Yankees Mailbag: Confidence and the Contact Game

Hello everyone, it's time to dig back into the mailbag and answer some of your questions. Remember to email your questions to for our weekly call pinstripealleyblog (at) gmail (dot) com.

The idiot who said “Harper is coming” asks: After last night's decisive ALDS win, do you think this is the season where we finally bring home the No. 28 seed? Can you rate your confidence on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the most confident and 1 being the least?

Congratulations on asking a confident question in advance that the Yankees would win on Thursday (even if you guessed the result wrong, no one is perfect). New York advances to the ALCS, one step away from the Fall Classic and a shot at its first championship since 2009. They didn't look like champs against the Royals, scoring more than three runs only once in the four-game set, but their pitching was effective, with the bullpen in particular completely failing. In addition, they got important contributions from their second-tier batsmen, which they need to go far, and although their superstars didn't do much damage, Juan Soto was a present threat and Aaron Judge seemed to be getting going in the finals. All in all, there are signs that they could get off to a much stronger start in the ALCS than they did in the ALDS.

How does this lead to self-confidence? Now, let's look at the rest of the field for a moment. I think that regardless of who emerges from the Guardians-Tigers series, you would favor the Yankees, with a stronger margin if Detroit pulls off the upset. Even though they've been one of the hottest teams overall over the last month or two, the postseason has shown that if Tarik Skubal doesn't pitch and has to eject him for Game 5 on Saturday, they look very close to the definition of a Wild Card, that he will only get two chances at most to influence the ALCS. On the other hand, it's a little more complicated since the Dodgers, Padres and Mets are all still in play – and all three look dangerous. Without looking at the next round of games to compare, I'd hesitate to pick a favorite, but the Yankees could at least compete with all of them and only one of them will, so overall I'd say I'm confident on the team is currently at 7.5/10. There is certainly still room for defeat, but they have a stronger chance than ever before.

TheHomeRunDispenser asks: Who is responsible for the “continue contact” rule that seems to send more runners to their doom on 3B than not? It is a model of insanity to continue sending them no matter what when we know that lazy grounders in the infield (and we bake a lot of them!) are safe at home.

Contact play remains an endless source of frustration for me and the rest of the staff, and every time we see it unfold it is brought up. The results seem to speak for themselves that you should probably move away from it, but everything remains the same. I argue that it wouldn't be so bad if they actually went with soft-contact, which would at least give them wiggle room to advance down the line, but ironically, the Yankees' lineup is so conducive to hard-contact in this category it hurts them when it hits the ground. There just isn't that much time to react, and so acting instinctively leads to more stupid failures than not. That doesn't mean that's their intention plate is wrong – the change should be on the base paths – but it seems like this is also an institutional part of their offensive game plan, and they're just willing to roll the dice, even if they've gotten Snake Eyes often enough to get to ask if they are weighted.

Ha'itosis asks: Jon Berti won't be a free agent until 2025. Do you think Cashman expects to play an important role in the squad next year?

I don't know how important it is, but similar to the acquisition of Jazz Chisholm Jr., having Berti here for another year gives the team a good foundation from which to build the roster. With Gleyber Torres' future still unclear (and him committed to coming back stronger and stronger with every day he's at the helm) and Anthony Rizzo's impending free agency also approaching, the infield carousel, that the team can consider through 2025 can be extensive. Berti could cover third if Chisholm moves back to the middle infield, he could be the backup if the team makes a new addition, or he could even fight to keep first base himself by spending an entire offseason Trained at the position after taking over for the postseason. It's better to have the options than not, and that's just part of the value Cashman saw when trading for him.