Yankees fans got their first up-close-and-personal look at the Rangers on Friday night, and they must be feeling quite a bit of envy. The Rangers are everything we hoped and expected the Yankees could be.
They can pitch, they can run and — here’s the big one — boy, can they ever hit.
It was Rangers cleanup man Adolis Garcia who blasted Yankees reliever Michael King’s first pitch of the 10th inning into the left field bleachers to give the Rangers a 4-2 lead and eventual victory at Yankee Stadium. But it could have been anyone in a lineup in which everyone is producing.
Close your eyes, Yankees fans. Here are a couple of stats that will seem unbelievable: Eight out of nine Rangers in their lineup Friday carried an OPS-plus above the league average, and every single one of them was batting better than .250, which put them all above average.
Yep, they are all doing damage. Every last one of them. The Rangers’ ninth-place hitter is batting .299. Is there any doubt he’d be batting third in a Yankees lineup, without Aaron Judge, that’s all pedigree, and little production?
Give it up to Texas. The Rangers remade themselves the past two winters with big, bold signings, and save for snakebit superstar Jacob deGrom, every one of those big investments is working out. Currently, they are the aberration in a league in which most of the big spenders are biting the dust.
Which brings us back to the Yankees. While they are off to one of their worst starts in recent memory (at this time last year they were leading the world), remarkably, they are outperforming most of the other big-spending teams. Hard as it is to believe, they are hanging on to one of the final two AL playoff spots, at 41-35, thanks almost exclusively to their efficient pitching, plus of course all the fine work Judge did before he went out with a toe injury, though he still has no timetable for a return.
(I know because I checked with Judge again after the game. He said it’s getting better, but didn’t provide any dates).
The biggest mystery, however, remains a Yankees offense that is nothing short of abysmal without their main man. They are averaging almost exactly three runs per game in the 16 games since Judge went on the injured list — they are 6-10 without him this time — and they didn’t help that average Friday.
Over the first 15 games in the nearly three weeks since Judge had that unfortunate meeting with the concrete base of the outfield wall at America’s most beautiful stadium (but also one of its oldest) in Los Angeles, the Yankees entered Friday hitting .196 (last in MLB), posting an OPS of .611 (last also) and averaging 3.2 runs per games (last again).
Maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise the Yankees seem to have a rotation of sub-.200 hitters manning the coveted No. 3 spot in the batting order with the great Judge out. In a bit of wishful thinking, Giancarlo Stadium was penciled into the No. 3 hole Friday night. But really, the choices are slim right now. Manager Aaron Boone has to pick between a hot journeyman like Billy McKinney and big names. No surprise, he’s going with the names.
“You know it could come at any time,” Boone said about Stanton. “He’s got to get there at some point.”
While it’s hard to disagree with that, there’s no evidence it’s coming soon. Since his return from the injured list, Stanton, a former MVP, doesn’t look well. For the record, Boone said he’s healthy.
Yet, the man who annually hits the hardest balls in the game, keeps bouncing out. He may be sub-.200 for the season, but he’s sub-.100 for the month (.096 to be exact) and fans are noticing.
Stanton absorbed regular boos during his 0-for-4 night, while Josh Donaldson only heard some boos because he didn’t start and was used in a pinch-hitting role, striking in the 10th inning, as his average dipped to .125.
As for the batting order, there just aren’t enough guys hitting well to justify the multiple marquee spots. Among the stars, the only one who’s healthy (and hitting!) is Anthony Rizzo, and someone has to bat cleanup. Rizzo actually reached base three times, but unfortunately, there’s little to clean up lately.
Through it all, Boone somehow remains remarkably optimistic. Before the game, he characterized the team’s horrid slump this way: “Those little snapshots are going to happen all the time where you through a little bit of a funk offensively.”
Give the man points for his hopeful outlook in the face of a continuation of the craptacular.
In the meantime, the Rangers, who have won four of five versus the Yankees (there were four games earlier in Texas), appear to be a juggernaut. They do no wrong, and they lead the league in scoring six runs a game — exactly double the Yankees’ recent output. Top to bottom, they are threats.
“They look like a different team,” former Ranger Isiah Kiner-Falefa said.
He meant the Rangers.
But of course, his Yankees look different, too, and not in a good way.
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