Things stink right now. The Yankee offense has been present for one game out of the last six, and we’re in the dark about the Max Fried’s potential elbow injury. On top of all that, New York lost a game that it felt like they were never involved in in the first place, managing a single base hit — at least it was a double! — in a 7-0 loss to the Orioles.
I wrote about what I think is wrong with Max Fried in the middle of the game, and it turns out I was wrong and everything is worse! The lefty was experiencing
posterior elbow pain and removed himself from action. He’ll be examined by team doctors today and head back to New York for further imaging tomorrow. This is almost exactly the same process José Caballero went through earlier this week. The key difference is of course that a finger injury is just plainly less worrisome than elbow pain.
I think it’s worthwhile to take this as a moment to remember that so much of the stuff we worry, fester, argue, complain, and speculate about end up being null. We’ve spent the last two weeks wondering what happens with the pitching when Gerrit Cole and Carlos Rodón are fully functional, whether Ryan Weathers or Will Warren go to the bullpen, and well we may have one of the answers presented to us.
Nature may abhor a vacuum but baseball abhors a surplus. The Yankees had too many starting pitchers, or at least they seemed like they would. Now, we’re left in the dark — the club clearly wants Cole to continue to build up despite throwing 77 pitches in his last outing, and who knows how long Fried will need before those elbow troubles are resolved.
That all this came in a game that was determined to annoy us regardless made everything worse. More than half the Yankee lineup no longer seems competitive, no matter how optimistic Michael Kay was about J.C. Escarra’s last eight games. Kyle Bradish has excellent breaking stuff, and has handled the Yankees well before, but the bottom four of the lineup all feature OPSs below .600. Jazz Chisholm Jr. had a booming double and finished the game at .608, and Trent Grisham is not at this time a leadoff hitter ahead of arguably the best two sluggers in the game.
That Jazz double was in fact the team’s only hit of the day, with Bradish posting six shutout innings before a trio of Oriole relievers shut down the rest of the game. The Yankees did manage five walks against seven strikeouts, a pretty good ratio for any game, but in that success the team kind of shows its weakness. They do walk a lot, and that’s good! Not making outs, getting yourself on base, these are things that should drive scoring.
Except, it’s very hard for a run to score because of a walk alone. Conversely, before certain commentators say certain things, it’s also very hard for a run to score because of a ground ball to the right side alone. It’s much easier for a run to score because you drove a fastball into the gap for an extra-base hit. I think the determination to work counts, and wait for one pitch, is causing the Yankees as a group to be a little too passive. Take two of Aaron Judge’s ABs for example:
Look I think that Aaron Judge is the most talented right handed hitter in the game’s history, and any one pitch can take a guy by surprise. Both times here though, the best pitch he sees — indeed, the only strike he sees — is in a hitting zone, and is taken. Maybe if he swings he swings through it, or he flies out, and who am I to tell Aaron Judge how to hit but the team from top to bottom looks a lot like they have a directive to see four pitches every at-bat regardless of where those pitches are. Or maybe I’m wrong about this too, and the plain fact is six hitters in the regular lineup probably shouldn’t be at this point.
The Yankees get an off day tomorrow, one that feels desperately needed. Of course we’ll spend it worried about the state of Max Fried’s elbow, but after a really frustrating six games, maybe this can be a good reset point. The Subway Series kicks off from Queens on Friday night, and if nothing else we’ll get to watch Cam Schlittler pitch. The annual battle for New York starts at 7:15pm Eastern, and if you have Apple TV+ you just might be able to view it.
