Yankees bullpen is a major problem heading into ALDS against Rays

The Yankees bullpen couldn’t hold the lead and it’s time to start worrying.

With the bullpen fully rested after Tuesday night’s blowout and Gerrit Cole’s mastery, the New York Yankees had everything lined up perfectly for Game 2 against the Cleveland Indians.

Masahiro Tanaka was on the mound and the offense was firing on all cylinders. If things went wrong, manager Aaron Boone had reinforcements.

But a disastrous start to this one put the Yankees in a 4-0 hole thanks to MLB being unable to properly diagnose a rain delay/read a weather radar (you can read more about that here). That left Tanaka in a tough spot since his start was delayed 45 minutes, then he took the mound, then had to wait another 30 minutes after an additional stoppage.

He ended up lasting four innings due to the fiasco (and allowing the first two batters to reach base in the fifth), but that wasn’t the worst thing in the world, right? Every reliever was well rested and ready to go. Handling one of the worst offenses in the league shouldn’t be a struggle, right? RIGHT?!

Wrong. Chad Green came into the game and for some reason decided to throw two breaking balls to Jose Ramirez (instead of his patented fastball), who creamed one into the right field corner for a two-run double, which tied the game.

Then came Zack Britton in the sixth, and when we tell you he’s incapable of split-inning duty, we mean it. Boone cannot use this man if he has to take any sort of break in the dugout. It never works. He was wildly inaccurate, recording just 10 strikes over 24 pitches, and issuing two walks to Carlos Santana and Franmil Reyes with two outs in the seventh.

When his time was up, Boone went to Jonathan Loaisiga. Was he the issue? Not really. It was the pitch selection. More breaking balls. Why? The man throws 97 MPH and he’s throwing off-speed stuff to Jordan Luplow, who can’t hit right-handed pitching. Luplow’s two-run double to dead center field tied it and Yankees fans everywhere almost lost it.

The bigger issue here was the blatant lack of trust in Adam Ottavino, who was regaining his footing after the disastrous six-run inning against the Blue Jays on Sept. 7, but fell right back into the hole by allowing one run on five hits in his last two appearances (one inning) of the year.

Sure, Chapman came in and sealed the deal, but he gave up a single to the first batter to give up the lead, and if not for Gio Urshela’s heroic defense that saved a run and resulted in a double play to end the eighth inning, it could have been an unmitigated disaster for the left-hander.

This front office went out and invested big money in the bullpen and it just hasn’t paid dividends when it’s mattered most over the last few years.

• Aroldis Chapman: $16 million per year
• Zack Britton: $13 million per year
• Adam Ottavino: $9 million per year
• Chad Green: $1.27 million

Your top four guys cost nearly $40 million collectively and they can’t hold a lead against the 24th-ranked offense? We know it’s the postseason and the stakes are higher, but this isn’t anything new. We’ve seen these problems against teams like the Mets, Blue Jays, Orioles and Marlins.

It’s time to buckle up, because we have a series against the Rays coming with zero days off, and any further underperformance will result in a quick out for the Bombers.

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