The last time the Yankees found themselves in the same dire predicament they faced Sunday night, Joe DiMaggio batted cleanup and Ted Williams was a 20-year-old rookie. It was 1939, when the Red Sox swept a five-game series in the Bronx shortly after Lou Gehrig gave his legendary farewell speech.
That really shows the depths of historical ineptitude these Yankees have reached against their bitter rivals from Boston, and Sunday’s series finale at the Stadium represented the last chance for Aaron Boone & Co. to avoid sharing the dishonor of being broomed by the Sox at home in a series of at least four games.
How the Yankees, with a franchise-record $315 million payroll, arrived at this humiliating place is hard to fathom, teetering on the wild-card bubble and looking up at the Red Sox. But after losing the last eight straight to Boston, the second-longest streak since the Hilltoppers dropped 14 in a row back in 1912, the Yankees’ mission had become crystal clear by Sunday night.
If there was any pride left in those pinstriped jerseys, it was long-past time to put an end to Boston’s bullying, especially coming off Saturday’s 12-1 smackdown, when the Sox turned the Bronx into Fenway South. The Yankees’ season wasn’t at stake Sunday night, but at some point, they had to show some guts, if not the ability to play winning baseball against a centurys-old rival that clearly has enjoyed pantsing them this season.
“It’s been fun — I’m not gonna hide it,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said Sunday afternoon.
Cora’s crew had savaged the Bronx with obvious glee, as the Yankees had more errors (five) than runs (four) through the first three games. By Sunday night, as ESPN hoped a national audience would tune in for the potential car crash, only one question remained: What lengths would the Yankees go to in order to stop getting embarrassed yet again?
A few of those answers were revealed shortly after 3 p.m. when we got our first look at the lineup card posted on the clubhouse door. Jose Caballero had replaced the spiraling Anthony Volpe at shortstop — for the second time this week — and Giancarlo Stanton was back in rightfield, despite all the mileage he logged out there Saturday afternoon, especially chasing down a half-dozen hits during a wild ninth inning.
Translation: The Yankees apparently were done tiptoeing around their biggest daily issues, protecting Volpe’s now-loosening grip on the everyday shortstop job and pushing their luck with Stanton’s fragile health status. We’re not exactly sure why it took this long to put the struggling Volpe on notice, since he’s been among the sport’s worst players going on months now — both at the plate and defensively. But in Stanton’s case, the Yankees’ need to have his bat in the lineup has now overtaken the physical risk, and it’s not like they have a choice with Aaron Judge still a while away from returning to his position.
“We’re at the all-hands-on-deck portion of the season,” Boone said before Sunday’s game.
There’s still five weeks left, and the Yankees were in a virtual tie with the Mariners for the second wild-card spot, and a three games ahead of the Royals, who have established themselves as a legit contender down at No. 4. But Sunday’s finale wasn’t so much about firming up playoff positioning as it was pushing back on the Red Sox.
During their eight-game slide, the Yankees were hitting .193 and had been outscored by Boston, 48-22, over that stretch. In Saturday’s 12-1 rout, Stanton’s homer accounted for their entire offense while the Sox racked up 17 hits, including 11 singles and a pair of sacrifice flies, chewing up Yankees starter Will Warren in the process.
Cora would never say it publicly, but he’s taken this rivalry to heart, and the Sox’s aggressive, attacking mentality is a reflection of their manager, who propelled them to a World Series victory in 2018 — something Boone couldn’t do last October in his only trip to the Fall Classic during his first seven years at the Bronx helm. Getting these Yankees back there is looking like a long shot lately, but trimming Volpe’s playing time is a step in the right direction.
Boone can’t afford to have Volpe as a pinstriped passenger when he’s more part of the problem than a solution, and the deadline acquisition of Caballero finally gave him the option of sitting the third-year shortstop, a strategy that was long overdue. If Caballero proves productive in that role, there’s no point in rushing back Volpe, either.
More important, the Yankees had to figure out a way to beat Boston — at least once — to preserve some measure of self-respect before the lowly Nationals come to town this week.
“We gotta play better,” Judge said after Saturday’s defeat. “That’s what it comes down to. Coaches can’t fix that. Fans can’t fix that. Media can’t fix that. It’s the players in this room. We gotta step up.”
And we’ll learn a lot about the Yankees if that doesn’t happen soon.
