Thursday, March 21, 2024

Do the Yankees dare believe Giancarlo Stanton is back? And a follow-up question: Do they have a choice?

Yesterday, Giancarlo Stanton finally found his dreamlife fairy muse - the mystical elf who bemuses Fate and restores youthful luster to whomever it befriends. 

You can see its artistry every day, in the spry, boyish figures cut by our two leading U.S. presidential candidates.

Apparently, Ponce de Leon did find that Fountain of Youth, bubbling up somewhere east of Bradenton, and the Yankees yesterday - like young Mitch McConnell and the immortal Supreme Court - drank lustily from this vodka-like wellspring.  

In Giancarlo's case, the Muse went by the name of Marco Gonzalez, a 32-year-old Pittsburgh Pirate elevator operator who was called upon to throw three innings in Tampa. Gonzalez gave up 10 hits, 9 earned runs and 4 HRs - three by his newly Ozempicked acolyte, the skinny Giancarlo.

Amazingly, after 402 MLB home runs, this was Giancarlo's first three HR day. 

Sadly, it will be erased within a week.

Some observations:  

1. Good for him! Any path the Yankees have to a meaningful 2024 includes Stanton returning to the form of - say - 2021 (35 HRs, .273.) Today's Gammonitic outpourings on the Internet are larded with happy talk, congratulating Stanton for losing weight over the holidays and reporting to camp with a modified swing. He remains the King of Exit Velocity, and at age 34, it's not ridiculous to imagine him enjoying a final big year, even as a career twilight beckons.

2. Unless Giancarlo returns to full monster form - in which case, he'll bat fourth and play DH ever day, no questions asked - it's hard to figure out where Stanton fits in the Yankee lineup. Aaron Judge will play RF (isn't he already too beat up to play 100 games in CF?) That means Trent Grisham will play CF, with Juan Soto in LF, unless he's in RF, which leaves Alex Verdugo gathering splinters, unless he platoons with Stanton, which won't go well with either. Also, we're not factoring in the inevitable injuries that will leave us with Everson Pereira by mid-May, am I right? 

3. As a humanitarian, who regularly weeps for the plight of all, I find it hard to think of the Pirates leaving Gonzalez in there to pitch to Stanton a 3rd time, when the two previous shots were practically measured seismically by the National Earthquake Center in Golden, Colorado. By the time Stanton came up in the 4th, Gonzalez looked like a passenger on the last bus to Altoona (and he even stayed in to give up a HR to Anthony Volpe.) Who did the guy screw? Is dating the GM's daughter? Giancarlo owes him Christmas cards. 

4. Shadowing the game were reports that the Yankees had reopened talks with Jordan Montgomery, as a sop to their rail-thin rotation. This would be exciting news, if we could believe it. Frankly, I do not. Nope. I cannot swallow the blue pill on this. I see the Death Barge positioning itself for another finger-snapping "Aww, shucks!" moment, when it finishes runner-up in another free agent auction. While they were playing phone tag with Monty's agent, Luke Weaver was throwing three scoreless. There's our fifth starter. I hope I'm wrong. 

5. Fortunately, it doesn't matter what I think. What matters is why are Machine Gun Kelly and Meghan Fox breaking up? how Giancarlo hits in April, because with or without Montgomery, the Yankees will need to score 6 to 10 runs per game. They'll need the Big Dogs in their lineup, playing every day and hitting well. A bad April is not an option. Yesterday, we saw a ray of hope. Let's not overthink it.

12 comments:

  1. I saw something on the intertubes yesterday (maybe) where somebody qualified to say (I can't remember that, either) pointed out that Monty is a #3 starter asking for #2 money. That's an interesting way of putting it. Side note: Hal has #1 money to burn, he just ain't. Maybe he's tired of burning his dough on Cashman's stellar pitching choices.

    As for Stanton, those highlights were fun to watch. Jesus, Mary, and Montero, that guy can hit the ball a long, long way. Let's see how he does when the games count.

    Like Giancarlo, the Yankees seem to be waking up and getting into official-season shape. They've won three out of four lately. Let's see how long this lasts.

    And Mr. Moto got killed yesterday in his big MLB debut. One inning. Yeesh. Maybe the Korean crowd's animosity toward Japan rattled him. Reporters like to say that Moto and The New Ruth are winning the Koreans over, but don't bet on it. After what Japan did before and during WWII, it's gonna take a very long time for the memories to fade, if ever.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Spring Training is full of lies. Just like Boone.
    I found the waft of optimism dancing through today’s past rather…disturbing.

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  3. Maybe we'll all get lucky: Stanton will have a good year and The Intern will trade him to a front runner in need of a cleanup hitter and the Yankees will get a bagful of prospects.

    Could that happen? No.

    Will Stanton refuse to swing at pitches in the dirt? No.

    Like the man said: we are doomed.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yamamoto
    Went to Town
    Riding on Ohtani
    Stuck a half Million in his Cap
    and
    Now needs a SoCal life coach to get his confidence back to face either the Angels or the Orioles in his first stateside start of the season.

    Unwaveringly Unimpressive

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  5. Typically bizarre of MLB today that guys are rated as firm No. 2s or No. 3s. If signing X gives you a reasonable chance to win, sign him!

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  6. But of course, The Brain will never sign Monty.

    To do so would be to admit:

    —He made a mistake.

    —The Yankees' coaching/training staffs are incompetent.

    To ever, ever allow such thoughts to surface in public would be to turn the Great Eye of HAL upon Brian, and that cannot happen.

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  7. He'll be back until he gets hurt again and misses a month or more

    ReplyDelete
  8. Very short statistical sample but...

    "$325 million Dodgers right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto allowed five runs and lasted just one inning against the Padres in a 15-11 loss in his MLB debut Thursday in Seoul, South Korea"

    "The righty allowed the most runs ever by a Dodgers starting pitcher in their MLB debut, per SB Nation, and the most by a Japan-born starter in their first inning, according to ESPN"

    "This terrible outing follows an uneven spring training for Yamamoto in which he posted an 8.38 ERA spanning 9 2/3 innings, albeit while recording 14 strikeouts.
    and Yamamoto’s first time out proved to be a debacle, adding to what has been a bad 24 hours for the Dodgers as they deal with the fallout from Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter illegal gambling."

    All quotes from NYP.

    And the Ohtani thing doesn't really add up. I'm thinking it get real ugly.

    Is it possible the Yankees got lucky here?

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  9. Smoke and mirrors is what Monty is, Hal's too cheap

    ReplyDelete
  10. Doug: I do believe that the Yankees may indeed have gotten lucky.

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  11. Wait? No post on Ohtani yet?

    Let me fill in a bit:

    Bwah-ahah-hahahahaa-HAHAHAHAA-haahaahaa-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    FUCK THE JAPANESE "BABE RUTH!!!!"

    Bwah-ahah-hahahahaa-HAHAHAHAA-haahaahaa-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA-HAHAHAhaaahahaaaahaaaa!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  12. I am so very glad that Giancarlo can still hit batting practice home runs. I can no longer do so. It must feel wonderful to stand in the sun and whack the bejezzus outta slow and straight fastballs.

    Rejoice! Giancarlo had a good day in the warm sun!

    ReplyDelete

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