Yankees: This is Deivi Garcia’s last chance to best JA Happ for playoff start

Yankees rookie starter Deivi Garcia has one final start against the Marlins to leapfrog JA Happ.

Week to week, day to day, and inning to inning, baseball is a roller-coaster game — and nobody knows that more in 2020 than Yankees fans.

From a 16-6 start to a 5-15 bottom, followed by a 10-game winning streak and playoff-muting 1-5 stretch, our perception of this roster and team chemistry has changed repeatedly.

Unfortunately, that confidence (or lack thereof) can sometimes be attached to as little proof as one (literally one) start.

Against the Red Sox in Boston last weekend, firebrand Deivi Garcia had his first “bad” start of his MLB career, allowing six runs in three innings, and unable to find the snapdragon curveball he’s so effectively relied upon throughout most of his big-league journey. Coming just one day after JA Happ’s resurgent and strange season continued with eight shutout innings against those same Sox, it seems fair to say that both men flip-flopped in the postseason pecking order.

Now, just one day after Happ rebounded from an early three-run homer to keep the Marlins at bay, Garcia has one more shot to make his case for Game 3 (if necessary) in the postseason’s opening round, and he has a pretty clear idea of what line he needs to beat.

Happ, let down by his defense in some pitch-count-extending innings, as well as himself in the first (two two-out walks preceded Garrett Cooper’s porch job), went five innings, allowing those three runs on three hits.

Garcia, who hadn’t delivered a start with more than three earned runs allowed prior to his meltdown on Pedro Martinez’s turf, likely isn’t thinking about it, but probably has to match or exceed Happ’s output, at this point, to get the nod.

Against all odds, the veteran Happ has likely lapped him, at this juncture, and it would take a markedly better start than Friday night’s outing for the kid to get the nod.

Of course, it’ll be all hands on deck in the three-gamer, and we’ll see Garcia whether or not he gets a start — perhaps we’ll get a chance to see him in an attack dog role out of the bullpen.

For now, though, his objective is clear: Prove you can bounce back, and make Yankees fans believe this team is capable of winning again.

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