River Avenue Blues

Can’t stop won’t stop. The Yankees won their sixth straight game Saturday, this time erasing three separate Tampa Bay leads to earn a 5-4 walk-off win over the Rays. Two walk-offs in three days. I like it. That’s six straight wins and eight wins in the last nine games.

Three-Plus & Fly
In all likelihood this was Caleb Smith’s last start for a while, and that’s good, because the Yankees can’t keep running him out there hoping he makes it through five inning and being satisfied if he makes it through four. He’s yet to do that in either of his two starts. Smith lasted three innings plus one out Saturday, allowing two runs on three hits and three walks. I know the kid has been in a show for like ten minutes, but getting this little length every fifth day can’t last.

Smith put the Yankees in a quick 1-0 hole two pitches in the game thanks to a Peter Bourjos solo homer. Peter Bourjos! He’s hit five home runs this season and two have come against the Yankees. The Rays scored their second run in the third inning with a pretty weak rally. Jesus Sucre singled to center, Steven Souza Jr. reached on an infield single that hit a leaping Didi Gregorius in the glove, and Evan Longoria drew a walk. A long Lucas Duda sac fly scored the run. Smith escaped further damage thanks to a great barehand play by Todd Frazier at third.

Through two starts and one relief appearance Smith has allowed eight runs and 17 baserunners in ten innings, and that ain’t good. The second time through the order continues to be a problem. Smith has a lively arm, so it would be silly to write him off, but at this point the Yankees need someone better to take the ball every fifth day. Given where the team is in the standings and their resources (money and prospects), odds are the Yankees will get someone better before Monday’s trade deadline.

Three Rallies
Three times the Yankees came from behind Saturday. The Bourjos solo homer was answered by a Gregorius sac fly in the second inning. Gary Sanchez got a good luck ground ball double — it blooped juuust inside the right field line — and moved to third on Matt Holliday’s ground ball to set Didi up for the sac fly. The Duda sac fly was answered with a Sanchez solo homer in the fourth. From 1-0 to 1-1 to 2-1 to 2-2. All tied.

The Rays took their third lead of the game in the fifth inning, when Souza managed to keep a high fly ball just fair for a solo home run against Adam Warren. It was about four seats fair and two rows deep. Not a majestic blast at all. A solo homer is a solo homer though, and that solo homer gave Tampa a 3-2 lead. The teams alternated one run in each of the first five innings. It made for a neat little line score early on.

It wasn’t until the sixth inning that the Yankees took their first lead of the game. Blake Snell has pretty nasty stuff and he did a good job getting New York to chase fastballs upstairs, breaking balls in the dirt, and changeups away. He allowed a hard-hit single to Holliday to start the sixth — it would have been a double for even an average runner — and popped up Gregorius for the first out to end his afternoon.

Rays skipper Kevin Cash went to righty slider machine Sergio Romo against righty Garrett Cooper, who Joe Girardi immediately lifted for pinch-hitter Chase Headley. Righties against Romo this season: .235/.293/.512 (.334 wOBA). Lefties against Romo this season: .316/.458/.526 (.412 wOBA). Pinch-hitting was an oh so obvious move, and it couldn’t have worked out better. Headley smacked a go-ahead two-run home run. Opposite field!

As good as Headley has been the last few weeks, he has not been hitting for power at all, which is especially crummy because pretty much everyone can hit for power in 2017. Saturday’s home run was Headley’s first since June 13th, the middle game of the three-game series in Anaheim. He’d hit one (1) home run in his previous 317 plate appearances coming into the game. Good gravy. The timely home run gave New York a 4-3 lead.

Asking Too Much From The Bullpen
An effective but hardly dominant day for the bullpen. Warren was the first reliever used and he allowed just the Souza homer in his 1.2 innings. He handed the ball to Dellin Betances for the sixth. Yes, Dellin in the sixth. Has he been demoted? My guess is no. Girardi was using him against the 4-5-6 hitters with the Yankees down a run. I like it. Betances walked Duda, the first batter he faced, on four pitches because of course. He retired the next three hitters with ease though.

With Dellin throwing the sixth, Tommy Kahnle came in for the seventh, and he looked human for the first time as a Yankee. Mallex Smith singled back up the middle and pinch-hitter Logan Morrison singled to right, giving the Rays runners on the corners with one out. The Yankees were up 4-3 at the time. Kahnle escaped that jam with a strikeout (Souza) and a foul pop-up (Longoria). Things got a little hairy there for a second, but the lead was preserved.

David Robertson handled the eighth inning and he hung the hell out of curveball to Duda, who swatted it off the facing of the right field upper deck for his second home run in two games with the Rays. The solo homer tied the game 4-4. That’s a shame. Robertson got through the rest of the inning unscathed, which set up Aroldis Chapman for the ninth, and once again, the Rays threatened. They had baserunner in every inning against the bullpen.

Souza was on first base with two outs in the ninth inning when Chapman picked him off. Had him caught between first and second. Headley’s throw to second was a little off line, forcing Gregorius to reach out, then swipe behind his back for the tag. His arm hit the sliding Souza right in the chest and knocked the ball loose. No only was the out not recorded, but Souza was able to scamper to third. Fortunately Longoria fouled out to end the inning.

The bullpen: 5.2 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 6 K. Pretty good, but not dominant. Warren allowed the Rays to take the lead and Robertson allowed them to tie it. The Yankees can’t keep asking these guys for this much length every five days though. It worked in Smith’s previous start — they had the benefit of an off-day the next day that time — and it worked in this game. Hopefully this is the end of it.

Walked Off
The game-winning rally in the ninth could not have been any more gift-wrapped. All the Rays needed to do was put a bow on it. Brad Boxberger faced three batters and all three reached base while hitting the ball a combined 70 feet or so. Headley drew a leadoff walk and was immediately replaced by pinch-runner Jacoby Ellsbury, who stole second. Didn’t matter though. Frazier took a pitch to the ribs as the next batter.

Ronald Torreyes, very predictably, squared around to bunt with two on and no outs. We all knew it was coming and that was 100% the right play. I say that as an anti-bunt guy. You only need one run in that situation to win the game. Torreyes laid the bunt down and … Boxberger ran around it. Everyone was safe. It was very weird. Between that and the Tim Beckham-Adeiny Hechavarria screw up on Sanchez’s game-tying single the other night, I’d be pretty aggravated if I were a Rays fan. Just sloppy, sloppy play.

With the bases loaded and no outs, all Brett Gardner had to was get a ball to the medium deep outfield to score Ellsbury from third. He did one better and singled up the middle to win the game. Brett’s second walk-off hit in three days. Each of his last three walk-off hits have come against the Rays. That hit also extended his hitting streak to eleven games. He’s 16-for-48 (.333) with two doubles, one triple, and four homers in those eleven games. Yup.

Leftovers
No contact day for Aaron Judge, who went 0-for-3 with a walk and three strikeouts. He’s gone 9-for-53 (.170) with 21 strikeouts in 15 games since the All-Star break. I’m not worried though. He’ll figure it out, hopefully soon. Clint Frazier went 0-for-4 with a strikeout. Pretty wild that Frazier and Judge did nothing, and the Yankees still had a young stud slugger swat a double and a homer (Sanchez).

Two hits each for Sanchez, Holliday, and Torreyes. Holliday’s sixth inning single, the would-be double for a good runner, was easily his hardest hit ball in a while. It was the first ball he hit out of the infield since Tuesday. His first single was a ground ball with eyes. The Yankees really need Holliday to right the ship. With any luck, Saturday’s game will help build some confidence going forward.

Box Score, WPA Graph & Standings
Head over to ESPN for the box score and updated standings, and MLB.com for the video highlights. FanGraphs has the bullpen workload information until I get my Google sign-in issues solved. Here’s the win probability graph:

Source: FanGraphs

Up Next
The Yankees will go for the four-game sweep Sunday afternoon. That’s another 1pm ET start. Rookies Jordan Montgomery and Jacob Faria will be on the mound. Want to catch the series finale live? Check out RAB Tickets.

Welcome back to first place. Friday night’s 6-1 win over the Rays combined with the Red Sox losing the Royals moved the Yankees back into the top spot in the AL East. It’s only a half-game lead (two in the loss column), but being in first place is better than not being in first place. The Yankees have won five straight ballgames. This winning stuff is fun, isn’t it?

TanaKKKKKKKKKKKKKKa
In his first two starts of the season against the Rays, Masahiro Tanaka allowed 13 runs on 17 hits in 5.2 total innings. On Friday night, Tanaka went 5.2 innings before allowing his first baserunner. He struck out the first five and seven of the first nine batters he faced, and it wasn’t until Adeiny Hechavarria found a hole with a ground ball that Tampa had a runner reach base. Seventeen up, seventeen down to start the game.

Tanaka was on cruise control all night. He did not have a single stressful inning — Tanaka struck out Mallex Smith to end the inning after Hechavarria’s two-out single — and only three of the 26 batters he faced hit the ball hard. Hechavarria on his fifth inning single, Corey Dickerson on his sixth inning line out to left field, and Lucas Duda on his seventh inning solo home run inside the right field foul pole. Stupid solo homers. The Yankees were up 5-0 at the time, so no big deal.

The biggest difference between Tanaka on Friday and Tanaka most of the rest of the season? The quality of his slider. Seven of his career high 14 strikeouts came on sliders, plus he got two ground balls and a pop-up with the pitch. Tanaka threw 43 sliders Friday. Here are the pitch locations, via Baseball Savant. Tanaka did a great job getting that slider down and to the gloveside.

Over his last nine starts now Tanaka has a 3.28 ERA (3.31 FIP) with 74 strikeouts and only nine walks in 56.2 innings. That’s awfully close to the 3.07 ERA (3.51 FIP) guy we saw last season. The home runs are still an annoying problem (1.59 HR/9 in those 56.2 innings), but as long as they’re solo shots, Tanaka and the Yankees will live. Welcome back, good Masahiro Tanaka. It’s nice to have you around.

The Baby Bombers Are Growing Up Fast
Back-to-back home runs by Brett Gardner. He ended Thursday night’s game with a walk-off home run and started Friday night’s game with a leadoff home run. That is pretty darn cool. Not as rare as you may think though! Gardner is only the second player this season to do the walk-off homer/leadoff homer thing. George Springer did it back in April. Still pretty neat. Just like that, the Yankees had a quick 1-0 lead.

A leadoff home run is always appreciated, and since Austin Pruitt came into this game with a 6.25 ERA (3.31 FIP!), it was easy to think more runs were on the way. And they were, but not right away. Pruitt retired ten straight after Gardner’s leadoff homer. It wasn’t until the fourth inning that the Yankees got on the board again. Pruitt busted Aaron Judge inside with a fastball and got him to foul it off for strike too. Pruitt tried it again and Judge hit it into the left field seats for a solo home runs and a 2-0 lead.

In the fifth, the Yankees broke the game open. Todd Frazier drew a one-out walk, Brett Gardner drew a two-out walk, and Clint Frazier annihilated an 89 mph middle-middle fastball for a three-run home run. Here’s the video. Listen to this damn thing:

The ball makes a special sound off Frazier’s bat. That kid’s bat speed and power is no joke. Pitch velocity: 88.9 mph. Exit velocity: 111.0 mph. Home run distance: 455 feet. Frazier after the game: “I almost overran first because I was watching it a little too long.” Hell yeah.

The 455-foot blast was the sixth longest homer by a Yankee this season and third longest by someone other than Judge. Only Matt Holliday (459) and Ji-Man Choi (456) have hit longer homers among non-Judge Yankees. Two solo homers plus one three-run homer equals a 5-0 lead through five. Between the pitching and the dingers, this was pretty much the perfect game.

Leftovers
Didi Gregorius extended his hitting streak to ten games with an eighth inning single, which drove in his team’s sixth run of the game. Gardner was hit by a pitch and Gary Sanchez was intentionally walked earlier in the inning. Gardner scored on the single and Sanchez was thrown out at the plate, though it was a bang-bang play. Would’ve been more annoying had the Yankees not been up by five.

Gardner (homer, walk, hit-by-pitch) and Sanchez (single, intentional walk) were the only Yankees to reach base multiple times. The young Frazier, Judge, and Gregorius had base hits and the old Frazier drew a walk. The 6-7-8-9 hitters went a combined 0-for-11 with one walk and six strikeouts. Yikes. That includes and 0-for-3 with two strikeouts for Holliday, who continue to looks completely lost.

David Robertson was the only reliever used. He retired all three batters he faced in the ninth inning on six pitches, and even squeezed a strikeout in there. Robertson’s pitch counts in his five appearances back with the Yankees, all full innings: 13, 13, 10, 7, 6. I guess he learned how to be efficient in Chicago?

Box Score, WPA Graph & Standings
ESPN has the box score and updated standings while MLB.com has the video highlights. I’m having some Google problems, so head to FanGraphs for the bullpen workload for the time being. Here’s the win probability graph:

Source: FanGraphs

Up Next
The Yankees and Rays continue this four-game series Saturday afternoon at 1pm ET. It’s not one of those weird 4pm ET starts, thankfully. Lefties Caleb Smith and Blake Snell are the scheduled starting pitchers. There are five games left on the homestand and RAB Tickets can get you in the door to any and all of them.