Now these are the Bronx Bombers.
After Monday night's 9-3 shelling of the Rays in Game 1 of the ALDS, the Yankees have scored the most runs and belted the most home runs over a team’s first three playoff games in MLB history. They also became the first club to hit grand slams in back-to-back postseason games, and the oft-chided Giancarlo Stanton, who has been the most expensive ornament in baseball history, just became the first Yankees DH to blast a grand slam in a playoff game, and has just joined Hank Bauer and Aaron Judge as the only Yanks to belt a homer in each of the first three games of a postseason.
In one of the worst-kept secrets in sports, the Yankees become almost impossible to shut out or shut down if Stanton catches fire. If the above numbers don't impress you or intimidate the rest of the sport, consider this: the Yanks had ten hitters register at least one at-bat, and all ten got a hit. The only Yankee batter to get just one hit sans scoring a run or adding a walk was Luke Voit, who is their best power hitter and led the majors in homers.
So what gives? Why are these Yankees doing what they couldn't last year? While they pounded the Twins in 2019, that's become an ugly, yearly ritual, but they only scored more than four runs just once in last year's seven-game ALCS - in Game 1. Yet, these Bombers are bombing the best arms in the sport – adding Blake Snell, the 2018 AL Cy Young winner, to a list that includes Cleveland’s Shane Bieber, who is sure to moonwalk to the AL Cy Young this year.
The Yanks looked funky during a few points of this season, but it's hard to win big-league baseball games, even for the Yankees. Add the pandemic that has rocked the planet and whacked 100 games off this season's schedule, the chain-gang protocols that come with it, and the specter of a cancelled season lurking every time a player tests positive for the coronavirus, and you can get it.
As Kevin Cash, the wonderful, wildly underrated manager of the Rays, said Monday, the Yankees haven't been at full strength for most of the season – and what we saw in Game 1 was an offense in full.
The rotation is still a variable. While their relievers were fabulous in Game 1 - three pitchers gave up zero hits in three innings - Gerrit Cole is the only starter who can always get the ball to the bullpen after the sixth inning. Masahiro Tanaka has looked unusually vulnerable, and JA Happ, Jordan Montgomery, and Game 2 starter Deivi Garcia aren't exactly the 1971 Orioles. Not to mention the Rays trot out Tyler Glasnow and Charlie Morton after Snell.
There's a reason the Rays pummeled the pinstripers to the tune of an 8-2 record over ten games: they are that good, and strolled to the AL East crown. They also won four more games than the Yankees despite a $28 million payroll, or 700 grand per win. The Yankees spent $113 million on players, or about $3.4 million per win. (Makes you wonder why Bob Melvin has won Manager of the Year three times while Cash has yet to win one.) Only the Marlins, Pirates, and Orioles spent fewer bucks on players.
But as Gregg Giannotti noted Tuesday morning, this is no time for hubris. Though the Yankees look like the best team in the American League, they can drop two games to Tampa at warp speed, and leave them gasping for playoff air – which is exactly what will happen if the team and town get cocky. Remember the Bombers blanked the Astros, 7-0, in Game 1 of last year's ALCS, then lost four of the next five, and watched yet another season float away sans a World Series.
But the good news is that if - and it's a muscular if - the Yanks can squeak by the scrappy Rays, they won't face the death stars they did last year in Justin Verlander and Gerrit Cole, with the former shelved by Tommy John and the latter now on the Yanks.
Maybe the Yankees don't scare teams like they used to, with the sheer force of their name, logo, and history. But they have enough to at least reach the World Series without Aura and Mystique on the payroll. If they lose before then, it's on them.
Follow Jason Keidel on Twitter: @JasonKeidel
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