BOSTON -- A better day is coming for the New York Yankees on Monday. Guaranteed.
That is because there is no game on Monday, and maybe the day off will allow some of the mostly self-inflicted wounds from the Boston Tee Party to heal before they head to a supposedly soft landing in Tampa, Florida.
Monday, Sept. 19 will be the Yankees best day in a week, actually, because it was just more than a week ago, at the close of business on Sept. 10, that the Yankees were so close to playoff baseball that, in the words of Mark Teixeira, they "could taste it."
Eight days later and after their latest loss, 5-4, to the Boston Red Sox, Teixeira was verbalizing what a lot of his teammates were surely thinking, that little short of a miracle could enable the Yankees to continue playing baseball beyond the close of business on Oct. 2, the last day of the regular season.
"A miracle would help," he said. "I'll pray if you do."
But it's hard to imagine the Yankees having a prayer of making it to the postseason after four devastating games in Boston, losses all, and three of them games in which the Yankees held substantial leads. Thursday night, they led 5-1 after four innings only to see their closer, Dellin Betances, blow it in a chaotic ninth inning. Saturday, they led 5-2 after four but gradually gave it all back, eventually losing on a wild pitch in the seventh.
Sunday night might have been the worst of all, even worse than the shocking walk-off loss on Thursday, if only because it seemed as if the Red Sox were taking a small measure of pity on their overmatched former rivals. They sat David Ortiz and replaced Sandy Leon, their catcher with the .339 batting average, with Brian Holaday, who came in hitting .214.
But Hanley Ramirez, who killed them Thursday night, was still in there, and so was Mookie Betts. Between the two of them, they drove a stake into the heart of whatever remained of the Yankees' playoff dreams.
"Brutal, just brutal," said Tyler Clippard, who allowed the game-winning hit, yet another home run by Ramirez, who sent a baseball out onto Landsdowne Street in the seventh inning, his second homer of the night. "Pretty self-explanatory."
But it was manager Joe Girardi who had the explaining to do after a couple more curious pitching decisions, namely his decision to have starter CC Sabathia pitch to Ramirez when the count ran to 3-1 with first base open and two on in the sixth with the Yankees leading 4-0.
"If you [walk Ramirez] then you put the tying run at the plate, and pitch to Chris Young, who’s hit lefties really well," Girardi said. "So that doesn’t make any sense to me.”
When Girardi was reminded that Sabathia had struck out Young on his two previous at-bats, the manager shot back, "What if he hits a home run? How many times have we seen Chris Young hit a homer off a lefty?”
Frankly, not as many times as we saw Ramirez hit home runs off Yankees pitching this weekend. In the four games here, Ramirez went 9-for-16 with nine RBIs and four home runs, including the one he smashed off the base on the light stanchion atop the Green Monster on Sabathia's 3-1 slider.
"It was a good pitch, a pitch off the plate. He went out and got it," Sabathia said. "It was one of those things. I was trying not to give in to him and throw him something that he could do that with. He ended up doing it anyway."
Sabathia set the shot up by shot-putting a potential double-play throw over the head of Billy Butler, who was making just his second start at first base since July 5. Sabathia had snagged a liner off the bat of Betts and a simple toss to Butler would have ended the inning with no damage. Instead, there were runners at second and third and Ramirez at the plate waiting to pounce.
"The big guys, the pitchers, sometimes the touch throws are the hardest throws for them," Girardi said. "It's the difference in the game, when you look at it."
But not the difference between the two teams, which was obvious. The Yankees abused starter Drew Pomeranz early, chasing him after scoring four runs in 3 and 2/3 innings, including a long home run by Gary Sanchez in the third.
But after adding their final two runs on fourth-inning ground outs, the Yankees managed only four more singles, and were robbed of a couple of potential doubles by Betts, who made nearly identical running, diving catches on line drives by Teixeira and Brett Gardner in the seventh and ninth innings.
“I didn’t even see Mookie," Teixeira said. "In my mind I’m thinking, ‘All right, that ball’s in the corner.' And then he comes out of nowhere."
As did a nightmare week in which the Yankees went from contenders -- they were a mere three games out of first place on Sept. 10 -- to descenders, now eight games back in the division and four back in the wild card with 13 games to play after losing seven of their last eight.
"We could have won all four of these games here," Girardi said. "But we're still playing the teams in front of us, some of them. We have to start over Tuesday.”
Actually, they can start over on Monday, which will be the best day the Yankees have had in a long time.
And maybe, the last good day they will have for the rest of the season.
