There’s a part of that pines for the tension of those late 90s/early aughts battles between the Yankees and the Red Sox, when each game carried the weight of decades, as if DiMaggio and Williams, Munson and Fisk, and all the rest were watching. A series in May seemed terribly important, and those few series in October were life or death.

It was that nostalgia (and, believe it or not, a George Costanza bobblehead) that justified a trip to New York this summer with my son to see two games in New York. I’d seen the Yankees play in the Stadium before, both the old one and the new, but I’d never seen a Yankees-Red Sox game in person, and so we went.

We chose the first two games of the four-game series in the third week of August. You’ll remember that series — the Boston wins in the opening three games were so decisive that the Yankee win on Sunday didn’t even matter. The Yankees were great against the bottom half of the league, the narrative went, but they couldn’t beat the good teams. They couldn’t beat Boston.

When they lost to the Red Sox on Tuesday night in the first game of the American League Wildcard Series, the narrative seemed to be correct. But as I pondered the possibility of another loss on Wednesday night, it occurred to me that what would really sting would be having the season come to an end; losing to the Red Sox wouldn’t add any extra pain. I just didn’t want this team to go out like that. Thanks to Cam Schlittler, they didn’t.

The Yankees scored their four runs in the fourth inning, courtesy of a couple questionable plays by the Red Sox and a couple seeing-eye ground balls, but it was nothing to apologize for. Even so, I won’t waste any space here discussing it.

The only story that matters coming out of Thursday night’s 4-0 win is Cam Schlittler. I had a good feeling about him heading into the game, and I even predicted to a friend that he would strike out eight; turns out I sold him short. With a variety of fastballs and sinkers ranging from 95mph to 101, Schlittler was absolutely dominant all night long, finishing with eight innings pitched, twelve strikeouts, and zero walks, and only five hits. It was the first time in postseason history that a pitcher threw eight or more shutout innings with 12 or more strikeouts and no walks. Think about that for a minute. He did something that Sandy Koufax and Bob Gibson weren’t able to do.

But the box score doesn’t tell complete story because box scores never do. Schlittler didn’t just dominate the Boston hitters, he dominated in the most cold-blooded way, never showing a hint of emotion. He was a Bizarro World Fernando Cruz, just putting his head down and walking to the dugout as the Stadium exploded after yet another strike out. It was one of the greatest pitching performances I’ve ever seen, and it was a rookie making his first postseason start in an elimination game against the Boston Red Sox.

More than just advancing the Yankees to the American League Divisional Series, young Mr. Schlittler gave us permission to dream. First, there’s the Big Dream — a rotation of Gerrit Cole, Max Fried, Carlos Rodon, Cam Schlittler, and (fill-in-the-blank) for the next six years. Just imagine.

But what about the Immediate Dream? Having Fried and Rodon at the top of the rotation gives the Yankees a shot in any postseason series, but Schlittler’s start changes the entire calculus. We can’t expect him to reproduce what he did last night on a regular basis, but just knowing that he has that in him changes everything. None of the remaining eight teams can match the three starters the Yankees are rolling out right now, so right now everything is possible. Everything.

So in the aftermath of Thursday night’s clinching win, I thought back to that August night my son and I spent with the Bleacher Creatures. There was an undeniable passion for the Yankees, but there was also an underlying anxiety that bubbled up from time to time whenever someone in a Red Sox jersey stood up to cheer. Or even to go get a beer. Fists never met flesh, but there were at least two or three shouting matches, and by the seventh inning or so several of NYPD’s finest were dispersed among the crowd to keep the peace. After the final out, as a disappointed crowd slowly made its way through the concourse and out into the Bronx night, the handful of Red Sox fans we saw were gleefully eager to engage, taunting anyone within earshot about the game and a season that seemed to be spiraling down the drain.

I wondered about those Boston fans on Thursday night. I wondered if that glorious night in August was enough for them.

I was in a bind yesterday. The game had a 3:08 Pacific time start, and my basketball practice went from 3:30-5:30. So I could track the score through practice (and be a bad coach) then race home afterwards (and be a bad driver) to catch the end. Or I could turn off my phone, focus on practice, drive home like a normal person, and then watch the recording in my deprivation tank.

I chose option two, but I figured I could still listen to the beginning of the game on the drive over to practice. Kind of a temporary compromise. Soon after Dave Sims* described Ben Rice’s blistering line drive into the right field seats, I turned off the car, turned off my phone, and headed to the gym with a smile on my face and a 2-0 Yankee lead in my pocket. Things were going to be just fine.

*A quick note about Dave Sims. A commenter mentioned something here earlier this week that I have to second. I often find myself driving home after school or practice during the early innings of the Yankee game, so I’ve listened to a lot of games this season on Sirius XM. Dave Sims has been an absolute joy, and it’s made me realize that I only put up with John Sterling because he came with Suzyn Waldman. The pairing of Sims and Waldman has been perfect, and it seems like they’ve been working together for years, not months. If you haven’t had the chance to listen to them, I highly recommend it.

But when I got back to my car after practice, I made a rookie mistake, probably because of my rising nerves. I punched the ignition button and the audio screen came to life, spoiling all my plans: Yankees 4, Red Sox 3, Bottom of the 8th. At least it was good news, so I couldn’t really be disappointed either with the unraveling of my plans or with Trent Grisham’s strikeout to leave the bases loaded. I’d only have to wait three outs instead of three hours to learn the Yankees’ fate.

It’s just a twenty-minute drive home, but I wonder if my fellow commuters knew what was going on inside my car. I was passing a park filled with hundreds of youth volleyball players as David Bednar struck out Wilyer Abreu, and a few blocks later I was screaming at the top of my lungs while sitting at a traffic light as he caught Jaren Duran looking on a 3-2 count. All of you probably threw up in your mouths while Ceddanne Rafaela’s ball was arcing towards the right field stands, but Dave Sims gave a measured description that never had me worried* and I shouted with joy just a few blocks from home. I looked into a few car windows around me, wondering if by some chance, three thousand miles away from the Bronx, there was someone else celebrating the victory, but alas I was alone.

*Have you ever had moments of stress about something that didn’t happen? When I finally got home and saw this play during the highlights, my stomach dropped even though I knew Judge was going to catch the ball. I can’t imagine the swing of emotions I’d have had watching live — the fear that the game was tied followed so closely by elation that it was over. Kind of the like the last swing of the 2000 World Series.

There was one mystery that I needed to be explained. During the ninth inning Sims had mentioned that Jazz Chisholm, Jr., (who had given an Ichiro-style postgame interview* on Tuesday night) had scored from first base on a single from Austin Wells. I tried to imagine a scenario in which this could happen. When I finally saw the play, I couldn’t help but think how different this Yankee team is. Jazz was on the move on a 3-2 count, so when Wells smashed a line drive down the right field line, he had already rounded second before the ball touched the grass. He never broke speed, rounding third in a blur before diving head first and sliding his left hand across the plate just a breath ahead of the tag.

*It’s hard to remember what a novelty Ichiro was when he first arrived. The second-best player in baseball right now is from Japan, along with more than a dozen others sprinkled around baseball, but in 2001 there was only Ichiro, and as big as he was in Seattle, he was far bigger in his homeland. There were rumors that a Japanese publication was offering $2 million for a nude photo of the superstar, so for a time Ichiro was conducting locker room interviews with his back to the assembled media as he changed to avoid any unwanted photographs. It was a crazy time.

As I watched him sprinting from first third, it occurred to me that rarely have the Yankees enjoyed a player as fast as Jazz. One measure of a team’s overall baserunning ability is a stat called “Extra Bases,” or how often a player takes an extra base by scoring from second on a single or from first on a double. The 2025 Yankees are tied for last in this category, but here was Jazz taking two extra bases in the bottom of eighth inning to keep his team alive. It was a beautiful thing.

The second best thing that happened for me on Wednesday night was that the Dodgers ended their series, allowing the network to push tonight’s Yankee game to a more reasonable (for me) 5:00pm Pacific start. I won’t get to watch the first couple innings live, but that’s not the end of the world.

I feel really good about Cam Schlittler, so I feel great about the game.

Let’s go, Yankees!

It all started in December, I suppose. Just a couple months after enduring the most painful inning of baseball any of us had ever seen, likely before some of us were ready to move past the disappointment of the World Series loss, and even before some of us had come to terms with the subsequent “loss” of Juan Soto, we were asked to look forward to next year, like it or not.

It isn’t quite the same as Brooklyn Dodgers fans consoling each other with reminders to “wait ’til next year,” or Cubs fans of a bygone era hoping for a World Series before they die, but it can be difficult to turn the page when the chapter you’ve just read was so painful. There’s a temptation to put the book down for a while.

But then there was Max Fried and Clay Bellinger and Paul Goldschmidt and Devin Williams. Sure, the generational talent of Soto was gone, but suddenly the roster looked younger and more athletic, the defense looked better, and the bullpen looked dominant.

And so we picked up the book and turned the page.

Like any good story, the 2025 season grabbed us right away.  Aaron Judge set the world on fire, and even though everyone knew he couldn’t possibly keep it up, he would. Max Fried was better than we could’ve expected, and Carlos Rodon quietly became the pitcher the team had hoped he’d be when they signed him before the 2023 season. The Yankees raced out to a lead in the American League East, and all was good in the world.

But stories don’t necessarily hold our interest when they go in a straight line. There are detours and disappointments. The romance fizzles, the hero is thwarted, the enemies storm the gate. And so the Yankees fell into their now-annual June swoon, inventing new ways to lose each night and forcing even the most faithful among us to wonder how we ever could’ve been fooled. When Judge was suddenly feeling elbow pain, all of us — even the Yankee brass, apparently — feared the worst. If we’re to believe recent reports, the Yankees considered becoming sellers at the trade deadline as they considered a season without the best hitter in baseball.

But fear not, dear readers! The Yankees didn’t just return to the plot, they did so with a vengeance. Trent Grisham, Ben Rice, and Jazz Chisholm, Jr., all had the best seasons of their careers, Max Fried recovered from his midseason malaise, and even Devin Williams remembered how to get batters out.

And Judge.

I could write for pages upon pages about the greatness of Aaron Judge, but I’ll be brief here. We have been spoiled as Yankee fans, and not in the way that fans of other teams might think. The World Series wins have been nice, but the greater gift has been this. For the past thirty years — without interruption — we’ve enjoyed the fortune of watching one all-time great after another wearing Yankee pinstripes. From Derek Jeter to Mariano Rivera to Alex Rodriguez (whatever you might think of him) to Aaron Judge, we’ve always had a legend to root for. For most franchises, a player like Judge would stand alone in a team’s history, but in Yankees Universe, Judge is just the next in line. That isn’t to say we should take him for granted, it’s just a reminder that we are members of the most fortunate fanbase in sports.

But Yankee history is a double-edged sword. Unlike any other franchise in baseball, the only currency that matters here is the World Series ring, and as fans we’ve come to accept that. We cannot celebrate last season’s American League championship — and there is no evidence of it among the banners at Yankee Stadium — because any season that ends without a ring is a disappointment, as the previous captain so often reminded us.

And because of this myopia, we will only judge this book based on this final chapter. And as if there were an actual author behind the plot, the possibility of an epic ending lies before us. Imagine a postseason run in which the Yankees first beat their greatest rival in the wild card round, dispatch the equally evil Blue Jays in the division series, eliminate Cal Raleigh and the Seattle Mariners in the ALCS, and then avenge last year’s loss by beating the Dodgers in the World Series. As Aaron Boone is fond of saying, the pen is in their hands, and they get to write these final pages.

So where does that leave us? All we can do is read and find out what happens next. The final chapter begins tonight.

[Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons]

Down the stretch, indeed. I’m not sure how, but the end of the season has really snuck up on me. Friday night’s game in Baltimore is the first of nine remaining games, and while this team was limping just three weeks ago, they suddenly seem ready for the playoffs. Can’t wait!

[Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.]

I didn’t watch a single pitch of the Yankees’ 8-7 loss to the Houston Astros on Wednesday night, but I was never far away from the game. I was sitting in a conference room with fifty other people taking a course to renew my CPR and First Aid certification, and class started at right about the time Trent Grisham stepped into the batter’s box to lead off the game.

As I tracked the next nine innings throughout the evening, the rollercoaster ride was punctuated by what was unfolding in front of me, sometimes in comically coincidental ways. Luke Weaver entered the game to stop a Houston rally just as our instructor was demonstrating how to tie a tourniquet, and an inning later, just after Darin Williams walked in the go-ahead run, I was asked to stand and wrap my arms around a medical dummy to practice the Heimlich maneuver. I saved the dummy, but Williams was choking two time zones away.

The final outs were recorded as I was driving home, so it wasn’t until I sat down for a late dinner that I learned the details about the ambiguous strikeout and the childish sensitivity of home plate umpire Brian Walsh who threw out Devin Williams (who was longer in the game) and Aaron Boone (who was walking away from at the time and didn’t even see the ejection) and spitefully called a balk on Camilo Doval. It was a lot, and somehow it was familiar.

The park once known as Enron Field and then MinuteMaid Park is now Daikin Field, but for the Yankees (and me) it will always be the Ninth Circle of Hell. Instead of Judas and Brutus and Cassius, it’s Altuve and Correa and Alvarez. But don’t worry — we can make it out of the Inferno, wander through Purgatory, and eventually find Paradise. Keep the faith!

No team in baseball boasts the history of the New York Yankees, and no team in baseball leans into that history in quite the same way that this organization does — for better or for worse. Old Timers’ Day, for example, neatly walks the line between nostalgia and maudlin sentimentalism, and I’ll never get tired of watching former players trot out of the dugout for another round of applause.

But while it’s easy to invite any former player who wants to make the trip for Old Timers’ Day, whether it be Brian Doyle or Derek Jeter, the politics and decisions behind uniform number retirement can be complicated, and it’s led to some glaring mistakes and dangerous precedents. Let’s take a look at all the retired numbers, in order of retirement.

#4 — Lou Gehrig — July 4, 1939
Gehrig wasn’t just the first Yankee to have his number retired, he was also the first baseball player from any team to receive the honor. Given his tremendous career and the tragic nature of his early retirement, this was an easy decision.

#3 — Babe Ruth — June 13, 1948
It’s Babe Ruth. If there was an easier decision than retiring Gehrig’s number it was this one. Kind of shocking that it took more than a decade for this to happen.

#5 — Joe DiMaggio — April 18, 1952
One of the craziest things about the New York Yankees is that you could create a Mt. Rushmore and make a convincing argument that Joe DiMaggio wouldn’t be on that mountain, while he would cleary be the greatest player in the history of most franchises. Everyone knows about his 56-game hitting streak, but maybe the most impressive statistic of his career is that he hit 361 home runs while striking out only 369 times. Pretty easy decision to retire number five.

#7 — Mickey Mantle — June 8, 1969
The Mick is probably the most beloved Yankee of all-time, but as great as he was, even Mickey himself conceded that he should’ve been even better. Alcohol and injuries conspired to limit his career numbers, but they couldn’t limit his mass appeal. No one was like the Mick.

#37 — Casey Stengel — August 8, 1970
Stengel led the Yankees to seven World Series titles in his twelve years as manager, so he was another easy choice.

#8 — Bill Dickey and Yogi Berra — July 22, 1972
Yogi Berra was always a great hitter, but many worried that his lack of skill behind the plate would limit his major league potential. Hall of Famer Bill Dickey tutored Berra in his early days in the organization, and Berra chose to wear Dickey’s #8 to honor his mentor. It made sense, then, that both of these legends had their identical numbers retired in a ceremony on the same day.

#16 — Whitey Ford — August 3, 1974
The Chairman of the Board. Given the length of his career and his World Series success, it’s pretty easy to argue that Whitey Ford is the greatest starting pitcher in Yankee history.

#15 — Thurman Munson — September 20, 1980
Like most Yankee fans my age or older, I still remember exactly where I was when I heard about Thurman Munson’s death in a plane crash. He was the team captain and had already won an MVP award, and his locker remained untouched for almost thirty years until the old Stadium closed down.

#9 — Roger Maris — July 22, 1984
At the time, it felt like the retirement of Roger Maris’s number was an apology for how he was treated when he broke Babe Ruth’s single-season home run record in 1961. Most fans wanted the beloved Mickey Mantle to break the record because Maris wasn’t viewed as a “true Yankee.” Everyone remembers Maris from that ’61 season, but he was just as good in 1960 and won the American League MVP both years. Even so, he only played seven seasons in New York, the second-shortest tenure for anyone on this list. If it were up to me, his number wouldn’t be retired.

#32 — Elston Howard — July 22, 1984
Elston Howard is one of the most important players in Yankee history because aside from being a great player (he won the A.L. MVP in 1963), he stands as a symbol of the franchise’s resistance to integrate. Eight years after Jackie Robinson debuted with the Dodgers in 1947, the Yankees became the second-to-last team to allow a Black player on their major league roster. (The Red Sox would be the final team to integrate when Pumpsie Green showed up in Fenway the following season.) But Howard deserves this honor for what he did on the field — twelve All-Star appearances and four World Series wins.

#10 — Phil Rizzuto — August 4, 1985
I’m not sure if the Scooter would’ve earned this honor solely based on his on field performance, even though he did win the MVP in 1950 and was the starting shortstop on seven World Series winning teams. His tenure as Yankee broadcaster likely tipped the scales in his favor, and I can’t really argue with his inclusion here.

#1 — Billy Martin — August 10, 1986
This is where things began to go awry. Being a Yankee fan in the 1980s was to endure one embarrassment after another, and most of those embarrassments were the result of manager Billy Martin. He was an alcoholic during an era when that was seen as a personality quirk, and his racism was largely swept under the rug by a sympathetic and complicit press corps. George Steinbrenner fired him so many times (five) that their song and dance routine became a punch line in beer commercials, and his psychotic need for control caused him to humiliate his players whether they were stars (Reggie Jackson) or journeymen (he once demanded that struggling left-hander Mike Pagliarulo bat right-handed in a game). Perhaps by way of apology, Steinbrenner decided that all of this was the résumé of a Yankee legend, and his number was retired in 1986. Using Billy Martin as a precedent, almost any former Yankee could make a legitimate claim for inclusion on this list, and that’s a shame.

#44 — Reggie Jackson — August 14, 1993
Okay, get ready for a controversial take. The question is not whether or not Reggie was a great player. His 563 career home runs made him a first-ballot Hall of Famer. The question is not whether or not he was a clutch player. His three home runs on three swings in the clinching sixth game of the World Series is still the greatest single-game hitting performance in the history of the Fall Classic. The question is this — was he a great Yankee? Those three swings in October and the Reggie Bar and the Yankee cap on his plaque in Cooperstown all make it hard to remember that he only played in New York for five of his 21 seasons, the same number of years he spent with the Angels and just half the time he played for the A’s. I absolutely love Reggie Jackson. Really. But should his number be retired? I’m just not sure.

#23 — Don Mattingly — August 31, 1997
The question about Mattingly isn’t whether or not his number should be retired, but whether or not he should be in the Hall of Fame. (I say yes.) In terms of hero worship, Mattingly bridged the generation between Mantle and Jeter, and he famously passed the torch to Jeter that afternoon in spring training when the two of them were working on a back field and Mattingly suggested they run in because “you never know who might be watching.” There was no better player in baseball from 1984-1989 when Mattingly won a batting title, an MVP (and was robbed of another), and five Gold Gloves (of nine his career) while averaging 203 hits and 114 RBIs. Donnie Baseball was my favorite player, and I was lucky enough to be at the Stadium when his number was retired. (You can read my account of that here. Fun fact — I met a teen-age Eli Manning in the subway on the way to the game that day.)

#49 — Ron Guidry — August 23, 2003
Guidry’s 1978 season was one of the greatest pitching campaigns in baseball history, and I can still recite the numbers off the top of my head — 25-3, 1.74 ERA, 248 strikeouts. His 25th win that year came in the one-game playoff against the Red Sox, and all of that might’ve been enough to cement his legacy, but he won 129 games after that and is clearly one of the best pitchers in franchise history.

#42 — Mariano Rivera — September 22, 2013
I have nothing to say here that hasn’t already been said. (But I did write a poem about him once.) He’s easily the best reliever of all time, and he’s the reason no reliever will ever again be good enough for us. Oh, here’s something I learned today — Mo pitched in more than twice as many games as any other Yankee pitcher.

#6 — Joe Torre — August 23, 2014
I was nine years old when the Yankees won the 1978 World Series, so my memories of those teams is a bit hazy even though I was already a fan. Then I spent the next 18 years wondering if I’d ever see another championship. Enter Joe Torre. Yes, the players that arrived with him had a lot to do with it, but Torre was at the helm for four World Series wins and easily could’ve won a couple more. There’s no question here.

#51 — Bernie Williams — May 24, 2015
I love Bernie Williams, so even though he isn’t really an elite player and didn’t stick around as long as the Core 4, I’m okay with his inclusion here.

#20 — Jorge Posada — August 22, 2015
You could easily make a case that Jorge Posada should be in the Hall of Fame. Most people assume that Salvador Pérez, for example, will walk into Cooperstown, but when you compare Posada to Pérez, our guy’s numbers outdistance the future Hall of Famer. Posasda belongs on this list, that’s for sure.

#46 — Andy Pettitte — August 23, 2015
Pettitte is the all-time Yankee leader in strikeouts, and if he hadn’t spent those three regrettable seasons in Houston, he’d also be the leader in wins. His 256 career wins would probably be enough for a ticket to Cooperstown if the writers weren’t scared off by his PED admission. (These are the same writers who happily elected Mike Piazza and Pudge Rodríguez.) Anyway, Pettitte deserves this honor and more.

#2 — Derek Jeter — May 14, 2017
Aaron Judge is putting together a pretty nice résumé, but right now Derek Jeter is the best Yankee that I’ve seen in the 45 years I’ve been a fan, and he will forever be my favorite player. Another easy choice.

#21 — Paul O’Neill — August 21, 2022
One of the best moments of the Yankee dynasty came during the top of the ninth inning when the Yankees were trailing against the Arizona Diamondbacks. Knowing that the retiring O’Neill would never play another game in the Bronx, the Stadium crowd famously serenaded him throughout that last defensive half inning. It didn’t matter that the team was staring at a three games to two deficit; this was a moment when the love the fans felt for individual player superseded the game, and it was beautiful. If that serenade hadn’t happened, I don’t think O’Neill’s number would’ve been retired. He was a really, really good Yankee, but he wasn’t great.

The Omissions
Even with twenty-two numbers retired, there are at least two glaring omissions. Cam Schlittler is wearing #31 this season, and that’s an absolute travesty. Dave Winfield was one of the best players in baseball during his nine plus years in New York, going to the All-Star game in each of his eight full seasons, winning five Silver Slugger and Gold Glove Awards, and driving in 100 runs six times. While people like to remember the second half of George Steinbrenner’s tenure as owner when he would do whatever it took to win, they often conveniently forget that he hired a known criminal to spy on Winfield and then withheld money promised to Winfield’s charity. As the story goes, when Winfield chose a Padres cap for his Hall of Fame plaque, Steinbrenner decided against retiring #31. It’s not too late to fix this.

What if s0meone played 13 seasons for a team, won two MVPs, hit 351 home runs, and drove in more than a thousand runs? What if he led his team to a World Series win, hitting six home runs with 18 RBIs in 15 October games? Most teams wouldn’t just retire that player’s number, they’d build a statue of him outside the park. Alex Rodríguez might be one of the best ten or fifteen players ever to play the game, but the Yankees are still letting people (first Joey Gallo and now Jazz Chisholm, Jr.) wear #13. It’s the hypocrisy that bothers me. The Yankees always knew he was using PEDs, and they were happy to look the other way while he was compiling numbers for them. When Rodríguez announced his retirement midway through the 2016 season, GM Brian Cashman sat at the press conference and set his 2009 World Series ring on the table in front of him and said he wouldn’t have had that ring were it now for A-Rod. So Rodríguez was good enough for them then, but apparently not good enough to be honored alongside the other Yankee greats. Hypocrisy at its finest. But again, it can be fixed.

[Photo Courtesy of WikiMedia Commons.]

Well, things are looking… different. In two weeks, despite several additions that even impartial observers hailed as largely positive, the Yankees’ playoff expectation according to BaseballReference.com has plummeted from 90% all the way down to 75%. Yikes.

It seems like my last three vacations have coincided with a Yankee slump, and so it is now. Thankfully the cerveza here is even colder than the Yankees’ bats, so I remain optimistic. And it can’t hurt that our man Aaron Judge is expected to be back in the lineup tonight. Let’s go!

The Yankees played their 100th game of the season last night, and without getting lost in the specific details of that disappointing loss, now seems like a good time to take a look at the broad view of the season. So here are 101 things about the Yankees’ 2025 season. As Vin Scully used to say, pull up a chair.

0
There are many amazing things about what Aaron Judge is doing this season, so this won’t be the last time he appears on this list, but this is perhaps the most amazing. He’s locked in a close race with Cal Raleigh for the league homerun title (Raleigh 38, Judge 36), which isn’t a surprise since he’s led the league in long balls two of the last three seasons. But here’s the shocker — Judge also has a comfortable lead in base hits with 128, outdistancing Bo Bichette, Trea Turner, and Bobby Witt, Jr., who are tied at 113. (One way to understand Judge’s dominance over the rest of the league is to look at the gap between Judge and second place. In this case, he’s thirteen hits ahead of second place, which is the same as the gap between second place and 26th place.) But back to my point. Judge has a chance to lead the league in home runs and hits. If that seems unusual, it’s because it is. It has happened exactly ZERO times in baseball history. This is a pretty special player we’re talking about.

1
This a franchise that always has only one goal — winning the World Series. It doesn’t matter there are people who will get their driver’s licenses this fall who weren’t alive the last time this happened, we all just accept that there is only one mission. Even if the team falls a few games short of this goal, as they did last season, a failed mission is still a failure. That view fuels desperation when there’s a three-game losing streak in May, when the bullpen blows a four-game lead in June, or when Anthony Volpe makes a throwing error in July. It would help to take a breath sometimes before grabbing the pitchforks and lighting the torches. It’s fine to have one goal, but it’s also okay to be measured in our response to the inevitable disappoints that this game with throw our way. (All that being said, I’ve bought in also. During the leadup to the World Series last October, I scoffed at all the Dodger fans I was walking around with t-shirts celebrating their National League Championship knowing that I would NEVER buy a shirt like that. I’m as guilty as the rest of you.)

2
The biggest problem that Anthony Volpe has is Derek Jeter. We were lucky enough to watch a generational player for two decades, inarguably one of the greatest shortstops of all time, and now we’ve got Volpe. Admittedly, he’s been in a funk for a couple months now, and I obviously don’t know how to fix him, but I think he only needs to be fixed a little bit. Dial back the swing in certain situations, hit behind a runner once in a while, and relax some in the field. We don’t need Derek Jeter; we just need Randy Velarde.

3
Volpe and Cody Bellinger are tied for the team lead with three triples.

4
The Yankees are four games behind the Toronto Blue Jays.

5
Giancarlo Stanton has five home runs, and I have absolutely nothing bad to say about him. Nothing.

6
The Yankees have a run differential of +109, better than every team in the American League, and just six runs behind the Chicago Cubs.

7
Aaron Judge leads all of baseball with a WAR of 6.9. (Just a tick below 7, so I’m cheating a bit here.)

8
Paul Goldschmidt and Jasson Domínguez each have 8 homeruns.

9
Infielder Jorbít Vivas has 9 hits.

10
The Yankees are ten games above .500, which kind of tells you all you need to know.

11
Max Fried has eleven wins.

12
Anthony Volpe has made 12 errors this season, leading the team and leading all major league shortstops.

13
D.J. LeMaheiu scored 13 runs before his Yankee career came to end when he was DFA’d earlier this month.

14
Jasson Domínguez leads the team with 14 stolen bases.

15
Carlos Rodón has given up 15 homeruns this season, the highest total on the team. Even so, he’s generally been great, exactly what the Yankees were hoping to get when they signed him three years ago.

16
Only 16 different Yankees have come to the plate this season, a number that seems surprisingly low.

17
Cody Bellinger has 17 homeruns, but that only tells part of the story. He’s been a huge addition to this team, and I hope he sticks around. (I mean, unless Spencer Jones turns out to be the real deal and is starting in center field next year.)

18
Cody Bellinger has 18 doubles.

19
Austin Wells has walked 19 times.

20
Yankee leadoff batters have hit twenty homeruns.

21
Austin Wells has the highest average launch angle on the team at 21 degrees. (Actually 20.9)

22
Yankee third baseman have combined for an OPS of .655, which is 22nd in baseball.

23
It isn’t difficult to imagine a world in which Don Mattingly is the next manager of the New York Yankees.

24
The Yankees have been caught stealing 24 times, tied with the Reds and Red Sox for the tenth highest total in baseball.

25
Oswaldo Cabrera struck out 25 times.

26
As a team, the Yankees have 26 saves.

27
Not including position player Pablo Reyes, the Yankees have used a preposterous 27 pitchers this season. Twenty-seven!

28
Will this be the year the Yankees with their 28th World Series? Only time will tell.

29
Cody Bellinger and Paul Goldschmidt have each walked 29 times.

30
The Yankee staff has 30 wild pitches this season, the thirteenth highest total in the game.

31
Ben Rice has 31 RBIs.

32
Fernando Cruz has appeared in 32 games.

33
Jazz Chisholm has an OPS+ of 133, meaning he’s 33% better than league average.

34
Oswaldo Cabrera played only 34 games before his injury this year, and I really miss him.

35
Tyler Matzek has faced 35 batters.

36
Aaron Judge has 36 homeruns.

37
Paul Goldschmidt has 37 RBIs, good for seventh-best on the time. Probably not what most envisioned.

38
Yankee batters have been hit by pitches 38 times, which is 17th in baseball.

39
Carlos Carrasco has given up 39 hits.

40
Jazz Chisholm has scored 40 runs.

41
Ian Hamilton has 41 strikeouts.

42
Mark Leiter, Jr., has allowed 42 hits.

43
Aaron Judge leads baseball with an OPS of 1.175, which is 181 points ahead of Shohei Ohtani in second place. There’s a similar gap between Ohtani (.993) and Junior Caminero (.812), forty-three spots lower.

44
Ben Rice has scored 44 runs.

45
The Yankees have 45 losses this season.

46
Trent Grisham has scored 46 runs.

47
Will Warren leads the staff with 47 walks.

48
Ryan Yarborough has allowed 48 hits.

49
Devin Williams has 49 strikeouts.

50
Oswaldo Cabrera had 50 at bats at home.

51
Cody Bellinger has 51 hits with the bases empty.

52
Jorbít Vivas has 52 at bats.

53
Anthony Volpe has 53 RBIs, which is fourth on the team. No matter how many times I notice this, it still blows my mind.

54
Ben Rice ranks eleventh in baseball with a 54% rate of balls hit with an exit velocity of 95MPH or higher.

55
The Yankees have 55 wins this season.

56
Cody Bellinger has scored 56 runs, the third highest total on the team.

57
Paul Goldschmidt has scored 57 runs.

58
Yankee pitchers have induced 58 ground ball double plays, which is 25th in baseball.

59
The Yankees won 59 of the first 100 games last year, just four games better than they are right now.

60
Aaron Judge has 60 RBIs when facing right-handed pitching.

61
Based on run differential, the Yankees should have 61 wins instead of 55.

62
Aaron Judge has 62 extra base hits — 24 doubles, 2 triples, and 36 homeruns.

63
Yankee designated hitters have 63 RBIs.

64
The Yankees have stolen 64 bases, tied with the White Sox for 18th in baseball.

65
The Yankees have hit into 65 standard double plays, which is right in the middle of the pack — 15th in baseball.

66
The Yankees have hit 66 homeruns against National League opponents, more than any other American League team.

67
The Yankees have hit 67 homeruns in day games, trailing on the Chicago Cubs, who have hit 70 in six more games.

68
Jazz Chisholm has 68 putouts.

69
Trent Grisham has started 69 games in center field, and he’s been great.

70
Anthony Volpe has struck out 70 times against right-handed pitching.

71
Trent Grisham has 71 hits.

72
Aaron Judge leads the team with 72 walks.

73
Clarke Schmidt struck out 73 batters before his season came to an end.

74
Max Fried has given up 74 hits to right-handed batters. (He’s also been just as good as the Yankees hoped when they signed up this off season. I can’t wait to see what this team looks like when he’s paired with a healthy Gerrit Cole.)

75
Jazz Chisholm has struck out 75 times.

76
Anthony Volpe has 76 hits.

77
Oswaldo Cabrera has fielded 77 chances.

78
Gerrit Cole, Clarke Schmidt, and Luis Gil have combined for 78.2 innings pitched this season, and obviously that’s all from Schmidt, who won’t pitch again for a year or so. If we’re being charitable, we have to admit that it’s remarkable that a team could lose 60% of its projected starting rotation and still be in contention.

79
Max Fried has struck out 79 right-handed batters.

80
J.C. Escarra has 80 at bats. Given his backstory, I’m sure he’s cherished every single one.

81
Austin Wells has appeared in 81 games.

82
Aaron Judge has 82 RBIs.

83
Trent Grisham has appeared in 83 games.

84
J.C. Escarra has an OPS+ of 84.

85
The Yankees have hit 85 homeruns at Yankee Stadium, trailing only the Dodgers (96) for most homeruns at home.

86
Trent Grisham has 86 total bases on the road.

87
Carlos Rodón has struck out 87 batters with the bases empty.

88
Someone named Brent Headrick has appeared in eleven games and posted an ERA+ of 88. If he were sitting right next to me right now I’d never recognize him.

89
Aaron Judge has scored 89 runs, tops in the American League and just five runs behind Shohei Ohtani.

90
BaseballReference.com gives the Yankees a 90.5% chance of making the playoffs.

91
Cody Bellinger has appeared in 91 games.

92
Mark Leiter, Jr., has an ERA+ of 92, which means he’s eight percent worse than league average.

93
Yerry De Los Santos has faced 93 batters.

94
Anthony Volpe has struck out 94 times, which is a huge problem.

95
Aaron Judge has an average exit velocity of 95.2 MPH. Only O’Neill Cruz (96.2) is higher.

96
Max Fried and Will Warren have each given up 96 hits.

97
Cody Bellinger has 97 at bats against left handers, hitting a robust .361 with an OPS of 1.042.

98
Will Warren, #98, has started 21 games, tied for the most in baseball.

99
Probably the best player any of us will ever see wearing Yankee pinstripes.

100
100 games down, 62 to go. Let’s go, Yan-kees!

[Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.]

Baseball is often described as a game of inches, but it’s probably more accurate to call it a game of millimeters. Games are often decided by plays which are determined by the smallest of margins. If Luis Gonzalez’s bat had been just a millimeter or two farther beneath Mariano Rivera’s cutter in Game 7 of the 2001 World Series, the ball would likely have been a pop up to short rather than a bloop that floated over Derek Jeter’s head. If Rivera’s pitch the year before had been just a millimeter or two lower towards the sweet spot of Mike Piazza’s bat, the 2000 World Series likely wouldn’t have ended on a deep fly ball to Bernie Williams.

We don’t usually think about these things, but with the Yankees struggling to win games lately, plays like this are magnified. If this team is able to right the ship, make the playoffs, and win a World Series, I have no doubt that we’ll be looking back at the play Cody Bellinger made in the seventh inning on Sunday against the Mets. With no outs and Francisco Lindor on first base, Juan Soto roped a line drive to left. It seemed like a sure base hit, which would’ve been problematic enough given the Yankees’ slim 6-4 lead, but when Bellinger raced in looking to make a play on the ball, disaster seemed certain. If the ball had gotten past him and rolled to the wall, Lindor would have scored easily with Soto ending up on third. Sure, it would only have been 6-5 at that point, but it would’ve been the beginning of the end.

But instead of that doom’s day scenario, Bellinger actually made the play, picking the ball out of the air just millimeters before it hit the turf and then firing a perfect strike to first to double up Lindor. Had it happened in the first inning on a chilly evening in April it would’ve turned heads, but given the circumstances — with his team riding a six-game losing streak and on the verge of being swept in the Subway Series — Bellinger’s play was one of the best we’ve seen this year and certainly one of the most important in New York’s season. But it almost wasn’t. It’s a game of millimeters.

I suppose it isn’t time to panic just yet, but it’s past time to be concerned. One game shy of the season’s halfway mark, the Yankees sit at 46-34 with a suddenly uncomfortable half-game lead in the American League East. They enjoyed a seven-game lead in late May, and most experts agreed that it was genuine. The surprising strength of their pitching staff combined with an elite offense had powered the team to one of the top records in the game, and expectations were high.

And then June arrived. While it wouldn’t have shocked anyone if Carlos Rodón had turned back into a pumpkin or if Clarke Schmidt had reverted to his previous four-inning form, the problem was with the offense. Take a look…

The counting stats will look at least a little bit better after the last four days of June, but the OPS numbers don’t lie. Jazz Chisholm missed all of May, so he’s hot right now instead, but everyone else in the lineup has declined either a little bit (Judge, but we’ll allow it) or a significant amount (Volpe, Bellinger, Grisham, Rice). Goldschmidt hasn’t just declined, he’s cratered to the point that anyone paying attention has to realize it’s time for a straight platoon at first base with Goldschmidt and Rice.

If you need evidence beyond what your eyes have been telling you, consider this. Rice is slashing .263/.358/.514 against righties, well over a hundred points better in each stat than he is against lefties, and Goldie is at .408/.494/.711 against southpaws, numbers that are staggering in comparison to the counter — .244/.287/.330. Think about that. This team has a first baseman that’s slugging .330 against righties.

The dip in individual offensive numbers has exposed this team’s larger problem. They are simply allergic to — and stop me if you’ve heard this one before — situational hitting. Aaron Judge should continue doing what he’s doing — swinging hard at every pitch that’s to his liking — but everyone else needs to look in the mirror. (Or at least angle that mirror so it’s reflecting an image of Cody Bellinger, the only hitter in the lineup who appears to alter his swing with two strikes.)

I don’t need to see a sacrifice bunt every time a player reaches base, but hitting to the right side with no outs and a runner on second would be nice, especially in extra innings. Winning is easy when you hit eight or nine home runs in a three game series, but when things begin to go sour as they have over the past three weeks, an extra run here or there can mask some of the individual slumps plaguing the lineup, and the dividends would extend beyond the boxscore. Don’t you think it would help Anthony Volpe to hear some cheers and get a few pats on the back for a ground ball to second base? And couldn’t that morale boost lead to a more relaxed at bat the next time he steps to the plate?

Some things just make sense. But what do I know?

[Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.]

As I look back over my 48 years as a Yankee fan — I can pinpoint the date of indoctrination, August 29, 1977 — there can be no question that most enjoyable era was the late 90s and early 2000s, but what’s interesting to me is that the postseason runs and World Series championships aren’t the only highlights. What really stands out in my memory are the games against the Boston Red Sox.

Because I was geographically removed from the Yankees out here on the West Coast, my knowledge of the rivalry came from books about the 1940s and ’50s and all the stories I learned about Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams. I remember watching the playoff game in 1978 and celebrating Bucky Dent’s home run, but in my eight-year-old mind it was just a dramatic win to move my team forward in the playoffs; I didn’t feel the thrill of watching a rival go down in defeat.

But then when the Yankees entered their golden era in the 1990s, pulling the Red Sox along with them, I finally understood. Every game during those days was theater, with villains in every corner of Fenway Park. When I took the family to see a game at the Old Stadium during its final year, I happened to be standing at a souvenir stand looking at a television screen showing highlights of a Red Sox win. The fan next to me looked up at the image and said, “Fuckin’ Youkilis.” He looked at me for agreement, but noticed I was holding my three-year-old daughter. “Oh, sorry about that,” he said.

“Oh, don’t worry. I feel exactly the same way. Better she learn it now than later.” (Spoiler alert: that daughter is now a sophomore at Boston University and, because she’s nineteen, loves nothing more than joking about becoming a Red Sox fan.)

So whether it was Pedro or Nomar, Manny or Papi, Varitek or Pedroia, the Red Sox have always had a cast of characters worthy of fear or hatred or both.

These Red Sox? Not so much. But it’s still the Red Sox, and it’s still Fenway Park. Here’s hoping the Yankees get a couple wins this weekend, even if there’s a little less theater than we’re used to.

A recording of Game 5 of the 2025 World Series still sits on my DVR, but not because there’s any danger I’ll ever forget it. The truest words that Yankee manager Aaron Boone has ever spoken came in the aftermath of that game when he emerged bleary eyed from the clubhouse to face the media and answer questions about one of the most shocking defeats in the long postseason history of the greatest franchise in sports.

“As I said to the guys, obviously it stings now. This will sting forever.”

I said something similar to my wife the next day as I was trying to put my life back together. “As long as I live, I will never get over that game last night.”

I could say that confidently because twenty-four years later I still haven’t gotten over Game 7 of the 2001 World Series, and I still wear the scars of the last four games of the 2004 ALCS. Keep in mind, my connection to this organization is measured only by the dozens of Yankee caps I’ve worn over the past 47 years, the seven World Series titles I’ve celebrated, and the thousands of games I’ve watched. This team is a part of me, so obviously losses like these are more than just disappointments.

But I’m at least self-aware enough to know that I don’t really know. I can’t possibly know what it feels like to begin working with a purpose in January, report to spring training in February, ride busses across Florida in March, endure the trials and tribulations of a six-month regular season, and then fight through two playoff rounds in October only to have the journey end in the most inexplicably painful way imaginable.

What I do know is that there are coffee mugs and mouse pads and t-shirts with the FOX chyron from that fateful top of the 5th inning, souvenirs that celebrate one team’s devastating collapse rather than the other’s improbable comeback. I know that I’ve catalogued the comments and asides I’ve gotten from Dodger fan friends and family here in Southern California, each remark innocent in its delivery but cutting nonetheless.

But I can’t know how many times Aaron Judge has thought about that dropped fly ball or how he will feel when he inevitably gets a sarcastic standing ovation before his first at bat at Dodger Stadium on Friday night. I can’t know how often Nestor Cortés has replayed the pitch he threw to Freddie Freeman, or whether or not Gerrit Cole had flashbacks during PFPs in spring training.

Will those demons get in the way during these three games, or will they drive the team to success over the weekend and through the rest of the season? Paul O’Neill frequently reminds us that the white hot brilliance of 1998 might never have happened had it not been for the October disappointment of the year before, so maybe we’ll see something similar this year. Maybe.

But I don’t think we’ll get an answer to that this weekend. Instead we’ll get constant comparisons of Judge and Shohei Ohtani, frequent reminders of last October and some of the more distant Octobers, and breathless predictions of another matchup in this year’s World Series. And we’ll probably get some good baseball.

And me? At some point I’m sure I’ll check my DVR and navigate to the folder titled “L.A. Dodgers @ New York Yankees.” I’ll watch the first inning as Judge hits a rocket into the right field stands and the crowd explodes with relief, I’ll watch Jazz Chisholm follow with a home run of his own, I’ll scan ahead to Stanton’s bomb in the third, and I’ll remember how it all felt. But then I’ll watch the fifth inning, and I’ll wonder what might have been.

[Image Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.]

You bet your ass they do. This game? This series? It’s about a lot more than the meeting of two first places teams with eyes towards the World Series. This is the Yankees and the Mets and a three-game series in the Bronx that promises to be sizzling all weekend.

Say what you will about Shohei Ohtani and his World Champion Los Angeles Dodgers, but they won’t play a single regular season series with the voltage of these three games in New York. Trust me. I live roughly half way between Dodger Stadium and Angels Stadium, and I don’t even notice when the Dodgers and Angels hook up. Dodgers vs. Giants only really matters in San Francisco, and while the Dodgers-Padres rivalry is blossoming, it’ll be another decade or so before people pay attention outside of the 619 area code.

But these three games in Gotham? They’re gonna be different.

Oh, and look at me burying the lede. There’s this guy named Juan Soto who plays for the Mets. If there’s one thing we can count on tonight, it’s that he’ll be booed mercilessly. The Bleacher Creatures had best hurry their way through the Roll Call in the top of the first, because once Soto climbs into the batter’s box, every pair of eyes in the Stadium will be trained on #22, and every set of lungs will be erupting in anger.

The Yankee haters around the country will shake their heads at entitled Yankee fans who expect every great player to want to play in pinstripes, but that’s not the problem. I could never begrudge a player’s decision to sign with the highest bidder (and unlike so many fans I don’t blame Hal Steinbrenner for drawing a financial line just a few million dollars south of the moon), but I still haven’t forgiven Soto for the manner in which he left.

The last time we saw him on our side of the field, the Dodgers were only midway through their first case of champagne and Soto was announcing that he was a free agent available to any of the thirty teams in baseball. He dutifully read from Scott Boras’s script, ignorant of the salt he was pouring into millions of open wounds. And so I’m sure he’ll be booed like few other opposing players ever have in Yankee Stadium. (Oh, and I think we can also bank “We’ve Got Grisham!” chants echoing through the park at some point, which would be nice.)

Will any of this bother Soto? Probably not. He seems to have pulled out of his early season funk, and the moment will be right, so I expect him to respond with a big series and at least two or three home runs. The question will be whether or not Yankee pitchers can limit the rest of the potent Mets lineup, and whether or not the other New York team can manage a Yankee offense that’s looking more and more like the best in baseball.

And just so I don’t finish this piece without mentioning it, Aaron Judge is pretty, pretty, pretty good.

All of this together makes for the most anticipated regular season series since the hey day of the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry in the early aughts. And I can’t wait.

Let’s go, Yank-ees!

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Aaron Judge is unlike anything we’ve seen before. In recent years people have begun to describe unique athletes like Judge as unicorns, a practice that’s become so common that now we’ve got an actual herd of unicorns galloping across the sports landscape. But in the baseball world, there’s Aaron Judge, and then there’s everyone else. (Okay, okay. Shohei Ohtani is probably the ultimate unicorn, an alien unicorn, but let me know the next time he puts on a glove.)

In Judge’s rookie season of 2017 he hit 52 home runs on his way to winning the Rookie of the Year and a questionable second-place finish in the MVP voting. He hit .284 that season, and he followed that with batting averages of .278, .272, .257, and .287 while hitting 27, 27, 9, and 39 home runs. That debut season seemed like a bit of an anomaly, but the waters he had settled into seemed just fine. He was the type of middle-of-the-lineup presence that a team could build around for years to come. Every team in baseball would be happy to have a player who could hit thirty to forty home runs while batting .275, even if it came along with a boatload of strikeouts.

And then 2022 happened. The American League record 62 home runs leap off the page, but Judge led the league in almost every batting statistic that matters, coming just five percentage points away from a batting title that would’ve earned not just the Triple Crown, but the ultra rare Triple Triple Crown (leading the league in runs, home runs, RBI, batting average, on base percentage, slugging percentage, OPS, walks, and total bases). It was an otherworldly season.

And then 2024 happened. Judge hit only 58 home runs, but he was arguably even better at the plate than he had been two years earlier, producing possibly the greatest single season of any right-handed batter in history, and he won his second unanimous MVP award.

This year, just for fun, he’s hitting .415 though 25 games. Hitting over .400 for any twenty-five game stretch is pretty impressive, but to do so while also leading the league in essentially everything else is absolutely ridiculous.

As Yankee fans we were blessed to watch Mariano Rivera, the greatest closer of all time, for nineteen years. It’s quite possible that fifteen years from now we’ll realize that we just finished watching the greatest right fielder of all-time also. So pay attention. You’ll want to tell your grandchildren all about it.

[Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.]

So did anything happen of note in Yankeeland during the off season? Let’s see…

First there was Juan Soto. I think I knew it was coming while I was sitting on the couch shortly after the Yankees’ self-destruction in the final game of the World Series. As the Dodgers were celebrating on the Yankee Stadium infield, I told my wife (a passive Dodger fan who grew up in a Dodger household thirty minutes from Dodger Stadium) that I would never get over that loss. Twenty minutes later manager Aaron Boone would share that he’d told the team, “This stings, and it will always sting.” Twenty minutes after that — and after we had heard from one devastated Yankee after another — Juan Soto looked into the cameras and, presumably with suffering teammates standing within earshot, announced that he was a free agent available to all thirty teams.

The timing of an announcement that only told us what everyone already knew was worse than salt in the fresh wound. We know that baseball is a business, but it was telling that Soto couldn’t even respect the moment. It was akin to standing up at your grandmother’s funeral and asking when the will would be read. So even though I was disappointed when he signed with the Mets a few weeks later, I was neither surprised by his decision nor bothered that the Yankees had allowed themselves to be outbid. Is it petty that I can’t wait to hear the boos the first time he returns to the Stadium? Perhaps.

But then there was Max Fried, Cody Bellinger, and Paul Goldschmidt. It was a free agent haul reminiscent of 2008 when C.C. Sabathia, Mark Teixeira, and A.J. Burnett arrived in the Bronx, and when reliever Devon Williams was added via trade, optimism was high. The Yankees suddenly had one of the best starting staffs in baseball, a dominant bullpen, a much improved defense, and perhaps a more balanced offense. They were the overwhelming favorites in the American League, and even though the Dodgers were playing with Monopoly money and creating a team that appears significantly better than their 2024 version, I still felt great about the Yankees’ chances at improving on last season’s result.

But then.

Gerrit Cole was scratched from a spring training start because he wasn’t feeling right, and I was mildly concerned. The team announced that he was flying north for tests, and I was more than a little nervous. After they got those test results back and that announced Cole was seeking other opinions, I knew the worst was coming. When everyone finally admitted that Cole would need Tommy John surgery and miss the 2025 season, the news came just a week or so after we heard that last year’s Rook of the Year, Luís Gil, would miss at least three months with an arm injury of his own, and just a week or so before we’d learn that Giancarlo Stanton, inexplicably, had tennis elbow in both elbows and would also begin the year on the injured list.

It was a lot.

The Yankees take the field in just a few hours, and even with all of the injuries, I’m still looking forward to the season. We’ll get to watch Aaron Judge again, we’ll finally get to see a full season of Jasson Domínguez, the star we’ve been wishing on for seven years now, and we’ll get to watch the continued development of Anthony Volpe and Austin Wells. We’ll get to watch baseball. Oh, and like it or not, there will be beards.

Let’s go, Yankees!

[Image Courtesy of WikiMedia Commons]

The greatness of Rickey Henderson was undeniable, even if it took baseball people longer than you’d think to recognize that Rickey could do more than just run. The Man of Steal burst on the scene with the Oakland Athletics not just by stealing more bases than anyone had before him, but by stealing more bases than anyone had thought possible. He bent reality in the way that only the greatest players can, but because people are the way they are, his early achievements were viewed from a deficit perspective.

Critics complained that he was selfish, that stolen bases in the ninth inning with his team down by four only tarnished the record, or they claimed that he was incomplete player, never mind the fact that at just 23 years old when he stole a preposterous 130 bases in that 1982 season, Rickey also scored 119 runs and led the league with 116 walks. The year before he had won a Gold Glove.

His greatest years, however, were still ahead of him. After being traded to the Yankees prior to the 1985 season, he thrived on the biggest stage in the game, becoming the only player in our lifetime to score more runs (146) than games played (143) while stealing 80 bases and slashing .314/.419/.516 only to lose the MVP to teammate Don Mattingly. Rickey would eventually get his MVP five years later after his return to Oakland when he stole 65 bases while hitting 28 home runs with a staggering 1.016 OPS.

How good was he? Without question, he was the greatest leadoff hitter of all-time. Bill James, the godfather of statistical analysis, once said that Rickey was so good that if you could split him into two players, you’d still have two Hall of Famers. (Here’s a discussion about that.)  To that point, if we disregard his slugging numbers and his 3,055 career hits and focus on the true through-line of his career, the stolen base, the numbers are mind boggling.

• His 1,406 career stolen bases is just one steal shy of being a full 50% better than Lou Brock’s second place total of 938. For perspective on that, the top four active stolen base leaders (Starling Marte, José Altuve, Trea Turner, and José Ramírez) have a total of 1,480 steals.
• During the twelve-year stretch from 1980-1991, Henderson led baseball in steals eleven times.
• Seven years after the end of that run, in 1998, Rickey again led baseball with 66 stolen bases for the San Diego Padres at the age of 39.

The statistics eventually become mind-numbing, but the true measure of any legend lies in the mythology that grows up around them. Did Rickey really frame his first million dollar check rather than cash it? (Yes, but still got the money.) Did he really tell Jon Olerud that he had once had a teammate who also wore his helmet in the field, forgetting that the former teammate was actually Jon Olerud? (No, but it’s a good story.)

Everyone in Rickey’s orbit had a good story to tell, even me. I collected baseball cards growing up, and when the hobby exploded in the 1980s, I began going to card shows, not just to grow my collection but to collect autographs. Rickey Henderson was a guest at a card convention in the spring of 1986 during his second year with the Yankees, so I drove down to the freeway so I could pay ten or twenty dollars for the autograph of one my favorite players.

Most of the players who appeared at events like this simply churned out one signature after another, earning their appearance fee by mindlessly repeating autographs on balls, bats, and photos for an hour or two. They were often bored or disinterested, sometimes surly and dismissive. Rickey was none of these things. He had far too much energy to be trapped in a folding chair behind a plastic table, and his eyes darted around the room, taking in everything, but connecting with no one.

When I finally made my way to the front of the line, Rickey’s eyes stopped on mine. We were in Orange County in the mid ’80s. If the world outside that hotel was predominantly white, that said nothing about the demographics of the hall we were in that afternoon. It’s likely that Rickey and I were the only two Black people in the room, and Rickey’s darting eyes were keenly aware of that. He took one look at me, extended his hand and said — and I will never forget this — “What’s happenin, soul brother?”

I was sixteen years old, filled with the typical insecurities of adolescence, but because I had spent my life growing up in places like Naperville, Illinois, and Irvine, California, I had never been comfortable in my own skin simply because that skin wasn’t the same color as the kids at school or the people in my neighborhoods. I was different, and it would be years before that discomfort would go away.

Rickey could never have known any of this, but he saw me. I didn’t quite know what to make of it in that moment, but it’s something that’s stayed with me in the three decades since. When I heard the news that Rickey had passed, appropriately dying the same year his Oakland A’s did, I eventually thought about the afternoon in Oakland when two friends and I sat in the right field bleachers and watched Rickey grab his 939th stolen base, but my first reaction was to think back to that day at the card show when a legend reached out and connected with me.

I wouldn’t be a Yankee fan were it not for the Kansas City Royals.

In the summer of 1977 when I was almost eight years old, my family drove from Detroit to New York City for a vacation in the Big Apple. We saw dinosaurs at the Museum of Natural History, walked in Central Park, and went to the top of the Empire State Building. All the stuff. But the highlight of the trip came on the day when my parents let me choose what to do. I was a huge baseball fan, so I asked them to take me to a baseball game.

The Yankees were playing the Royals that day. Catfish Hunter got the start, and Chris Chambliss hit a three-run home run in the bottom of the eighth to give the Yankees a 5-3 lead that turned into a win when Sparky Lyle finished things up in the ninth. I hadn’t yet forged any bonds with the Tigers, so the die was cast that afternoon. I’d be a Yankee fan for life.

This matchup with the Royals in the ALDS is bringing up all kinds of memories, and not just my own. The game-winning home run that I witnessed wasn’t the first time Chambliss had broken Kansas City hearts. Just the year before he had led off the bottom of the ninth with the game tied in the decisive fifth game of the American League Championship Series and struck one of the most memorable home runs in Yankee history, sending the Bronx into bedlam — actual bedlam — and sending the Yankees to the World Series.

That playoff loss was the first of three straight the Royals suffered at the hands of the Yankees, one of which famously left Kansas City shortstop Freddie Patek crying in the dugout.

But revenge for the Royals would eventually come when they served me the first heartbreak of my Yankee life. After dropping the first two games of the 1980 ALCS, the Yankees took a 2-1 lead into the bottom of the seventh at Yankee Stadium. Tommy John got the first two outs, but after he yielded a double to Willie Wilson, John was lifted for Rich Gossage, hopefully for a seven-out save. But Gossage give up a single to U.L. Washington and then this happened.

As if that weren’t enough, then we had the Pine Tar Game three years later. All of this contributed to what was, for a time, the greatest rivalry in baseball. You don’t think so? Ask George Brett. Still don’t think so? Watch this absolutely insane clip from Game 5 of the 1977 ALCS.

This week’s matchup with the Royals might not include all this drama, but then again it might. Buckle up, everyone, and Let’s Go, Yankees!

I really don’t care that the Orioles celebrated their playoff clinching in the Bronx, and I only marginally care that Gleyber Torres continues to remind me of perhaps my favorite Aaron Boone quote of all time. (Name that quote in the comments for extra credit.)

Here’s the one thing I truly care about — the Yankees will clinch tonight. Book it!

[Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons]

With just nineteen games left to play, the American League East, inexplicably, is still completely up for grabs as the Yankees and the Orioles are locked in the most polite game of musical chairs you’ve ever seen, with each team standing back and doing its best to usher the other into the lone chair remaining. There’s been some good news recently from the Yankees, with the return of Luís Gil and Clarke Schmidt from the injured list and the return to form of Gerrit Cole, but with each step forward comes a step back. Aaron Judge has been wearing a Kryptonite necklace for the past two weeks, Clay Holmes has finally lost his closer job, and Alex Verdugo is still playing left field instead of Jasson Domínguez.

So what will these next nineteen games bring? Pull up a chair, and let’s find out.

Whatever happens over the next five weeks and hopefully more, please take a minute to appreciate something we might never see again, or, more optimistically, something we’ll be watching for the next ten years. There’s been nothing in my lifetime quite like the combination of Juan Soto and Aaron Judge, two otherworldly talents hitting back to back in the order. I once wondered what it would’ve been like to watch Ruth and Gehrig every day, and now I know. It’s pretty, pretty, pretty good.

[Photo Credit: WikimediaCommons]