Yankees reek of desperation as they trot out The Captain to wake up Aaron Judge

The New York Yankees' championship hopes are on life support following two dispiriting losses to open the World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers. The offense, outside of Juan Soto and Giancarlo Stanton, has gone silent. Aaron Judge looks totally lost at the plate. The team's fundamentals on the bases and in the field are a mess. Aaron Boone seemingly has no clue how to manage his own bullpen. Anything that could go wrong, did go wrong over Games 1 and 2, and now New York finds itself needing a win just to keep any hope of a comeback alive.

If there's a silver lining to all of this, it's that the scene now shifts to Yankee Stadium for Game 3. The Bronx has been a fortress in October for years now, and it figures to be foaming at the mouth for its first World Series game in 15 years. Considering how bad the vibes are right now, New York is desperate for something, anything, to turn the tide, and creating as much of a home-field advantage as possible feels like the best bet on that front. So the team is trying to wake up every echo it can find, starting even before first pitch.

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Derek Jeter set to throw out first pitch at Yankee Stadium before World Series Game 3

After the last two games, the Yankees need a healthy dose of confidence. So who better to call on to throw out the ceremonial first pitch than Mr. Clutch himself, Derek Jeter?

Jeter is the embodiment of everything New York has been trying to get back to for the last 15 years: October (and November) inevitability personified, the type of cool, calm performance that has eluded Judge throughout his postseason career so far. You could do a lot worse when looking for a tone-setter ahead of a must-win World Series game.

That said ... well, Jeter isn't going to actually be playing in Game 3. The Yankees prize their own mythos more than just about any other team in the league, and no doubt Jeter will have the Bleacher Creatures ready to run through a wall. But none of it will matter unless something changes between the lines, starting with Judge figuring out how to translate his regular season into the postseason. New York has little to no reason to believe that can happen (especially if Boone isn't willing to do a single thing differently), so it has to reach for old pageantry instead.