I had the misfortune of watching some of the July 4th game while around my Staten Island-based cousins, and while there are a few Yankee fans in there, a lot of people were rooting for the other team. And so as the Yankees ended up spiraling out and the Mets' lineup started beating up Stroman, I just sort of shuddered and went about my drinking. The Mets started a no-name starter based one town over from me, who they were forced to start because their pitchers keep getting injured, and they still won the game because the Yankees managed to find a way to suck more.
Both of these teams have similar issues, honestly. In both cases, the lineup will pick choice moments to not show up. It's happening now for the Yankees. Judge is slowing down, Stanton's been anemic, Wellsy's been slacking. At the very least Cody Bellinger has been stepping up more, as he now has 13 homers and 47 RBIs. But the May momentum is gone because the lineup just isn't there. The Mets went through this before, but now they're getting production from Alonso, Lindor, Soto, McNeil and the works. Brandon Nimmo, even in what's knowingly a lesser year, has 18 homers and 52 RBIs. You can play the whole 'we traded away PCA' game for hours but ultimately this team has hit its way to 50 homers when the Yankees haven't yet. Even in that period where the Mets weren't winning games, which was fun by the way, they didn't look as bad as the Yankees did in their drought. You didn't hear about how bad the Mets were, because they still managed to score runs.
The other problem these teams share is the back half of their rotations. The Yankees just lost Clarke Schmidt and Ryan Yarbrough, and are down to a skeleton crew of Fried, Rodon, Warren, Stroman and a to-be-determined minor leaguer who'll have to face the Mariners in a couple days. Who will it be? Rookie Clayton Beeter? Scranton favorite Allan Winans? Hell, is this finally the moment J.T. Brubaker starts a game for us? The Mets may be in even more dire straits, because they're down to just David Peterson and Clay Holmes as viable MLB options. Yes, Frankie Montas is healthy, but like usual in New York he's getting obliterated in between injuries. Justin Hagenman did his best but...he's your 4 guy and he already feels like a last resort. In lieu of a fifth starter the Mets went with a reliever game on Sunday, and if we'd have lost that I think Aaron Boone would have lost his job. There is a belief that both Kodai Senga and Sean Manaea could be back for the weekend series against the Royals, but that's a lot of hope to throw on these guys. I've seen 'everything's gonna be alright when Senga comes back' before, and it didn't go too well last summer. And let's just hope Manaea still has some of whatever made him a Mets hero last year.
Both the Yankees and the Mets have similar issues, and went through similar stretches. That the Mets were able to wake up first, my hat goes off to them. But this isn't a death sentence for the Yankees yet. There's still half a season to play, and still a lot of momentum to gain. We'll see how we're looking after the break.
Coming Tomorrow- For years he looked like the last true 'can't miss' closer. In April...he missed.
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