More to Fear Than Fear Itself
The loss of Bird takes away what was supposed to be an additional weapon, not one that produced last year, and his nine home runs from last season seem easy to replace. Plus, he is projected to come back by June, when his bat can still be a difference maker.
Even without him, though, the Yankees have three of the ten best power hitters in baseball. And while right-handed pitchers will get some respite, Judge, Stanton and Gary Sanchez will all bat in a row against lefties.
Forget Judge and Giancarlo hitting 100 homers; what about the three of them hitting 150?
That might not happen but it is possible, and it is that possibility that will keep pitchers up at night. Before July, some of the best pitchers in the AL will see Judgian blasts in their sleep.
Yankees fans are seeing them now. And they are likely to go on seeing them, all through the season: Big home runs that fly deep into the night, American League scoreboards changing quickly as uncatchable balls soar past them, and past the faces of gigantic, smiling Yankees.
Soon the sight of Sanchez and Stanton rounding the bases yet again will be burned into their minds. And those of Yankees’ opponents.
Working on a Dream
By August, the specter of the on-going Home Run Derby that will be the Yankees this year will win them some games before the end of batting practice. And that is the real moment fans are waiting for: Cheering not just for a winning team, but for the most feared team in sports. This from Master Sun:
"The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting."
And, even more, succulent to Yankees fans, this purportedly from Genghis Khan:
"The greatest joy for a man is to defeat his enemies, to drive them before him, to take from them all they possess [and] to see those they love in tears…"
That is the season they want and expect: To win it all and do so in bloody fashion. And they might just get it.
But those are just hopes and dreams. Now is the time for speculations to end and preparations to close. Now we get the anthems and the dirty uniforms, and the panic of a three-game losing streak. We understand the early leads and the late game losses, and the modern-day version of murderer’s row.
It’s baseball, and it’s back in all its pain and glory.