By Tom

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The baseball gods are smiling upon the world, as both New York teams stink right now! The Yankees have pissed away a 15.5 divisional lead now down to 5, and the Metropolitans are doing what they do every season; collapsing down the stretch!

Okay this is a bit cruel, so all schadenfreude aside, the Mets haven’t been that bad so much as the Atlanta Braves have been that good. The Yankees, on the other hand, have been abysmal since their divisional high on July 8th, however all those games they won in April, May, and June do count.

The Mets “collapsing” is more of the Braves surging. The Mets churned out a 19-11 August record, and went 17-8 in July. A 36-19 clip is 100 win stuff. The kicker is that the Braves have been matching that run with their own 36-18 July-August run. Atlanta was 10.5 games back at the end of May and 3 games under .500, they then started June 14-0 and narrowed the Mets lead down to 4 games, where they’ve remained in their vision ever since. If you could say the Mets had a bad month this season, it was there 13-12 June.

As of now both teams are tied for 1st in the NL East. The Mets are in a tiny rut as of late, going 12-12 in their last 24 games and losing last night to the lowly Pittsburgh Pirates. They’ve entered the soft part of their schedule, where 7 of their remaining 9 series are against teams with losing records, and the Milwaukee Brewers who in the middle of their own collapse. 

Since the start of this rut on August 11th, the Mets rank 20th in OPS, 19th in wRC+, 18th in batting average, and 26th in runs scored. They are putting the ball in play, as their 19.6 K% has been 6th in the league, however their .270 BABIP and 7.8 BB% are all bottom 10. The Metros are more of a victim of some bad luck than inept team hitting as they do rank 15th in hard hit%. 

The Mets pitching has been mostly solid during this span. They rank 15th in ERA, 7th in FIP, 12th in K/9 and BB/9, and 4th in HR/9. 7 of New York’s 12 losses have been by margins of 3 runs or less. To make matters worse, Max Scherzer is hurt again; the reasoning this time is that he’s got an “irritation” on his left side, which, knowing the Mets this irritation will turn out to be a stroke and will end his career and kill Jacob DeGrom as well. 

On the flip-side, the Atlanta Braves are fucking everything up. They rank 2nd in ERA, K/9, and 5th in BB/9 and FIP. The only facet of their game where they have been mediocre is HR/9 where they’re 16th, but c’mon they’re cool. Offensively, the Braves have been murdering everything ranking 2nd in runs scored and OPS–behind the Cardinals–3rd in wRC+, BABIP, and batting average, and 7th in hard hit%. The Braves offense has been on a mission and that is catch the Mets so we can all laugh at them.

The Yankees, on the other hand, are an overflowing state fair toilet. Since being really good on July 8th when they were 61-23, they have been really bad going 20-31 in that span. They went from a 118 win clip, to a 99 loss one faster than you can say nevah forget. The Yankees have been battered up and down through the season, losing Giancarlo Stanton–who woulda guessed–for 45 games, and is also hurt again. Stanton has taken his criticism in New York with immense class–which is hard to do because Yankees fans are as insufferable as Phillies fans, but at least they’ll just sue you than throw beer on your kid–but he has woefully underperformed. Stanton’s played in 428 games through 5 seasons since signing a mega-deal with the Yankees, he’s had one season where he’s played over 150 games–a feat he’s only done 3 times in his 13 year career. 

Matt Carpenter, who was sent packing by the Cardinals after posting a .605 OPS his last two seasons, broke his foot. Carp signed on with the Rangers minor league earlier in the year and ended up in New York where he quickly solidified himself as Luigi to Aaron Judge’s Mario. Seriously, Carp went off, posting a 1.138 OPS in 47 games to go along with 15 tanks and a .305 batting average. The power outage the Yankees lacked from Joey Gallo was more than made up by Carp.

Anthony Rizzo has been battered all season and is currently heading to the IL. The Yankees traded a healthy pitcher for an injured–albeit extremely drippy–center fielder. Michael King and his 2.29 ERA and 11.6 K/9 were done for the year when his arm exploded. Chad Green’s arm turned into goop, Zack Britton is still rehabbing, Miguel Castro’s shoulder got hit by a missile. That missile probably being the last ounce of Aroldis Chapman’s career, as he’s also been hurt and shitty. I mean look at this fucking injury log, the Yankees basically had half their roster executed–as they should be. 

Anyway, welcome to hell, Yankees fans!

Some of these injuries occurred before the Yankees high water mark day, allowing the front office to prepare for it. However the injuries to King, Carpenter, Luis Severino, Andrew Benintendi, and now Rizzo and Stanton have all been a what-else-could-go-wrong scenario.

Injuries aside, this Yankees team has been playing terribly. Since the start of their skid, they’ve posted a .700 OPS good enough for 19th in the league. New York’s woes really intensified in August, however, as they bumbled to a 10-18 mark for the month. Their offense managed a 26th ranked .651 OPS during that time. A team that has power hitters like Aaron Judge, Anthony Rizzo, Giancarlo Stanton, Josh Donaldson, and had Joey Gallo, were 9th in home runs since July 9th, however since August they’ve fallen to 19th. 

Gallo massively underperformed in New York, or he just hated it so much he needed to get out–probably this option–as he lost his starting spot after only slugging 12 homers and slashing .159/.282/.339; the Yankees sent him to the Dodgers where he’s slashing a more improved .203/.311/.469. Donaldson, when he’s not acting stunned that people think he’s an asshole, has mustered only 12 homers and a .684 OPS this season. His defense has been stellar, but you don’t pay Bringer of Rain kind of money for Bringer of Rain defense. And if I weren’t done shitting all over him, Stanton’s numbers since May have been atrocious. He’s slashing .214/.297/.453 for the season, well below his career numbers, but things have been a lot worse since June where Stanton’s posting a .654 OPS. For players with at least 200 PAs since then, he ranks bottom of the league in batting average, just ahead of Joey Gallo. In regards to OPS, his .654 mark is bottom 20 for the league, along with guys like Nick Senzel, Rafael Ortega, Connor Joe, and Tyrone Taylor. 

That torrid August also saw the Yankees divisional lead shrink from 12 games to 6. You know who is catching up? The goddamn Rays that’s who. A team with a $44 million 26-man payroll is once again playing frugal lucre out here and challenging for the division crown. I hate the Yankees for this. If there’s one team that should be punished for underpaying their players and begging for public subsidies it’s the Rays, and the Yankees have left the door wide open for these anti-vax and anti-gay morons. 

The Yankees have sucked virtually everywhere on the field in August. They’ve had 2 positions in the top 10 for wRC+, everywhere else is middle of the road or scraping the barrel. 2nd base and shortstop are black holes, Rizzo’s contributions have only placed 1st base as high as 19th, 3rd base is bottom 20, and left field sits at 27th. 

The pitching since July appears average, but trust me folks, this staff is choking on its own asshole. You don’t lose the 7th most amount of games without a full team effort of ass-eating–unless you’re the 2014 Padres. In terms of ERA and WAR the Yankees sit 15th and 18th since July 9th. Prior to that they were 2nd and 3rd. The Yankees were awesome the first three months of the season, they ranked top 5 in K/9, BB/9, HR/9, and FIP. They’ve dropped at least 10 spots in all those categories since July. Frankie Montas and his 5.87 ERA forgot how to pitch, Jordan Montgomery his 1.47 ERA might get a fuckin’ statute built of him near Grand Station. I’m not joking, this team is destined to get bounced in the first round at this clip. 

Meanness aside, for the month of August Yankees pitchers honestly held their own. They ranked 13th in ERA, 18th in FIP, 10th in BB/9, but were 20th in WAR, 21st in HR/9, and 22nd in K/9. The Rays on the other hand, have been Top 10 in all those categories, and I don’t mean a fringe top 10, they’re sitting near the top or at the top. This team is designed to steal every New York retiree and show them why their entire fandom is a lie. A bunch of Floridian freaks. 

Maybe the competition has been hard for the Yankees, let’s take a gander at that! And…well it has been, good job! Luckily the top teams never make the playoffs. The Yankees played 18 games versus teams with a winning record, and they went 6-12 in those games. They won one series, a 2 game set against…the Mets?! RED ON RED VIOLENCE. But against teams like the Red Sox, Athletics, and Angels they went 4-6 against. Since July 8th the Yankees have gone 11-20 against winning teams, and 8-9 against sub .500 clubs. This team sucks right now.

It’s hard to think that the Yankees will keep laying these eggs further, but baseball is a cruel sport. I could have easily spent this much time shitting on the Milwaukee Brewers, but there’s something about being a baseball fan of a non-New York team and watching as their darlings stumble to the finish line. Both New York teams are sure to figure this out, for their sake, but for now let’s enjoy the bad fate that has fallen upon them both, mainly the Yankees. 

The Yankees are carrying a $181 million 26-man payroll, the Mets over $220 million, depending on what brings you joy in this world, you could say money does buy happiness.