Nestor Cortes has reentered playoff conversation after post-tweet Yankees redemption

In Nestor Cortes Jr.'s most recent terrible start for the Yankees, it was pouring rain -- and seemingly only when he pitched.

Locked in a 1-1 tie, Cortes took the mound for the top of the third as the weather somehow worsened on a dime. Fighting through a wet, gray maze, he surrendered three consecutive hits to begin the inning, somehow weaseling out of the trouble with just a single run allowed.

The rain eventually slowed down, allowing the game to continue (and preventing a one-night east coast trek for the Angels in September). Unfortunately for Cortes, the stadium flooded yet again in the top of the fifth, when he was one inch from working out of a rally before Kevin Pillar blooped him to death. Ultimately, six earned runs ended up on his ledger.

You're going to have to believe me that the dark cloud seemed to follow Cortes exclusively, dissipating when his foe, Tyler Anderson, took the very same mound. These were just the kinds of things that happened to Cortes around the season's midpoint, ironically picking up in frequency after his oddly timed and ill-fated mid-All-Star Game tweet.

Was this a direct response to David "Big Papi" Ortiz walking through the AL's dugout and telling all of New York's rivals to beat the Yankees while cackling on national television?

Was it trade deadline-related, as Cortes mulled over the reality that he could be entering his final weeks in pinstripes? Or was it just something he'd been meaning to say for a while, and felt compelled to while sitting around and stewing, reflecting on the Yankees' pre-break loss to the Orioles, where they squandered yet another ninth-inning lead on the back of poor defense?

Regardless, the missive missed the mark; Cortes hasn't tweeted since, and he allowed 19 earned runs in 19 innings in the four starts that followed it.

Perhaps that Angels start in the gale-force mist reserved only for his innings was the outlier, though. After Cortes escaped the trade deadline in pinstripes, he reversed course with 5 1/3 solid, three-run innings in Philadelphia. Then, the rains came, but he rebounded once more from that effort with seven shutout against the White Sox, seven more against Cleveland, and Monday night's dialed-in effort against the upstart Nationals, highlighted by this sixth-inning escape, capped with a flourish by the best pitch he'd thrown all night (in years?).

Yankees' Nestor Cortes Jr. looks playoff ready after recent scoreless streak snapped

Cortes' outing didn't end there, in an unfortunate turn of events for his scoreless streak. With his pitch count still more than manageable, Aaron Boone attempted to minimize the Yankees' exposure to Mark Leiter Jr., as Cortes faced three more batters, retired two, and surrendered a solo home run. Ultimately, Leiter Jr. did the exact same thing, and Cortes exited at 91 pitches, so the move was probably wise, though it melted the left-hander's final line just a bit.

Now, though, there's a path forward for Cortes, who's gone from "crafty back-end starter" to "on the outs, but sold low" to "potential No. 2 in a playoff series yet again, the same way he was used in 2022." That will likely be an open competition for the remainder of the year, but much like fellow rebounder Carlos Rodón, he's found his changeup and emphasized it more as the year's gone on (2.8% usage to 8.5% year over year). That shifting pattern has made his 94 MPH fastball play up further, as it did when Andres Chaparro was seeking slow-motion and instead found giddy-up on the corner to end the sixth in Washington.

Regardless of where he lands in the Yankees' pecking order, Cortes has shown enough recently to be involved in high-level conversations, as well as the kind of stuff that might actually work out of the bullpen, if he's called upon to escape an October jam. That's real progress from someone who -- say what you want -- certainly embraces the idea of rising to the occasion in pressure situations, all in an attempt to live up to the power of the pinstripes.