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Yankeemetrics: Riding the pinstripe rollercoaster (April 16-17)

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(Newsday)

The Good …
It’s always nice to beat up on the teams you’re supposed to crush, and that’s exactly what the Yankees did in their 12-1 rout of the Marlins on Monday night. The 11-run win was their second-largest in an Interleague game at Yankee Stadium, trailing only their 15-0 shellacking of the Mets in 2009.

The fireworks started early and didn’t let up, with the Yankees racing out to leads of 5-0 after at the end of the third and 11-0 at the end of the fifth. The Yankees have made a habit out of taking big leads recently. Since the start of last season, it was the 61st game in which they’ve had a lead of at least five runs. That’s four more such games than any other team in MLB through Monday’s slate (Astros were second with 57).

Aaron Judge continued his destruction of baseballs and record books, going deep in the second inning for his 60th career homer. It came in his 197th big-league game, making him the fastest player in major-league history to hit 60 homers, needing five fewer games than Mark McGwire.

Didi Gregorius somehow upstaged Judge by knocking two balls out of the park for his second multi-homer game in 2018. As of Monday, he was the only player in the American League with two multi-homer games this season. It was also his fifth homer of the year — #FunFact alert! — which is the same number that the Tigers and Royals each had as a team entering this week’s schedule.

In terms of piling up two multi-homer games this early into the season, Didi has put himself in some elite company. Only four other Yankees have done it twice in the team’s first 15 games since 1950: Alex Rodriguez (2007), Graig Nettles (1974), Mickey Mantle (1961) and Bill Skowron.

These were not Yankee Stadium cheapies, either, with distances of 411 and 416 feet. As of Monday, only six other guys had a game with two 410-foot-plus homers: Justin Smoak, Khris Davis, Javier Baez, Matt Davidson, Tyler Austin and Giancarlo Stanton.

Luis Severino bounced back from his rough outing at Fenway last week to throw an absolute gem. He gave up just one hit over six scoreless innings, walking one and striking out eight. Amazingly, its his second start this season with at least seven strikeouts and no more than one hit allowed.

  • He’s the first pitcher in franchise history with two such games in a single season. Reminder: it’s the middle of April.
  • The only other major-league pitchers in the last 110 seasons to have two such starts within the team’s first 15 games are Bob Feller (1947) and Sam McDowell (1966).
  • Sevy is the lone pitcher in baseball with three such games since the start of last season (his other came last September against the Rangers)

Or, if you prefer something simpler, there’s this leaderboard (through Monday):

Most Starts with 0 or 1 Runs Allowed Since 2017
Luis Severino 18
Chris Sale 18
Clayton Kershaw 17
Max Scherzer 17
(Getty)

… and The Bad
So who are the real Yankees? One day after posting their most convincing win of the season, the Yankees flopped in epic fashion on Tuesday night as the Marlins pummeled them, 9-1. Three weeks into the season and the Yankees are doing their best to define mediocrity. For example, their record after each of their last 10 games (starting April 5): 4-3, 4-4, 5-4, 5-5, 6-5, 6-6, 7-6, 7-7, 8-7, 8-8.

Masahiro Tanaka followed up last week’s debacle against the Red Sox (5 IP, 6 R, 6 ER, 7 H, 2 HR) with a nearly identical awful line against the Marlins (5 IP, 7 R, 6 ER, 8 H, 1 HR). He’s the first Yankee to cough up at least six earned runs in back-to-back starts since … Tanaka did so on May 14 and May 20 last year. #NotTanakaTime

Yes, he was hurt by a couple untimely errors behind him, but he didn’t help himself by allowing a ton of hard contact. Eleven of the 17 balls in play against Tanaka had an exit velocity of at least 96 mph, easily the most such batted balls given up by a Yankee pitcher in a game this season.

Giancarlo Stanton was booed yet again at the Stadium as he went 0-for-4, striking out twice, grounding into a double play and popping out with two men on base. It was his sixth game this season with multiple whiffs and no hits, the most by any Yankee in the team’s first 16 games. It’s a super-small sample size, but the hometown fans have good reason to spread the Bronx jeers when he’s at the plate: Stanton is now 3-for-35 (.086) with 20 strikeouts in eight home games, compared to 10-for-31 (.323) with nine strikeouts in eight road games.

Before we close, let’s end on positive note. Miguel Andujar was the Yankees savior and hitting star, helping the team avoid what would have been its worst shutout loss ever in Interleague play, thanks to his first career big-league homer in the bottom of the ninth inning. Combined with his fifth inning double that broke up Jarlin Garcia’s no-hit bid in the fifth inning, this was his third straight game with multiple extra-base hits, earning the young slugger our Obscure Yankeemetric of the Series:

The 23-year-old Andujar is the youngest Yankee in more than 50 years to put together a streak of back-to-back-to-back games with at least two extra base hits. The last one to do it was a Brooklyn-born, 21-year-old rookie named Joe Pepitone in 1962.

Stanton’s early season woes and the two possible explanations

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(Presswire)

Yesterday afternoon the Yankees suffered a brutal loss when a 5-0 first inning lead turned into an 8-7 loss in 12 innings. When a team blows a five-run lead, even that early in the game, the blame has to start with the pitching staff, especially when the starter doesn’t get through the fifth. But still, losing a game like that requires a team effort. It’s never just one guy.

Despite that, all the headlines today are focusing on Giancarlo Stanton, who went 0-for-7 with five strikeouts yesterday — it was his second five-strikeout game in a week — and 3-for-28 (.107) with 16 strikeouts during the six-game homestand. Yesterday’s game dropped his season batting line to .167/.271/.429 (98 wRC+) with 20 strikeouts in 48 plate appearances. The super early strikeout rate leaderboard:

  1. Ian Happ, Cubs: 56.7%
  2. C.J. Cron, Rays: 44.8%
  3. Miguel Sano, Twins: 43.8%
  4. Paul DeJong, Cardinals: 42.9%
  5. Giancarlo Stanton, Yankees: 41.7%

You’re surprised Giancarlo isn’t higher, aren’t you? It’s okay, I was too. Stanton stunk during the homestand and the Yankees lost some heartbreakers, which is a great combination for boos. He heard them throughout the homestand and they were full-throated yesterday. I haven’t heard an individual Yankee booed that loudly at Yankee Stadium since Alex Rodriguez. Booing is dumb, but fans are going to do it, so whatever.

“They’re not gonna cheer,” said Stanton after yesterday’s game. “What do you expect?”

As bad as things have been lately, we have already seen the good version of Giancarlo Stanton this season. He smacked two home runs on Opening Day, and they were the kind of home runs only a handful of players can hit. Absolute lasers the other way and back up the middle. Stanton struck out five times in the home opener and was booed, then hit a pitch to the moon in his first at-bat the next day, which was a nice response. He cares. He’s trying.

Any time a player struggles like Stanton struggled on the homestand, there’s never just one reason. It’s always a combination of things. For starters, his timing is off. That much is clear. Stanton looks jumpy at the plate — so does Gary Sanchez, for that matter — and he’s in that bad place where he’s late on fastballs and out in front of offspeed stuff. His small sample whiff-per-swing rates tell the story:

  • Fastballs: 36.2% (25.9% last year)
  • Breaking Balls: 40.6% (41.6% last year)
  • Offspeed: 57.1% (33.8% last year)

Secondly, Stanton sure does seem to be pressing. During the home opener I thought it looked like he was trying to hit the proverbial five-run home run each time up. First home game (and first homestand) in front of the new fans. I get it.

And third, Stanton is seeing some new pitchers and new teams for the first time, which isn’t easy. That all comes with the territory. New opposing pitchers, new game plans, new coaches, new city, the works. J.D. Martinez is going through all the same things and he’s hitting .226/.286/.419 (92 wRC+) with a 31.4% strikeout rate. No one cares though because the Red Sox are winning.

There are two possible explanations for Stanton’s performance this season. Either he is actually this bad, now and forever, or he’s just in a regular old baseball slump. I’ll go with the latter. This isn’t his true talent level. Stanton has had plenty of slumps in his career. He is 7-for-42 (.167) with 20 strikeouts right now. At one point last June he went 8-for-48 (.167) with 17 strikeouts. He’s slumping now and you know what? He’ll snap out of it, then he’ll slump again at some point. That’s baseball.

At this point of the season it’s hard to break down anything — good or bad, it should be noted — with something other than “it’s been ten games,” but it’s been ten games. Ten bad games for Stanton, especially yesterday, but still ten games nonetheless. We can acknowledge Giancarlo has been bad so far without thinking he’ll continue to be this bad going forward. It’s baseball. Weird things happen in small samples, and because it’s early in the season, those weird things get magnified.

“You’ve just got to look at it as a bad week,” said Stanton after yesterday’s game. “The season’s much longer than a week. A couple of good games, turn it around and help us win … It will be alright.”

Yankeemetrics: Bronx is Burning (April 5-8)

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(Getty)

Dead Bats Society
The dream of an 81-0 home record was put to bed in the series opener, thanks to a 5-2 loss to the Orioles on yet another chilly night in the Bronx. After averaging more than 10 runs per game vs the O’s at Yankee Stadium last season in winning eight of 10 meetings, and never scoring fewer than four runs in any game, they scored just two runs in Thursday’s loss. Masahiro Tanaka allowed three runs, a notable number because Yankee starters had allowed two or fewer runs in each of the team’s first six games, the first time they did that since 1911.

Tanaka cruised through the first six innings allowing just three baserunners among the first 20 batters he faced. He was almost perfect with his splitter, consistently spotting it below the knees and burying it in the dirt while generating eight whiffs on 13 swings against the pitch; he was less precise with his slider in those first six innings, though the pitch generated weak contact (83 mph average exit velocity on six batted balls) and kept the Orioles off-balance:

It all unraveled in the seventh inning when the first four batters went single-home run-groundout-single, ending Tanaka’s night on the mound. As you can see below, he served up three meatballs in the hitters’ sweetspot — a slider, splitter and four-seamer — and the Orioles didn’t waste their chances to pound him.

The Yankees’ bats were as cold as the near-freezing temperatures, though they had plenty of chances to score. They had 12 baserunners but couldn’t cash in as they went 1-for-15 with runners on base. The Yankee entered Thursday’s game hitting .294 and slugging .560 with runners on base, both marks second-best in the American League.

(AP)

Nightmare on River Avenue, Part I
Friday night’s 14-inning disaster gave us our first nominee — of the series — for Worst Loss Of The Season (WLOTS). It had been three decades since they lost a game in the 14th inning or later against the Orioles — June 4, 1988 in Baltimore — and more than 50 years since it had happened in the Bronx — a 2-1 14-inning loss on July 16, 1967. The cleanup hitters in that 1967 game were Brooks Robinson and Mickey Mantle.

Without re-hashing the entire nightmare that played out over more than five hours of baseball, let’s highlight a few notable stats from the game.

  • Aaron Judge’s game-tying RBI single in the third inning was his 13th straight home game with an RBI dating back to last season, breaking the franchise record previously set by Tino Martinez (1997-98).
  • Judge also starred with his glove, robbing Caleb Joseph of a potential go-ahead homer in the 13th inning with a spectacular catch at the wall in right field. According to Sports Info Solutions, which has tracked batted ball data going back to 2004, it was the first time any player had robbed a home run in the 13th inning or later of a game.
  • Didi Gregorius gave us free baseball with a clutch solo dinger to knot the score at 3-3 in the eighth inning. It was his first game-tying homer in the eighth inning or later as a Yankee.
  • Jonathan Holder wore the goat’s horns as he picked the worst time to surrender his first career grand slam — to Pedro Alvarez in the top of the 14th inning. Holder is the first pitcher in franchise history to give up a grand slam in the 14th inning or later of a game.
(AP)

Fighting Spirit!
The Yankees bounced back from Friday’s nightmare with a resounding 8-3 win, despite trotting out a makeshift lineup that was missing several regular starters and resembled something you might see in a spring training road game.

Sonny Gray struggled badly at Yankee Stadium last year — a 5.65 ERA in seven regular season starts there — but delivered a solid, workman-like quality start (six innings, three runs allowed) in his first outing here in 2018. Most notably, he kept the ball in the park, which was a huge step forward considering in 2017 he allowed at least one home run in each of his seven regular season starts in the Bronx.

Ronald Torreyes sparked the offense from the bottom of the order with a team-best three hits, and earned our coveted Obscure Yankeemetric of the Series award:

This was Torreyes’ ninth three-hit game out of the nine-hole since joining the team three seasons ago. In the designated hitter era (since 1973), the only Yankees with more three-hit games as the number-nine hitter are Roberto Kelly (11), Bob Meacham (12), Pat Kelly (14), Melky Cabrera (15) and Bucky Dent (19).

Didi Gregorius went hitless, snapping an 18-game hit streak against the Orioles, which was the fourth-longest by any Yankee in the Divisional Era (since 1969). Yet he still contributed with two walks, extending his trend of improved plate discipline in 2018. It was Didi’s second multi-walk game on the homestand, a huge positive stat considering that he had only one multi-walk game all of last year. The two walks were his seventh and eighth of the season — he didn’t reach eight walks in 2017 until July 3 (in his 58th game).

(Newsday)

Nightmare on River Avenue, Part II
Deja Vu clobbered the Yankees on Sunday afternoon, as they suffered yet another gut-wrenching extra-inning loss to the Orioles. This one might have been even more brutal than Friday’s bummer, blowing a 5-0 first-inning lead — while chasing Orioles starter Mike Wright two outs into the game — and ultimately had the bases loaded with nobody out in the bottom of the 12th but couldn’t get anybody home. The last time the Yankees lost a game, despite the opposing starter allowing five runs and not making it out of the first inning, was September 23, 1992 against the Tigers.

Combined with Sunday’s crushing defeat, this is only the third time in the last 50 years that the Yankees lost multiple extra-inning contests this early into the season (through 10 games). It also happened in 1997 and 1980. Also, since 2011, the Yankees are now 13-27 in extra inning games at home, the worst record in MLB during that span. That seems bad! But what does it really mean? Yes, it’s happened twice in three days, but before everyone jumps off the ledge, here’s some rational thoughts to consider …

Extra-inning games tend to have random results in the long-term and year-to-year (for example, the Orioles were 16-2 in extras in 2012, but 7-7 in 2013 and 8-7 in 2011). Plus, this is a small sample of just 40 games played over seven-plus seasons for the Yankees, and you also have the dramatic roster turnover for the team on a yearly basis. And then there’s this stat to chew on: In the previous seven seasons — from 2004-2010 — the Yankees were 25-11 in extra-inning games at home, the best record in MLB during that span.

Back to the game … and the less written about it, the better. But unfortunately we can’t finish before acknowledging the pinstriped elephant in the room — Giancarlo Stanton. His game-ending strikeout in the 12th inning was his fifth of the game, and the second time on this homestand he’s earned a Platinum Sombrero. He is the first player in franchise history to compile two five-strikeout games within a Yankee career.

The only other players in the last 110 years — and likely major-league history — with multiple five-strikeout games in an entire season are Ray Lankford (three in 1998) and Deron Johnson (two in 1964). Neither of those guys did it in a span of less than a week, like Stanton. And even worse, it’s also the second time he’s struck out five times and produced no hits in a game this year. He is the only MLB player ever with two such games in a season.

Yankeemetrics: Hello, Bronx Bombers (April 2-4)

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(Getty)

#Didi4MVP
The Yankees kicked off the Bronx portion of the 2018 schedule with a 11-4 rout of the Rays on Tuesday afternoon, thanks to an incredible performance by Didi Gregorius. It was their most runs scored in a home opener in nearly two decades, since a 12-3 win over the Tigers in 1999.

Before we stat-binge on Didi’s record-breaking day, let’s not forget to mention another stellar outing by a Yankee starter. Jordan Montgomery battled through five innings, allowing just one run while holding the Rays hitless in six at-bats with runners in scoring position. As Mike mentioned in the recap, the most notable thing about his start was the use of his changeup, which he said “was gone” last year.

Well, it looks like he found it in 2018. Of his 80 total pitches, 17 were changeups, a 21 percent usage rate that was well above last season’s average of 15 percent. And the results on those 17 changeups were encouraging.

He generated four whiffs — a 24 percent swinging strike rate that was much better than his 2017 numbers (15.3%) and the league average whiff rate on changeups (15.8%). Only two changeups were put in play, and both resulted in groundball outs. Stuff-wise, he got excellent drop on the pitch, averaging 7.2 inches of vertical movement, the lowest mark in any of his 30 MLB starts.

He also did a good job of keeping the pitch away from righties, painting the outside corner for a couple called strikes and getting those grounders on pitches down in the zone:

Now it’s time for the main event. Let’s unpack Sir Didi’s epic day – 4-for-4 with a walk, three runs scored, two homers, a double and eight RBI – a performance so noteworthy it deserves bullet points.

  • The eight RBI are the most ever by a Yankee shortstop in a game
  • Didi is the second player in MLB history with eight RBI in a game this early into the season (team game no. 5), joining Mike Schmidt in 1976 for the Phillies.
  • The only other MLB shortstops with at least eight RBI and four hits in a game were Miguel Tejada (2001 A’s) and Hall of Famer Travis Jackson (1923 Giants)
  • Two other Yankees have recorded at least eight RBI and four hits at Yankee Stadium: A-Rod on April 26, 2005 and Paul O’Neill on August 31, 1995.
  • Didi and Danny Tartabull (1992) are the lone Yankees to go 4-for-4 or better and drive in at least eight runs in a game
(AP)

We also have a #FunFact Guest Yankeemetric from friend of the blog, Mark Simon, who notes that the Yankees are the only MLB franchise that has an eight-RBI game from each of the eight non-pitcher positions.

Catcher – Yogi Berra, Elston Howard
First baseman – Lou Gehrig
Second baseman – Tony Lazzeri
Shortstop – Didi Gregorius
Third baseman – Alex Rodriguez
Leftfield – George Selkirk
Centerfield – Joe DiMaggio, Bernie Williams
Rightfield – Selkirk, Tartabull, O’Neill

Didi’s numbers through five team games were video-game-like: 8-for-18 with four doubles, two doubles, a triple and a single (.444/.524/1.111).

He is one of six Yankees with at least 20 total bases in the team’s first five games, a list that also includes Alex Rodriguez (2007), Alfonso Soriano (2003), Mickey Mantle (1956), Lou Gehrig (1932) and Samuel Byrd (1932). And the only other Yankee with seven extra-base hits through five team games was A-Rod in that 2007 MVP-winning campaign.

(Getty)

Three times a charm
The Yankees completed the short two-game sweep of the Rays with another convincing win, 7-2, on Wednesday. They’ve now won 11 straight home series over the Rays, their longest such streak against any opponent at the current Yankee Stadium.

Murderers’ Row II had a spectacular debut, with Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Gary Sanchez each going deep in the same game for the first time this season. Each of them quickly erased any doubts about their recent “slumps” with one swing of the bat — in true Bronx Bomber fashion.

Judge entered the game with one extra-base hit in the first five games, and then in the fourth inning mashed a 419-foot homer to quiet the critics. By the way, last year Judge had one extra-base hit in the first five games of the season, and then hit his first homer in the sixth game. Sound familiar?

Stanton was coming off a historically awful home-opening game, when he went 0-for-5 with five strikeouts. He was the first non-pitcher in franchise history to get at least five at-bats in a game at Yankee Stadium and strike out in every at-bat. He bounced back from that disaster by drilling a laser shot over the left-field fences in his first trip to the plate on Wednesday.

The ball left Stanton’s bat with an exit velocity of 117.9 mph and went an estimated 458 feet. Goodness gracious, I feel sorry for the baseballs. It was Stanton’s fourth home run that was hit that hard (117-plus mph) and that far (458-plus feet) since Statcast began tracking such things in 2015 — one more than the rest of MLB combined has hit over the last four seasons.

Sanchez had been in the deepest funk of the trio before digging into the batter’s box in the third inning, with just one hit in 20 plate appearances and hitless in his last 17 at-bats. He then crushed a towering moonshot to left, sending it 369 feet into the seats with a launch angle of 38 degrees. It was the third-shortest homer hit by Sanchez and tied for the highest launch angle he’s produced on any of his 54 career homers.

The trio of bombs from the middle-of-order guys overshadowed a fantastic effort on the mound by Luis Severino. The righty lived up to his ace status with an efficient and overpowering performance, throwing 7 1/3 innings of two-run ball with seven strikeouts. Of the 22 outs he recorded, only two were in the outfield — a first-inning popfly in shallow right field (Torreyes Web Gem alert!) and a sixth-inning flyout to left — and the 13 outs he generated via groundballs were a career-high.

Yankeemetrics: Welcome back, baseball (March 31-April 1)

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(Getty)

It is high, it is far, it is Gian
For the first time since 2011, the Yankees celebrated a season-opening win as they blasted the Blue Jays on Thursday, 6-1. The last time the Yankees won on Opening Day, the winning pitcher was Joba Chamberlain and Mariano Rivera got the final out of the game… yeah, it’s been a while, eh?

[On the other hand, some things never change … the starting leftfielder and leadoff man in the 2011 was opener was Brett Gardner, who was in that same position and batting spot in 2018. It was Gardner’s seventh Opening Day start in left field, tied with Babe Ruth for the second-most in franchise history; only Roy White (9) has more.]

The winning formula was a perfect blend of power and pitching, as the Yankees banged out seven extra-base hits — their most in a season-opener since 1963 — and held the Blue Jays to just two hits — their fewest allowed in a season-opener since 1967.

Giancarlo Stanton cemented his True Yankee™ status on his very first swing in pinstripes, drilling a laser shot into the right-centerfield seats in the first inning to give the Yankees an early 2-0 lead. The ball exploded off his bat with an exit velocity of 117.3 mph, the hardest-hit ball recorded at Rogers Centre. And never before had an opposite-field homer measured by Statcast rocketed off the bat that fast.

But Stanton was merely heating up with that early longball… he capped off the win with a solo dinger to dead-center in the ninth inning, producing a remarkable Opening Day effort and a near-unprecedented Bronx Bomber debut:

  • Stanton is the fourth Yankee since 1950 with a multi-homer game in the team’s season opener, a list that also includes Joe Pepitone (1963), Roger Maris (1960), Mickey Mantle (1956).
  • Stanton joined Maris (1960) as the only players ever to go deep twice in their first game played as a Yankee.
  • Stanton and Barry Bonds (2002) are the lone players in major-league history to follow-up a 50-homer campaign with a multi-homer game on Opening Day of the next season.
  • Including his fifth-inning RBI double, Stanton finished with three extra-base hits, three runs scored and four RBI, becoming the first player in franchise history to reach each of those thresholds on Opening Day.

The new guy’s ridiculous performance overshadowed a stellar outing for Luis Severino, who surrendered one hit across 5 2/3 scoreless innings while striking out seven. He is the only Yankee starter since at least 1908 to give up no more than one hit on Opening Day.

And, most impressively, the 24-year-old joined Bob Feller (1940) and Walter Johnson (1910) as the only major-league players under age-25 to pitch more than five innings, allow one hit or fewer and strike out at least five guys on Opening Day.

(Getty)

The Drury and Wade Show
On Friday night it was another pinstriped newbie who provided the big hits, while a familiar “ace” dazzled on the mound en route to a 4-2 victory in Toronto.

Perhaps the most encouraging numbers from Friday’s game were 0 and 12 — Stanton, Aaron Judge and Gary Sanchez combined to go 0-for-12 with four strikeouts — and the Yankees still added a ‘W’ to the ledger because their number eight and nine hitters (Brandon Drury and Tyler Wade) combined to drive in all four of the team’s runs.

Both of Drury’s RBI hits — a double in the second and a single in the fourth — gave the Yankees the lead. Per Fangraphs’ win probability added (WPA) metric, Drury’s performance at the plate increased the Yankees chances of winning by 25 percent. This was his 291st career game, and only seven times has Drury contributed more WPA in a team win.

The biggest storyline, though, of the first two games was the excellence of the pitching staff. Their three runs allowed in games one and two are the fewest for the Yankees in the first two games of the season since 1996 (insert emoji of choice here).

The starters — Severino and Masahiro Tanaka — were both stellar, and Tanaka’s one-run, three-hit, eight-strikeout effort somehow the lesser of the two pitching lines. The last time the team’s first two starting pitchers of the season each gave up no more than one run was 2003 (Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte); and the last time Yankee starters each had seven-plus strikeouts in the first two games of the season was 1932 (Lefty Gomez, Red Ruffing).

Tanaka and Severino are the first pair of starters in franchise history to each allow no more than three hits in the team’s first two games of the season.

(AP)

Clutch Austin, Disaster Dellin
The dream of a 162-0 regular season ended on Saturday with a frustrating 5-3 loss. The lone bright spot in the lineup was Tyler Austin, who single-handedly kept the Yankees in the game with a couple of booming game-tying homers. A two-run shot in the fifth and a solo bomb in the seventh added to his growing legend as a clutch masher.

Those were his eighth and ninth career homers, and of the nine, eight have tied the game or given the Yankees the lead. For his career, he is hitting .348/.360/1.000 in high-leverage situations, with five homers in 25 plate appearances. Since his debut in 2016, he owns the highest OPS (1.360) and slugging percentage (1.000) of any player with at least 25 high-leverage plate appearances over the last three seasons.

CC Sabathia wasn’t as dominant as Severino and Tanaka, but still gutted through a solid five innings, allowing two runs (one earned) on five hits. It was enough to extend the rotation’s record-setting season-opening performance: since earned runs became official in the American League in 1913, this is the first time that each of the Yankees’ starters allowed no more than one earned run in the first three games of the season.

The Yankees’ hopes of a trademark comeback victory were squashed thanks to an eerily familiar meltdown in the eighth inning by Dellin Betances. The trouble began when he gave up a 455-foot tie-breaking homer to the leadoff batter, Yangervis Solarte, the longest homer he’s allowed in the Statcast era (since 2015). That’s two homers allowed in two appearances for Betances, who last year didn’t surrender his second homer until September 4 in his 56th outing of the season.

And somehow coughing up the go-ahead homer was only the second-most gut-wrenching thing in the inning.

Kevin Pillar reached on one-out single, and then ambushed Betances by swiping second base, third base and home to give the Blue Jays a two-run lead. It had been nearly 90 years since a player stole three bases in an inning against the Yankees.

The last guy to do it was a Tigers shortstop named Jackie “Rabbit” Tavener on July 25, 1928, and the Yankee pitcher on the mound was rookie Archie Campbell. Incredibly, it was the second straight season Tavener stole second, third and home in an inning against the Yankees (he also did it on July 10, 1927)! He had 46 career stolen bases, and six of them came in those two innings against the Yankees.

Betances allowed four total steals in that inning (Luke Maile also stole second), a feat that’s been done by only one other Yankee pitcher in the last 40 years: Mariano Rivera, who did it twice during his career, on September 26, 2010 against the Red Sox and September 5, 2011 against the Orioles.

(Getty)

Smoak’d
Four games into the season and we already have an early leading candidate for Worst Loss of The Season. The bullpen imploded for the second consecutive day in Sunday’s 7-4 loss, and the Yankees ended up with a disappointing series split. The Yankees still haven’t won a series at the Rogers Centre since August 2015, their longest current drought at any AL East ballpark.

For all of the crushing losses the Yankees suffered last season, they didn’t experience one quite like they did on Sunday. Last year they were 56-0 when leading by at least three runs entering the seventh inning. This season they are now 2-1 in such games, after Tommy Kahnle and David Robertson choked away a three-run lead in the seventh and eighth innings.

In a surprising twist, it is the starting rotation which has shined while the bullpen has been a train wreck:

Starters Relievers
IP 20 2/3 13 1/3
ER 3 11
HR 1 4

Four outs away from a victory, Robertson loaded the bases in the eighth inning via an intentional walk to Josh Donaldson and then surrendered a heart-breaking grand slam to Justin Smoak to seal the defeat. That was Smoak’s second career grand slam, and the other came on August 8, 2015 against… the Yankees.

The inevitable question is whether Robertson should have simply pitched to Donaldson in that situation. While there is certainly a ton of statistical and non-statistical factors to consider with the matchup, here’s one pair of numbers to think about:
1. The small sample-size data — Smoak was 0-for-5 with four strikeouts in his career vs Robertson while Donaldson was 3-for-8 with two homers — suggested that giving Donaldson a free pass to face Smoak was a good option.
2. But the large sample-size numbers — Smoak’s 31 homers vs. right-handers last season were the third-most by a lefty against a righty in the majors — screamed that pitching to Donaldson was a better choice.

Regardless, the end result was a crushing defeat, leaving the Yankees at .500 or worse through four games of the season for the seventh straight year.

Update: Yankees announce 2018 Opening Day roster

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The eighth reliever. (Presswire)

March 29th: The Yankees officially announced their Opening Day roster this morning. It is as expected, only with Tyler Austin replacing the injured Greg Bird. The roster has been updated below. Also, Tyler Wade and Jonathan Holder have new numbers. Wade will wear No. 12 (had been No. 39) and Holder will wear No. 56 (had been No. 65)

March 24th: The Yankees have not yet made an official announcement, but the 2018 Opening Day roster is set. Domingo German was optioned out Saturday, and Brian Cashman told Pete Caldera that Jonathan Holder will be in the Opening Day bullpen as the eighth reliever. Here is the Opening Day roster:

CATCHERS (2)
Austin Romine
Gary Sanchez

INFIELDERS (6)
Greg Bird Tyler Austin
Brandon Drury
Didi Gregorius
Ronald Torreyes
Tyler Wade
Neil Walker

OUTFIELDERS (4)
Brett Gardner
Aaron Hicks
Aaron Judge
Giancarlo Stanton

STARTING PITCHERS (5)
RHP Sonny Gray
LHP Jordan Montgomery
LHP CC Sabathia
RHP Luis Severino
RHP Masahiro Tanaka

RELIEF PITCHERS (8)
RHP Dellin Betances
LHP Aroldis Chapman
RHP Chad Green
RHP Jonathan Holder
RHP Tommy Kahnle
RHP David Robertson
LHP Chasen Shreve
RHP Adam Warren

DISABLED LIST (3)
Greg Bird (ankle, 10-day DL retroactive to March 26)
Jacoby Ellsbury (oblique, 10-day DL retroactive to March 26)
Clint Frazier (concussion, 7-day DL retroactive to March 26)

Cashman said German is going to Triple-A Scranton to remain stretched out as a starter. German and Luis Cessa are presumably the sixth and seventh starters in whatever order. Usually when a sixth starter is needed, it’s more about who’s available to pitch that day rather than who the team wants to pitch that day though.

Anyway, there are no surprises with the Opening Day roster. We were just waiting to find out the identity of the eight reliever. Wade played well in Spring Training and won a roster spot, and the Drury trade and Walker signing all but guaranteed Miguel Andujar and Gleyber Torres would begin the season in Triple-A. They’ll be up soon enough.

Obligatory reminder: The Opening Day roster and the end-of-season roster tend to look very different. Here is last year’s Opening Day roster, for example. Holder is keeping a roster spot warm for Ellsbury, who has already resumed playing in Grapefruit League games. He could be back soon. Frazier’s concussion looks to be more long-term, unfortunately.

The Yankees begin the season against the Blue Jays on Thursday, March 29th. There are still five days to go before the season opener, so the Opening Day roster could change if someone gets hurt — example: Drury taking a pitch to the elbow yesterday, though he escaped with a bruise — but hopefully that won’t be the case.

Devil’s Advocate: Splitting up the big righty bats with a lefty

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(Presswire)

Ever since December, when the Yankees acquired Giancarlo Stanton, it’s been impossible not to dream about the lineup possibilities. Stanton and Aaron Judge are arguably the two best power hitters in baseball, and Gary Sanchez is no slouch with the stick either. He missed nearly a month with an injury and still socked 33 home runs last season.

Stanton, Judge, and Sanchez all happen to be right-handed hitters, and these days, the general belief seems to be that stacking batters with the same handedness anywhere in the lineup is a bad thing, especially the middle. Stanton, Judge, and Sanchez back-to-back-to-back in whatever order opens up the possibility for a right-handed specialist.

Of course Stanton, Judge, and Sanchez will bat in the middle of the order. But there has been plenty of talk about squeezing a left-handed hitter in somewhere to break up all the righties. Aaron Boone has called it an “ideal situation,” in fact. From George King:

“I think it would be nice (to break up the righties). I am not married to it yet,’’ Boone said. “In an ideal situation I would have a lefty splitting those three. Nothing is for certain and it might be a matchup thing. It could be a team’s bullpen and how we view that matching up in a game. But ideally, I would like to have a lefty in there.’’

Give the Yankees a truth serum and I’m certain they’d tell you they wanted Greg Bird to be the left-handed hitter who broke up the big righty bats, but that’s not possible now. Bird will miss the next 6-8 weeks after having another ankle surgery. Sucks. Boone hit Bird third between Judge and Stanton several times late in the spring. You could tell it was something he was strongly considering for the regular season.

With Bird unavailable, Boone slotted Didi Gregorius into the cleanup spot between Stanton and Sanchez in Monday night’s spring finale, and he went deep. It worked!

As I’ve said several times in recent weeks, I don’t love splitting up the big righty bats with a lefty. Seems unnecessary to me. Stanton, Judge, and Sanchez all crushed righties last season and they are the three best hitters on the team. My ideal lineup has Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez in the 2-3-4 spots. That way Judge and Stanton are guaranteed to bat in the first inning, and if anyone reaches, Sanchez gets to hit too. Perfect. Stack the big bats and let ’em eat.

There are two sides to this argument, however, so for the sake of completeness, I’m going to be my own devil’s advocate and examine the benefits of splitting up those big right-handed bats with a left-hander. Let’s talk this out.

1. Mixing in a contact hitter. Among the 144 hitters with enough plate appearances to qualify for the batting title last season, Judge (4th), Stanton (27th), and Sanchez (34th) ranked among the top 35 hitters in strikeout rate. Or bottom five, I guess would be more accurate. Anyway, Judge and Stanton are always going to have some swing-and-miss in their game because they’re so big, and Sanchez can get jumpy at the plate, leading to strikeouts.

Batting Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez back-to-back-to-back in whatever order creates the opportunity for the opposing team to escape a jam without a ball being put in play, especially with a high strikeout reliever on the mound. Heck, a few weeks ago someone named Drew VerHagen struck out those three guys in a row.

Those three are going to strike out a bunch. That’s just who they are as hitters. With Bird sidelined, Gregorius is the obvious left-handed bat to slot in the middle of the righties, and he’d provide a contact element those three do not possess. Some quick 2017 numbers:

  • Judge: 30.7% strikeouts (67.4% contact)
  • Stanton: 23.6% strikeouts (70.5% contact)
  • Sanchez: 22.9% strikeouts (74.0% contact)
  • Gregorius: 12.3% strikeouts (80.5% contact)

All contact is not created equal — Gregorius has the lowest hard contact rate of the four by nearly 14 (!) percentage points — but sometimes all you’re looking for is a ball in play, and Didi is a much better bet to provide one than the three big righty bats. It’s not necessarily about breaking up the righties. It’s about breaking up the strikeout prone bats.

2. Giving the pitcher a different look. I’m not sure there’s a way to quantify this and it might be total nonsense anyway, but when you stack hitters of the same handedness in the lineup, you run the risk of the pitcher getting into a groove with a specific set of pitches and/or pitch sequences. The starter could get locked in with, say, fastballs in and sliders away, even if only for a few batters. Better execution through reputation.

Whenever Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez hit back-to-back-to-back, a righty is going to attack them with fastballs on the inner half and breaking balls away. That’s the way to go after them. If it’s a southpaw, we’re probably talking fastballs and changeups down and away. Make sure they either can’t extend their arms, or have to really extend their arms to get to a pitch. If you miss, miss well outside the zone. These dudes will make you pay dearly otherwise.

Squeezing a lefty (Gregorius) somewhere within the three big righties would, in theory, help prevent the pitcher from getting into such a groove. He can’t go fastball in/slider away for three straight batters, not unless he intends to pitch a lefty the same way, and hey, maybe he does. Like I said, this might not be total nonsense, but I feel like I’ve seen games in which a pitcher faced several batters of the same handedness in a row, and settled in quickly.

(Presswire)

3. Opposing managers will do something stupid. Stupid is too harsh. But inevitably moves will be made to match up that are overly cute, and they’ll backfire. Happens all the time. All the time. Perhaps that means bringing in a left-on-left matchup guy to retire Gregorius, and leaving him in to face Stanton. Or staying with a left-handed starter to face Judge and Stanton because you want him to face Gregorius. Things like that.

Point is, when you bat hitters of the same handedness back-to-back-to-back in the lineup, it makes life easy for the opposing manager. In this case, with hitters like Judge and Stanton and Sanchez, you bring in your best righty reliever and hope for the best. Insert a left-handed hitter into the mix — it has to be a quality lefty, obviously, not any old lefty will do the trick — and you create the opportunity for the opposing manager to overthink things (i.e. bring in a inferior pitcher), which could potentially lead to mistakes or poor decisions. Some managers won’t fall for it. More than you’d think will.

* * *

Based on last season, the platoon splits don’t help the argument to break up the big righties with a lefty. Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez all hit lefties and righties better than Gregorius last year. Look:

  • Judge: 179 wRC+ vs. RHP and 149 wRC+ vs. LHP
  • Stanton: 144 wRC+ vs. RHP and 202 wRC+ vs. LHP
  • Sanchez: 130 wRC+ vs. RHP and 131 wRC+ vs. LHP
  • Gregorius: 120 wRC+ vs. RHP and 72 wRC+ vs. LHP

That’s why I am against splitting them. Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez are great hitters regardless of who is on the mound, so don’t overthink things, and just let them hit. After all, if you were an opposing pitcher, wouldn’t you rather see Judge-Gregorius-Stanton or Judge-Stanton-Gregorius coming up rather than Judge-Stanton-Sanchez? Of course you would.

There is a case to be made for breaking up those big right-handed bats with a lefty, however. Adding a contact bat to the mix and inviting the opposing manager a reason to make a potentially unnecessary pitching change are chief among them. How much impact will that have in a single game or across the entire 162-game season? Eh, hard to say. The overall impact of the lineup tends to be overstated unless we’re talking about something like Judge batting eighth instead of second. As long as the big righties are near the middle of the lineup, the Yankees will be fine.