Us or Them? Have the Yankees been replaced by Jordan Peele duplicates?

Moviegoers are struggling to analyze Jordan Peele's latest horror movie, "Us," where a standard, stock-issue American family faces terrifying doppelgangers who seek to replace them. Yankee fans should be wary of this film. You'll go home wondering if it's fiction... or a documentary.

One week into 2019 - dear God, only a week? - the Yankees are a fun-house reflection of the team that left Tampa, happily singing show tunes on the bus. Instead of the victories we were all but guaranteed, every game has birthed a new horror unto our fragile psyches. The Loews Broadcast Booth is now represented by the Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. WTF? When the doorbell rings, should we even answer?

Last night, we watched the replacement duplicate of Aroldis Chapman - aka, closer to "the arguably greatest bullpen in history" - melt into a homeless man holding an invisible sign that says: TAKE ME OUT.

All spring, radar guns have questioned Chapman's reduced velocity, which the YES/Sloan Kettering Cancer Center squad last night pooh-poohed as a glitch of early spring. After El Chapo fanned the first Tiger on three pitches, his return to dominance invoked memories of George W. Bush's plans for "shock and awe." Then, right before our eyes, the reservoir drained to reveal bed springs and rusted cars. A 3-2 walk (with the final pitch in the dirt), a double lashed to left (and a terrible cut-off throw by newcomer Mike Tauchman), a hard single up the middle, another single, and when he finally recorded the third out, Chapman was on the verge of being ignominiously replaced by Stephen Tarpley. 

Here's one for the fun house: If he can't hold the Tigers at home, how much confidence should we have in him entering the ninth at Fenway?

On opening day - dear God, it seems a month ago - from his perch in the Cancer Center booth, John Sterling waxed triumphantly about this great Yankee bullpen, Not only would it hold leads, but our dazzling assortment of stars would keep the Yankees in every game. Then, as the Yankees savaged lowly Baltimore, Suzyn added that it just wasn't fair to force a young team like the O's to start the season playing six games against such an invincible, Olympian foe.

And then the duplicates arrived. 

Since that wondrous Day One, the Yankees have found horror movie ways to lose three of four. With the exception of Adam Ottavino, the bullpen has sucked. With the exception of Aaron Judge - (who last night drew his first intentional walk of 2019; in all of last year, he drew only three) - our miserable attack has been reduced to solo HRs and strikeouts. And last night, there was El Chapo, sweating and heaving, glancing to the bullpen like a lost child searching for his parents.

We even had a brand new injury scare, when Luke Voit took a fastball to the wrist. The Yankees say x-rays came back negative. Who knows the truth? Don't be surprised if Voit misses a few games, then goes on the DL. And frankly, the real question isn't whether he's hurt: It's whether he's the guy we thought he was. 

Until further notice, if the doorbell rings, don't answer. It might be the Yankees. Or it might the Sloan Kettering Cancer people. We just don't know.