About the Rainout: A Few Thoughts

About the Rainout: A Few Thoughts

By Tim Kabel

August 10, 2024

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The Yankees’ game against the Texas Rangers yesterday was rained out and will be made up today as part of a doubleheader. This is a good time to take a step back and look at the Yankees as a team and see where they are and where they might be headed.

At this point, the Yankees are 68-48 and tied for first place in the American League East. They recently won series against the Red Sox, Phillies, and Blue Jays. They actually swept the Phillies. Then, they turned around and lost two of three to the Angels. In the American League, only the Oakland A's and the Chicago White Sox are worse than the Angels.

The Yankees are a streaky and inconsistent team. They seem to play to the level of their opponent. They can beat the best teams but just as easily lose to the worst teams. After this series against the Rangers, they play the White Sox and the Tigers. They should be able to dominate all three of these teams. Does anyone feel confident that they will?

Unless the Yankees promote players from the minor leagues, this will be the team for the rest of the season. As I have noted before, the Yankees have adopted an approach of relying on the unreliable. At this point, first base is at very least a platoon between Ben Rice and DJ LeMahieu. A lot has been made about the few big games that DJ LeMahieu had in the last week or so. That's great but, he is still batting below .200. Ben Rice has had some ups and downs but, he is a rookie and just when it seems that he's on an upswing, he gets pulled from the lineup. This is yet another example of the way that Aaron Boone mishandles young players. He has done it throughout his tenure with the Yankees and will continue to do so for as long as he is here. There have also been rumblings that Anthony Rizzo will be back soon. My question is: why? He wasn't providing anything before he went on the IL. It will take him a while to get back in the swing of things. It would be much better to play Rice the bulk of the time and let him continue to develop. Aaron Boone will not do that. I guarantee that when Rizzo is ready, first base will become a platoon between Rizzo and LeMahieu with a very occasional Rice sighting.

Second base is being manned by Gleyber Torres, who is moody, petulant, and seemingly unmotivated. His only achievement is in underachieving. He is having a dreadful season. He leads the Major Leagues in errors by a second baseman. In addition to actual errors, he has made numerous misplays and has been sloppy in the field. His base running is abysmal. His hitting is incredibly streaky, as it always has been. Yet, the Yankees are stuck with him because Boone won't play anyone else there. At some point down the stretch or in a playoff game, Gleyber Torres will do something to blow a game. He will fail to hustle or make a ridiculous base running mistake or be daydreaming in the field. He will go 0-12 against the Red Sox, causing the Yankees to lose the series. There is ample evidence to support this theory.

Giancarlo Stanton has struggled since returning from the IL, which many of us predicted he would do. That's what he does. Even when things are going very well for him, he is very streaky. When he has been out of action for a while, it always takes him a significant period of time to get everything In sync. That's why he needed a minor league rehab. He didn't get one and the team is suffering for it. I know people suggested that he could be a “scarecrow” behind Aaron Judge but he's not scaring anyone. With him as the scarecrow, the crows are having a corn festival. Teams are now walking Judge consistently rather than pitching to him. Austin Wells has done a good job adjusting to the clean-up position but, he is a rookie and if no one is producing behind him, it's not overly effective.  I believe that Stanton will remain in a prolonged offensive drought for the foreseeable future and that his most productive days this season have already passed.

Alex Verdugo is another streaky and inconsistent player. He can be good when he's hot but, when he's cold, he is ice cold.

At this point, the Yankees are relying on too many unreliable players in their lineup. Think about it. You have LeMahieu at first, Torres at second, Stanton at DH, Verdugo in leftfield, and Trent Grisham playing very frequently as well. The Yankees as an organization, like to have giveaway days when they give their fans something. Lately they have been giving away outs to the opposition. At this point, the Yankees would be better served by letting Rice play almost every day at first base, benching Torres and if they don't feel that Caleb Durbin or Oswald Peraza are ready to contribute, they should let Oswaldo Cabrera play. He is better defensively than Torres and he's actually hitting better than Torres. He also tries. I guarantee that Cabrera would never malinger or pout the way that Torres does with alarming regularity. As soon as Jasson Dominguez finishes knocking off the rust, he should be up and playing in the outfield every day. That would bring us down to one inconsistent player in either Verdugo or Stanton at DH. One inconsistent player in the lineup is much better than four. However, none of that is likely to happen.

The reason why the Yankees will continue to trot out this lineup that relies on the unreliable is that the manager is the most unreliable one of all. This is Aaron Boone’s seventh season as the Yankees’ manager. He has never made it to a World Series and I doubt he ever will. He has the Yankees poised to collapse or at least to fade down the stretch. We have been over this time and time again. He is not a good manager, and he is horrible at developing young players. He will stick with the tired, worn-out veterans and the team will not win a championship this season. Once Jose Trevino returns from the IL, he will gradually usurp playing time from Austin Wells, which is a mistake. I am willing to bet that before the season ends, you will see a lineup that features LeMahieu, Rizzo, Trevino, Stanton, Torres. and Verdugo. That would be on a day when Boone decides to rest Jazz Chisholm, Jr. and puts LeMahieu at third base. 

Relying on the unreliable is never a good idea but it's what the Yankees will continue to do for the rest of this season. That is because the man filling out the lineup card, despite whimsical notions to the contrary, is Aaron Boone. He is the most unreliable one of all. Actually, let me strike that. Boone is extremely reliable. You can rely on him to make the wrong decision, play the wrong person, bungle a pitching move, or do something to cost the team a victory and yet another chance to play in the World Series. I wonder if there is any truth to the rumor that before the White Sox broke their incredible losing streak, they brought Aaron Boone in to tell the team “it's all right there in front of you.”

On an unrelated matter, the revolving door approach to replacing John Sterling continues. This weekend, Craig Carton, disgraced former WFAN host, will team up with Suzyn Waldman to broadcast the games. Carton has admittedly not watched a single game to its completion this season. He is an arrogant, loudmouth who will simply come into the booth to draw attention to himself. Most concerning, he was frequently extremely unkind to Suzyn Waldman when he co-hosted a show on WFAN. I'm sure she remembers that, and it is not fair to force her to work in such close proximity to someone who maligned her repeatedly. I understand the idea of trying out different people but, this is a bad decision. In the words of Archie Bunker, “it is a new high in lows.” It is spreading the concept of relying on the unreliable to the broadcast booth.