What kind of team hits nine home runs in two different games in a single season? In case you were wondering, THAT IS NOT NORMAL!

The last time this happened was the second game of the 2025 season, and the Yankees hit nine home runs against the Milwaukee Brewers, setting a franchise record for the most home runs hit in a single game. The all-time MLB record for home runs in a single game is 10, a feat accomplished by the Toronto Blue Jays in 1987. Now, the New York Yankees aren’t just the first team in Major League history to have multiple nine-home run games in a single season, but the first franchise to ever record multiple nine-homer games in its history.

Do you see why this isn’t normal?

It really is all right in front of them.

This past weekend, the Yankees swept the St. Louis Cardinals, and they now find themselves tied with Boston for second place in the American League East (five games behind Toronto) and in a three-way tie with Boston and Seattle for the first AL Wild Card spot. With a four-game series against Boston approaching this weekend, plus three more games against them and Toronto in September, the Yankees have an excellent chance at securing not just the first Wild Card spot, but a second consecutive division title. The playoff push starts now.

On Wednesday night, the Yankees failed to sweep the Minnesota Twins, losing 4-1. The All-Star righty Joe Ryan shut down the Yankees’ lineup, which could only muster four runs on five hits. The loss marked the Yankees’ first to Minnesota in 10 games.

The then 11-5 Joe Ryan and his 2.79 ERA were too much for the Yankees to handle. They have been inconsistent offensively against the league’s best pitchers. Recently, they were able to overcome Zack Wheeler, Hunter Brown, and Framber Valdez, but they didn’t win all those games because of their bullpen. In early August in Miami, Eury Pérez and Edward Cabrera shut them down. The next week, they were no match for Nathan Eovaldi or Jason Alexander.

Last night, the Yankees achieved consecutive wins for the first time since July 31 as they defeated the Minnesota Twins 9-1. The Bombers crushed three home runs while allowing just one hit to Minnesota. They also walked 11 times with just five strikeouts.

Things were looking bleak early as Carlos Rodón couldn’t get an out in the first inning before he loaded the bases. “We were set up for disaster there,” said Rodón. “But we got through it.” Rodón managed to record two strikeouts and a groundout, allowing the Twins to plate just one run. After allowing a leadoff single to Austin Martin, walking Byron Buxton, and hitting Ryan Jeffers in a 31-pitch first inning, Rodón went on to retire 17 consecutive batters and pitch through seven innings. He walked two hitters and struck out five, efficiently finishing with 96 pitches.

Sure, it’s just the Twins. But the Yankees need wins, so anything counts.

Last night, the Yankees defeated the Minnesota Twins 6-2, thanks to four solo home runs and a strong start from Will Warren. The win marked the Yankees’ first series-opener victory since the All-Star Break. Since 2002, the Yankees hold a 124-44 record against Minnesota, including a 30-5 mark at home since 2015. There is no better get-right series for the Yankees than this.

What is it going to take for this Yankees team to start winning games? When do all the heartbreaking losses become too heavy to bear?

On Friday night, Devin Williams blew a tie game in extra innings. On Saturday, Trent Grisham came up clutch with an eighth-inning home run to lead the Yankees to a win. But on Sunday, the Yankees went down silently against Jason Alexander and his 5.97 ERA, and Max Fried couldn’t give his team a chance to win.

It was an awful week for Yankees manager Aaron Boone, so when his team was on the verge of losing their Wild Card spot on Wednesday, he knew he had to change his approach. The first change was removing Devin Williams as closer. The second was replacing him with David Bednar.

With the Yankees leading Texas 3-2 with one out in the bottom of the eighth inning yesterday, Boone selected Bednar to attempt a five-out save. Bednar walked Joc Pederson but struck out Kyle Higashioka and Josh Smith to end the inning. He started the bottom of the ninth with two strikeouts, but after a walk to Corey Seager and a single from Marcus Semien, Boone had a key decision to make.

Last night in Arlington, another costly decision by Aaron Boone led to a fifth straight Yankees loss as they got shut out 2-0 by the Texas Rangers. Before last night’s game, Boone said that in save situations, he’d be open to deploying pitchers other than Devin Williams.

Texas’s starter, Nathan Eovaldi, dominated the entire Yankees’ lineup, allowing just one hit through eight scoreless innings. Impressively, rookie starter Will Warren kept up with Eovaldi, permitting three hits and three walks across five scoreless innings. “Going back to last year and a little bit in the beginning of the year, there were some situations that happened today that I think in the past, a couple runs come out of,” said Warren, who stranded at least one runner in scoring position in four of his five innings pitched. His five scoreless starts this season are tied for the third most all-time among Yankees rookies.

Last night, the Yankees fell to the Rangers 8-5, and after their bullpen held it down for three innings, Devin Williams collapsed in the bottom of the ninth. He hung a changeup in the heart of the plate for the .126-hitting Joc Pederson, who tied the game with his third home run of the season.

“I’m trying to throw it down and away there, and missed middle – and obviously, [Pederson] did what he did,” said Williams, who has allowed at least one earned run in five of his last seven appearances. Also, for the first time in his career, he has allowed an earned run in three straight appearances, and he has blown a save in back-to-back games. “This game and the last one, it was really one pitch that hurt me; but that’s the difference between winning and losing sometimes, and I can’t let that happen.”

I have defended manager Aaron Boone for a long time.

I defended him two years ago when the Yankees went 82-80. I defended him last year when he chose Nestor Cortes over Tim Hill in Game 1 of the World Series. I even defended him when the Yankees made four errors in Toronto two weeks ago. But now, after getting swept in Miami for the first time in franchise history, Aaron Boone no longer seems fit to manage the New York Yankees.

The trade deadline has concluded, and the Yankees were successful. While they didn’t acquire a starting pitcher or a left-handed reliever, this deadline was a slam dunk. Brian Cashman gained a lot of tools, including three high-leverage bullpen arms, without giving up much.

Anthony Volpe is tied for the most errors in Major League Baseball. However, it isn’t due to a lack of defensive talent.

Last night in the Bronx, the Yankees rebounded from a poor offensive game with a 7-5 win over the Tampa Bay Rays. With the win, they gained 1.5 games in the American League East standings since Baltimore swept Toronto in a doubleheader. Max Fried was dominant for the Yankees, striking out nine batters while allowing four runs on a career-high 111 pitches. However, only two of the runs were earned.

The 2025 New York Yankees’ season was over. And then it wasn’t. On Saturday, the Yankees announced Aaron Judge was undergoing imaging for an “elbow issue.” Losing Aaron Judge for the year would mark the end of the Yankees’ season. In Tuesday’s game in Toronto, cameras caught Judge wincing after making a throw from right field. He served as the Yankees’ designated hitter the following day, the reason for which manager Aaron Boone later admitted was related to the discomfort Judge was feeling. He returned to right field on Friday night, but he struggled to make plays. The next morning, he was left out of the Yankees’ lineup.

Mark your calendars: July 23, 2025. The day the New York Yankees stopped being good enough to win a championship. With an 8-4 loss to the Blue Jays on Wednesday, the Yankees not only left Toronto with more hurdles to climb for the lead in the American League East but also made four errors in the process. Embarrassing. Unacceptable.

Yesterday’s win cut the Yankees’ deficit for the American League East lead to three games. However, the fears induced by Monday’s loss remain apparent in Yankees Universe. When Toronto beat the Yankees on Monday, Oswald Peraza and Anthony Volpe committed consecutive throwing errors in the fifth inning that each allowed a run to score. After the game, manager Aaron Boone dared to call Volpe one of the best shortstops in the league, and that while he may have committed many errors this season, “errors get handed out a lot of different places in a lot of different ways.” He added, “He’s still making plays, but he hasn’t been as consistent as he wants to be and as consistent as he normally is.”

They call Atlanta the Big A, which seems fitting for the city where Aaron Judge tied A-Rod for the sixth most home runs in Yankees history. The Yankees’ coaching staff was in Atlanta for the All-Star Game last week, and they extended their stay for a three-game weekend series. Thanks to a 4-2 win in yesterday’s rubber match, the Yankees secured the series win.

Right on time, too, with Boston beating Chicago and Toronto sweeping San Francisco. The Yankees will head north of the border today for their most important series of the season since Toronto leads them by three games in the American League East.

There is no worse feeling for a team than the bitterness of losing a championship. The feeling that every step of the season was worthless. The feeling of falling short on the greatest stage. It is impossible to fall any shorter. For the Yankees, their weaknesses brought them down in last year’s World Series, and they had to watch the Dodgers eliminate a 5-0 deficit in Game 5 and celebrate at Yankee Stadium.

That’s why this season is so important. The redemption tour. The chance for revenge. This is when a team reaches the ultimate crossroads between success and failure. Failure can appear in many forms, but at no point is the road to a championship clearer than right after losing one.

The headline entering this three-game series is that Mariners’ catcher Cal Raleigh leads Aaron Judge by two home runs this season, so last night, the Yankees rallied behind their captain with three home runs. One might expect a baseball team from Seattle to be used to rain, but the Yankees used their home field advantage to capitalize on a 35-minute rain delay. In the top of the fifth inning, Will Warren had a 2-1 count on JP Crawford with two outs and runners at the corners when the tarp was rolled out over the field. After the rain delay, it took Warren just one more pitch to retire Crawford. He finished the night with 5.2 scoreless innings.

After the Yankees got swept in a four-game series in Toronto for the first time ever, and lost their American League East division lead, manager Aaron Boone told his team that they are “the best team in the league.” “There’s been years where we haven’t been equipped to go through this,” said Boone. “[This] group is, and we will.”

But what if this team isn’t equipped to overcome this adversity? What if this team’s identity resembles their performance in June better than that of April and May? The Yankees seem to find themselves in a rut like this every single June and July. That is not an attribute of the best team in the league. Neither is the current state of the Yankees’ offense or bullpen amid this horrific stretch.