace for 65. In the 7th, Isiah Kiner-Falefa hit a home run, his 2nd of the season. He's now on a pace for 3.

Greg Weissert pitched a scoreless 6th. He and Wandy Peralta pitched a scoreless 7th. Peralta pitched a scoreless 8th. Clay Holmes pitched a 1-2-3 9th.

Yankees 5, Twins 2. WP: Weissert (2-0). SV: Holmes (19). LP: Trevor Megill (3-2).

The series continues, but not tonight: The nasty weather from earlier has already postponed today's game, setting up a doubleheader for tomorrow. The Yankees have Domingo Germán going in the opener, and Gerrit Cole in the nightcap. As of this writing, the Twins haven't announced their starting pitcher for either game.

Yanks' Best Pitcher In Horrible Loss to Rays Is Marwin González

The Yankees began September the way they played most of July and pretty much all of August: Making complete fools of themselves.

It didn't start out that way: Domingo Germán started the opener of this more-important-than-it-should-have-been series away to the Tampa Bay Rays, and allowed 1 unearned run on 5 hits and 1 walk over the 1st 6 1/3rd innings.

Unfortunately, the Yankees didn't hit, again: They wasted men on 1st & 2nd in the 1st inning, went down 1-2-3 in the 2nd, wasted men on 1st & 2nd with 1 out in the 3rd, wasted a man on 1st in the 4th, wasted 1 leadoff double and a 1-out walk in the 5th, wasted 1st & 2nd in the 6th, and went down 1-2-3 in the top of the 7th. It was 1-0 Rays at the stretch.

Germán got the 1st out in the bottom of the 7th, then he walked a batter. You know the Cliché about what walks can do: The next batter hit a home run. It was 3-0 Rays, and, while Germán still hadn't pitched badly, it felt like game over.

And it was. The Yankees went down 1-2-3 in the 8th. And then Greg Weissert fell apart in the bottom of the 8th, allowing 2 runs. Aaron Boone brought Anthony Banda in, and he imploded, allowing walk, bases-loading single, bases-loaded walk, bases-loaded walk, 2-run single, and finally he hit a batter. Boone actually sent a position player in to pitch at this point: Marwin González, who finally got the 3rd out.

Aaron Hicks hit a single with 1 out in the top of the 9th, but it wasn't followed up. Rays 9, Yankees 0. WP: Jeffrey Springs (7-4). No save. LP: Germán (2-3).

Here are the career earned run averages of the pitchers the Yankees used last night: Germán, 4.36; Weissert, 10.13; Banda, 5.64; Marwin González, 0.00. He had previously pitched a full scoreless inning for the Boston Red Sox in 2021.

Aside from Germán, there is no reason for any of those men to ever pitch for the Yankees again.

The Yankees, once in 1st place in the American League Eastern Division by 15 1/2 games, are now just 5 games ahead of the Rays, 4 in the all-important loss column. And they are 6 games behind the Houston Astros for home-field advantage in the Playoffs. There are 30 games to go.

After the game, Boone said, "It's just embarrassing when you get beat like that and you're going through the struggles you are. I'm in charge of this team, what we're going through right now, I know better than anyone, there's going to be hard moments and hard times. I do think the effort is there, I think the care is there. But, we've set a much better standard in that room that we've got to start living up to it."

No shit, Sherlock.

The series continues tonight. Clarke Schmidt, who shouldn't be starting for the Yankees, does, against Corey Kluber, who should be starting for the Yankees, except Brian Cashman let him go. And you know what happens when Cashman lets a pitcher go, most notoriously with Nathan Eovaldi. I can feel another unacceptable loss coming on.

To Tell the Truth, Yanks Needed That Win Over Mets, Badly

Going into last night's opener of a 2-game Citi Series game with the disgusting Mets and their even more disgusting fans, no Yankee Fan could have been faulted for asking, in the tradition of the old TV game show To Tell the Truth, "Will the real New York Yankees please stand up?" Or wondering if they could.

All the signs for an embarrassment were there. Domingo Germán was starting against Max Scherzer. Giancarlo Stanton still wasn't available. The rest of the Yankee lineup was still mired in a slump. And while the Mets had seen their lead in the National League Eastern Division, as high as 10 1/2 games on June 1, fall to just half a game on July 23, it was back up to 4 games after Sunday's contests.

Besides, since the Yankees had seen their American League Eastern Division lead fall from 15 1/2 games on July 8 to 7 games on Saturday, nobody was noticing that the Mets were doing their usual "Oh, that's right, we're the Mets, and we're supposed to stink and look like idiots while doing it" routine.

Except the starting pitchers flipped the script. In the 1st inning, Scherzer hit Andrew Benintendi with a pitch, gave up a single to Anthony Rizzo, and gave up a sacrifice fly to DJ LeMahieu.

In the 3rd, he gave up a home run to Aaron Judge. This was a case of The Curse of Kay: Broadcaster Michael Kay mentioned an overwhelming stat, in this case that Judge was in the longest home run drought of his career, and the opposite happened. It was Judge's 47th home run of the season, and, even with the drought, he's on pace to tie Roger Maris' real major league record of 61 home runs in a season.

In the 5th, Scherzer gave up a ground-rule double to Isiah Kiner-Falefa, a sacrifice bunt to Marwin González, and a double to Benintendi. It was 3-0 Yankees.

It was 3-0 Yankees because both starting pitchers had flipped the script: Germán was perfect over the 1st 3 innings, and, through 6 innings, had allowed only 2 baserunners, singles to Brandon Nimmo and James McCann. The sellout crowd of 48,670 was roaring. They seemed to have gotten their Yankees back.

Aaron Boone left Germán in to start the 7th. He struck Francisco Lindor out. Then came a play which reminded every fan of both teams not just of the Yankees' poor play since July 8, but of the infamous Luis Castillo Game of 2009. Pete Alonso popped up. Rookie 2nd baseman Oswaldo Cabrera could have gotten it. Right fielder González could have gotten it. Neither got it: They crashed into each other, and the ball dropped. Given this chance, Daniel Vogelbach hit a home run, and the Mets were within 3-2. 

Boone took Germán out, and Ron Marinaccio got out of the inning without further damage, but now, every Yankee Fan watching, in the stands or at home, was nervous: Was this the game that would symbolize the season turning from glory to disaster?

As he already had in this game, Benintendi provided the answer: No. With 1 out in the bottom of the 7th, IKF singled, and when Lindor mishandled the ball, he got to 2nd. After González popped up, failing to redeem himself, Benintendi singled IKF home.

Marinaccio and Jonathan Loáisiga pitched hitless ball the rest of the way. Yankees 4, Mets 2. WP: Germán (2-2). SV: Loáisiga (1). LP: Scherzer (9-3).

To tell the truth, the Yankees needed that win, very badly. It was a reminder that the Yankees should be, if not are, the best team in New York, and the best team in baseball.

The brief series concludes tonight. Frankie Montas starts against Tajuan Walker. Come on you Pinstripes!

There's More for the Yankees' Life With Sears

Brian Cashman's "Bomb the opposition out of the yard, so it doesn't matter how good your pitching is" philosophy often doesn't work. Especially when you get to a game where your starting rotation has a hole in it, and you need to call someone up from the minor leagues. Last night's game against the Oakland Athletics at Yankee Stadium was an example: Rookie JP Sears (like CC Sabathia, no periods) had been called up to start.

It turned out to be the 23rd time in their 1st 75 games this season that the Yankees scored 2 or fewer runs. But the pitching has been good enough that their record in those games is 9-14.

So after Aaron Boone put this game on his Sears card -- I can tell that joke, because I worked at a Sears store for a year and a half -- Sears pitched into the 6th inning, allowing no runs, just 3 hits and 1 walk. The store's old slogan was right on this occasion: "There's more for your life at Sears." Ron Marinaccio, Wandy Peralta and Michael King got the team through the 8th inning with no damage.

But you need to score runs to win. Jose Trevino singled home a run in the 1st inning, and Marwin González hit a home run in the 2nd. The Yankees didn't get many more chances. Isiah Kiner-Falefa got to 2nd base with 1 out in the 5th, and that was as close as they came to a 3rd run.

Clay Holmes has done a fantastic job substituting as the closer during the injury to Aroldis Chapman -- who, it has been suggested, may be activated today. (If he is, then it will probably be Sears who gets sent down to open the roster spot. "Thanks for the win, pal, now get back to Scranton.") But last night, Holmes struggled to finish the game off. He struck out the 1st 2 batters he faced. Then, Trevino committed catcher's interference -- after the Yankees benefited from that call twice in 1 inning the night before. King then allowed 2 singles, leading to a run, before getting a groundout to end it.

Yankees 2, Athletics 1. WP: Sears (3-0). SV: King (13). LP: Frankie Montas (3-8). The Yankees are now 55-20.

The series concludes tonight. Cole starts -- not Gerrit Cole for the Yankees, but Cole Irvin for the A's. The Yankee starter will be Jameson Taillon. Then we go down to Houston for a big, big series against the cheating Astros. The idea of starting Sears last night was to make the Yankee rotation line up better against the Astros this weekend.

Nestor Getting Hit a Bad Sign for Yankees

Last night's game was a bad sign. The Yankees sent Nestor Cortes to the mound against the Tampa Bay Rays, and they were hitting his inside pitches. Isaac Paredes and Harold Ramirez hit back-to-back home runs off his inside pitches in the 1st inning. Paredes hit another homer off him in the 3rd. Cortes was taken out in the 5th, and replaced by Clarke Schmidt, and the 1st batter he faced was Paredes, and he hit another homer -- 3 in 1 game.

I guess it was no surprise when Ron Marinaccio hit him with a pitch in the 7th, and he didn't get an additional chance to join the 4-homers-in-a-game club.

But the Yankees simply couldn't get untracked in what was essentially a bullpen game for the Rays. DJ LeMahieu singled home 2 runs in the 2nd inning, but that would be it until the 9th. There was a glimmer of hope that began when Gleyber Torres drew one of those leadoff walks that can kill a team, and advanced to 2nd on a passed ball. But Aaron Hicks' hot streak cooled off at a bad time, and he struck out. Kyle Higashioka, still not hitting well enough to be our starting catcher, grounded to short. But Marwin González hit a home run, and that made it 5-4.

And up to bat came Aaron Judge. And he hit one deep to left. It looked like the game was tied -- for a moment. It didn't quite go far enough, and it was caught at the warning track. Rays 5, Yankees 4. WP: Shawn Armstrong (1-1). SV: Colin Poche (5, and he came within 2 feet of blowing it). LP: Cortes (6-3).

This is a bad sign. We are going to need to beat good teams on the road to win postseason series. And while the Rays are now, probably, too far back to make a legitimate run at the American League Eastern Division title, they can still win a Wild Card slot and become a Yankee postseason series opponent.

Until the Yankees get it done, they are still the 2010-21 Yankees, with echoes of the 2004-08 Yankees -- not the Yankees of 2009, and certainly not the 1996-2003 Yankees.

The series concludes tonight, with Jordan Montgomery starting against Shane Baz. Then, they come home for 4 games against another team that, coming into this season, had a hammer over them: The cheating Houston Astros. Cortes could start the finale on Sunday. Hopefully, he'll learn from this performance, and beat them.

Nothing Lasts Forever

Nothing lasts forever, not even a Yankee winning streak. They couldn't complete the sweep of the Toronto Blue Jays yesterday.

Luis Severino, scratched from his start on Thursday due to an unspecified illness, only went 5 innings, allowing 5 runs. He was supported by home runs from Gleyber Torres, Josh Donaldson, and back-to-backs from Kyle Higashioka and Marwin González.

But between Severino being unable to get an out in the bottom of the 6th, Miguel Castro allowing 2 runs, and Wandy Peralta having nothing, the Yankees blew an 8-3 lead. Anthony Rizzo hit a home run in the 8th, but the Yankees couldn't complete the comeback. Blue Jays 10, Yankees 9. WP: Yimi Garcia (1-3). SV: Jordan Romano (17). LP: Peralta (1-1).

The Yankees hit 5 home runs, and lost. They had previously been 13-0 this season when scoring 9 or more runs.

The Jays' fans celebrated like they'd just won the World Series. Which they haven't done in 29 years. Their team did some minor trash-talking as well. It is now 11 games behind the Yankees.

This run of tests, against the best teams in the American League, continues this week, as the Yankees visit the Tampa Bay Rays, and then come home to play the Houston Astros. So far, pretty good. But they've got to keep it up.

*

Days until the next New York Red Bulls game: 2, this Wednesday night, at 8:00, home to arch-rival New York City Charlotte FC, in the U.S. Open Cup.

Days until the Red Bulls again play a nearby rival: See the previous answer.

Days until the Yankees' next series against the Boston Red Sox begins: 17, on Thursday, July 7, at Fenway Park.

Days until Arsenal play in America again: 26, on Saturday, July 16, vs. Everton of Liverpool, at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore.

Days until the next Arsenal game that counts: 46, on Friday, August 5, at 2:45 PM New York time, away to South London team Crystal Palace, in the 2022-23 Premier League season opener.

Days until the next Rutgers University football game: 75, on Saturday, September 3, away to Boston College. Under 3 months.

Days until the next East Brunswick High School football game: 81, on Friday, September 9, against arch-rival Old Bridge. Under 3 months. Hopefully, our home field, under renovation through the entire 2021 season, will be ready, so we don't have to go back to the purple pit.

Days until the next East Brunswick-Old Bridge game: See the previous answer.

Days until the next North London Derby: 103, on Saturday, October 1, at 10:00 AM New York time, at the Emirates Stadium. It will likely be moved, to at least a different time, and possibly a different day, for British TV purposes.

Days until the New Jersey Devils play again: Unknown, as the 2022-23 NHL schedule hasn't been released yet. Usually, the new season starts on the 2nd Friday in October, which would be October 7, which is 109 days from now, a little over 3 months.

Days until the New Jersey Devils again play a local rival: Unknown, but it probably won't be the season's opening game.

Days until the next elections for the U.S. Congress and for the Governors of most States in the Union, including New York and Pennsylvania: 141, on Tuesday, November 8, 2022. Under 5 months.

Days until the next World Cup opens: 154, on Monday, November 21, 2022, in Doha, Qatar. A shade over 5 6 months.

Days until the next game of the U.S. National Soccer Team: 154, on Monday, November 21, against Wales, in the Group Stage of the World Cup, at the Ahmad bin Ali Stadium in Al Rayyan, Qatar.

Days until the next Rutgers-Penn State football game: 152, on Saturday, November 19, at 12:00 noon, at SHI Stadium in Piscataway, New Jersey. Under 5 months. It was supposed to be the following Saturday, during Thanksgiving Weekend, but it was moved up.

Days until the next Women's World Cup opens: 385, on Friday, July 10, 2023, jointly held in the neighboring nations of Australia and New Zealand. A little over a year, or under 13 months.

Days until the next Summer Olympic Games: 767, on Friday, July 26, 2024, in Paris, France. A little over 2 years, or a little over 25 months.

Days until the next Presidential election: 869, on Tuesday, November 5, 2024. Under 2 1/2 years, or under 29 months.

Days until the next elections for Governor of New Jersey and Mayor of New York City: 1,233, on Tuesday, November 4, 2025. Under 3 1/2 years.

Days until the next Winter Olympics open in Milan, Italy: 1,327, on Friday, February 6, 2026. Under 4 years.