Yankees get cute and squander Game 2

 The Yankees dropped game 2 to the Rays 7-5 and the ALDS is now locked at 1-1. 

Giancarlo Stanton continues to be red hot as he belted two more home runs one bigger than the other but it wasn’t enough for the Yankees. His hot hitting is a very good sign for things to come.

The Yankees went with Deivi Garcia as the starter but pulled him after 1 inning for JA Happ. The plan didn’t make much sense to  anyone except Brian Cashman and Aaron Boone. The move was done to have the Rays thrown off and maybe shuffle the lineup but they didn’t do that. They stood their ground and it worked. Happ went 2.2 innings giving up 4 runs. 

https://twitter.com/tomscibelli/status/1313702184157097985?s=21

I know everyone always wants to try and reinvent baseball these days and the opener and bullpen games is the new wave. The truth is they haven’t worked for anyone in the playoffs. The teams that have consistently done this haven’t won. The Rays have done it in the past successfully but they have better pieces to do it with. The Yankees didn’t have to do this. They could have went with Masahiro Tanaka or they could have just started Happ or Garcia from the beginning. When you watch Happ on the postgame you can tell he didn’t really buy into the plan. If you have a philosophy that the players don’t buy into then it’s not the philosophy to use. 

The Yankees tried to outsmart the Rays, they tried to be the smartest person in the room and in the end they only outsmarted themselves. If they lose this series everyone will comeback to game 2 and rightfully so.