ESPN’s Jeff Passan Talks Dodgers, Yankees, Mets, Braves, ABS & More with Rich

Jeff Passan thinks the Yankees have already lapped most of the American League.

The ESPN MLB lead checked in with Rich on Tuesday and the message on the AL was unambiguous. With Aaron Judge anchoring an offense that has quietly replaced Juan Soto with Ben Rice taking walks, hitting home runs, and slotting in front of or behind the captain, and a pitching staff doing it without Gerrit Cole, the Yankees have separated. Cam Schlittler and Max Fried are pitching like the rotation Brian Cashman wanted from the start. Will Warren is in there. The strike-throwing in particular has been the difference in a year where the league is walking more hitters than it has in generations.

"That's the scary part in this era," Passan said. "Yankees pitchers are throwing strikes."

He gave Cashman credit for the Anthony Volpe situation too. Volpe is healthy and rehabbing, but the infielder ahead of him is hitting too well to displace, and Passan saw that as a different kind of organizational urgency. The Yankees, he reminded Rich, have not won a World Series since 2009.

The catch on the AL is everyone else. Outside Detroit, Cleveland, and the Tampa Bay Rays at 21-12, the league is below .500. Passan still believes Seattle will get there. Detroit will get better. But the path through October goes through New York.

The NL is still the Dodgers' to take.

Even with Mookie Betts, Edwin Diaz, and Blake Snell on the shelf, Passan said the Dodgers have a payroll-driven luxury most franchises can only watch from across the room. They plan for October, hoard depth, replace a Cy Young winner with Justin Wrobleski going sub-2.00, and trust that the talent shows up in October. The Atlanta Braves have the best record in MLB despite their pitching injuries. The Cubs are playing inspired. But the Dodgers are still the team to beat.

The Red Sox firing Alex Cora got the most candid breakdown.

Passan said it was a philosophical fight between Cora and chief baseball officer Craig Breslow that mirrored the Chaim Bloom era. The slow start gave the front office the cover it had been looking for. Underneath, Cora was protecting a hitting-coach approach the Red Sox front office did not like. Modern baseball, Passan argued, requires a straight line from manager's office to front office and back. Boston did not have it.

He pointed to AJ Hinch's hiring in Arizona under Josh Byrnes a decade ago, when the phrase "organizational advocacy" got laughed at. The principle, Passan said, has aged better than the joke.

The Mets are next on his hot-seat list, even with a David Stearns vote of confidence behind Carlos Mendoza this week. If the Mets keep losing, Passan said, Mendoza will be fired "like that." Steve Cohen pledged a World Series within five years when he bought the team. The Mets are 40 years removed from one. Cohen is not the kind of owner who will eat five months of bad baseball with $400 million on the field.

The fun came on ABS. One month in, Passan and Rich both said they love it.

Passan called out something most highlight reels miss. The dot is delayed. Watching the trail behind the pitch and waiting for the pink sliver is a better viewing experience than a static call. Umpires, he said, now have two-way microphones to ABS operators, who give in-game feedback when a strike zone is drifting. Hitters mostly just want consistent calls, and the system gets closer to that than the old way.

Rich predicted an umpire one day spinning into a helmet-tap of his own. Passan was on board.

He left wearing his son Jack's youth baseball gear on national TV after a grand-slam game over the weekend, including a real diving catch in center field.

"As he's in the air, I'm thinking to myself, that's not my son," Passan said. "There is no way."