Why the Yankees / Twins will win the AL Wildcard Game

Twins visit the Yankees for the 2017 AL Wildcard Game

On Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, the New York Yankees will host the Minnesota Twins in the American League Wildcard Game.

The Yanks are skippered by Joe Girardi, who has never experienced a losing season in his 10 years at the helm.

Girardi has accumulated a 910-710 record, and led the team to three AL East Division crowns. He also guided baseball's marquee franchise to their most recent World Series championship back in the fall of 2009.

Girardi accumulated 1,100 hits across 15 seasons in the big leagues, which included four in Yankee pin stripes. Those four years, from 1996-99, coincided with the franchise' most recent dynastic run. Girardi would win three World Series rings as a player with those Yankees teams.

Over in the visiting dugout, the Twins will be guided by Paul Molitor. One of the greatest hitters of all-time, the Hall of Famer amassed 3,319 base knocks over a storied 21-year career. He was a 7x All-Star and a 4x Silver Slugger Award winner.

Molitor was the MVP of the 1993 World Series while a player with the Toronto Blue Jays, and was also runner-up for both the 1978 AL Rookie of the Year and 1993 AL Most Valuable Player awards.

As the Twins manager, the Saint Paul native has compiled a 227-259 record over three seasons. Two of his three years have resulted in winnings campaigns. But a year ago, his Twins club finished at 59-103, the worst record in baseball.

This season, Girardi's Yankees finished at 91-71, just two games behind the arch-rival Boston Red Sox in the AL East. Molitor's Twins team was one of baseball's most unlikely stories, and finished 85-77, good enough to capture the second AL Wildcard spot by five games.

During the first decade of this century, the Yankees ousted the Twins from the American League Postseason four times. New York defeated Minnesota in the ALDS in 2003, 2004, 2009 and 2010, the last two coming in three-game sweeps.

The host Yankees will enter the game as favorites, and prohibitive ones to many prognosticators. However, there are very good reasons to believe that each of these teams can win, moving on to a date with the defending AL champion Cleveland Indians in the ALDS.

The Yankees empire strikes back

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GM Brian Cashman working to improve the Yanks

It has now been almost five years since the New York Yankees last captured an American League East Division crown. There has been just one World Series championship in the Bronx in the last seventeen years.

While the majority of MLB fan bases would be fine with their team having won a division title as recently as five years ago and a world championship just eight years ago, this isn’t most teams.

The New York Yankees are supposed to be the gold standard of Major League Baseball. The franchise has captured 27 World Series titles, sixteen more than the next highest club. They have won 40 American League pennants.

The two decades between 1994 and 2002 were particularly spectacular for the Yankees. The team finished in first place in the AL East in 14 of those 19 seasons. They won the AL pennant and advanced to the Fall Classic seven times, winning the World Series five times.

But over the last four full seasons, the Yanks won between 84 and 87 games. They finished second twice, third once, and then last season had fallen to fourth place in the division.

In those four seasons, there was just one playoff game. The Houston Astros shut the Yankees out 3-0 in the 2015 AL Wildcard Game.

SURPRISE 2017 CONTENDERS

Coming into this season, the Yankees were seen by many as having an aging core. Most had manager Joe Girardi‘s club finishing between 3rd and 5th place in the AL East in this 2017 season. When the team lost four of their first five games, there seemed like nothing was happening to contradict those predictions.

But then the Yankees began to win. Led by tremendous performances from the lineups two youngest members, catcher Gary Sanchez and right fielder Aaron Judge, the club reeled off eight straight victories after that slow start.

The winning came with consistency for the Yankees over the next two months. The new version of the Bronx Bombers spent most of the period between mid-April and late June at the top. At one point, they opened up a four game lead in the division.

In mid-June, however, the Yankees began to slow down. From June 13 through July 19, the team went just 10-22. They plummeted to third place, 4.5 games behind the arch-rival Boston Red Sox, who seemed ready to run away with the division.

But over the last 10 days or so, the Yanks have righted their ship. Following Monday’s 7-3 victory at Yankee Stadium over the visiting Detroit Tigers, the club has won nine of their last 11 games.

THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK

Inspired by his team’s play this year, general manager Brian Cashman decided to do whatever he could to move up their timetable for championship contention.

On July 19, Cashman sent reliever Tyler Clippard and prospects Blake Rutherford, Ian Clarkin, and Tito Polo to the Chicago White Sox. In exchange, slugging third baseman Todd Frazier and a pair of proven relievers in David Robertson and Tommy Kahnle came to New York.

In the last two days, Cashman acted to plug up holes in the starting rotation. First he sent prospect arms Dietrich Enns and Zack Littell to the Minnesota Twins on Sunday for nine-year veteran lefty Jaime Garcia.

And then on Monday’s MLB trade deadline, he landed a big fish. Right-handed starting pitcher Sonny Gray was acquired from the Oakland A’s in exchange for prospects James Kaprielian, Dustin Fowler, and Jorge Mateo.

Tigers' Michael Fulmer Should Be the AL Rookie of the Year

A pitcher with the Detroit Tigers has been one of the top rookies in the American League this season, and should be the AL’s Rookie of the Year Award winner.

It has been a full decade since the last Detroit Tigers player won the American League Rookie of the Year Award.

That year, 23-year old right-handed starting pitcher Justin Verlander went 17-9 over 30 starts with a 3.63 ERA to take the voting by a comfortable margin over the Boston Red Sox 25-year old reliever Jonathan Papelbon.

Verlander has gone on to a fantastic career with the Tigers over the last dozen seasons. He won 24 games and the 2011 Cy Young Award as part of 173 career victories. This season, Verlander is again a leading Cy Young favorite.

Now a decade later, the Tigers again have a right-handed starting pitcher up for the award. In my opinion, he deserves to be the winner.

Michael Fulmer turned 23-years old back in spring training, the same age as Verlander when he won the top rookie honors.

Fulmer was the New York Mets pick during the supplemental first round of the 2011 MLB Amateur Draft at 44th overall out of a Oklahoma high school. He then went to Detroit in a 2015 trade deadline deal for Yoenis Cespedes.

Called up by the Tigers at the end of April, Fulmer won seven of his first eight decisions and was 9-2 by the MLB All-Star break.

Though he only won twice more over the balance of the regular season, it wasn’t for a lack of trying. Fulmer tossed eight Quality Starts over 13 outings in the season’s final two and a half months.