From Bryan Hoch:
Aaron Judge glanced toward the third-base dugout, seeking eye contact with Ron Washington. The Angels’ manager had just issued a second intentional walk in as many innings, a show of respect that the reigning American League MVP acknowledged with a wink and a tip of his batting helmet.
That gesture preceded boisterous laughter from Washington, a baseball lifer who clearly had no interest in allowing Judge to beat his club.
Someone else would have to, and that’s exactly what happened: Clarke Schmidt hurled six scoreless innings and the bullpen finished the job as the Yankees completed a sweep with a 1-0 victory on Wednesday evening at Angel Stadium.
“I guess that’s what a sports fan feels like when you’re watching the games — you’re on the edge of your seat,” Schmidt said. “We were in here cheering every pitch, every strike. It’s a lot of fun.”
With both Luke Weaver and Devin Williams unavailable due to fatigue, Mark Leiter Jr. was assigned the ninth inning and notched his second save of the season, freezing Logan O’Hoppe on a called third strike to seal New York’s first 1-0 win over the Angels since April 30, 1970.
It’s kind of weird if Weaver is legit dealing with enough fatigue that a single day off wasn’t enough for him.
Leiter really has been surprisingly good this season. He looks like the dude Cashman THOUGHT he was getting LAST season (and to be fair to Leiter, he also seemed to turn into a different pitcher in the playoffs). JC Escarra has been the best framer in baseball so far this season, and he used some EPIC framing to get Leiter two strikes on the last batter of the game, including the final pitch, which was an obvious ball that Escarra framed into a game-winning strikeout.
Clarke Schmidt was very frustrating in his six innings (going to 3-2 on seemingly every hitter, needing 6 pitches to get every batter, even the shitty ones), but hey, the results speak for themselves.
The Yankees really need to start scoring some runs off of lefthanded pitchers, though.
Featured image is another one of J.C. Escarra’s classic “celebrate the performance when the pitcher is done for the game” bits, and what’s fascinating here is that Escarra is typically super peppy at these moments, but here, he clearly has decided to match Schmidt’s energy, and just be intense, “Fuck yeah” with Schmidt instead of peppy like he is with other guys.
Good point about Escarra
Escarra is also, like, six years older than Wells, so he has a really strong sense of the game out there. Perhaps they really should try a more even split with the two guys.
If Wells is going to hit like DJLM last year, then yes, they really should.
If he starts hitting the way we expected him to, then – not a chance!
JC should get the featured image for stealing strike three to end it.
You know I considered it! But Schmidt just pitched too well to not get the featured image, but putting him WITH Escarra also honored Escarra, too.
Using the typical Cashman logic of “If he liked you once, he’ll like you now,” Yoan Moncada would be an interesting guy, but even though he’s a switch-hitter, he sucks against lefties, so I think that probably rules him out.
“Sucking against lefties despite switch-hitting” doesn’t seem to stop them from running out Jasson.
Jasson has massive potential, it’s a totally different case.
The split looks huge this year but it’s only 18 PAs vs LHP. For his career it’s 775/705.
Then go get Moncada, Cash!
You know that is a really good picture
I wonder if the umps will see the framing stats and at some point be tougher on the better framers, consciously or unconsciously expanding the zone.
Or we will have robot umps and this entire conversation becomes moot.
“The human element is part of the game” is about as poor an excuse as “the dog ate my homework”.
Sure years later we get to talk about Dumb Denkinger in the 85 WS or Joyce and the imperfect perfect game. But I don’t think that’s to the benefit of baseball but rather to its detriment.
Though the Derek Jeter Jeffrey Maier HR still makes me happy.
1000%.
There’s an optimal amount of chaos through ineptitude in sports and it’s not 0%.
If he liked you once, he’ll like you now: Cubs Designate Brooks Kriske For Assignment
Jazz 2/3 with a double and a walk, Spencer 2/3 with a walk.
The night of the living dead!
Have you given up on Jazz?
So they’re committed to DJ? Jazz Chisholm Jr. says he was given the choice to play third or second base, but Aaron Boone strongly indicated he’d like him to play third
“I’m a team guy. I’m here to win a ring. I’m not here to fight over positions. We’ve got some of the best players in the world on our team”
Brian – that’s okay, so long as he’s looking for a THIRD baseman… and not a second baseman, leaving Jazz at third. (Unless we’re talking Joe Morgan, of course.)
If the best hitter out there is someone who can only play second, I’m fine with them sticking with Jazz at third. The odds are, of course, that the best hitter available WILL be a third baseman, but we shall see how the market works out. There might literally be no one out there who is even worth it.
I tend to believe that if there was someone out there that was really available for trade, Cashman would have traded for them already in the offseason.
Exactly. If the best hitter out there – BEFORE any positional adjustment – is at second – then we’re saying the same thing!
…
A sweep. They were close to so many sweeps, we should enjoy actually COMPLETING one more.
I know there was talk of Arenado and he nixed a trade to the Yankees, but it’s not clear to me the Yanks were interested. Ironically St Louis is playing well and he…is not
Oh right, sorry, I meant a trade for a guy making $10 million or less. Cash clearly wasn’t going to be able to add a big money bat like Arenado (and I don’t think he wanted to, really). But you know how he tried to get Bryan Reynolds back when Reynolds was making $5 million? If there was a second baseman or a third baseman like that on the market this offseason, I think Cash WOULD have acquired him, but there really wasn’t.
They really only need a replacement level 3b/2b. As it stands Peraza leads all our 2b/3b in OPS+ with a robust 60.
I literally don’t know if there was a replacement level second baseman or third baseman available in a deal this offseason that was making roughly $5 million. The market is REALLY shitty right now. Jorge Polanco turned out well, but he also cost $8 million, likely more than what Cash had to spend.
I don’t know what you’re going to get for that kind of money that’s better than hoping from progress from the prospects.
I can imagine teams like the Rangers getting to the point of selling some real talent (and they have iit), but for the purpose of getting rid of larger salaries.
By the time the trade deadline gets here, dudes making $10 million will now cost $5 million, so it opens up the options a bit.
DJ and The Martian sit. Gonsolin has a pretty big split 871-625 but I suppose it’s hard to sit PGold.
Gil 15 pitch bullpen session.Cruz to throw live bullpen, could be back next week? Jazz to play tomorrow, maybe DH Sunday. Could be back next week.
Wait… what channel is the game on?
Apple
So it’s inaccessible to most fans?
That’s insane.