Eric Hubbs rips Yankees offense after ALDS sweep by Rays

Hubbs figured the elimination would end the misery. Then he watched 2 days of other teams' October baseball.

Eric Hubbs

@BarstoolHubbs

I thought with the Yankees eliminated, their annual humiliation tour would come to an end. Instead I'm reminded how lost they are with their offensive approach against these teams. Cleveland racked up more hits last night vs TB than the Yankees did in the entire ALDS. The Brewers lineup had no issue working counts and chasing elite SP in Skubal and Yamamoto from the game. A major philosophical change is needed or we're going to be right here next season and the year after.

The number that set him off came from Cleveland. The Guardians beat the Rays 7-3 in Game 1 of the ALCS on Monday night. They trailed 2-0 early, scored 7 runs over the last 4 innings and finished with 14 hits. Chase DeLauter went 3-for-4 with a homer, José Ramírez went 3-for-5, Patrick Bailey tied it with a solo shot and Nathaniel Lowe put them ahead with a 2-run single in the 8th. That's the same Tampa Bay staff that just finished off New York.

The Yankees' series against that staff was ugly. They had 1 hit in Game 1 and lost Game 3 by a score of 4-3 when Max Fried hung a 6th-inning sweeper to Victor Mesa Jr. They didn't lead for a single inning of the 27 they played. It's only the 2nd time the franchise has been swept in a best-of-5, and it came against a club spending about a third of what New York does. Hubbs says Cleveland outhit the Yankees' entire ALDS in 1 game, and nothing about how the Yankees hit in that series makes it a stretch.

Hubbs is mad about more than the hit totals. He's mad about how the at-bats looked. His comparison is the Brewers, a lineup he says worked counts and chased Tarik Skubal and Yoshinobu Yamamoto, 2 of the best starters in the sport, out of games. His point is that good October offenses grind elite pitchers down. The Yankees, in his view, keep getting overpowered by them, and Barstool Baseball ran his full breakdown under a headline calling it a humiliation tour.

Barstool Baseball

@StoolBaseball

Just When You Thought The Yankees Humiliation Tour Was Over, You Have The Brewers And Guardians Making a Mockery Of The Way They Play Against Good Teams In October @BarstoolHubbs

The bigger picture explains the anger. The Yankees won 93 games and swept the Red Sox in the Wild Card Series, and the season still ended the way most recent ones have. The World Series drought is now 17 seasons, dating to 2009, on a payroll MLB.com puts at roughly $308.3 million, 3rd-highest in baseball. A team with that much money and that many wins kept running into good pitching in October and coming up empty.

Hubbs isn't asking for a different hitter here or a new reliever there. He's calling for a "major philosophical change" in how the Yankees hit, and he warns that without one, 'we're going to be right here next season and the year after.' The offseason is about to start. The Guardians and Rays will keep playing for the pennant, and every long at-bat and late rally in that series will probably remind Yankees fans of what their own lineup didn't do.