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Jeff Passan, ESPN
LOS ANGELES – The New York Yankees came into the World Series carrying themselves like dawgs and have spent the first two games like dogs. To defeat the Los Angeles Dodgers, it takes firm constitution, clean execution and the ability to meet the moment. The Yankees have crumbled, stumbled and bungled. They look like an American League team in a National League world. And unless New York knows how to reawaken the best version of itself, the dream of this World Series will be over in time for the kids to go trick-or-treating in Yankees uniforms with paper bags on their heads.
For the majority of Game 2 on Saturday night, a 4-2 Dodgers victory that gave Los Angeles a 2-0 advantage in the best-of-seven series, the Yankees looked overwhelmed. They collected one hit in the first eight innings. The missing captain action after the season led to three more strikes. An apparent early advantage disappeared with three home runs allowed. And make him have to do what few others have. Of the 54 teams that started the World Series with a two-game deficit, only 10 recovered to win a ring.
“No one said it was going to be easy,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “It’s a long streak, and we have to make it a long streak now. We’re not going to flinch. We just have to stay in it.”
Staying at it requires some fixing, everything is possible. Doing so on the fly, against a team as complete as the Dodgers, takes “urgency, will, grit,” Yankees first baseman Anthony Rizzo said. “We will have to make it happen.”
Rizzo knows this better than anyone in the Yankees clubhouse. In 2016, the Chicago Cubs trailed Cleveland three games to one before rallying to win their first championship in 108 years. A short-term mistake could cost the season. Wrong pitch wrong. One uncompetitive at-bat. Teams that dig their own holes remove the margin for error. It’s pretty hard to beat the Dodgers. Doing it with self-inflicted wounds won’t play.
It starts with Aaron Judge, the best batsman in the world, who at the most inopportune time has met his nadir. In the first two games of the World Series, Judge has swung the bat 24 times. He has missed in 14 of those swings, striking out six times in nine at-bats. His October OPS was .605, down more than 500 points from his MLB-best 1,159 regular season. He pressed, desperate to find the swing that carried the Yankees through the season with more hits than downs.
“I have to go up,” Hakim said, and rightly so. For all of Juan Soto’s greatness — and this October has reinforced just how great he is — he and Giancarlo Stanton can’t be the Yankees’ only consistent threats. Twice this postseason team has chosen to intentionally walk Soto to face Judge, and unless Judge contracts the strike zone and improves his swing, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts will be incentivized to continue doing so. Throw Judge spin — 10 of 14 swings and misses have come on curveballs, sliders and sweepers — and keep winning.
At the same time, Judge is not the only New York hitter to come up short. The Yankees lost because of a contact allergy. The Yankees have swung at 147 pitches and missed 52 times. The Dodgers have swung at 133 pitches in the first two games and missed only 24. It’s a defining statistic from the first two games, especially considering how relatively rarely the Yankees did it against Kansas City and Cleveland during the first two rounds: 601 swings. , 154 misses.
It’s not just about awakening the Yankees offense. They also need better pitching. And for Game 3, that was Clarke Schmidt’s start. “I’m not trying to go out and be a hero,” Schmidt said, and while he’s right that trying to play hero ball is a bad path, there has to be a savior from somewhere.
Even if Shohei Ohtani didn’t play in Game 3 (his status remains unclear after he suffered a subluxation in his left shoulder while making a last-ditch steal attempt in Game 2), the Dodgers could stack the lineup with a left-hander for a season of mistakes. from the right hand whose arsenal runs almost all gloves. Schmidt’s cutter-slider-curveball-heavy array doesn’t feature changes to keep hitters honest, and the Dodgers’ ability to counter pitches — they’ve eliminated 39.1% of their swings in the World Series compared to the Yankees. 29.9% – leaving any pitcher vulnerable.
As if that wasn’t enough to overcome, the Yankees had to do all of that while avoiding the mistakes that cost them Game 1. Not a single foul ball was put in play in the infield. No more kicking the ball and allowing the Dodgers to take extra bases. There are no baserunning follies that give out.
“I think we’ve played really good baseball,” Yankees third baseman Jazz Chisholm Jr. said. “Guys are still very confident at the plate in the field, and we’re still very confident with our pitching, so I think we’re going to come home and energize the crowd.”
Here’s the truth: The Yankees haven’t played very good baseball. They have been OK, and OK is not enough to beat the Dodgers. Championships demand top-to-bottom excellence, from the batter’s box to the pitcher’s mound to the field to the dugout, where Boone’s judgment can be the difference between a ring and bare fingers.
His choice to call Nestor Cortes left to make 10Th innings of Game 1 loomed over Game 2. Boone stood by the decision to go with Cortes, whose balky left arm had kept him out for more than five weeks before allowing Freddie Freeman’s walk-off grand slam, through lefty Tim Hill, who had been wrong one of the Yankees best relievers. If there’s one regret, Boone said, it’s that he didn’t stick with closer Luke Weaver, who needed 19 pitches to secure five outs, to protect a 3-2 lead.
The Yankees finally came alive in the ninth inning of Game 2, lacing a three-run single off Dodgers reliever Blake Treinen and loading the bases with one out and a two-run deficit. Then Anthony Volpe hit Treinen’s sweep that was nearly half a yard from the plate. And pinch hitter Jose Trevino, for the platoon advantage against left fielder Alex Vesia, hit a fly ball to center field for the 27Th exit.
“I like the bats that are behind me,” Boone said. “Competition, fight.”
It was too little, too late, and now the Yankees are in a precarious position. For six months, they were the best team in the AL. He breezed through the first two rounds, beating a team with a salary one-third his size. The Dodgers are not the Royals and the Guardians. They are machines, and through two games they handed the Yankees as many losses as New York had in the rest of October combined.
The Dodgers are not infallible either. San Diego pushed Los Angeles to the brink of elimination. The New York Mets took two games against him. The Dodgers’ Game 3 starter, Walker Buehler, has not been up since October 16, they are primed to throw relievers-only Game 4, and Yankee Stadium is bound to invigorate New York. The path to the series even exists. This is the Yankees’ first World Series since 2009, and there is a risk of blowing it spectacularly. They can win. They were able to convince Soto that he should spend the rest of his career in the Bronx. He can strengthen Hakim’s legacy. He can catch 28Th champion.
All he needed was to back up his season-long bark with World Series bite.
