BOTTOMS UP
Wade and Drury, batting 8th and 9th, save Yanks as big bats go silent
Tyler Wade reacts after belting what turned out to be the game-winning two-run double in the Yankees’ 4-2 win over the Blue Jays Friday night. Brandon Drury (inset) added two hits and two RBIs.
TORONTO — By the time last season was over and Aaron Judge had nearly won an MVP and Luis Severino a Cy Young, and Gary Sanchez had drilled home that he was the best-hitting catcher in the sport and the Yankees bullpen was close to a force of nature, well, it was pretty difficult to make a case about the value of Austin Romine and Ronald Torreyes. They, after all, were the 24th and 25th men on the roster, a couple of backups who teamed to hit five homers with a .636 OPS. Yet, when I begin a question about MVPs of last season, Aaron Boone — not even the manager of that team — interjects with Romine and Torreyes. A manager understands. Look, the Yankees are blessed with lots of terrific players and there will be plenty of games across six months like Thursday’s opener when Giancarlo Stanton hoists an entire team on his biceps to victory. But a roster is a delicate ecosystem. As Brett Gardner said, “It really doesn’t matter what the roster is on Feb. 20 or March 20 or April 1. That is not going to be your team all year.” The best clubs are those that defy crisis because players seize opportunity. Last April, the Yankees lost two middleof-the-diamond cornerstones in Didi Gregorius and Gary Sanchez and Torreyes and Romine played their best when the team needed them most. Judge, who you might remember was not yet AARON JUDGE, put down step one on a great season. Aaron Hicks began to wrest the center-field job from Jacoby Ellsbury. Before Game 2 of the 2018 season, the Yankees put Hicks on the DL. Greg Bird was already there and so were Ellsbury and Clint Frazier, which in some combination or another represents a lot of lefty bats and a bunch of outfielders. “I don’t feel like we are in crisis mode,” Boone said. “I think we have the talent to come through this. I think we have the talent not just to maintain but thrive.”
In Game 2, Stanton went 0for-4. He struck out twice and twice had his bat broken on grounders. Judge went 0-for-4 with two double plays. Gary Sanchez also was 0-for-4. The big bats were hitless in 12 atbats. Ferocious turned feeble.
But the Yankees won 4-2 because their No. 8 hitter, Brandon Drury, had an RBI double in the second and an RBI single in the fourth and that moved Toronto starter Aaron Sanchez to basically unintentionally intentionally walk Drury to load the bases in the fifth with two down. Made sense as the best approach to protect a 2-0 disadvantage. After all, the next batter was No. 9 hitter, Tyler Wade.
The young infielder had been overmatched by Sanchez in his first two-bats, a whiff and a grounder to first. That made Wade 9-for-61 (.148) in his career with two RBIs. Wade, though, matched that RBI total by lashing a two-run double to right-center, punctuating it with an outburst of joy toward his dugout.
“It is Game 2, but for me each and every game is a big game,” Wade said. “I was fired up.”
In many ways, Drury and Wade epitomize the work Brian Cashman and his staff have done in recent years to assemble this deep roster. Drury was a player the Yanks had pursued for a while, a player they looked at like Gregorius, Hicks and Chad Green, who had a ceiling not yet reached.
Wade is part of excellent internal assessment. The Yankees took him in the fourth round in 2013, but believed early on that if Wade had gone to college, he would have emerged as a firstround pick. Yankees officials were not discouraged by his poor cameo last year, as they were not by that of Judge in 2016 or Severino’s work as a starter the same year. They saw an athlete, player and personality with which to remain patient.
“He’s a confident kid and he should be confident, he’s a good player,” Gardner said.
With Bird out, Neil Walker is going to play a lot of first base. That will give Wade an opportunity to show that he is not just a placeholder, particularly for top prospect Gleyber Torres. Drury is being given the third-base spot with touted prospect Miguel Andujar percolating down below. Tyler Austin will get plenty of reps at first to prove he belongs while Bird heals. Until either Ellsbury or Hicks gets back, McKinney will play and he got his first hit Friday night.
“If you are going to have the season you want, you are going to have to get contributions from guys you do not expect,” Boone said.
Last April that was the rather anonymous duo of Romine and Torreyes. Friday night — when the muscle in the Yankee lineup went limp — it was Drury and Wade. As great as Stanton, Judge and Sanchez are, it takes a whole team to accomplish something
special.