Why Masahiro Tanaka is the most important Yankee in the ALCS
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A day after wrapping up the ALDS against the Cleveland Indians, the New York Yankees announced their ALCS starting rotation on Thursday. Masahiro Tanaka will start Game 1 against the Houston Astros, followed by Luis Severino in Game 2, CC Sabathia in Game 3,Why Masahiro Tanaka is the most important Yankee in the ALCS
A day after wrapping up the ALDS against the Cleveland Indians, the New York Yankees announced their ALCS starting rotation on Thursday. Masahiro Tanaka will start Game 1 against the Houston Astros, followed by Luis Severino in Game 2, CC Sabathia in Game 3, and Sonny Gray in Game 4.To put it bluntly, Tanaka can’t falter in Game 1.We don’t mean that in the traditional “the Game 1 starter sets the tone for the whole series” sense, either. Certainly, there’s some truth to that. When you only need four wins and can’t lose more than three times, every game is important. But the Game 1 result isn’t necessarily what’s important for Tanaka.What’s important is that he gets outs and goes deep into the game. If he does that and New York still loses, then things still shape up relatively well for the Yankees. If, however, the team wins despite a short, quick outing from its starter, we’ll still have reason to be pessimistic about New York’s hopes for the remainder of the series.This all boils down to a very simple idea. Read more