HOUSTON — The✨ sixth-inning rally for the Yankees on Friday night at Minute Maid Park rꦛeally began hours before the first pitch.
That’s when as a team the Yankees made a FaceTime call to injured rookie outfielder Dustin Fowler.
Manager Joe Girardi wanted his team to be together for the call. It stayedꦯ that way the rest of the night as the Yankees put together a bat-around sixth inning in which they scored five runs to erase a 3-1 deficit.
Iꦕn the seventh Brett Gardner (career-high six RBIs) lashed a grand slam to right to build an impressive 13-4 win over the Astros, who have the best record in all of baseball.
That was a FaceTime call, too. The Astros had no idea what hit them. If the Yankees are going to survive this season they are only going to do it one way, 🐻as a team. Already, the Yankees have used 15 rookies this season. They used 17 all of last season.
Baby Bombers, in🌜deed. Nine rookies have made their major league debuts with the Yankees this season.
Another rookie will join them Saturday, when 🐲outfielder Clint Frazier comes aboard from Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. The Yankees have put their egos aside for the success of the team and Frazier will have to do the same.
When I visited with Frazier in the winter in Atlanta, he was hopeful he would get such🥀 a call t💖his season. That was his dream. He came over from the Indians organization and he has spent a lot of time learning how things are done in the Yankees system. It has been an experience.
This winter, Frazier described his style of play to me and comparedꦯ it to his long red hair.
“I play like my hair is on fire,” he said. “It’s fiery, like my personality. It’s big 🦹hair, and I try to make my personality big. I think it represents me because it’s different, I’m different, i🦩t’s unique to who I am.t makes me one of a kind.’’
Frazier is one of a kind and that is a good t🦹hing, but he will join a club that is playing together, and that must continue.
If Frazier just follows Aaro⛎n Judge’s lead, he will have no problem.
Judge sets the tone fo💧r this team in every way and Friday night Judge reached base safely for the 32nd consecutive game, tying the longest such streak in the majors this season.
Judge reached base in t𝓀he sixth inning with a walk. Didi Gregorius started the rally with a single as the Yankees got big singl🦄es in the inning from Ronald Torreyes, Chris Carter, Gardner and Jacoby Ellsbury. They knocked out starter Lance McCullers Jr. and then took apart reliever Michael Feliz.
Judge told The Post abouಌt the Yankees’ “together” mindset.
“I noticed that in spring training,’’ Judge said. “All the veterans, Gardner, CC [Sab🦩athia], they all have gone out of their way to m꧒ake us feel comfortable so we can just go out there and play.
“For me this year,෴ at the beginning of the year, I didn’t know if I’d be in Triple-A, but they were behind me 100 percent and when they said I was going to be the starting right fielder, the veterans said, ‘Hey man, you’re our guy, let’s go out there and do something and surprise some people. Let’s go out there and hav🌠e some fun.’ ’’
That’s just what Judge has d🌌one. That’s what the Yꦍankees have done.
“This is all a 🐻testament to the veteran guys in this clubhouse,’’ Judge said of the Yankees’ 43-35 record. “They go out of their way to make us feel special and to make us feel like we’re a team. When you got everybody in here acting like we’re a team, good things happen. We’ve surprised a lot of people that we are in ꦑthe position we are in right now.’’
The Yankees have been tested. They have survived in the AL East. They have done this together in a new kind of Yankees Way, relying on the young players while getting a boost from key veterans like Gardner. These Ya♏nkees have given their all — together.