Yankees destroy Oakland, punch ticket to rematch with Boston in ALDS
By Josh Hill
After the Yankees routed Oakland in the AL Wild Card, the postseason bracket is finally set.
Tuesday saw the second-best team in the National League fall short of making it out of the Wild Card alive, a fate the New York Yankees would not suffer. While the Cubs mustered up only a single run at home in the NL Wild Card, the Yankees bombarded Oakland with 7-runs to punch their ticket to the ALDS and a series against Boston.
It’s fitting that Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton bookended the scoring with home runs. Everyone expected those two to amplify New York’s offense and while there were struggles during the year it appears the Bronx Bomber Brothers are going to be noisy in October.
Here’s where we sit now that both Wild Card games are in the books:
What’s Next For New York?
It’s off to Boston to renew one of the best rivalries in sports under the bright lights of the postseason. The Yankees lost the season series to the Red Sox 8-9, which is an indication that this series will not be lopsided by any means. Despite posting the best record in baseball this year, there is concern that Boston might collapse under the pressure of winning in October, something the team made moves this season to combat against. The Red Sox bullpen is dicey, but the Yankees don’t boast the level of confident talent it did out of the pen last year either.
It’s hard to pick against the Red Sox, based on what we saw over the course of 162 games this year, but the Yankees shouldn’t be slept on. J.A. Happ is a Boston killer and will likely start Game 1, followed by Masahiro Tanaka and then Luis Severino — who pitched very well in the Wild Card game on Wednesday. It’s never not fun when the Red Sox and Yankees get together, and it’s even more fun when that meeting happens in October.
What’s Next For Oakland?
Don’t for a minute think that the A’s getting housed in the Bronx ruins their season. No one pegged any sort of expectations on this team at the start of the season, and there were periods of the season where it looked like Oakland might leapfrog Houston and win the AL West. That didn’t happen, but the fact that the A’s ran away with the Wild Card the way they did is something to be very proud of.
Billy Beane has a young team on his hands that is only going to get better next year. Matt Olson and Matt Chapman are Superstars on the corner of Oakland’s infield, and the pitching will likely be improved this winter. Oakland will next year have expectations it didn’t have this season, but we’ve seen more than enough out of Bob Melvin’s team to believe they’ll be a contender. This is a sour way to end such a magical season, but losing in the Wild Card doesn’t change the fact that no one though the A’s were going to get here in the first place.