![]() Entering Friday night’s slate of games, the Yankees - who are in Fenway Park to take on the Boston Red Sox - as a team hit 141 dingers, 14 more than the team with the second most in all of baseball. But of that, chances are said to be less than great.The New York Yankees have earned the best record in baseball this season in large part because their lineup of small and power forwards launch balls into the second deck with regularity. The only way the Yankees are going to get the overhaul they need is through a massive haul on the summer trade market, preferably through a deal for Shohei Ohtani. There is, of course, no going back for a mulligan. In equal measure with his supreme talent came a tendency for serious injuries, which the Yankees didn't need in a rotation where Severino and Montas already presented injury risks. Rodón's deal, meanwhile, was simultaneously impossible to hate yet hard to embrace. Ditto for merely adding the oft-injured Tommy Kahnle to a bullpen that really struggled under the weight of Clay Holmes' decline after the All-Star break-which, by the way, is ongoing. 232/.291/.360 (h/t Mike Axisa of ) in the second half of 2022, so re-signing him and Anthony Rizzo and leaving it at that was an unforced error. Yankee hitters not named Judge batted a combined. Enough to make even Patrick Mahomes blush.īut the execution? Yeah, there's fault to find there. Boosted by a $360 million contract for Judge and a $162 million pact with Rodón, the Yankees claimed the top of the free-agent spending leaderboard with $574.5 million in total expenses. The Yankees needed a big offseason centered around re-signing Judge, but also consisting of bringing on new blood. The way forward after that series was daunting, yet clear. They've scored fewer than five runes 22 times already, second to only the Miami Marlins. In going from 4.98 runs per game in 2022 to 3.94 this year, the Yankees are suffering through the most dramatic drop in scoring of any team in the league. Really, anything but the offense they have. Offense worthy of the "Bronx Bombers" moniker. Now more than ever, what the Yankees need is offense. Though Nestor Cortes' early struggles are also a factor, that figure helps explain why the Yankees are 7-0 on days when Gerrit Cole starts and 10-15 on everyone else's days. ![]() In their place are Clarke Schmidt, Jhony Brito and Domingo Germán, who have a 5.21 ERA between them. The three injured starters posted a combined 3.35 ERA last season. Specifically sans Carlos Rodón, Luis Severino and Frankie Montas-whose returns aren't nigh. Though reigning AL MVP Aaron Judge and fellow MVPs Giancarlo Stanton and Josh Donaldson loom large on the Yankees' IL, just as consequential are all the pitchers they're missing out on right now. That's more than 11 teams spent on IL-bound players in all of 2022. ![]() Indeed, really the only things the Yankees lead the league in are cumulative injured list days and $20.2 million spent on players while they've been on the IL. It's also not exactly a secret that the Yankees don't have the appropriate tires for the rough road ahead right now. ![]() Of the Yankees' next 29 games, seven are against the Rays and 13 more are against the Toronto Blue Jays, Baltimore Orioles, San Diego Padres and Los Angeles Dodgers. Difficulty ratings for the Yankees' remaining slate range from tough to very tough, and the tough customers aren't far down the road. The schedule won't provide handholds out of this hole. 28 or a second straight AL East title, their odds of achieving their goals are down significantly. And whether we're talking about World Series championship No. 500, the Yankees are further out of first place (9.0 GB) now than they were the last time they were in the AL East cellar this late in the season ( 6.0 GB in 2016). To essentially rephrase what Boone was hearing on Wednesday, here's our counterpoint: no. Don't count us out"- Brian Cashman /Sw4ktLlLmx
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