Tomorrow. The Yankees have talked about tomorrow so much over the past seven weeks that at times it has felt like an open casting audition for “Annie.”
They have had to conjure tomorrow as so many of the todays since mid-July have gone so horrendously, when the accumulation has led to them blowing a 10-game division lead. The promise was in forgetting about today, seeing the silver lining of tomorrow: the beginning of the good play and the winning streak that would enable them to restore their command of the AL East, secure a division title.
They have had to believe this, that tomorrow will be better. What else did they have against the relentless avalanche of bad play and dimming confidence and breaking bodies?
And maybe tomorrow finally came yesterday. Arrived because Ivan Nova returned from the disabled list with poise, power and precision to help the Yankees beat the Rays 5-3. Because Andy Pettitte is scheduled on Tuesday. Because the Orioles lost, 5-2, in Oakland, and the Yankees reclaimed the top spot in the AL East.
The Red Sox historically collapsed last September for many reasons, none bigger than their inability to get consistently good work from their rotation. Josh Beckett and Jon Lester fell apart and Clay Buchholz, despite constant updates that he was near ready, could never get healthy enough to start.
Nova and Pettitte provide the best chance for the Yankees to avoid repeating Boston’s pathology. Of course, as impressive as Nova was, we need to see how he bounces back from his first start since Aug. 21. We have to see if Pettitte can walk into the rotation in September as seamlessly and superbly as he did in May.
But at least now the Yankees can see a way to lessen the sting of CC Sabathia’s fall from ace-hood, offer potentially fresh arms to join Hiroki Kuroda and Phil Hughes. And don’t undersell the importance of being able to move David Phelps’ young, effective arm into a bullpen working on fumes. The Braves’ historic fall out of the playoffs last September was mainly due to a relief corps — heavily stressed by so many close games — running out of gas.
The tantalizingly frustrating thing about the Yankees’ poor seven weeks of play is just how close they have been to winning so many of these games. That has led to overexposure of the main cogs of the bullpen in rare wins and just about every loss. And now those key elements have begun to have that gasping-for-air look.
“When we were going good [earlier in the season], our starting pitching was going good,” catcher Chris Stewart said. “So Nova being back is huge. Hopefully, that will help get us on a run right to the playoffs.”
Stewart is right. From May 22 to July 18, the Yankees went 36-13 and their rotation in those 49 games pitched to a 3.19 ERA despite missing Sabathia from mid-June to mid-July and losing Pettitte to a fracture near his ankle on June 27. That moved the Yanks to their high-water mark of the season, 10 games up in the AL East.
But since then, even with yesterday’s win, they are just 25-29. That is 54 games. That is exactly one-third of a season. That is no small-sample size.
There have been times during these past seven weeks when this feels like the final four games of the 2004 ALCS — but on endless loop. Like momentum and confidence and consistency and team-wide excellence have slipped irrevocably away. In 2004, the infamy was becoming the first club ever to blow a three-games-to-none lead and lose a playoff series, in part, because they ran out of starters and Game 7 became a poisonous choice for Joe Torre of Kevin Brown or Javier Vazquez. This year it would be becoming the first Yankees team to squander a double-digit lead and not win a division.
“You stop it,” general manager Brian Cashman said of the negative momentum. “Or you don’t.”
Maybe Step 1 to stopping it finally came yesterday as Nova fired mid-90-mph fastballs to both sides of the plate and — despite the layoff — surprisingly had the feel for both his curve and slider. He struck out eight and gave up two runs in six innings.
Manager Joe Girardi said he liked “Everything [Nova] did” and already was imagining building him up further toward 100-plus pitches, benefitting in the short run from an off-day tomorrow. Pettitte follows that off-day by returning from his own disabled list stint to face the Blue Jays.
If the Yankees are finally going to gain a foothold against seven poor weeks of play, it is going to begin with these arms. The only way to stop projecting something better for tomorrow is if starters such as Nova and Pettitte make a bunch of Yankees todays a lot better.
joel.sherman@nypost.com