The Yankees, reeling as much as any baseball team can right now, will face the Baltimore Orioles in a Weekend Reel-Off at Camden Yards. It’s hard to see them having much of a chance to make a statement without their all-world right fielder Juan Soto, but the slugger offered Yankees brass another reason to be concerned late Thursday night in Tampa.Soto, who homered deep to the opposite field earlier in the game, drilled a double, and walked, is still less than two weeks removed from being scratched against the Blue Jays after banging his hand on the ground during a violent slide, then defiantly returning to the lineup the next day and inspiring the team to victory.
It revealed a lot about Soto’s character. It also revealed a lot about the problem the Yankees will have down the stretch with their superstar, who has already denied removal once and will most likely need persuaded any time the “pause” button is the sensible option from now on.
On Thursday, Soto took a hard swing at a Jason Adam fastball in the top of the seventh inning and came up clearly shaking his sore hand. He groaned, composed himself, and eventually struck out. If there is no risk of aggravating and causing further harm — which there should not be — Soto should play if he can grasp a bat properly. His earlier home run appeared to show that he was feeling confident at the plate. But if he’s one swing away from coming up this lame — and this isn’t the first time this series when he appeared wobbly on a hack — then the Yankees need to have a serious internal talk on Friday morning about how much of a “All-Star break” they can give to one of
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