We hope you are having a safe and productive holiday season so far and that your 2018 is ending on a positive note.

Some of you may have already heard the news but in case you haven’t, here it is: BP Bronx is joining the rest of the BP Locals in closing down. Now, this doesn’t mean you won’t see the BP Bronx writers ever again. Quite the opposite! You will be seeing everyone on the main Baseball Prospectus site!

That’s right. Our Yankees analysis will be published on the mothership—Baseball Prospectus. So this isn’t a goodbye, it’s a, “See you around!”

Derek Albin and EJ Fagan have already published pieces on the main site and you can look forward to reading more from them. The Bronx Beat Podcast will also continue! In fact, EJ is busy setting up the schedule for the next few weeks. I’ll give you a hint: there will probably be some discussion about Mariano Rivera making the Hall of Fame and we all hope that there will be a need for an emergency podcast for when Manny Machado signs with the Yankees. (Fingers crossed.)

The BP Bronx site will remain up on the interwebs so you will be able to look back fondly at the work of the great writers who have published their analysis on this site.

We want to thank you all for being loyal readers of the site for the past four years. From Andrew Mearns’s first post to Derek Albin’s last post and everything in between, there were more than 900 posts written on BP Bronx.

So on behalf of the entire staff at BP Bronx, past and present, thank you all once again for reading our stuff, commenting on the pieces and listening to the podcast.

Happy Holidays and have a safe New Year!

Stacey Gotsulias
Former Editor-in-Chief

Settle in with a drink or something. Let’s go:

• Winning two out of three is fine but I would have preferred the Yankees sweep Seattle for the season.
• Masahiro Tanaka should start the Wild Card game.
• At least that’s how I feel right now.
• We’ll see how I feel further down the line.
• Let’s hope the Yankees 1) make the Wild Card game and 2) host it.
• I really don’t want them to play in Oakland.
• They won’t win.
• That’s not me being a pessimist, it’s me being a realist.
• Oakland has turned into one of the best teams in baseball while the Yankees are just there.
• And I know, they’re a win away from 90 on the year but it seems like the Yankees are treading water.
• I hate that feeling.
• The A’s will be playing the Orioles this week.
• The Orioles are 41-102.
• The Yankees count for six of those 41 wins.
• How annoying.
• The Yankees play them one more time later this month.
• If they don’t sweep Baltimore, it will be an embarrassment.
• Tanaka looked really good against Seattle on Friday night.
• He’s now 7-0 with a 2.02 ERA against them in his career.
• Not too shabby.
• Austin Romine hit his 10th home run of the season on Saturday night.
• Dellin Betances gave us all a scare on Saturday night.
• He actually Houndini’d his way out of a pretty big jam in the bottom of the ninth.
• I really thought he was going to blow it.
• He didn’t.
• Unfortunately, that luck didn’t carry over into Sunday when he gave up the winning run in the bottom of the eighth.
• Oh well.
• Gary Sanchez still looks awful at the plate.
• So does Giancarlo Stanton.
• The Yankees need Aaron Judge back.
• And who knows if that’s actually going to happen.
• The wrist is the worst thing to break.
• It’s a tricky healing practice depending on how you break it.
• Freakin’ Jakob Junis.
• I like Andrew McCutchen.
• He’s funny.
• If you don’t follow him on Instagram, correct that mistake.
• Dellin Betances’ bloody finger scares me.
• That has to be annoying for him.
• The Yankees are 82-21 against the Twins in the regular season since 2002.
• Isn’t that something?
• When you think of all of the turnover in the rosters these last 16 years and how different the teams have been, it’s really an incredible accomplishment.
• Sonny Gray is getting the start at Target Field on Tuesday night.
• That frightens me a bit.
• The Twins are doing the opener thing.
• After all of the jokes about the Rays doing it, it seems every other team in the league is trying the opener experiment as well.
• If it works, why not?
• J.A. Happ is looking for his 16th win tonight and Luis Severino will be looking for his 17th on Wednesday.
• Severino is worrying me a bit which is why I want Tanaka to start the Wild Card game.
• I don’t trust Severino as much as I trust Tanaka right now.
• Again, we’ll see how things go these next few weeks.
• After the series in Minnesota, the Yanks return home for their last homestand of the season.
• I’ve only been to one game this year and they lost to the Rays.
• It was game in which the Rays used an opener and the Yankees couldn’t get anything going against them.
• It was irritating to watch in person.
• It was also Old Timers’ Day and very hot out.
• Anyway, let’s go Yankees!

Yes, I’m back after a bit of a hiatus. To be honest, I was burnt and couldn’t come up with things to write about which is odd because if any team has had things to write about, it’s 2018 Yankees. Between the injuries, losing to crap teams and Aaron Boone’s mindboggling in-game decisions, I could have been writing non-stop.

So now that I’m feeling a bit more like myself, I have decided to get back into things by writing a random thoughts post because those are easy to write and my goodness do I have a lot of thoughts after Wednesday night’s disaster.

• It’s embarrassing that the Yankees split their season series with the Marlins.
• A team that’s filled with guys you don’t know.
• A team that’s going nowhere.
• A team that can’t draw 10,000 fans to a game.
• And what on earth was Aaron Boone thinking leaving Lance Lynn in the game in the sixth inning?
• Did he not see the disaster that was about to happen?
• Everyone else did!
• Lynn had been lucky all game, was up to around 100 pitches but sure, leave him in. That’ll go well.
• Nope.
• The sixth inning was embarrassing.
• The eighth inning was just downright confusing.
• Why was Chance Adams in for a second inning?
• Was there no one else available?
• I realize a lot of guys the bullpen were used in the 12 inning game on Tuesday but Thursday is an off day. They can rest then.
• Boone turned a possible comeback win into a 9-3 loss.
• I’ve tried to be nice and I’ve tried to accept the fact that this is Boone’s first season as a manager on any level but he has cost this team at least 10 wins.
• Because of lineup construction.
• Because of his in-game decisions like either taking starters out too early or leaving them in too long.
• He goes to guys like A.J. Cole instead of Dellin Betances.
• Now, his inexperience is starting to bug me because we’re getting down to the wire and with injuries to Aaron Judge, Gary Sanchez, Didi Gregorius and Aroldis Chapman, the Yankees need every win they can get.
• Which is probably why Sonny Gray will be starting the second game of the doubleheader against Baltimore on Saturday.
• My goodness.
• Gray can’t start and he can’t be a reliever.
• He’s useless right now.
• He will cost the Yankees a win to the worst team in baseball.
• I have no confidence in Gray.
• Saturday will be a debacle.
• Player’s weekend is this weekend so we’ll see everyone with their nicknames on the back of their jerseys.
• Some guys opted for their last names while others are putting their nicknames across their backs.
• I thought it was boring for guys to choose their last name but someone pointed out that this is the one time they can have their name on a jersey in a game.
• So it makes more sense to me now.
• I still wish they would have allowed Didi Gregorius to come up with their jersey “names” by using emojis.
• Brad Boxberger is going to have a box emoji and a burger emoji on his jersey.
• Maybe Sonny Gray could have the poop emoji on his jersey.
• Perfect.
• Just in case you didn’t know, Sunday’s game has been moved to 8:05 so they can show it on ESPN.
• Because if there’s one team everyone in America wants to see, it’s the Orioles.
• Personally, I’m annoyed that it’s a Sunday Night game because Sunday is my birthday.
• They don’t do great on my birthday.
• I once wrote a post about it and the time of that post, they had a losing record on my birthday.
• Lame.
• I’m also the only one in my immediate family to not be born in a World Series-winning year.
• My dad was born in 1941, my mom 1947 and my brother 1978.
• I was born in 1974 when they had to play in Shea Stadium while they were refurbishing Yankee Stadium
• Although there is one thing that Yankee fans who are 1974 babies have that’s pretty cool.
• Well, if they were born January – October and not in November or December.
• The Yankees won their 24th, 25th and 26th championships when we were 24, 25, and 26.
• That’s pretty cool.
• They won number 27 when I was 35 which doesn’t mean anything.
• They almost won 27 when I was 27.
• Freakin’ Diamondbacks.
• Pedro Martinez needs to zip it.
• He thinks the Yankees aren’t hustling enough and not counting the injuries to key players as a reason.
• Really?
• Imagine the Red Sox without J.D. Martinez, Mookie Betts and let’s say Xander Bogaerts. Oh and add Craig Kimbrel.
• How well do you think they’d be doing without those players?
• Shut up, Pedro.
• And on that note, I will end this post.
• Enjoy the off day.
• Go Yankees.

Case in point:

Here’s the info about the dinger:

Giancarlo Stanton hit a 121.7 mph, 449-foot home run. It's the hardest home run Statcast has ever tracked. pic.twitter.com/kU2r4IVEIb

— David Adler (@_dadler) August 10, 2018

Since hitting his walk-off dinger against Seattle in late June, Stanton is hitting .320/.370/.566 with 11 homers and 34 RBIs. (Thanks, Marc Carig of The Athletic) He’s also doing a good job while Aaron Judge remains on the shelf with his broken wrist.

Stanton has yet to go on one of his infamous home run streaks but maybe this week is the start of one? The Yankees and their fans sure hope so.

E.J. is away so Paul Semendinger fills in as host and talks with Scott Moss about the slew of Yankee trades that have happened in the past few days.

But…

It was against the Orioles and he’s had some success against them—Gray is 3-0 with a 0.51 ERA in three starts at Camden Yards. So while it was nice to see Sonny Gray exit a game after six innings (instead of two) without giving up any runs, he hasn’t quite turned the corner. Not yet anyway. He’ll need to string together a few strong/quality starts against tougher teams and/or be successful at home for that to happen. Still, Wednesday night was a step in the right direction.

So what worked for Gray against the Orioles?

His curveball:

As you can see, he threw it a lot. Gray finished his outing with 90 pitches and half of them were curveballs. He also threw 39 two-seam fastballs, three four-seam fastballs, two sliders, and one changeup.

A positive for Gray was his eight strikeouts–five swinging, three called. He threw his curve for strike three five times, his two-seamer two times and he threw one four-seam fastball for strike three against Chris Davis. Gray’s had three outings with eight or more strikeouts.

The other positive for Gray was that he only gave up three hits and he didn’t surrender a run. There were no two-out, two-strike, run-scoring hits for Baltimore. He gave up two doubles and a single and the two times when Baltimore had runners in scoring position (the second inning and the sixth inning), Gray was able to work out of the jam and end the inning without any damage. This was only his second scoreless outing of the season. The other time he didn’t give up a run was in an eight-inning, two-hit masterpiece against Toronto on June 6.

As Gray told reporters last night, “It’s one start,” but it’s a start he can build upon, hopefully.

Gray’s next start will be after the All-Star break so we’ll have to wait until then to see if he’s actually turned the corner.

Photo credit: Tommy Gilligan / USA TODAY Sports

• I didn’t mind the 4th of July uniforms and hats.
• I kind of like them.
• I know, sacrilegious!
• But, I own a floral Yankee cap so who am I to say anything?
• The Yankees should have swept the Braves.
• Monday’s game was so frustrating.
• So many squandered scoring choices.
• And Tuesday’s game was a bit scary.
• I really thought they’d blow.
• It seemed like that kind of game.
• Thankfully A.J. Cole and Chasen Shreve came to the rescue.
• That was an unlikely scenario, right?
• Especially Shreve.
• Two on, one out… I was fully expecting him to surrender a double.
• Luckily, he didn’t.
• The fourth of July is John Sterling’s birthday and when Giancarlo Stanton hit a home run, Michael Kay said Sterling’s call for Stanton.
• It was funny.
• Paul O’Neill loved it.
• Sterling turned 80!
• He looks good for 80!
• So the Yanks are off today and start a series against Toronto tomorrow.
• Toronto just played a series against the Mets.
• The Mets actually won on Wednesday.
• They blew a six-run lead on Tuesday.
• Hopefully, the Yankees will repeat what they did the last time they played a series against Toronto.
• Win it.
• Seems simple enough.
• The news of Gleyber Torres going on the DL was a bummer.
• How about Kyle Higashioka?
• All he can do is hit bombs.
• It’s pretty funny.
• Clint Frazier caught Masahiro Tanaka on Wednesday in Scranton.
• Yes, you read that correctly.
• After Tanaka was done, Frazier went out to centerfield.
• So MLB fined Brett Gardner for taking too long to get into the batter’s box.
• He was not happy.
• It was around $3,500 which is a lot of money to a regular Joe but Gardner was still pissed.
• He had a good quote about it.
• “Somebody else can [throw pickoff throws to first base] 27 times in a game and waste 15 minutes of everybody’s time, and I get fined thousands of dollars taking three seconds too long to get in the box.”
• He has a point.
• MLB is so worried about the pace of play and it seems unnecessary.
• And if you’re so concerned about the pace of play, fine the pitchers that take forever between pitches.
• That really slows the game to a snail’s pace.
• I remember loathing seeing the Yankees play Josh Beckett because he was so slow.
• And Clay Buchholz, I’m pretty sure he also moved at a glacial pace when he pitched.
• The pace of play also bothers me because there are so many other things to be worried about.
• Like how they handle off the field issues.
• I don’t want to get into a long diatribe about this so let’s move on.
• Sonny Gray is terrible and I will not watch him pitch anymore.
• My blood pressure cannot take it.
• It is frustrating to watch him fail so miserably when he starts.
• That start against the Red Sox when he had two strikes and two outs on four batters and gave up a grand slam?
• I wanted to launch Gray into space.
• He’s better than how he’s pitching and I don’t understand why the Yankees aren’t doing something with him.
• It’s almost always a guaranteed loss when he’s pitching.
• And how can someone be so putrid at home but do okay on the road?
• Shouldn’t it be the other way around?
• He’s pitching on Friday against Toronto because Brian Cashman doesn’t think Gray should miss a start.
• I think he should miss a start but the Yankees’ rotation is depleted so I can understand why they’re not skipping him.
• But I don’t have to like it.
• The Yankees’ schedule from now until September 1 the Yankees will play 43 out of their next 51 games against teams with records below .500.
• They need to capitalize this stretch and win as much as possible.
• They cannot afford to play down to their opponents.
• And when September rolls around, they still have six head-to-head contests with the Red Sox.
• The division will come down to that stretch of games as well.
• The Yankees need to aim for the division.
• This year they won’t be facing the Twins in the Wild Card game.
• It could be Seattle and while the Yankees swept Seattle when they last played them, the Wild Card game is a much different story.
• Anything can happen.
• The Yankees’ bats can go cold.
• The Yankees’ starter can leave after an inning because he couldn’t get anyone out.
• Wait, that sounds familiar.
• So, yes, aim for the division just to be on the safe side.
• We’re entering the dog days of summer.
• This is the most important time of the season.
• Let’s go Yanks!

• No, really, that sucked.
• Hard.
• Sunday’s game was especially frustrating because Clint Frazier should have won the game for the Yankees.
• But no! The dumb things that hang all over Tropicana Field’s ceiling had to ruin it.
• I loathe that place.
• I’m so glad the Yankees are out of that shithole.
• Tonight they’re in Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love.
• It’s also a place where pitchers have to bat.
• Dun dun dun dun, dun!
• Maybe the team can escape with all of their pitchers in tact this time.
• Cross your fingers.
• And your toes.
• And what the hell, cross your eyes too.
• Speaking of hurt, Gary Sanchez…
• This is just not his year.
• What a bummer.
• Another bummer? The Yankees wasting a five-hit game from Giancarlo Stanton.
• Come on, guys.
• Jonathan Loiasaga is starting tonight.
• Let’s hope he goes as well as his first start rather than his second start.
• And oh my God, Domingo German on Sunday!
• YIKES.
• He admitted after the game that he wasn’t feeling his pitches.
• We weren’t either, dude.
• What a nightmare.
• I’m glad the Yankees were able to scrape together some runs on Sunday.
• Their previous two games weren’t great and even after scoring those four runs against James Paxton on Thursday, they had big trouble scoring.
• Hopefully, they’ve snapped out of it and can score again.
• This streak isn’t the end of the world.
• The Yankees are still 50-25 which is excellent.
• Things could be a lot worse.
• We could be Mets fans.
• Woof. They gave up seven solo home runs yesterday.
• The dagger being Justin Turner’s home run in the 11th which turned into the game-winner.
• I finally attended my first game of the year.
• It was Old Timers’ Day.
• My 20th in a row.
• Too bad the game afterward wasn’t so much fun.
• Still, it was a good day. A hot one.
• I took about 40 pictures of Jason Giambi alone.
• Having gone to the past 20 OTDs I can say how different they’ve become.
• We used to see a bunch of guys who played in the 40s and 50s and now there are only a few left.
• Dr. Bobby Brown is the lone survivor of the 1947 World Series winning squad.
• I know that’s how life works but it’s still sad.
• For instance, we won’t get to see Oscar Gamble’s crazy afro anymore.
• I had forgotten that he died and when he name flashed up on the scoreboard during the in memoriam part of the ceremony, I became sad. I even shed a little tear.
• For him and for Don Baylor.
• And for all of the others we’ve lost since June 2017.
• The game itself was a blowout!
• I’ve never seen anything like that.
• It was incredible.
• Nick Swisher’s home run was the most amusing part of the day.
• Of course, he’d be the one to hit a ball into the second deck.
• Back to this week.
• I’ve never been to Philadelphia.
• Yeah, I know.
• Well, not unless you count the few times I’ve passed through it while taking Amtrak down to Baltimore and D.C.
• I’ve always wanted to go.
• There are a few places I want to go to and stuff my face.
• And none of them are Pat’s or Geno’s.
• I’m not into cheesesteak because I don’t like the cheese they use.
• There’s a pub called The Good Dog that I saw on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives that looks incredible.
• The food is drool-worthy.
• I’d also like to get a Dinic’s roast pork sandwich.
• Those also look incredible.
• I saw that place on DDD too.
• I think Guy Fieri wants to make me fat.
• I would like for the Yankees to snap out of this lull they’re in.
• We were on such a high after the Seattle series.
• Or at least I was.
• I was so sick of everyone fawning all over them.
• I’m glad they came back to earth a bit.
• Seeing tweets about how magical Safeco Field had become was really testing my digestive system.
• So after Philly, the Yankees play the Red Sox again.
• Let’s hope we have a repeat of last time and they win two out of three.
• That would be nice.
• I’d like for them to score off Kimbrel, beat Chris Sale and keep Mookie Betts’ and JD Martinez’s bats silent.
• I may be asking for too much.
• A girl can dream, right?
• I’d also love it if Stanton’s hot hitting can stick around.
• I’m sick of people booing him.
• It’s very silly.
• Anyway, go Yankees!

Hooray!

Anyway, let’s get into it, shall we?

• Watching the Yankees beat Houston is a lot of fun.
• Tuesday’s game wasn’t fun until the ninth inning.
• What a sloppy performance.
• But hey, they won.
• And how about Brett Gardner coming back to life.
• Usually, he starts off hot and cools down in the second half.
• This season, he had been ice cold to start and is now heating up as the weather does the same.
• And isn’t Gleyber Torres great?
• I enjoy watching him play.
• Well, when he’s not making errors in the field.
• He’s hitting well for someone his age.
• I was worried about Miguel Andujar after that collision with Yuki Gurriel during Wednesday’s game.
• Didi asked him what 1+1 equaled and Andujar laughed.
• It’s good to know that our players know basic math.
• And how about Luis Severino?
• It’s relaxing watching his starts unlike Sonny Gray’s starts while can be agonizing.
• The personal catcher thing isn’t really helping.
• Apparently, it doesn’t really matter who’s catching him.
• He works better when he’s fast.
• If he takes too long on the mound, it screws him up.
• He’s opening the series against Baltimore that starts on Thursday night.
• Bad news: Gray is 1-3 with a 5.40 ERA in his career at Camden Yards.
• Good news: Aaron Judge really likes hitting against the Orioles.
• The Orioles are bad and the Yankees should beat them.
• Should.
• Back to Houston, can we talk about how nice it is that the Yankees can beat Dallas Keuchel?
• Remember dreading his starts against the Yankees?
• Justin Verlander is pitching out of his mind.
• And it’s not at all suspicious that a guy who is 35 and has over 2600 innings on his arm and who was plagued by injuries is suddenly pitching better than he did in his 20s.
• Not at all.
• My main reason for pointing this out is because he’s so sanctimonious when it comes to PED and I’d love nothing more than to see him get caught doing something illegal.
• The Astros are heading home to play the Red Sox this weekend.
• Hey! The Red Sox are finally playing a good team for once.
• Their schedule has been a cakewalk so far this season.
• The Yankees are now in the cakewalk part of their schedule.
• And they need to take advantage of this stretch.
• Remember when the Yankees were 9-9? It seems so long ago.
• As if it wasn’t this season.
• During that stretch, they lost three out of four to the Orioles.
• Hopefully, they can return the favor and beat up on a terrible Orioles team.
• They were able to beat the Angels two out of three this past weekend.
• The one loss was Gray’s start.
• Of course.
• I really don’t like going into Gray’s starts and assuming it will be a loss.
• CC Sabathia isn’t looking great either.
• He started off well but now he’s losing a bit of that early season magic.
• And his starts seem to go the same way.
• He’ll be great for the first few innings and then fall completely apart in the fourth or fifth inning.
• Maybe this stretch of “easier” games will help him out
• Maybe it could help Gray out as well.
• Giancarlo Stanton didn’t get hot until July of last year and then he went HAM.
• So I’m not worried about him yet.
• I’m glad that after looking dreadful at the plate on Tuesday that Gary Sanchez turned things around on Wednesday.
• Can we talk about this play?

• I mean, come on.
• It worked out perfectly.
• What a carom off the backstop.
• Jeez.
• If Chapman tried that 10 times, he wouldn’t be able to do it.
• Yankee magic!