Lupica blows the layup.

You know he waited his whole life to write this column and, I dunno. Maybe he was distracted:

"So the Yankees are back in the big business of being the Yankees again, bigger than ever, now that they are making this kind of big deal for Giancarlo Stanton."

"Bigger than ever."


"Once, almost a hundred years ago, they got Babe Ruth here from Boston, and Ruth would eventually hit 60 home runs in a season, and first make the Yankees the Yankees and put them on the top of the world."

Oh, yeah.

Ruth, Gehrig, Murderer's Row.

I forgot about those Yankees one sentence ago when I wrote that the 2018 Yankees are "bigger than ever."


"Stanton hit 59 for the Marlins last season, and chased 60 all the way to the last at-bat he will ever have for the Marlins. Now Stanton is supposed to put the Yankees back on top of the world."

"Supposed to."

Only if he can survive the barbs of Daily News columnists.


"Now we all wait to see if putting Stanton with Aaron Judge will work out better for the Yankees than putting Alex Rodriguez, and all of his home runs, with Jeter himself once did."

Framing ARod's Yankees career as a failure? Mike Lupica?


"They figure they can find enough pitching to make this work. Maybe Stanton can pitch and hit the way Shohei Ohtani is going to for the Angels. First the Yankees wanted Ohtani. He told the Yankees he didn’t want them. Ohtani ends up on one coast, Giancarlo Stanton ends up on 161st St."

Maybe Stanton can pitch and hit? Well, no, but it was a seamless segue into Ohtani. 



"There really have only been three other star, home run plays like this in all of Yankee history:
Ruth.

Reggie.

Rodriguez."

And a dozen others off the top of my head.


"Only for all the hitting the Yankees did this season, they couldn’t hit once the ALCS went back to Minute Maid Park."

You win some, you lose some.


"They stopped hitting in the ’03 World Series a few months before they brought A-Rod, who had hit 50 home runs twice in Texas, to town."

"... who had hit 50 home runs twice in Texas, to town."


 "Now they are bringing Giancarlo Stanton and his 59 to town."

Yes, we know.


"They are the Yankees. At the end of October they came up small. Now they go for a real big home run hitter."

Riiiight.


"And hope it works out better with him over the next 10 years than it did when the big deal in the big town was A-Rod."

Phfffft.

That's all you've got?