Yankees News: 5 Impressive Facts About New York's Hot Streak

The New York Yankees are the hottest team in baseball, winning their 15th game in 16 tries Sunday afternoon. The team has been virtually unbeatable after a 9-9 start, and their 24-10 record gives them the second-best mark in the entire league.

New York is playing like the World Series contender they were predicted to be heading into the 2018 MLB season. There have been many impressive aspects of the Yankees' current hot streak, though five, in particular, stand out.

Terrific Starting Pitching

What was supposed to be the team’s biggest weakness this season has been their greatest strength over the last two-plus weeks. Yankees’ starters have posted an incredible 1.89 ERA with a 0.87 WHIP during New York’s hot streak, striking out 93 batters in 95.1 innings.

It starts with Luis Severino, who's picked up where he left off when he finished 3rd in the 2017 AL Cy Young voting. He’s a bonafide ace, allowing Masahiro Tanaka to thrive as the No.2 starter. CC Sabathia continues to defy Father Time, allowing just one earned run in his last four starts, and even Sonny Gray has picked it up with two straight outings of six-inning, two-run ball. Jordan Montgomery could be out until the All-Star break after a solid start to the year, but Domingo German was unhittable—literally—as his replacement Sunday.

Maybe the idea that the Yankees will acquire a starting pitcher before the trade deadline is no longer the foregone conclusion that it once appeared to be.

Rookie Contributions

Even though the Yankees’ high expectations to start the year were based largely off the way their stars performed in 2017, this 15-1 streak wouldn’t be possible without the contributions of several first-year players.

Tyler Austin leads AL rookies in home runs and RBI, and about half of that production has come during this winning stretch. Miguel Andujar has 10 extra-base hits, as well as a game-winning single, since April 21. Domingo German tossed six-hitless innings Sunday before Gleyber Torres became the youngest Yankee to ever hit a walk-off home run at just 21 years old.

It’s no coincidence that New York’s hot streak has coincided with Torres' promotion to the big leagues. He’s played like an All-Star with .327/.357/.500 splits in his first 15 games, already looking like the superstar that the Yankees expect him to be in the future.

Strength of Schedule

Winning 15 out of 16 games against MLB’s worst teams would be difficult to accomplish. The Yankees have managed to do it against the AL’s top World Series contenders.

It started with two straight wins against the Toronto Blue Jays, who have a 17-11 record when they haven't played the Yankees. New York swept the first-place Los Angeles Angels on the road and took three out of four against the defending champion Astros in Houston. This past weekend’s sweep of Cleveland brought the Indians back to .500, though they remain the prohibitive favorites in the AL Central. The Minnesota Twins are the only losing team the Yankees have beaten, and they’d be .500 if it wasn't for a four-game trip to the Bronx.

New York's tough stretch isn't over yet. When the Yankees host the Red Sox for three games this week, it’ll be a matchup of MLB’s two best teams.

Late-Game Heroics

The Yankees could just as easily have only 10 or 11 wins over this stretch. They refuse to die, even when they are down to their final out, to the point that you’ve almost got to expect this team to come back when they are losing late in games.

Gary Sanchez hit a walk-off three-run homer with the team trailing Minnesota by two runs on April 26. That started a string of six wins in 11 games in which the Yankees were either tied or losing at some point in the ninth inning. Didi Gregorius’ solo home run in L.A. gave the Yankees their first extra-inning victory, while Torres and Andujar both picked up walk-off hits this past weekend.

Of course, the Yankees have also been dominant at times, sporting a plus-62 run differential on the season.

Stanton, Judge Struggling

You would think that the reigning NL MVP and the AL MVP runner-up would both be playing a big role in any Yankees’ hot streak. New York, however, has thrived despite the struggles of their two biggest sluggers.

Since hitting a homer in the first game of New York’s hot streak, Aaron Judge has hit .240 with just two home runs. Though the outfielder has gotten some big hits, he’s posted a .269 on-base percentage during the team’s six-game winning streak. Giancarlo Stanton still hasn’t completely rebounded from his slow start with season splits of .227/.313/.455. Stanton has driven in a run in just three of the team’s last 16 games.

Judge played well for most of April and is in nothing more than a mini-slump. Stanton usually starts off slow and will undoubtedly get on track. That’s bad news for the rest of the league, and it could mean New York won’t get cold anytime soon.