Sports Time Radio

The New York Yankees are 13-6 and have won their last three games in a row. They are in 1st place in the American League East two games ahead of both the Tampa Bay Rays and the surprising Baltimore Orioles.

Now the Yankees where a popular pick to win the World Series before the season started and they’ve looked like a good choice so far, but they’ve had a couple of injuries that could slow them down.

Now the Yankees knew all along that they would be without starting pitcher Luis Severino for the entire  game season. Aroldis Chapman hasn’t pitched this season due to illness, but was scheduled to throw a simulated game yesterday. If Chapman’s simulated game went well he could possibly join the Yankees bullpen soon. That bullpen took a hit earlier this month when set up man Tommy Kahnle injured his elbow. Unfortunately Kahnle is done for the season and will require Tommy John surgery. In almost a flashback to last season the injuries just seem to keep coming for the Yankees. Four days ago the Yankees placed outfielder/designated hitter Giancarlo Stanton on the Injured List. Stanton was diagnosed with a Grade 1 strain of his left hamstring. This injury normally has a recovery time of three to four weeks, but it was reported yesterday that Stanton’s injury is worse than expected and his timetable for return may be long than those three to four weeks. Then yesterday the Yankees added outfielder Aaron Judge to the Injury List. Judge hadn’t played in the last couple of games because of his injury which was diagnosed as a mild calf strain.

Judge has been the Yankees best player this season. He was hitting .290 with 9 home runs and 20 RBI’s. Those 9 home runs lead all of baseball and his 20 RBI’s are tied for the lead in baseball with three other players. Even though Judge had played just 17 games there where quite a few media members who had already awarded him the MVP.

Now last season the Yankees had quite a few injuries and where still able to win the A.L. East. The Yankees swept the Minnesota Twins in the ALDS before being beaten by the Houston Astros 4 games to 2 in the ALCS. Of course the Yankees where able to recover from their injuries last season over the course of a 162 game season. Will they be able to do the same thing this season with just a 60 game season?

In last nights Yankees line up Luke Voit batted 2nd in the Yankees line up; which is where Judge normally hits. Mike Tauchman played rightfield in Judge’s place while Clint Frazier was called up from the teams alternative site and filled in for Stanton as the designated hitter. Thairo Estrada was called up to take Judge’s spot on the roster.

Obviously not just one player can replaced what Judge has given the Yankees on offense this season, but it could soften the blow a little if Gary Sanchez, Gleybar Torres and Brett Gardner start to hit. Currently Sanchez is hitting .113, Torres is hitting .217 and Gardner is hitting .163.

Tauchman and Frazier should get the majority of the playing time in rightfield, but it’s possible that utilityman Tyler Wade might see some innings out there. Even though Frazier filled in at DH last night you have to think that Mike Ford will get some of those DH at bats. The Yankees also have Miguel Andujar at their alternative training site; so it’s possible he could be brought back up and help fill the void left by the bats of Judge and Stanton.

The Yankees currently have a two game lead in the division, but can they hold onto that lead with Judge gone for a minimum of 10 days and Stanton appearing to be gone for a month or more. With the expanded playoffs this season it’s doubtful that even if the Yankees struggle with these players out they’d miss out on those playoffs, but I guess it’s an outside possibility.

With 41 games left on their schedule; where do you think the Yankees will end up?

The St. Louis Cardinals haven’t played a game since July 29th do to a Covid-19 outbreak within the team, but the Cardinals are scheduled to restart their season with a doubleheader against the Chicago White Sox today.

With just five games under their belt this season it’s very doubtful that the Cardinals will be able to play the entire 60 game schedule. It does appear that Major League Baseball is going to try and get the Cardinals to that 60 game mark, but that’s going to entail them playing multiple doubleheaders and you have to think that the strain of that kind of schedule isn’t going into play towards the Cardinals favor of making the playoffs.

How do you think the rest of the Cardinals season goes? When the Miami Marlins came out of their Covid-19 quarantine they played and have continued to play very well. Could St. Louis go on a run like the Marlins did and get themselves into the expanded playoffs? Or is the strain of trying to play 55 games over the remainder of the season just be too much for the team to handle?

The Cardinals four have doubleheaders schedule between now and their next day off which is September 3rd. After that day off the St. Louis has seven doubleheaders on the schedule and just one other schedule day off on September 9th. I doubt that at any other time in baseball history has a team tried to play that kind of a schedule.

Just as the Cardinals are getting ready to return to play it was reported that the Cincinnati Reds had a player test positive for Covid-19 jeopardizing the teams game tonight against the Pittsburgh Pirates.

While this isn’t the first time this season that the Reds have had Covid-19 issues it doesn’t appear as this is the first actual case the team has had. Reds infielder Matt Davidson actually had a positive test results, but all follow up testing came back negative which led to the belief that the first test result was a false positive. Mike Mouatakas and Nick Senzel self reported symptoms and ended up on the injury list until a negative test allowed them to be reinstated. Joey Votto also spent one day on the injury list before being allowed to return.

The Reds will have to go through extensive testing and with that going on you’d have to think that the remainder of their series against the Pirates will be postponed. Hopefully those will be the only postponements the Reds will face, but will have to wait to find that out.

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