Yankees have plenty to feel good about during their recent rebound
The Yankees' Andrew Velazquez celebrates after tagging out the Red Sox's Hunter Renfroe during the first inning at Yankee Stadium on Tuesday. Credit: AP/Frank Franklin II
What the Yankees did in 1978 to catch the Red Sox and force an epic do-or-die playoff game became the stuff of legend. It took them roughly eight weeks to erase that 14-game deficit.
Forty-three years later, Aaron Boone & Co. trailed division-leading Boston by 10 1/2 games after the games of July 5. But with Tuesday’s doubleheader sweep of the Red Sox, the Yankees pulled into a virtual tie for the two wild-card spots with Oakland and Boston.
Total time elapsed? Six weeks.
Given up for dead, with the season already condemned as a failure and a restless fan base calling for Boone’s job, the Yankees have rebounded to loudly change the narrative on 2021. The fact that it again came at the expense of the Red Sox is always a bonus, and the two teams have basically traded places since Boone’s crew dropped three of four excruciating games during a visit to Fenway that was supposed to bury them before the end of July.
It didn’t happen. Beginning with the second game of a July 4 doubleheader against the Mets, the Yankees have gone 27-11. Since moving 10 1/2 games ahead of them by winning the next day, the Red Sox have gone 15-21.
During the first four months of this season, the Yankees couldn’t do anything right against their ancient rival in dropping 10 of the first 13 meetings. But in Tuesday’s doubleheader, they were always a step or pitch ahead of the Sox in a stunning role reversal.
"The bottom line is, that’s great, we’ve climbed back in. But we’ve got a long way to go," Boone said. "We are focused on the task, we’re focused on the daily grind, and I like where our club’s at. We’re playing with a lot of confidence."
Luke Voit, whose job was handed to the newly acquired Anthony Rizzo while Voit was on the IL, has signaled he’s not going down without a fight, emblematic of these Yankees as a whole. Voit’s two-run single in the fifth inning of Game 1 turned out to be the winning hit in the 5-3 victory. In Game 2, he and Giancarlo Stanton homered to secure a 2-0 win.
Voit’s resurgence has come with Rizzo on the IL recovering from COVID-19, and he was defiant after Tuesday’s sweep in saying that he deserves to play, too. Not only for what he’s done in Rizzo’s absence, but as last year’s MLB home run champ and MVP candidate. If the sizable chip on Voit’s shoulder helps the Yankees win, all the better.
"We’ve had the same mentality all year, we just haven’t had a lot of stuff go our way," Voit said. "I believed in everyone in this clubhouse. A lot of these guys know what to do in the big situations to get the job done."
That’s not just happy talk anymore. The Yankees are proving it, and Tuesday’s sweep of the Sox in front of Stadium crowds numbering above 30,000 brought a playoff feel to the Bronx.
Both games featured tightrope efforts by the bullpen, with Jonathan Loaisiga pitching his way out of a bases-loaded, none-out jam in the seventh to get the save in Game 1. The pivotal moment of Game 2 came in the sixth, when Wandy Peralta knocked down Bobby Dalbec’s line drive and fired a bullet to first that stranded the potential tying runs.
No Aroldis Chapman, no problem. The Yankees have been living on the edge for so long, nothing seems to faze them anymore. They’ve played in 68 games decided by two or fewer runs, the most in MLB, and are an astonishing 45-23 in those contests. Good training for the playoffs.
"We’ve still got a lot of work to do," Stanton said. "We’re in a good spot for the work we’ve done, but there’s a lot of baseball left."
Suddenly, that doesn’t seem like a bad thing anymore. The Yankees finally are playing consistent, winning baseball — just as they were supposed to when this season began. And with all the outbreaks and setbacks and injuries, they are finding some unexpected help along the way.
Take Andrew Velazquez, the Bronx native who played in the shadow of Yankee Stadium at Fordham Prep. If not for Gleyber Torres’ thumb sprain and Gio Urshela’s hamstring injury, he never would have ended up patrolling the same patch of dirt as his idol, Derek Jeter, and delivering a huge two-out, two-run single in Game 1.
"I probably imagined that a million times," Velazquez said. "We’re here now, so it’s a beautiful thing."
The 2021 Yankees finally have arrived. And they don’t look done yet.
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.
