TORONTO – The Yankees had hoped to put their Rogers Centre woes behind them.
Instead, the first two games of the ALDS only magnified their Toronto troubles this season, as the team has now lost 8-of-9 games north of the border after surrendering 23 runs – the most ever over two postseason games – between Saturday and Sunday. The poor display, which coincided with strong pitching performances from Toronto’s Kevin Gausman and Trey Yesavage and weak showings from the Bombers’ bats – now has the Yankees readying for another potential elimination game in the Bronx after they managed to win two over the Red Sox in the Wild Card Series last week.
“We did well with our backs against the wall against Boston,” Ben Rice said after the Yankees lost, 13-7, in Game 2 of the ALDS. “Now we’re gonna have to show we can do it again.”
Aaron Judge shared a similar sentiment, calling the Yankees’ predicament “nothing new for us.” The captain cited the Wild Card Series, as well as the Yankees pushing the American League East race to the final day of the regular season, though the team benefitted from playing some last-place squads at the very end. The Jays won the division anyway because they held the tiebreaker over the Yankees, their reward for an 8-5 record in head-to-head play during the regular season.
Judge even went back to his rookie year in 2017 as he made his case for confidence, as those Yankees lost two ALDS games in Cleveland before winning three straight – two at home before one on the road – and advancing to the ALCS.
“We’ve been here before,” said Judge, who is hitting .444 this postseason but has yet to homer. “We got experience. We got guys in here who have been to the World Series, been in some tough moments, backs against the wall, especially all season long. So we just gotta show up and do our thing.”
With the Yankees looking to return to the World Series and avenge a sloppy showing that had the backend of the victorious Dodgers’ roster mocking them all offseason, the odds are not in their favor.
Teams that have taken a 2-0 lead at home in the ALDS have won it 31 out of 34 times. That includes 20 sweeps.
“We’re ready to go,” Max Fried said after allowing seven earned runs over three innings in Game 2. “Obviously, we had a rough showing here, and obviously we’d rather be up 2-0 than down 2-0, but we have a lot of faith in this club.
“We’re a good team. Two games doesn’t mean anything. We still have the ability to go out there and win three in a row and win the series.”
While the Yankees’ season is now on the brink again, the team is not changing the even-keel, one-day-at-a-time mindset that has become embedded in the clubhouse under Judge and Aaron Boone.
Will Warren, who gave up six earned runs on Sunday, said there’s no need to be “rallying the troops,” as the Yanks “know what’s at stake.”
“Obviously, don’t like it. But to get out of it? One at a time,” Giancarlo Stanton, who is hitting an uncharacteristic .150 this postseason after picking up a two-run single on Sunday, added of the situation. “You can’t look to the whole series. You gotta go one at a time, execute each inning, execute each pitch, and not look far ahead.”
Boone, meanwhile, noted that “baseball is a funny game,” full of unpredictability.
“Obviously, it feels like the world’s caving in around you, you lose two games like that in their building where it doesn’t go right,” the manager continued. “But all of a sudden you go out there and win a ballgame on Tuesday; the needle can change.
“There’s been a lot of weird things that have happened in baseball this year. This would not be the weirdest, us rallying. We’ll come ready to go Tuesday, expect to win, and then look to win again and push it back here.”
By “here,” Boone meant Toronto, which would host a decisive Game 5 if the Yankees can win two back home.
The pinstripers haven’t been able to pinpoint why the Rogers Centre has been such a nightmare for them – at least not publicly – but they’ve expressed conviction in their ability to beat the Jays in their raucous ballpark.
Actually achieving that has been a rarity this season, though. Not just for the Yankees, but across the sport, as Toronto went 54-27 in Canada this season.
No American League team had a better record at home.
“They have good fans. They’re loud. But we all enjoy being in hostile environments,” Rice said. “They have definitely played very well at home, so hat’s off to them.”
