The rookie supplied a crucial insurance run just as it started to pour in Denver.
With their West Coast road trip kicking off with a three game set against the Rockies, it was easy for the Yankees to fall into the trap of not taking their opponents seriously. That’s precisely the scenario that played out, Colorado nabbing just their ninth win of the season in the series opener. It served as a reminder that no matter how historically bad the opposition, you still have to show up to the ballpark ready to fight for a win.
The embarrassing loss seemed to light a fire under the offense, because they exploded for their second 10-run inning of the season in the middle game to put themselves back on track for a series win. However, that same approach did not carry over into the rubber game, the Bombers bats seemingly insistent on keeping their cellar-dweller opponents in the ballgame and making it a far more uncomfortable experience than it needed to be. The Yankees managed a fair bit of traffic but couldn’t quite manage the big hit to pull away from the worst hitting and pitching team in the league.
The other wrinkle concerned the rapidly approaching storm clouds and a packed schedule that would have turned making up this game into a logistical nightmare. Therefore, it became imperative that the Yankees widen their 3-2 lead before the tarp came out. They gave themselves the perfect opportunity to do so in the fifth, loading the bases on a Paul Goldschmidt single, Ben Rice walk, Aaron Judge RBI double, and Cody Bellinger intentional walk. This brought Jasson Domínguez to the dish with one out and a little added pressure after he struck out in his first two plate appearances.
Reliever Jake Bird starts Domínguez off with a first-pitch curveball, the catcher setting up outside to try to steal a called strike one.
Domínguez reads the ball well out of Bird’s hand, picking up the spin and realizing that the pitch starts too far outside for its movement to carry it back into the zone. In other words, a pretty straightforward take for ball one.
Seeing the previous pitch land relatively close to the zone and understanding Domínguez’s struggles against the breaking ball this season, Bird sticks with the same pitch-location combination.
This time he executes to his spot, and is aided by an approach shift by Domínguez. Whereas with the first pitch it appears Jasson was able to read the spin out of the hand, this time he guesses fastball. It results in a very early swing, Domínguez’s bat whiffing through the zone before the ball reaches the plate.
After watching how much Domínguez missed the previous pitch, there is no reason for Bird to change course.
Bird replicates the execution of the previous pitch, his third straight curveball landing in an almost identical location. Once again, Domínguez is early. He’s able to lag his bat as he diagnoses curveball mid-flight, but it’s too late, and he’s still out in front of this pitch, topping it foul down the first base line.
Two not-so-great swings later and Jasson finds himself in a hole, 1-2. By this point the rain is really starting to stream down. In between pitches, you could see Bird futilely trying to find a dry spot on his jersey to wipe the water from his pitching hand. The curveball is the obvious choice given the two previous pitches, but the conditions are becoming more prohibitive to breaking balls by the second.
This curveball appears to slip a bit out of Bird’s hand and he sprays it wide for an automatic take, ball two.
I wonder if Domínguez picks up on Bird’s desperation to dry his hand. Can he reasonably eliminate the curveball after the rain impacted his opponent’s ability to control the previous pitch?
Whatever the case, Domínguez gets his first fastball of the encounter and he doesn’t miss. He rockets this belt-high, 94-mph sinker 416 feet to center field, an impressive catch by Brenton Doyle the only thing keeping this a sac fly instead of a bases-clearing extra-base hit.
Domínguez’s clutch contribution could not have come at a better time as during the very next AB, this game was sent into a one hour and forty-six minute rain delay. Losing their starter Will Warren just as he was starting to dominate the outing and having the bats get cold on the bench for almost two hours made it critical that the Yankees push at least one more run across before the delay.
I was impressed by the way Jasson’s timing was right on the fastball despite seeing four straight curveballs at 80 mph. That plus the early swings on strikes one and two are evidence of a mindset I love to see in a hitter — staying ready to hit the heater. If you want to succeed in the majors, you have to be able to hit the fastball, and that means staying geared up for velocity and being able to adjust to the off-speed.
All of this tells me that Domínguez stepped to the plate with a well-formed plan in his mind — hunt a fastball up in the zone that he can drive to the outfield for at worst his team’s fourth run. The headlines for this game might belong to J.C. Escarra and his two RBIs and first career three-hit game, but the Yankees do not win this contest if not for Domínguez’s timely contribution as the heavens opened up.