At the All-Star Break the Yankees finished the first-half with a 62-33 Record. The .653 winning % is 2nd best in MLB, and projects to 106 wins for the season !!
The Bombers lead the majors with 161 Home Runs (Boston is 2nd with 134) and that is a pace that would give them 275 HRs at the end of the season and shatter the current all-time MLB record ( 264 HRs by the 1997 Seattle Mariners) !!
The Yankees team ERA is 3.48 which ranks them 2nd in the majors (behind only Houston at 2.94) !!
So with all that said, things could not be more perfect in Yankee-land .. right ?
Not exactly.
Although the Yankees have the 2nd best record in baseball, the team with the best record also plays in the AL East. The Red Sox have an astounding 68-30 (.694) record and lead the division by 4.5 games. So with all the first half success, the Yankees are staring at the real possibility of winning 100+ games and still having to play a sudden-death Wild Card game.
The Yankees are hitting Home Runs at an unprecedented pace, but have shown a weakness for knocking runs in with RISP (dead-last in MLB since June). One reason for this is the lack of situational hitting and hitting for average. The team leader in BA (with qualifying AB’s) is rookie Miguel Andujar with only a .279 BA. Right behind him is Stanton at .278 & Judge at .276. Gleyber Torres does have a .294 BA but doesn’t have the qualifying AB’s due to a recent stint on the DL. The return of Torres will be a huge boost to the line-up. Gary Sanchez, also on the DL has a .190 BA. Hopefully Gary can turn things around in the 2nd half. The Yankees team BA is .252. That is 20 points less than the AL leading Red Sox at .272. The SABR-Metric analysts think that BA is an unimportant stat. I couldn’t disagree more. Last year the Houston Astros won the WS with an offensive approach that focused on hitting for power & average. They had an MLB best .282 team BA & were also the hardest offense to strikeout in the majors, while finishing 2nd in mlb in HRs just behind the Yankees. We looked at the Yankees BA leaders. Now compare them to the other top AL teams. Boston, Houston, & Cleveland each have 2 hitters batting above .300. Boston has Betts .359 & JD Martinez .328. Houston has Altuve .332 & Gurriel .310. Cleveland has Brantley .308 & Ramirez .302. To win in the postseason you need a balanced attack. A balance of power and situational hitting. All the Yankees need to do is look back at their most recent WS winning team in 2009. That team is the last team to win a WS & lead the league in HRs. However, that team also had a .283 team batting average. Derek Jeter had a .334 BA, Cano .320, (Teixeira .292). Go back further and look at one of the greatest Yankee teams of all-time, the 1998 Champs that won 114 regular season games. They had a team BA of .288 & did not have a single batter hit 30 HRs (6 players had 19 HRs or more) in a season that other teams had sluggers who were hitting 40, 50, 60 & even 70 HRs. Bernie had a .339 BA, Jeter .324, O’Neill .317, Brosius .300.
The Yankees team ERA is a solid 3.48, but mainly because the bullpen has the lowest ERA in MLB (2.69 ERA). The starters (4.00 ERA, 14th in MLB) are where the concern is. Luis Severino had an incredible Cy Young worthy 1st half , 14-2 with a 2.31 ERA , but he needs help. Especially if the Yankees have to use him in the WC game. CC Sabathia has been solid, 6-4, 3.51 but the risk is his age and surgically repaired knee. Tanaka has a 4.54 ERA and has allowed more HRs since the start of the 2017 season than any other pitcher in the league. The hope is that the time on the DL with the pulled hamstring leg muscles has allowed his elbow (partially torn UCL) to rest and he will be strong for the 2nd half. Sonny Gray has a 5.46 ERA and has shown flashes of brilliance (on the road) but absolutely no consistency, and when he has been bad .. he has been really bad. Gray has gotten lit-up at Yankee Stadium nearly every start and also by the rival Red Sox. That is a lethal-combo for a Yankee pitcher. Rookie Domingo German has an 5.49 ERA. He has swing & miss stuff. 3 put-away pitches (FB, Curve, C/U) but needs to work on repeatability. FB command has been an issue in a number of his poor starts. He’s a rookie, and inconsistency is to expected, but he has a high ceiling.
You can give good grades, or even an “A” to many of the Yankee players & the manager on their 1st half report card. As far as Brian Cashman, his grade will be based on what moves he makes at the trade deadline. I would trade Sonny Gray immediately for the reasons I mentioned previously (can’t pitch at Yankee Stadium & can’t pitch vs. Red Sox), but he has pitched well on the road and should have some value. This would create the need for 2 starters. Cashman needs to trade for a #2 & #4 starter imo. The latest rumor is that Carlos Martinez of the Cards might be available. He’d be a solid #2. Picking up a #4 would not be difficult, we have all heard the names out there, Happ, Hamels, and many others. German could be traded or he could pitch out of the pen. Either way he has value. The result would be 5 veteran starting pitchers for the 2nd half pennant race in which the Yankees hope to catch and pass Boston to avoid the WC scenario. Then Boone and the front office would have the ability to pick the 4 best /healthiest of the 5 for a postseason rotation. If Cashman can do that, his grade would be A+. However .. if he can’t upgrade the rotation significantly at the deadline, many will look back to the off-season and recall he said over-and-over that starting pitching was the teams number one priority. Yet that never happened. And Pitching wins Championships. Now the success or failure of the 2018 season will likely be determined by the rapidly approaching trade deadline. Tick-Tock.
Congratulations to Aaron Judge on his All-Star Game Home Run. It was the 1st ASG HR by a Yankee since Jason Giambi in 2003. Kudos also to Luis Severino for pitching a scoreless inning while striking out two batters, helping the AL defeat the NL in the 89th All Star Game 8-6 at Nationals Park.
It’s back to work for the players & the GM. Much is at stake after the break.
As always,
Go NYY !!
