The plot of the Yankees’ game Saturday was borrowed from those movies through which a plane that has been presumed lost suddenly materializes and lands while missing passengers stream off the aircraft no worse for the damage from the experience.
When NYY27 touched down in The Bronx after having spent weeks in parts unknown, lo and behold there was Giancarlo Stanton and there was Josh Donaldson and there was DJ LeMahieu and there, surprise, surprise, was the offense. They spit out eight hits, five for extra bases, including three home runs, in a 6-3 victory over the Cubs.
It might have seemed sort of an unusual hazy, lazy day of summer except it was anything but. The Yankees had been limited to 14 hits — three for extra bases — over the course of the three-game losing streak they toted into Saturday. It was anything but unusual for a team whose production has been scraping the underside of the AL barrel since Aaron Judge went down in Los Angeles on June 3.
Did someone say barrel? Stanton sure did when he blasted Drew Smyly’s 1-0 sinker into orbit with two out in the underside of the primary, sending the ball crashing into the façade of the third deck on the Stadium, 447 feet away. It had an exit velocity of 118.1 mph that made it the third-hardest-hit ball of the MLB season behind ones hit by Matt Olson (118.6) and Jake Burger (118.2).
“I’ve never seen anything prefer it,” said Gerrit Cole, who was masterful through 7 ¹/₃ innings of three-hit ball before he bumped into trouble within the seventh.
“I’ve never seen anything prefer it,” said Aaron Boone, the manager.
“Through the years I’ve got some good ones, but that was pretty nice,” said Stanton. “It was good to place us up.”
The Yankees (49-41) have one game to go before the All-Star break and are tied with the Blue Jays for the last AL wild-card spot. Cole has been an ace. Carlos Rodon’s performance Friday in his debut in pinstripes provides hope for a rotation that has been held together through the primary half by bailing wire, chewing gum and Cole.
“He’s one in all the sport’s greats. He’s been a rock, a model of consistency for us,” Boone said of Cole, who heads to Seattle with a probability to begin for the American League All-Star team after a 9-2 (2.85 ERA) first half. “He’s an incredible, great pitcher.”
But even when the rotation spins, the Yankees won’t go anywhere meaningful if the massive names packing the lineup proceed to sputter, and that applies whether or not Judge is in a position to provide meaningful at-bats for the club down the stretch. There’s nowhere to cover for the center of the order that has put up ghastly numbers in Judge’s absence.
Stanton, in his sixth 12 months as a Yankee, has left as light an imprint on the landscape as humanly possible for a fellow who goes 6-foot-6, 245 kilos. He has shown flashes of unusual power, but they’ve been obscured by his repetitive and lengthy stays on the injured list. He has too often been an afterthought.
“He’s as unique as they arrive,” Boone said of Stanton, who poked one off the right-field foul pole with a person on base within the fifth inning for his second homer of the afternoon to increase the result in 6-1. “You’ve just got to ride through it and when he locks it in he can go for some time.
“That first ball, wow, I’ve never seen that.”
Stanton, who got here off a lengthy stay on the IL throughout the series through which Judge was injured, entered Saturday with a slash line of .151/.240/.256 with two homers and eight RBI since his return. He also had a career-low .656 OPS following last season’s second-half OPS of .582.
“I don’t put more pressure on myself due to Judge,” said Stanton, who was within the outfield (right field) for the twelfth time this 12 months. “It’s nothing to do with that for me. It’s never an absence of effort or an absence of labor.”
Donaldson, included among the many manifest feared missing, had a .130/.215/.406 slash line with six homers and 10 RBI since Judge left the lineup. On Saturday, he crushed his tenth home run into the left-center-field stands for a 2-0 lead within the second. That’s 10 home runs … out of his season total of 14 hits.
“I feel like my at-bats have been there,” said the third baseman, who also got here off a lengthy stay on IL during that fateful series at Dodger Stadium. “I can’t control where the ball goes.”
So Stanton … and Donaldson … and hey, LeMahieu, too, who essentially has fallen off a cliff since he signed his six-year, $90 million contract ahead of the 2021 season, following his first two seasons as a Yankee, through which he posted a .336/.386/.536 slash line. Since then, he has gone .256/.340/.366 while making several trips to the IL.
But Saturday, LeMahieu hit a solid double within the second inning. Baby steps, possibly, but steps nevertheless.
The Missing reappeared on Saturday. It was quite a sight. Possibly they are going to even show up again Sunday.
