The oft-lost legions of the Yankiverse - a death cult without a leader, a haunted house without a ghost - will always have last night.
The deeper we stagger into October, the more meager our first-round win over Boston feels. Last weekend, we thought it could validate the 2025 season. Now, it feels like a one-night stand 10 years ago that left only rug burns and chlamydia. For any of this to matter, we must beat Toronto. And our margin of error remains thin as a coat of Windex.
But but BUT... we're still here, a franchise of legends, maybe with a few new ones?
Consider:..
1. Anthony Volpe, the Lost Boy. The way the Fox blather-brokers eulogized him last night, you'd think Volpe was laid out on a gurney, gushing Formaldehyde. John Smoltz tried to recap his entire Yankee career between ticks of the 20 second pitch clock. Later, the broadcast booth analyzed the flaws in Volpe's swing, like Batman deciphering a code from the Riddler. Volpe is floundering. In the postseason, he has now fanned 13 times in 23 at bats. It hasn't affected his defense... yet. But something is coming to a head.
2. Jazz Chisholm, the Yawning Yank. In what looked like the last burp of hope last night, Jazz forgot to throw home, allowing Toronto to pile it on. Then, in an amazing close-up, on national TV, the Fox cameras caught him in a gaping, Marie Antoinette yawn. Social media exploded, furious fans calling for his expulsion from the heaven on earth known as the Yankees. You knew the tabs were prepping it for the back page. Then, to top everything off, a few innings later, he homered to put the Yankees ahead. William Blake wrote of "A lifetime in a grain of sand, and an eternity in an hour." Tino Martinez once said, in NY, you read your obit every day. Somehow, Chisholm is still going.
3. Aaron Judge, the Great. Finally, we don't have to watch Ohtani, Raleigh and Vlad Jr. batter their way through the postseason, while Judge - the greatest of them all - belts piddily-ass singles. At last, his playoffs moment. Nobody can ever again question his October creds. But will it matter? Will it prove to be a turning point? Is it part of history, or simply a bullet point on Judge's resume?
4. Cam Schlittler, the Myth. Last night, it was weird listening to Smoltz, who seemed to view it as a fait accomplice that a) Schlittler will dominate tonight and b) the Yankees will win. The Fox team spent the final innings debating Toronto's Game Five pitching rotation. Well, nothing is for sure. Tonight, for better or worse, we will learn the legend of Schlittler.
This are why - no matter how painful, how embarrassing, how insulting - it can be, we can never shake the Yankee addiction. They are worse than heroin, worse than Oxy, worse than Doritos.
We'd be a death cult, if only we had a leader.
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31 comments:
One swing, and now Judge is having a monster postseason. That's baseball, Suzyn.
Well, he is batting .444 or something with an OBP well over .500 and slugging over .700. I think.
But yeah, a double, a clutch home run, and a nice catch--suddenly, there's meat on all the singles. Amazing how that works.
Last night needs to not be a unicorn.
It was another Yankees Classic...
BUT...if Smoltz's snide microaggressions took a hit last night, that alone was worth something.
Judge: batting average this postseason is .500 and OPS 1.304.
Holy cow.
Judge is hitting .500/.577/.727 (1.304 OPS) this postseason. He's finally having *that* postseason, even with that shitty 3-2 swing decision vs. Kevin Gausman in Game 1.
Just a shame his teammates are hot garbage.
Luis Gil, Max Fried, Will Warren (in relief), and Carlos Rodon have combined for this line in the ALDS:
12.2 IP, 25 H, 21 R, 21 ER, 5 BB, 9 K, 8 HR, 14.92 ERA
Just can't win a series when your starting pitchers give you that kind of effort.
A shame. Because our relief guys pitched their asses off last night:
6.2 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 9 K
Maybe we win today if Schlittler's magic continues. (Though the Jays hit high velocity much better than the Red Sox did in the regular season.)
But I don't see a way to win Game 5 anyway.
Maybe some of us will watch tonight’s game.
I for one believe that I willa
Let's see...the game starts at 1 in the morning here, figure it goes until 3:30-4...yeah, I'm not gonna see it.
However, I hope they win and win again in Toronto, so I can see some of the next round when I'm in New Yawk next week.
Yeah. After Barney shot Otis, Mayberry has gone downhill. Might as well watch the carnage.
Never forget that Jeannie getting married episode.
Or the Batman and Robin part one'r of our hero's trapped in that, uhm, like you know . . . THAT thing !
Judge’s HR ignited the team and the crowd. But it will all come down to pitching tonight. We must have a quality start at the very least from the Caminator. For god’s sake stop with the first pitch, wild swings and give Caballero a start, although it looked like he may have tweaked something lady night?
Albert Einstein on relativity:
"Sit on a hot stove for a minute and it seems like an hour.
Talk to a pretty girl for an hour and it seems like a minute.
That's relativity. "
Miss Norma Jean Baker called him the series man alive. Which pissed off Joe D. Hoss, any relation?🤔
Do you think anyone in Mayberry realized that Gomer was gay?
The dark side of me believes that the Shlitter's last performance was a setup so that he can now fail and our great hope for next year gets tossed onto the rocks.
I am trying not to lean into that and trying to send good vibes to the Schlitz, not that he needs ANY vibes from me. They must ALL step up. All hands on deck again. And then again, Juju gods willing.
JM - check your email.
JM, Goober probably did.
Can you still buy Schlitz? And is it the old recipe or the one that "improved" it by ruining it?
Sexiest not series. Damn spell check
So there is some fight in our Battlin' Bronx Bastards, after all. Thought it was over when Vlad the Impaler hit the 1st inning two run jack. Then, when it was 6-1, it certainly looked like curtains on another "Sinking of the Yankee Titanic" season. Looked like Boone had waited too long to pull Rodon. But the Battlin' Bronx Bastards had not begun to fight!
Judge, on an 0-2 pitch, clocks a 100 mph fastball that was way inside right down the line for a 3 run HR. Now that was UNBELIEVABLE!
I wrote the other day how good pitchers will throw hard stuff inside when they're ahead in the count, because good hitters protect the outside corner with two strikes. Well, Judge made an adjustment! He was obviously looking dead red inside on 0-2, and that was maybe the most amazing homer I've ever seen! Good pitching got beat by better hitting! Chaulk one up for the batter!
I guess if you come inside enough times, you get burned sooner or later. According to the stat geeks, that's the hardest pitch Judge ever hit for a homer. And that's the furthest inside pitch of over 99 mph that was ever hit for a homer, at least since stat geeks started keeping track of such since 2008. In theory, Judge should not have able to pull a fair ball for a home run on that pitch.
Brilliant fucking post, Duque! Did Tino really say that? It's a great quote.
You're right, Hammer; I still don't know how he kept that ball fair...
Yes, we need Schlittler to come through, of course. But it would also be nice to see Stanton break out. And what the hell is with the righty-lefty-lefty-righty middle of the order? Even for Boone and his master, Cashie, that seems bizarre.
Rufus, I believe Norma Jean was Frank H. R. Baker's and Jordan's kid, which would make her my second cousin, va-va-voom. Bobby was her younger brother. His kid, Frank II, got a shot with the Yankees in the 1970s, but it didn't work out.
Cam Schlittler will have his work cut out for him tonight. I think he might pitch okay but the Yankees are going to have to score some runs to win. Let's fact it: if the Yankees can't score 8 or 9 runs in a Blue Jays bullpen game, they don't deserve to win. They scored 9 runs last night. They better do something similar again tonight if they want to stave off elimination and get to Last Chance Saloon in Toronto.
Quiz for today: Judge last night broke the team record for home runs hit in a game with the Yanks facing elimination. Weird, mostly meaningless stat; The Babe and Joe D. rarely got to hit in such situations, because his Yanks were usually busy pulverizing the opposition.
Nonetheless, the two men whose record he broke were Yogi and The Mick. In anticipation of the upcoming Mickmas, who did Mantle hit those home runs against, and when?
Google for 100, Alex
If Marilyn Monroe thought Albert Einstien was the sexiest man alive and also married Arthur Miller she was probaby a sapiosexual.
The duck drops down and you win $100.
So are Birch trees (so I've been told)
Well played ≥ ≤ Rufus.
Maybe that's why Dick Cheney kept on firing . . . .
That reminds me of the joke about the two woodpeckers
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