Luis Severino Is So Incredibly Back And It Almost Doesn't Feel Real
Yesterday Luis Severino made his second start since coming off the season long I.L. He was orgasmically good. It almost didn’t feel real. 5 shutout innings. 3 harmless hits. 0 walks. 9 strikeouts. 80 pitches. If you combine both starts this year that puts him at 9.0 IP, 0 R, 5 H, 2 BB, 13 K. My God….
When Sevy was on his way back to the big leagues I didn’t have any idea what to expect. Would he top 95 mph? Could he go more than two innings? Would he have the same slider as years’ past? The answer to all of those questions appears to be a resounding yes. Severino was hitting 98 mph yesterday in the 5th inning as his outing came to a close. He was painting corners so perfectly that Pitching Ninja had no choice but to do a Bob Ross gif of him.
What we’re seeing here is a man with a fresh, live arm. Actually we’re not seeing a man. We’re seeing a monster. A goddamn monster. One that has sat back and watched this team dominate the 2019 regular season while he couldn’t be a part of it. Now it’s his time to carry us. In prior postseasons Severino’s arm has tired after long, brilliant regular seasons. He had nothing in the tank come October. That wont be the case in 2019. That man is as fresh as can be and that’s terrifying news for the rest of baseball.
The Yankees will start two openers against Tampa this week before heading to Texas to end the season. Right now they have lined up Paxton-Severino-Tanaka for those games. Given that they can pretty much order those however they want in terms of days of rest, that would lead you to believe that’s the 1-2-3 in the ALDS. James Paxton is without question your Game 1 starter. He’s won every single of his last 10 starts. He’s been one of the more dominant starters in baseball over the last two months. He’s your horse. After that it becomes a tad tricky. Tanaka has been your guy in the postseason over the years. He turns it on to another level. His issue is his home/road splits are drastically different: 3.10/6.16. Now if you take out his London start against Boston where he didn’t escape the 1st inning and his other one in Fenway where he allowed 12 runs, then his ERA on the road drops to the low 4’s. Still not great, but not dreadful.
You ideally want Severino and Tanaka pitching at Yankee Stadium, but that’s not possible. Severino, given that he just came back, appears to be the guy they want riding the momentum of the crowd in Game 2. I guess they’ll be banking on Tanaka using the crazy extra days of rest to show up on the road. I think you can make a good case for either option. What’s important is that Luis Severino has returned breathing fire out of his mouth. With what just happened with Domingo, we could not have had a better timed return from one of the best pitchers in baseball.