David Lennon: Lower part of Yankees' batting order shows what it can do
The Yankees' Jazz Chisholm Jr. watches as his two-run home run goes over the wall in the seventh inning of a game against the Toronto Blue Jays at Yankee Stadium on Sunday. Credit: Newsday/Thomas A. Ferrara
All eyes were on Cody Bellinger’s return Sunday. The former MVP’s return figured to spark the Yankees’ misfiring offense, which had been among baseball’s worst going on three months.
But for those seeking a more meaningful impact against the Blue Jays, and these crucial upcoming weeks through October, you had to look further down the lineup, beyond Bellinger to depths mostly thought of as Bronx wasteland this season.
With Giancarlo Stanton reduced to a hulking mirage and Aaron Judge still a relative mystery, the Yankees can’t rely on their usual saviors. Which is why Sunday’s 8-3 victory over the Blue Jays was as instructional as it was important, revealing the potential pop that can be supplied by some new faces and a few underachieving incumbents.
The flashiest of that crew also happens to be the most frustrating, because every time Jazz Chisholm Jr. does (positive) Jazz stuff, it conjures up the idea that he’s back being a game-breaker again rather than a broken two-time All-Star. But Chisholm put himself in the plus category Sunday from the No. 7 spot with a bunt single that helped trigger a three-run sixth inning and a rainbow second-deck homer that drove in two runs with two outs in the seventh.
“Jazz doing small ball, big ball — Jazz ball,” manager Aaron Boone said.
This wasn’t merely a Jazz riff, however. The Yankees’ bottom five hitters went a combined 7-for-18 with six runs scored and four RBIs.
(That's not to say the top of the order didn't contribute. After the Yankees loaded the bases with none out in the sixth, Austin Wells struck out and Jose Caballero popped to shallow center. With the rally about to fizzle, Trent Grisham walked on a 3-and-2 pitch to give the Yankees a 3-2 lead and Ben Rice singled home two more runs. Grisham also hit his 18th homer, a 413-foot shot into Monument Park, in the eighth.)
George Lombard Jr. and Spencer Jones, positioned in the fifth and sixth slots, respectively, twice ignited rallies on their own.
In the second, Lombard slashed a leadoff single to right before Jones’ scorching 109-mph RBI double put the Yankees on the board first. In that pivotal sixth — again off the Jays’ imposing Jose Soriano — Lombard beat out a slow roller to third for an infield single and Jones smoked a 110.2-mph single to center.
“Playing with George is fun,” Jones said. “He told me after he scored, he’s like, ‘Man, I feel like we’ve been doing a lot of that.’ Where he gets on base, I hit the ball in the gap and let him run around the bases.”
Sign the Yankees up for more of that. No one knows exactly when Judge will be back, but we feel confident saying that Jones needs to be a daily fixture in rightfield until the captain is comfortable playing there again. Give deadline pickup Heliot Ramos the nod vs. elite lefty starters, but Jones seems to be improving every game and has become a factor on both sides of the ball.
Jones has hit safely in eight of his last 11 games, batting .308 (12-for-39) with two homers, seven RBIs and a .921 OPS in that span. Stick the scrappy Lombard in front of Jones — with his ability to pressure the defense, using his legs and his knack for contact — then watch their chemistry produce almost instant results from the middle of the order.
Lombard recorded his fifth multi-hit game Sunday in his first 17 games in the majors.
“Two young kids that are playing really good,” Bellinger said. “They’re just really good baseball players. Adds a good dynamic to the lineup for sure.”
Lombard hasn’t even been wearing pinstripes for three weeks. And Jones? He’s got more experience — 57 games total in the bigs — but the version we’re seeing lately is light years ahead of the 6-7 masher that first showed up from Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre on May 8 of this season. His rapid climb up the MLB learning curve couldn’t come at a better time, either.
“Just reflecting on past failures and allowing myself to trust my routine,” he said. “Trust the program. Know that certain pitches in the zone I got to attack and visualizing what I got to see.”
Said Boone: “He’s made good adjustments to the league and I feel like he has a good understanding of his strengths and weaknesses. It’s been a good year on balance for him as far as his development.”
The Yankees had big hopes pinned to these two former RailRiders, and both are on delivering on those expectations. On Sunday, even Wells — a homegrown Scranton star who had gone sideways this season — came through from the No. 8 spot with a one-out RBI double in the second inning.
Wells, who is batting .179 with a .571 OPS, has kept his job because of his prowess behind the plate, not standing beside it. But with the lineup revival going on just above him, the Yankees are better equipped to forgive his weak bat, especially if Chisholm can make a late push to attract more free-agent dollars during the next five weeks (as well as October.).
Chisholm routinely stands in front of the postgame TV cameras and absorbs all of the criticism directed his way. He freely admits this has been a terrible year for him. But it’s also not too late for him to change the narrative, and Sunday’s performance capped a pretty decent 6-for-17 stretch in the past five games, including a double, triple and homer.
The formula? “Just try to barrel up the ball,” Chisholm said. “Not strike out, and just keep going.”
Chisholm did say there has been some bad luck involved — “A lot of balls I’ve hit, I’ve hit at the guy that’s been playing in that position for 120 years now. It’s just baseball” — but the Yankees showed a resourcefulness Sunday that should bode well for the future.
Presumably that future will include Judge as well as Bellinger at some point. In the meantime, however, what they have now might just work, too.
David Lennon is an award-winning columnist, a voter for baseball's Hall of Fame and has covered six no-hitters, including two perfect games.
