Because he's short. Get it? "Big" is an ironic description in the headline.

I mean, Jose Altuve certainly plays baseball for the Astros and the Astros make the playoffs a lot. So there's that. 

In the 2022 playoffs, he has not come up big:

"Altuve, who has been such a terrific postseason player in his career, somehow started the ’22 postseason by going 0-for-25."

"Somehow."

 

"He hit in a big October game the way he has so many other times in his career, and he reminded everybody of something, as if anybody needs reminding at this point in Altuve’s career:"

And yet, here we are.

 

"He has been one of the best players of his time, and one of the great second basemen of all time."

I guess you can sit on an article for a couple of weeks and wait for Altuve to finally get a hit. Which he did. Truly compelling stuff.

 

"Listen, everybody knows what happened with the Astros in 2017, even as they keep winning. Altuve and his teammates are always going to hear it in New York, and they’re sure never going to love the Astros in Los Angeles. But the team is the same as the guy who leads off for Dusty Baker and is still out there at second: They don’t go away."

Everybody knows and nobody needs reminding. 

Maybe the Daily News could therefore make better use of their resources by reminding their readers that the clocks are turned back next Sunday.

 

I think I understand Manny's sense of humor.

No, he isn't actually planning a comeback. He is saying that the Yankees offense was so bad vs. Houston, he couldn't possibly be any worse.

Congratulations on your participation trophy.

There's something noticeably unsettling about the players on this team who are positive to the point of being delusional. I don't know why he's so proud of himself for not pouting and the bench ... and whatnot:

“I thought I bounced back from being benched,” he said. “It’s a tough, tough place. And I was able to make the routine plays and whatnot. I could have folded and let things beat up on me or could have just sat on the side and not worked. But after I got benched, I was out there early every day. Just wanted to help the team in any way possible. I had an opportunity in Game 1 and Game 4 and I was able to play good defense — way better than the LDS — and swing it when I had the opportunity.”

The 28-year-old Kiner-Falefa has one more year of team control left but he knows he may have fallen out of favor in the Bronx. The club has Peraza and Anthony Volpe coming up and they may choose to go in another direction with someone like free agent Carlos Correa.

Though fans might remember him for the October defense, Kiner-Falefa is happy with the character he felt he displayed in what could have been his final game in pinstripes.

“I’m definitely happy with not giving up and still working, even though I could have just quit and sat on the side and just been a grump and, and whatnot,” he said. “I was just happy that I kept my head up and just waited for another opportunity and didn’t botch any balls tonight.”

I don't see a strategic way out. Find players who come through in the playoffs.

That's why the got Rizzo and Donaldson.

Build a team around Judge and Oswaldo?

Hope that Oswaldo gained some experience and the .083 postseason batting average is not indicative of future performance?

Maybe that happens. I'll believe it when I see it.

A catcher who can get a hit once in a while would also be a change for the better.

Because I don't think it's impossible that Cashman, Boone, and Judge are all gone for the 2023 season. The Yankees won't be better, but the expectations will be lower, and in a perverse way, that will provide the fans with some relief:

"The more immediate curiosity is what Hal Steinbrenner does with the damning data. This will be the Yankees’ sixth failed attempt at a world championship in the Boone/Judge era. Something has to give. The blowback from fans will be unlike anything the Yankees have experienced in years.

You didn’t have to be an expert in public relations to know why the crowd started heading for the exits in sixth inning on Saturday. Yes, sixth. The fans were voting with their feet.

The Astros had just taken a 5-0 lead, but the Yankees still had 12 outs to manage a comeback, two more chances for Judge to hit a monster home run. But the ticket buyers had seen enough.

They knew the Yankees weren’t rallying against a team that’s beaten them 8-of-10 times this season."

I think there is an organizational arrogance and stubbornness that manifests itself negatively. The same can be said for the players who make unbelievable and endless excuses.

The Astros have beaten the Yankees eight out of ten this season, including a no-hitter. The Astros have not lost a single game in the playoffs this year. 

It's not the ump, the wind, bad luck, the banging of trash cans five years ago.

"Woulda"

Has a warning track fly ball ever garnered so much attention?

It was a 345-foot fly ball, for crying out loud.

Maybe lots of things. Maybe the Astros "woulda" pitched him differently if he was playing at Yankee Stadium.

 

I don't know when the excuses started to infiltrate the Yankees' culture.

The Yankees would have won if the roof was closed.

The home run that wasn't really a home run.

Maybe if you want to blame Cashman for something, blame him for this.

The flip side of the experience coin.

Every player who establishes himself as a reliable playoff veteran had to start somewhere. When Chapmas fell off the face of the Earth, most Yankee fans couldn't identify the other lefties in the bullpen. Peralta became an ALDS hero; Luetge didn't even get into a game.

Still a lot of chatter about Saturday's game.

I thought the Ramirez bloop should have been caught. Definitely not an error. One of four plays in the game that I thought should have been made by Yankee fielders which were not made. None of them were identified as errors.

So ...

The chatter is that Aaron Hicks should have been in left field at the start of the ninth inning.

Do y'all mean this Aaron Hicks?

Or this Aaron Hicks?

Facts that are verifiable.

In the second half of the 2022 season, so-called "closer" Clay Holmes amassed four saves and pitched to a 4.84 ERA.

Eleven walks and four HBP in 21 innings.

He's the Perfect Guy to enter a game with men on base, don't you think? Too bad Chapman flaked out or maybe we could just blame him again and get the funny grimace on his face as he walks off the mound.

In all seriousness, at least Schmidt made the batter actually hit the ball. It wasn't the Chapman/Holmes Special they learned from A.J. Burnett and latter day Dellin Betances. Walk, walk, HBP, wild pitch, wild pitch, wild pitch. Three runs without swinging the bat.

I was actually surprised to see Holmes appear in Game One in a high leverage situation. Why was I surprised? Because he basically stinks.

Also, he isn't the closer and hasn't been for a while. There is no closer for the Yankees because no one is dominant enough to be reliable in the ninth inning.

Where have you all been?

Has Luis Severino been in a coma over the past two months, or something?

Chad Green is injured; Michael King is injured; even what's-his-name Scott Effross is injured.

I suppose in retrospect Lou Trivino could have been pushed to get out a few more betters.

Wandy Peralta has been great so far in the playoffs, a true champ. He also left the game with two runners on base in the ninth inning, didn't he?

OF COURSE, in retrospect, extending Peralta would have been a better decision. A team can only either Win or Lose. A better decision would have been Domingo German or Nestor Cortes, for that matter. Or not shifting vs. Ramirez. Or throwing a fastball instead of a slider. If Peralta had stayed in the game and given up a three-run home run to the next batter, it's not a worse loss, it's just a different Last Pitcher to blame.

Sorry, folks, have any of you ever watched a baseball game before?

Over in San Diego, Josh Hader with the negative WAR in 2022 and a recent history of buh-lowing it for Milwaukee in playoffs, just blows away the Dodgers. 

Who would have thunk it? 

Everyone, apparently.

Everyone knows everything in hindsight.

Yes, predictions are stupid ...

 ... I heard another host on WFAN who declared that he didn't think the Guardians thought they could beat the Yankees.

This isn't going to be pretty.

Please add to the list ...

• Their shortstop's continued disappointments in the field.
• Aroldis Chapman.
• Josh Donaldson styling out of the box, costing the team an out (again), and getting away with it.
• Both Holmes and Severino openly defying their manager in postgame comments.

Clarke Schmidt is a Yankee. He's a teammate. He's ... good. He was one strike away from being a hero. Real teammates support him in the dugout and in the locker room. He might go from goat to hero tomorrow.

A team that acts like losers doesn't deserve to win.

Let's have a collective fever dream in which Clay Holmes in October 2022 is a reliable closer.

Severino is hot after the game, but he should keep his mouth shut. Mariano Rivera isn't walking through that door.

Victory lap for Gerrit Cole.

A list of high-profile pitcher who Cole outpitched his important week:

• deGrom (arguable)
• Scherzer
• Castillo
• Verlander
• Kershaw
  

Chapman wasn't going to be on the roster anyway.

It gives Boone an excuse to pile on, but it's also obvious that Boone had legit gripes with the guy for a long time.

I think we can all agree it's time to give someone else on the Yankees a chance to give up a walkoff home run in the playoffs. Step right up, Scott Effross.

No one likes losing.

 I recall a saying that you can lose but you don't have to act like a bunch of losers.

Remarkable.

 Brian Cashman at his press conference.

Bad news for Aroldis Chapman.

If you can't throw strikes, you can't pitch.

He has no place of the postseason roster.