The Yankees may be out of the AL East race, but the last week of the regular season still has real work attached to it. With the postseason looming and a likely Wild Card trip ahead, New York has a handful of priorities to sort through before October begins.
At the top of the list is Jazz Chisholm Jr., who came back into the lineup Tuesday night against the Rays after missing time with a sprained thumb. Aaron Judge is likely out at least for the start of the postseason, which makes Chisholm one of the biggest swing pieces for the Yankees’ playoff run.
That’s why these final games matter for him even if the standings don’t. He needs the at-bats.
The timing of the injury was brutal, because Chisholm had finally started looking like the player the Yankees expected when the year began. Over his last 18 games before getting hurt, he hit .364/.446/.545.
Since the trade deadline, he’s slashing .295/.338/.442 across 29 games. If that version shows up again, the lineup gets deeper fast, especially if his work against left-handed pitching keeps trending upward after he was one of the worst hitters in baseball against them through the end of July.
Ben Rice is in a different spot, but the Yankees still have reasons to keep him active. He deserves some rest after what he’s done this season, though he should still get plenty of run this week, including a few starts at first base after spending most of the last few months as the full-time DH.
The target is simple: one more home run and five more RBIs. He’s already at 100 runs, so two more round numbers would make the season look even cleaner.
That would also place Rice in some pretty rare company. He’d become only the 11th Yankee to hit 40 homers, score 100 runs and drive in 100 in the same season, joining names like Babe Ruth, Aaron Judge, Lou Gehrig, Mickey Mantle and Alex Rodriguez. He’d also be just the third first baseman to do it, behind Gehrig and Jason Giambi, and the second Yankees draft pick to get there, behind Judge.
On the pitching side, the Yankees have a different kind of tune-up to manage. The three starters who are most likely to open the Wild Card series against the Red Sox should get their final looks against Tampa Bay, a team New York could see again in the playoffs.
Max Fried is basically built up and took the ball in the second game of Tuesday’s doubleheader. He’s coming off seven strong innings in Minnesota last week, and while he has usually handled Boston well in his career, the postseason has not been his best stage.
Cam Schlittler is sitting on the edge of what looks like an AL Cy Young Award, with one start left and Dylan Cease likely being shut down by the Blue Jays because of shoulder soreness. That final outing should be more of a celebration than a test, but it still matters as part of getting him lined up for October. The question is whether the Yankees should trim him back by an inning to keep him fresher for Game 1 next Tuesday.
Then there’s Gerrit Cole, who probably needs the strongest finish of anyone on the staff. He’s hit a rough patch at the start of the month and suddenly has a problem with the home run ball.
It has taken longer than expected for the 2023 Cy Young winner to run into the usual post-Tommy John wall, but the Yankees need him past it now. He’s also been rough against the Red Sox as a Yankee, and if he’s likely to start a potential Game 3, he has to get those issues sorted out before the postseason arrives.
The bullpen is another area that needs careful handling. New York’s deadline approach drew criticism because the club didn’t really reinforce that group, and the wear of the season has shown up. Paul Blackburn and Brent Headrick have both stumbled recently, with both struggling on 9/11 against the Mets and Headrick later allowing a grand slam on Sunday against Arizona.
Those two, along with David Bednar, are going to matter a lot if the Yankees want a deep October run. The rotation can carry a game with just four pitchers, but only if the bullpen pieces are fresh enough to hold up their end.
Headrick, who looks the most worn down, should probably be kept to two appearances and no more than one inning at a time this week. Blackburn and Bednar can be handled in similar fashion.
The rest of the relief group should be treated like an open tryout. Clarke Schmidt should get three appearances if his bicep soreness isn’t a problem, and Michael Fulmer, Luis Gil and Tim Hill should all get chances to make their case.
The biggest frustration is that a four-game series with the AL East-leading Rays no longer carries the weight it was supposed to have. For months, it looked like the stretch that could decide the division. Instead, it’s arriving after Tampa Bay has played exceptional baseball and New York has only been good.
Still, the Yankees can’t treat these games like throwaways. Aaron Boone can manage with one eye on the postseason, but the players need to act like they’re still in the kind of series they were expecting to be in all along. Even if the standings say otherwise, New York should play with enough force to keep the Rays from celebrating on their home turf.
There’s also a bigger October lesson in all of this. The Yankees want to walk into the playoffs knowing they can beat the team in front of them.
The Blue Jays were a problem this season because Toronto kept beating them, and that confidence carried into October. Taking three of four from Tampa Bay would at least send a message that the Yankees are the team to worry about, even with the Rays holding home-field advantage in Tampa.
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