From Bryan Hoch:
Ben Rice didn’t love the early swings he took on Sunday afternoon. They lacked conviction, he thought, showing little of the presence that makes him one of the Yankees’ most important hitters while Aaron Judge is sidelined.
Good thing he saved his best one for the end. Rice cracked his team’s second tie-breaking ninth-inning homer in as many games, a two-run blast that lifted the Yankees to an 8-3 victory over the Blue Jays on Sunday at Rogers Centre.
“It just speaks to the mentality of the group,” Rice said. “I feel like everyone’s got that next-man-up mentality. Regardless of who’s on the mound, regardless of the situation, we’re going to go up there and put together a quality at-bat.”
Following the script of Paul Goldschmidt’s deciding homer on Saturday, Rice connected with a Braydon Fisher slider for his team-leading 19th home run of the season, a Statcast-projected 381-foot knock that cleared the right-field wall.
Here’s how much Ben Rice has been slumping lately. Even Aaron Boone after the game, was talking about how he was giving Rice some grief over how awful his at-bats have been recently. But, of course, as Boone laughed, “But you were right on time with that last one!”
Great win for the Yankees, especially after Will Warren was absolute dogshit in this one, lucky to only give up two runs in four innings (FOUR INNINGS! He couldn’t even pitch into the fifth inning! Dude almost had 100 pitches in four innings!). The bullpen mostly did its job, except for a solo home run allowed by Jake Bird. Again, though, that’s the thing with relievers. An occasional home run shouldn’t be a knock on ANYone, but when you’re a relief pitcher, said occasional home run means you lose the game, ya know?
The biggest revelation of the game was Camilo Doval, who has been locating his slider for the last few outings, and, well, holy shit, when this guy is properly locating his slider, he’s nearly unhittable! He’s been locating his sinker pretty well, but that typically only gets him as far as two strikes, and he can’t put guys away because they know he doesn’t have the slider. So they just sit on him eventually throwing a fastball, and we all know Major League hitters can hit fastballs, even if they’re 100 MPH.
But once he has located his slider, he’s so dangerous, because he can get ahead, and then retire batters with the slider and, because you’re now looking for the slider, he can also get you out with the sinker. He got two seemingly effortless strikouts in the 8th inning against Okamoto and Jesus Sanchez using the slider in one at-bat and the sinker in the other.
Do I trust that Matt Blake has finally gotten through to Doval? No, no I do not. After all, Doval started off the season like this as well, when all of the offseason instruction was fresh in his head. But as the season went on, he ignored it all, and started to suck. I imagine they’ve been trying to get it back into his head, but who knows if it will ever stick. But hell, it’d be a game-changer if he has, especially since Doval is under team control through next season.
Anyhow, HUGE to win a series IN Toronto, especially both of them being late game wins.
The offense needs to do better in innings 1-8, though.
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Austin Wynns right handed hitting catcher has been released unfortunately he’s hitting 075/125/075
He’d fit right in.
He had a major dead duck bounce last season, so maybe it’s worth a shot? He’s also apparently a really good defender.
Juan Soto steps out on Chase Burns and then
https://x.com/pitchingninja/status/2066663330010263690?s=61
After hitting for the cycle, moments later Crow-Armstrong got picked off first.
What would a trade for Skubal cost? Would you do it?
While there is no such thing as too much starting pitching, I think that the Yankees should focus on a catcher who can hit at least a little and a 3B who can hit. Though McMahon has been perfectly cromulent and provides excellent defense there most games, the Yankees can’t carry a zero at SS and C.
Now that he’s proven he can actually play a decent second base, I really think Luis Arraez is sort of the perfect hitter for this lineup. Could they move Jazz to third again?
I worry (only a little) about Rice’s slide since April. He’s been mired in a bit of a slump for a while and his otherworldly numbers in April are keeping season long stat-line in the upper echelon. I think he’s still a great hitter and make the next adjustment, but with Judge and Grish out, Stanton apparently unable to play, and the rest of the offense (other than Belly) very inconsistent, it’s a weak spot heading into the primetime of play.
Hopefully they can figure out Judge’s injuries and get him back before September. Sucks to see him end up with another lost season.
Yeah, it’s been pretty rough for a WHILE now.
Hopefully he can adjust. He sure did an AMAZING swing last night against Fisher.
As an aside, I feel that thing are even now, as the Blue Jays annoyingly used Fisher in a tie game in extras against the Rays and he got shelled in a Rays win, and so now he pitched in a tie game against the Yankees and got shelled in a Yankees win, so it’s all good now, Blue Jays!
Hopefully this Dodgers series continues to go poorly for the Rays. This White Sox series is a bit scary. They are fucking HOT right now. They just took 2 out of 3 from the Dodgers, and they didn’t even use their best starter, who is going tonight (he just beat the Braves, shutting them out for six innings as he out-dueled Chris Sale, as the White Sox took 2 out of 3 from the Braves, as well! Going 4-2 against the two teams with the best records in baseball).
Congratulations to Davis Martin on his first career perfect game.
Quick question, are the Knicks still world champions?
No, still the Dodgers
The Giants are apparently willing to trade Matt Chapman, among a few others.
If they’d be up for it, a swap of Chapman for McMahon works. They get out from under Chapman’s long contract, and the Yankees get the better player.
Matt Chapman is still good, but he’s already 33 and signed through 2030 at $25M/year. Not many 3B’s hold up past 35, and the back end of that contract could be painful, though the media would love to cover an aging Josh Donaldson with Tourette Syndrome.
Martian had a tooth pulled.
B Rice (L) 1B
C Bellinger (L) LF
P Goldschmidt (R) DH
J Chisholm Jr. (L) 2B
S Jones (L) CF
J Caballero (R) RF
R McMahon (L) 3B
J Escarra (L) C
A Volpe (R) SS
Boy, that is one sorry ass lineup.
Trent Grisham has a moderate strain of his hamstring, Aaron Boone said. He will miss “a little bit of time.”
Giancarlo Stanton re-injured his calf, Aaron Boone said. is, He’s going to have a slow week this week, not a lot of baseball activities and not running.