Who is Aaron Boone’s X-factor for deep Yankees playoff run?

by Felix Pantaleón

The New York Yankees have a 2.5-game lead over the Oakland A’s for home field in the American League Wild Card race. A Yankees loss to the Red Sox on Wednesday, September 19, 2018 (9/19/18) at Yankee Stadium will give Boston its third straight American League East division title.

Watch video

The Yankees will take the field Wednesday against the Boston Red Sox at Yankee Stadium 10.5 games out of first place in the American League East.

A Red Sox win Wednesday or Thursday will clinch Boston’s third straight division title.

So the only way into the playoffs for the Yankees will be as a wild card.

Minute-by-minute breakdown of Judge’s return

The Yankees own a 2.5-game lead over the Oakland A’s for home field in the American League Wild Card race.

The Athletic’s Jim Bowden identified eight players who could be X-factors down the stretch. One of them plays for the Yankees: Aaron Hicks.

Hicks has been in a slump recently, batting just .130 and going 3-for-23 in his last six games with no extra-base hits and no stolen bases. Sounds to me like statistics that are waiting to be corrected. Hicks can beat you with his range in the outfield, his base running and his power. If he can get hot, he could be crucial to the Yankees’ hopes of hosting the wild card game. And home field is more important to the Yankees than it is to the Athletics — because if the Yankees have to play it in Oakland, think of their travel schedule. They finish the regular season in Boston. So, they’d have to fly after the game in Boston to Oakland, then, if they were fortunate enough to win the wild card game, they would have to fly right back to Boston to open a five-game series. They would, in theory, have also burned their best starting pitcher. If they host the wild-card game, then it’s just the shuttle back and forth to the Big Apple. It’s going to be a grind to the end of the regular season; the Bronx Bombers will need someone like Hicks to step up.