Brawlin In The Bronx - Will The Yankees Show Up?

I am NOT looking forward to this. The Dodgers are coming into town. That means I am going to hear all of the fake, annoying Dodger fans at work become even more obnoxious. Here come all of the jabs about the next three-peat and dynasty. You won’t find a bigger pool of bandwagon Dodger “fans” then where I live. This is their breeding ground.

So here we go. First series back from the All-Star break and it has to be against the damn Dodgers. At least it’s on our turf, but then again….it’s on OUR turf! I still think about how the Dodgers embarrassed us in the World Series. We have been playing some very uninspiring baseball for too long. This could be a disaster in the making. I hope the time off invigorated the Yankees but this team for years has needed a lot more than time off to help them become real contenders.

At this point, we are at the halfway point. Wildcard standings, division races and trades matter more than ever. October is coming and fast. This series could be a preview of what’s to come. Some fans are really serious about it, others aren’t and that’s a lot of what YES broadcasters discussed HERE. I think if you are the Dodgers this series doesn’t matter as much, but the Yankees it matters a lot.

I love Paul O’Neill, he’s a legend and I like listening to him call games. I just don’t know if I share his same thoughts about this series. “I don’t think a weekend series in July tells you how you’re gonna play a team in the World Series. Everybody looks at that World Series where the Dodgers on paper look like they beat up the Yankees but the Yankees had a couple of games that they could’ve coulda won and it could’ve been a seven-game series. I never feel that the Yankees are truly overmatched by anyone. I would assume that the media will turn it up to be a big, big series, but Aaron Judge is not a part of it, Stanton’s not a part of it. Ohtani, who knows? He might not even be a part of it, won’t be pitching probably. It’s gonna be a different scenario if you meet them again in October.”

Coulda, shoulda, woulda won….but didn’t. There’s too many of these. O’Neill may not feel like the Yankees are truly overmatched by any team but they certainly play like they are sometimes. They lack fundamentals, can’t hit the broad side of a barn, have circus ringleader Aaron Boone for a manager and are their own worst enemy. Teams don’t fear them whether Judge is playing or not. He’s only one guy on the field or in the batting lineup. The rest of the team does not compare and all signs point to Shohei Ohtani playing this weekend just most likely not pitching.

Do I think he’s right that it will be a different scenario if we meet again in October? It could be. But first we have to get there and it’s hard to have confidence that we will. Both teams slumped heading into the All-Star break, but we slumped a lot longer and harder. The Dodgers kick it up another gear once the postseason hits and we just have a hard time finding one that isn’t reverse. 

I hope this weekend goes well for us. Hopefully the Dodgers continue their slump, and we find a spark. I think this series matters. Let’s face it they all do but second half of the season against the Dodgers is a real test….and I am not sure that the Yankees are ready.