"After the New York Yankees tied the series with a win in Game 2, being back home with their ace on the mound should have been their recipe for a lead in the American League Division Series."
"Should have been."
"That wasn't all Severino's fault. Some of it was Lance Lynn's and Chad Green's.
But above all, it was Aaron Boone's."
Above all, it was Aaron Boone's fault.
I can instantly think of 52 people I'd blame/credit for this loss before I'd get to Aaron Boone:
- All 25 players on the Yankees roster
- All 25 players on the Red Sox roster
- The GM who got rid of Eovaldi
- The GM who acquired Eovaldi
OK, to be fair, he's talking about the 4th inning only ... but he's not talking about the 4th inning only.
"It didn't take a strong pair of glasses to see that Severino wasn't
fooling Red Sox hitters in the first three innings. He'd given up three
runs, and the amount of hard contact indicated that the 24-year-old was
lucky it wasn't worse.
Even with the bottom of Boston's order due
up in the top of the fourth, Boone was thus taking a chance simply in
allowing Severino to return to the mound. After he allowed a leadoff
single to Brock Holt—his first step toward the first cycle in postseason history—the hook should have come out immediately."
Sure, I guess.
In retrospect, Severino should have been pulled a little earlier, I suppose.
It would have been nice if the "ace" could show some guts. If he can't beat the Red Sox, trade him to an NL team.
"By the time Boone called on Green, Lynn had allowed another hit to put
two runners on with only one out. Despite Green's best efforts, three
more runs scored, and whatever hope the Yankees had of mounting a
comeback was all but gone."
Right.
So Green was ineffective (despite his best efforts) ... just like all five Yankee pitchers and one Yankee backup catcher/pitcher ... but Green would have been Pedro Martinez if he had just been brought in earlier.
Was Chad Green going to pitch six shutout innings and also pinch hit for Andujar and belt a couple of home runs?
As
for "high leverage" situations, Green has a pretty noticeable track
record of playing poorly in the highest leverage situations.
"The long leash he put on Severino might have made sense if this was
the same Severino who dominated throughout all of 2017 and most of 2018.
But everyone is aware Severino struggled (5.57 ERA in 12 starts) in the
second half. And while he refused to break, he definitely bent in his
four innings in the Wild Card Game.
Boone's decision to make Lynn
the first man out of the bullpen is equally baffling. If he was going to
bring in Lynn, it should have been with clean bases at the start of the
inning. Once that ship sailed, Boone's first move should have been for a
pitcher accustomed to dominating in high leverage."
You know what?
The only thing Boone could have done wrong was waste his top pitchers instead of saving them for Games Four and Five.
The Red Sox schooled the Yankees by playing smart professional baseball. The Yankee All-Or-Nothing Heroes can learn a lesson by watching how the Red Sox approach their at-bats against a hard-throwing strikeout pitcher.
Is it just me, or is there a pattern where people stretch all credibility to blame the Yankee manager whenever the Yankees lose in the playoffs?
The Yankees aren't a great team. They're a good team, but not a great team. They may even turn it around and win the World Series, but that would be a very surprising outcome.
The Red Sox are better than the Yankees and have been all season.
Maybe this is difficult for people to acknowledge because they fall for the marketing campaign?
I really don't know.
It just seems to happen a lot that everybody is ready with the excuses (abbreviated warmup session?) instead of just acknowledging the relative lack of talent.
A team loses 16-1 and you think a fourth-inning pitching change was the difference in the game?
This is utter nonsense and I think it lets the players off the hook.
