Gerrit Cole, Yankees' Revitalized Offense Send Loud and Clear Message to Rays

SAN DIEGO — Damn right they are savages. More this year, way more, than when manager Aaron Boone called it last year.

So they spent much of the summer wrapped in ice bags and underachieving. Big whoop. Aaron Judge nailed it here Sunday as the pinstriped and newly fortified New York Yankees prepared for what turned out to be a 9-3 steamrolling over the top-seeded Tampa Bay Rays in Game 1 of an American League Division Series on Monday night.

"For me, the regular season is kind of like spring training," Judge said in a Zoom interview. "The real season is the playoffs."

Look out, the Yankees are going to be a handful this month.

Boone was hoping new ace Gerrit Cole would set the tone.

Working his first postseason for the Yankees and facing the team that smoked them to win the AL East, Cole reared back and fired with a one-run lead, two outs and the bases loaded in the bottom of the fifth inning...and Tampa Bay's Manuel Margot never had a chance at the 100.1 mph heater that zipped past him to end the inning.

Cole's guttural scream of ecstasy as he departed the mound echoed deep into the night throughout fanless Petco Park.

How pumped was Cole? The 100.1 mph clocking was his highest-velocity strike-three pitch of 2020 and the second-fastest strikeout pitch by a Yankees starter in the playoffs since the pitch-tracking era started in 2008.

He is a savage, and—the ink barely dry on that nine-year, $324 million deal—Cole is in the right place at the right time this autumn.

The Yankees are healthy, wealthy and swinging it.

Yankees fans were hoping fragile bopper Giancarlo Stanton would be more real than the Great Pumpkin one of these Octobers.

Jae C. Hong/Associated Press

Stanton tamed both the famous marine layer—heavy clouds that move in from off the coast at night and knock down fly balls—and Tampa Bay reliever John Curtiss with a ninth-inning grand slam that turned a two-run game into a rout. And this after he crushed two homers and collected three RBI in last week's two-game sweep in Cleveland.

"When he has quality at-bats, there's nobody like him," Boone said.

Sure, the Yankees could turn right around and lose Tuesday night when they send rookie Deivi Garcia to the mound—at 21, the kid will become the youngest postseason starter in franchise history—but this is a team that has too many things coming together to lose much this month.

DJ LeMahieu, Judge, Aaron Hicks, Luke Voit, Stanton, Gio Urshela and Gleyber Torres were the first seven hitters in the lineup for this ambushing of Tampa Bay, and do you know how many times those men have played for the Yankees on the same day over the past two years? Count 'em: three, as The Athletic's Jayson Stark pointed out this week.

That is utterly amazing...and, if they stay on the field for the next three weeks, it's likely to be deadly to everyone else. These Yankees now have crossed the plate 31 times in their first three games this postseason. And Cleveland and Tampa Bay finished second and third in team ERA during the regular season.

It's not just the frequency, it's the muscle, too: The Yankees have blasted 11 home runs in their first three playoff games, the most in a three-game span in postseason history, according to ESPN Stats & Info.

Meantime, get a load of this: The Yankees' Nos. 8 and 9 hitters produced 18 home runs during the regular season, most in the American League. Clint Frazier (third inning) and Kyle Higashioka (fifth) added two more to that total against Rays starter Blake Snell.

"The quality of at-bats throughout the lineup," Boone said when asked what stood out. "That's something that these guys are capable of when they're whole and healthy and locked in like they are.

"Snell's tough, man. He's hard to hit. But he felt the weight of everything, the grind-it-out at-bats. Eventually we were able to really break through."

Stanton has always hit well here, including winning the Home Run Derby at the 2016 All-Star Game. After his big moment Tuesday, he said, simply, "It's Southern California."

He grew up in the Los Angeles area. He's comfortable here. He knows both the geography and the weather patterns...which is why, he said, he watched that grand slam for an extra second or so before departing for his trip around the bases.

While everyone else in the park knew it was out, Stanton knew something else.

"I knew about that marine layer," he said. "That's why I was watching it. I knew it was either a sacrifice fly [or a homer], but either way I had to make sure."

As much time as he's spent on ice...and on the training room table...and in rehab...and being glued back together...to a man, the Yankees are thrilled to watch Stanton do what he can do.

"I think that was the first time I've screamed for somebody else," Frazier said. "I'm not a big emotion guy, but ... I was excited for him. He's had a really big moment in each of the last few games, and it's been really key for us because we know what he can do from now on."

What's over the top is when Higashioka homers and bangs out another single. Because everyone knows Gary Sanchez is the Yankees' choice for offense behind the plate. But because the receiving part of the game long has been an afterthought to him, Cole this year lobbied hard that Sanchez not be on the field with him—at least, not while wearing a catcher's mitt.

Higashioka became Cole's personal catcher in September and posted a 1.32 catcher's ERA in five starts (including Game 1 against Cleveland) as part of the battery with Cole. During those five starts, Cole fanned 47 of 127 batters. Higashioka's catcher's ERA with Cole was the best by any backstop working with a single pitcher in the majors this season.

And Cole raved about him again Monday: With Margot at the plate in that key fifth inning at-bat, Higashioka called a fastball at one point, and Cole crossed him up with a curve. Cole said had Higashioka not caught it, it would have been a "totally different ballgame."

"I called fastball," Higashioka said. "I noticed a curve was coming about halfway to the plate. It was just reaction."

Now, it's time for Tampa Bay to react. The Rays' Game 2 starter is Tyler Glasnow, who should have the edge over the kid the Yankees are starting. But these are different Yankees, bigger and badder than the group that lost eight of 10 to Tampa Bay during the regular season.

Jae C. Hong/Associated Press

"It's one game," Boone cautioned. "We've got to win three. We know they're a great team and a great opponent. We know we've got to play our best to beat them."

Which just so happens to be where the Yankees are right now. So bring on Game 2, and then Game 3, and we'll see how the week goes.

Savage is what it could be.

Scott Miller covers Major League Baseball as a national columnist for Bleacher Report. Follow Scott on Twitter and talk baseball.