The Yankees
One thing remains same: Yankees expect success
NEW YORK — In February, they were fueled by anger and powered by the addition of one of the best pitchers of his generation. With a young, powerful lineup, a bullpen stacked to shut down games after the fifth inning and the addition of Gerrit Cole to the front of their rotation, they were the favorite to win the American League coming into 2020 before the coronavirus pandemic shut down baseball.
Now, with the world and country in the midst of the pandemic, after a three-and-a-half month hiatus, the anger at the Astros cheating scandal has faded a bit. The routine-rich game that is a marathon of a season has been altered almost beyond recognition by the coronavirus health and safety protocols. As the Yankees prepare for a 60-game sprint of a season, there will be no Bronx cheers, no Yankees Stadium roll call, no fans in the ballpark.
About the only thing that hasn’t changed in the Bronx is the expectation of success.
“The reason we’re here now is to doesn’t change.‘... Our goal at the start of spring training, with the team that we’ve got together here, with a team that’s been on the brink, with a team that’s knocked on the door now for a few years, with a team with some unfinished business, I do feel like we’re still a very hungry group and we want to climb to the top of the mountain,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone told his team when they reconvened July 4 in the Bronx. . “And because circumstances have changed, and certainly this season has changed, that goal doesn’t change. We want to win. We want to be champions. I know our guys feel the same way.”
If anything, the expectations are probably higher now.
While the Yankees have lost starter Luis Severino for the season after February Tommy John surgery, several key players were able to use the COVID-19 shutdown to get healthy. Lefty James Paxton, who had surgery in early February and was expected to miss the first few months of the season, is back and ready to pitch when the season begins. Slugger Aaron Judge, who missed all of the first spring training with what turned out to be a stress fracture in his top right rib and partially punctured lung, is back fully participating in the rebooted training camp and has declared himself “game ready.” Center fielder Aaron Hicks, who had Tommy John surgery right after the Yankees lost the 2019 ALCS, was expected to miss half a season rehabbing, but he too is “game ready.” Finally, Giancarlo Stanton, who missed all but one spring training game with a strained right calf before the coronavirus shutdown, is now “100%,” and is expected to be in the lineup when the Yankees start the season July 23 against the defending World Series champion Nationals in D.C.
The core of a team that won 103 games in 2019 despite having a record number of players go on the injured list is healthy. They also added the biggest free agent available in Cole, perhaps the best pitcher of his generation.
Cole is a lifelong Yankees fan, who still turned them down as a high school senior when the Bombers drafted him in the first round of 2008. GM Brian Cashman called him the team’s “White Whale,” after they failed to get him a second time when the Pirates traded him to the Astros in 2017. Now, after signing a nine-year, $324 million deal, Cole is the ace of the staff.
The Yankees hope he is the piece that will finally push them to the top of that mountain and end their decade-long World Series drought.
“We liked our chances in February, not coming out of the gate 100% healthy so I gotta say that we really like our chances coming out of the gate 100% healthy…. We’re bullish on it,” Cole said. “It’s going to be a different season right? I mean we’re used to playing really about three times the amount of games, but with that said there is only going to be one coronavirus World Series Champion and I don’t see why in and of itself you wouldn’t want to take that trophy home.”