To suggest there was a chance the New York Yankees could miss the playoffs a couple weeks ago would have been laughable. As recently as July 28th, they had a seven game lead in the American League East and were about to embark in what turned out to be the offensive onslaught of the season so far in Major League Baseball. Between July 28th and August 4th (seven games), the Yankees scored 12 runs or more four times and terrorized the pitching of the Rangers, White Sox, and Red Sox.
However, in a possible example of foreshadowing, the Yankees had two games during that stretch where they could only muster two runs. That stretch has now been followed by a string against Boston and Toronto (five games) where they totaled four runs! The Yankees are now only leading the second-place Blue Jays by 1.5 games.With a tough schedule coming this month, is a five game sample size too small to be worried? Or should the pinstripe faithful be quaking in their Mitchell and Ness replica Mickey Mantle jersey?
The Yankees pitching cannot be blamed for last week’s struggles. During that five game stretch, every starting pitcher got through at least five innings, and only Ivan Nova allowed more than earned runs (four) during his start. The starters totaled 28.2 innings and only allowed nine earned runs, good enough for a 2.87 ERA. Teams whose starters ERA hover around 3.00 are going to be very successful throughout the course of a season. With the exception of Branden Pinder allowing an eventual game-winning run to the Blue Jays in the top of the 10th inning on August 7th, the bullpen was very solid. Overall, the Yankees were outscored 13-4 over those five games, hardly a bloodbath.
But what they did run into was even better pitching by the opposing teams. All five opposing starting pitchers went at least six innings and the only pitcher who received the loss was Eduardo Rodriguez of the Red Sox, who still allowed two runs over seven innings but was outdueled by CC Sabathia.
| Pitcher | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO | BF | Pit | |
| 8/5/2015 BOS | Steven Wright W (5-4) | 8 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 9 | 29 | 108 |
| 8/6/2015 BOS | Eduardo Rodriguez L (6-4) | 7 | 6 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 5 | 30 | 103 |
| 8/7/2015 TOR | R.A. Dickey | 7 | 6 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 28 | 113 |
| 8/8/2015 TOR | David Price W (11-4) | 7 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 7 | 27 | 110 |
| 8/9/2015 TOR | Marco Estrada W (10-6) | 6.1 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 6 | 25 | 89 |
Yankees fans shouldn’t be too concerned about the Red Sox and their pitching, arguably the worst in the American League. However, Toronto, ladies and gentlemen, is not going anywhere. The most active team at the trade deadline made two stunning moves in acquiring Troy Tulowitzki and David Price to shore up their middle infield and add an elite starter to their rotation. Those are the types of moves that win championships (if they don’t win the World Series, obviously they will look foolish).
The Yankees play the Blue Jays ten more times before the end of the season including a weekend series in Toronto beginning this Friday. Now is not the time for a team to get inside your heads and with the standings where they are currently, the Yankees cannot afford to come up short and get swept again.
Starting Tuesday, the Yankees open a three-game set in Cleveland against the Indians, who have above average pitching and have yet to play the Yankees this season. The Bombers will have four more next week against the Tribe and these are the teams that playoff-bound teams beat like a drum.
Currently the Yankees have just shy of a 90% chance of making the playoffs (according to Fangraphs) and the Blue Jays have an 86% chance. However, if you rewind to July 28th, the Yankees were at 95% and the Blue Jays were…at 22.5% and a 7.3% of winning the division (now they have a 41.4% of winning the AL East). The tides have turned since the trade deadline and the Yankees are certainly not in as comfortable position as they were.
Alright let’s slow down here and take a breath. The Yankees are still in pretty good shape. Again, before this five game stretch they had been putting up crazy offensive numbers and their pitching has been pretty solid all year. Five games shouldn’t make much of a difference in the long-run right? Well, normally that would be a definite “No,” however, when the team that just shut you down completely, is the team chasing you in the division standings, five games could prove to be pivotal to the conclusion of the season.
The Yankees are obviously are going to be playing teams other than the Blue Jays, and they will inevitably have a stretch where they are beating the bad teams like a bad habit. They won’t be facing David Price every night and again, their pitching has been respectable all season. The Yankees have the talent and firepower to pick themselves back up and get into October. In fact, it would be illogical to bet against them. However, if last week showed us nothing else, it showed us that the American League East is not going to a “run away and hide” type of finish. With four teams having a legitimate shot of sneaking into the playoffs, the competition will only get more heated before it cools down.
