AL East midseason check-in: Yankees dominating above wild-card fray

By Jake Mintz
FOX Sports MLB Writer

The AL East is a big deal — always has been, always will be.

The Yankees and the Red Sox are always news, and if any of the Rays, Jays and O’s are good, it turns a duel into a brawl. 

This year, the Yanks are a juggernaut, Toronto, Boston and Tampa Bay are slogging up the middle, and Baltimore — though not as ungodly awful as in the recent past — remains the doormat. 

So with the MLB season halfway over (time flies when you’re whining about the ball), let’s take stock of baseball’s deepest and most competitive division.

New York Yankees (58-22)

Not much to see here; just a team on pace for one of the best seasons ever.

The Yanks entered play Tuesday with a 58-22 record through 80 games. Assuming they win Tuesday and then double that record, the 2022 Yankees would finish 118-44, eclipsing the 116 wins posted by the 2001 Mariners and 1906 Twins for the best record in MLB history.

Will they do it? Probably not. Sadly, it’s always prudent to gamble against history, as equilibrium rears its ugly head at one point or another. Most likely, a crucial player or two will get injured and miss time, somebody will slump, and the slog of summer will weigh down this unstoppable freight train. After all, Aaron Judge can do only so much. 

But bearing disaster, these Yankees will be forever known as one of the most dominant regular-season ball clubs of the century.

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Judge has been magnificent (as I’m sure you know). He’s the deserving AL MVP at the midway mark, with 29 bombs and a .981 OPS to his name. But the rest of the lineup has shined, too: Anthony Rizzo has 22 homers and a 141 OPS+, Gleyber Torres has bounced back from a rough ‘21 with 13 bombs, and Jose Trevino, an emergency acquisition a week before Opening Day, has been a revelation and the second-best hitting catcher in the American League.

And don’t forget Giancarlo Stanton, though it seems many have. It’s difficult for a 6-foot-7 behemoth cut like a statue to fly under the radar, but Judge and his 29 homers cast quite a shadow. The 32-year-old Stanton, oft-booed by pinstripe faithful for his mountain of strikeouts, hasn’t exactly solved that gaping hole in his game this season, but he has walloped 20 homers anyway. Nobody on planet earth or beyond can thwack a baseball harder than Stanton, and no amount of strikeouts can change that.

But while the bats have boomed, the arms have been the true separator thus far for New York. Gerrit Cole, Nestor Cortes, Jameson Taillon, Luis Severino and Jordan Montgomery have all made at least 14 starts, and all have ERAs under 3.35. Cole and Cortes are likely All-Stars. And despite a rash of injuries to stalwarts such as Aroldis Chapman, Jonathan Loaisiga and Chad Green, the bullpen has held firm thanks to a remarkable season from new closer Clay Holmes (just two earned runs in 37 innings).

The rest of this division is talented, hungry and whichever other clichés you can dig up, but the Yankees should breeze to a division crown. Still, the hordes of raucous fans packing Yankee Stadium every night don’t care about AL East titles. This team will and should be defined by what it accomplishes once the leaves change color. For now, though, enjoy the show.

Boston Red Sox (45-35, 13 games back)

On May 8, when the Red Sox were 10-19 and the Celtics were ripping through the Eastern Conference semifinals, nobody in Massachusets was too concerned about the Sox, even though things were decidedly not good. Since then, Boston has gone 35-16 to rocket up the AL East standings and back into contention for a wild-card spot. The Sox’s 20-6 record in the month of June was third-best in baseball, behind only those of the Braves and the Yankees.

Why the surge? It has been a combination of phenomenal starting pitching and Rafael Devers being elite. FanGraphs actually has the Boston third baseman ahead of Judge in WAR, albeit by a minuscule 0.1. Still somehow only 25, Devers has taken another step forward at the plate by shedding 4% off his strikeout rate to go from the 49th to the 73rd percentile in baseball in that metric.

Perhaps more importantly, his defense doesn’t totally suck anymore. It’s still not spectacular, and he won’t win any awards for it, but it’s now merely bad, instead of unplayable. And that’s a big difference over a 162-game season. If Judge slumps and Devers keeps this up, there might be a conversation about AL MVP after all.

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On the bump, Boston’s starters pitched to a 2.91 ERA in June — the lowest in baseball — and that’s without anything from rehabbing all-world limb-lord Chris Sale. It has been a lot of good Nick Pivetta (whom I’m henceforth calling The Canadian Conundrum), a handful of solid Rich Hill and Michael Wacha starts and, of course, three outstanding outings from somebody named Josh Winckowski (2.12 in 17 IP). The three-headed monster of 2018 October hero Ryan Brasier, the wispy-goatee’d Tanner Houck and the inexplicably good John Schreiber have nailed things down in the later innings.

Declarative statements tend to age poorly, but so do we all; this Red Sox team is not good enough to catch the Yankees. They’ll have some fun, chippy encounters before October, but Boston can’t make up that 13-game deficit in the next 81 games. A wild-card date at Fenway remains the most likely outcome, which, given the unpredictability of autumn baseball, could mean an ALCS date at Fenway, too.

Toronto Blue Jays (44-37, 14.5 games back)

Last season, the Jays did a North American world tour, playing games in Florida and Buffalo before returning home to Canada once border restrictions were loosened. They heroically fought to within a game of New York in the wild-card hunt but fell just short. As such, expectations were sky-dome-high heading into this season.

So far, things haven’t been disastrous for Toronto, and there have been moments of inspiration, but as a whole, it has been … sleepy. A story of good but not great.

Bo Bichette? Good, not great. Teoscar Hernandez? Good, not great. Matt Chapman? Fine, not good. Vlad Jr.? Great, but not an MVP-hunting alien life form. George Springer? OK, or as expected. Alejandro Kirk? The best hitting season we’ve seen by a catcher in decades. Huh?

Mound-wise, José Berrios and Yusei Kikuchi have disappointed. The 28-year-old Berrios, who was acquired last trade deadline for a hefty prospect package and then extended by Toronto until 2029, has been particularly horrible. His stuff hasn’t changed in any meaningful way, and the velocity hasn’t dropped, but he’s just not striking people out. Weird.

Alek Manoah, on the other hand, is the real deal. The 6-foot-6, SUV-sized righty has already tossed 100 1/3 innings, allowing just 26 runs (2.33 ERA). He doesn’t miss as many bats as you’d expect, but outs are outs, and he’s getting them.

Honestly, I’m not really sure what to make of this team at the moment. Losing Robbie Ray and Marcus Semien in free agency was probably bigger than we all gave it credit for at the time, even if Kevin Gausman and Santiago Espinal have been adequate replacements. This club needs another cup of coffee, a midday espresso to jolt itself awake. 

On paper, the Jays have the talent to compete with the Yankees. Too bad baseball is played on a diamond.

Tampa Bay Rays (43-37, 15 games back)

The roster deeper than the other end of the local swimming pool has been stretched to its limits already this campaign. Tampa Bay has nine arms currently on the 60-day injured list, including key bullpen pieces such as Andrew Kittredge, J.P. Feyereisen (he of a 0.00 ERA), Pete Fairbanks, JT Chargois and Nick Anderson. Tyler Glasnow is still recovering from Tommy John, while the young and talented Luis Patiño, acquired in the Blake Snell deal, has been on the IL since April due to an oblique strain.

That has opened the door for an even more anonymous cadre of Tampa Bay relievers than we usually see. Jason Adam, Ryan Thompson, Jalen Beeks and Brooks Raley have all been effective (both on the mound and at embarrassing themselves by refusing to wear a pride month patch).

The real story here, though, is Shane McClanahan, the early front-runner for the AL Cy Young. Sugar Shane has been borderline untouchable so far, to the tune of a 1.74 ERA in 98 1/3 innings with a whopping 133 strikeouts. It’s not rocket science, but it kind of is; McClanahan throws 100 from the left side, and now that he knows where it’s going, hitters are simply praying.

Injuries have hampered the lineup, too. Only four Rays — Randy Arozarena, Yandy Díaz, Taylor Walls and Harold Ramírez — have played in more than 60 games. The Yankees have nine such players. Wander Franco has been more solid than great in his sophomore campaign, outfielder Josh Lowe hasn’t hit a lick in his debut season, and Brett Phillips, though a beautiful human being and force of joy, is currently hitting .148/.218/.252.

The players actually keeping the offense afloat and this team in the mix are *checks notes* Ji-Man Choi, Harold Ramirez and Isaac Paredes? I guess the Rays are still the Rays. If they can survive these injuries, they’ll stay in the mix. If they can actually get healthy, they’ll make some noise.

Baltimore Orioles (37-44, 21.5 games back)

This team doesn’t suck. I’m serious. Whatever image you have of a lowly Baltimore Orioles team bungling and fumbling its way to losses galore, I promise you, this team is just regular bad. They even have a few good players. Watch them — you’ll see.

Last year, the Rays went 18-1 against the Orioles, which played a huge part in Tampa’s running away with the division. But the Birds aren’t pushovers anymore. So far this season, they’ve gone a respectable 15-20 against their AL East companions, including an 11-10 record against the non-Yankees.

A big reason for Baltimore’s competence has been the pitching. Do you know who Tyler Wells is? Are you aware that in 75 2/3 innings, he has a better ERA+ than Gerrit Cole? Go look up Baltimore’s bullpen numbers; it’s jarring stuff, especially after the past few seasons, when it felt like O’s relievers were donating home runs to charity.

Offensively, there’s competence as well. Austin Hays, Ryan Mountcastle and Trey Mancini have all been definitively good at hitting. Cedric Mullins has taken a step back from his 2021 campaign, but he still has the most bWAR on the team. Adley Rutschman has picked it up after a brutal first few weeks. This isn’t a good lineup or anything, but the Orioles have scored more runs than the Rays.

“Who can take care of the Orioles?” will play an enormous role in determining whether one of Boston, Toronto or Tampa Bay can grab a hold of the top wild card in the American League. 

Just another wild year in the AL East.

Jake Mintz is the louder half of @CespedesBBQ and a baseball writer for FOX Sports. He’s an Orioles fan living in New York City, and thus, he leads a lonely existence most Octobers. If he’s not watching baseball, he’s almost certainly riding his bike. You can follow him on Twitter @Jake_Mintz.