by EJ Fagan
October 3, 2024
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NOTE: The following comes from EJ Fagan's substack page and is shared with permission. This was published a few days ago so the stats don't include the last few games.
Please check out EJ's substack page for more great articles.
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I’ve still got my hands full with a newborn, but I still get to watch baseball. Here are a few thoughts ahead of the ALDS. I’ll preview the series more thoroughly when we know which team the Yankees are facing off against, and how their pitching will line up.
The 2024 Yankees are the best playoff team of the Aaron Boone era. That’s a weird thing to say given that they won 100+ games in 2018, 2019 and 2022, but this team feels stronger. The foundation of Soto, Judge and Cole is a lot stronger than the foundation of the 2018-2019 teams, and the 2022 team limped to the finish. Also, the playoff competition is way weaker. I think the Yankees are clear favorites to win the pennant, even if the playoffs are still a crapshoot.
This team lives or dies by Soto and Judge. Soto hit .343/.500/.600 over his last two weeks, which would be impressive had Judge not hit .333/.500/.849. Other than them, only Gleyber Torres and maybe Stanton ended the season hitting well. But having the two best hitters in baseball might be enough, if the Yankees can punish teams for pitching around them.
No lefties, please. Corbin Burnes is a Cy Young contender, but I’d rather that the Yankees face him than the worst lefties in the playoffs. Cole Ragans and Framber Valdez scare the crap out of me, especially in a 5-game series. Pretty much everyone other than the Astros have a bunch of lefty relievers that could make their life hard too. If the Yankees get beat by lefties in the postseason, Brian Cashman deserves a ton of criticism for not finding someone at the trade deadline. As I said at the time, Jazz Chisholm was a great trade, but not necessarily the trade they needed.
Is Austin Wells okay? Wells quietly had an absolutely awful September: .111/.217/.194. Catchers wear down (see Rutschman, Adley), so it shouldn’t be surprising. It’s criminal that the Yankees did not give him a lot more time off during the month to rest. Hopefully the week off will be good for him. The Yankees need a cleanup hitter. They might even want to sub in Chisholm for now.
The bullpen has been quietly elite. Yankee relievers posted a 2.74 ERA over the last two weeks, good for 6th in baseball. Luke Weaver allowed just two runs over his last 19 2/3 innings, in part due to a tweak that added a tick to his fastball. Tim Hill posted a crazy 2.05 ERA as a Yankee despite a sub-4 K/9. Tommy Kahnle posted the lowest ERA of his career. If one more guy steps up (a healthy Cousins, Hamilton, maybe a reinvigorated Holmes), they’ll be good enough for the playoffs.
Oswaldo should play. Rice proved that he has a MLB future by pounding Triple-A pitching after being sent down, but for now Cabrera is the safe pick. His OPS against righties is well over .700 on the season and closer to .800 in the second half. Maybe Rice will find it in the majors, but for now give me the safe pick.
That’s it for now! Let’s hope that the Tigers can knock out of the Astros. (Editor's note - THEY DID!)
The only thing I will predict is that there definitely won't be any sweeps for any of the Yankees post game series. All the games in each series will go either the maximum number of games or one shy of the maximum (4 or 5 in the ALDS, and IF....and only IF.... the Yankees advance, 6 or 7 in the ALCS)
i guess everyone was worried about the Os, because of our head to head record? I feel like they had a couple dominant wins in the first 2 series. overall, i thought we played the Os pretty well. obviously, we played the Royals well also, BUT at this moment, the Royals pitching is SO SO much better than the Os pitching
I mean the Royals just won 2 games and scored a total of 3 runs. will it be that type of games vs NYY also?
for me the whole thing really comes down to Judge. if Judge hits even 75-80% of what he did for most of the season, I believe things are going to go quite well
strangely,…
Bye Bye Brewers! I am noticing a trend. Those "3rd First Place" teams, the first place teams with the worst of the 3 records, who is forced to play in the Wild Card series with no bye....They haven't been faring too well against their low Wild Card opponents.
"It’s criminal that the Yankees did not give him a lot more time off during the month to rest."
And yet the Greek Chorus here demanded Boone's head for starting Trevino as much as he did. They tried a platoon for about 2 weeks (IIRC), and then had Wells play all the games except maybe one a week (again IIRC; I didn't go back to check). So it has to be one or the other (though I certainly respect anyone who said all along Trevino should get more starts; I just don't recall anyone taking that position, though I did support the platoon scheme).
Tim Mayza even pitched well in September and deserves mention with the others. There is even debate right now regarding whether or not the Yankees should leave Marcus Stroman off the ALDS roster in favor of Mayza. "Starters turned Post Season relievers" can also strengthen the bullpen.
Exactly. Austin Wells was likely "worn down" and this week off will do wonders for him. As I mentioned in…