As Didi goes, so go the Yankees. That's a long way from Mickey Mantle.

Mickey Mantle was king of the American League for a decade as was his Yankee team. The operative phrase was:

As Mantle goes, so go the Yankees.

Timo Perez was a 25 year old rookie spark plug on the 2000 pennant winning Mets, who lost the finals to the Yankees. Timo played only 24 (94 PA) regular season games in 2000 but Met fans seemed to think that he contributed more than he did. So, to mock the Mets, I'd say:

As Timo goes, so go the Mets.

Now the tables are turned and so far in this 2017 tournament the New York Yankees are basically:

As Didi goes, so go the Yankees.

Is Didi so far from Timo?

Didi Gregorius hit a home run in the wild card game win over Minnesota and then two more in the final game of the five game series against Cleveland, leading his Yankees to victory and into the league championship series against Houston starting tonight.

Name	G	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR ▼	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS	SB	CS	E	G	AB	R	H	HR	RBI	SB	BA	OPS
Gary Sanchez	5	23	3	4	0	0	2	3	0	10	.174	.174	.435	.609	0	0	0	122	471	79	131	33	90	2	.278	.876
Greg Bird	5	18	3	4	0	0	2	3	3	7	.222	.364	.556	.919	0	0	0	48	147	20	28	9	28	0	.190	.710
Didi Gregorius	5	17	3	4	0	0	2	3	6	3	.235	.435	.588	1.023	0	0	0	136	534	73	153	25	87	3	.287	.796
Aaron Hicks	5	19	3	6	1	0	1	4	1	6	.316	.350	.526	.876	0	0	0	88	301	54	80	15	52	10	.266	.847
Aaron Judge	5	20	1	1	1	0	0	2	4	16	.050	.208	.100	.308	0	0	0	155	542	128	154	52	114	9	.284	1.049

Gregorius didn't do much else but that's how legends are built. Look at the SO totals for the two big boppers:
Judge 16
Sanchez 10

Wednesday, October 11, 2017 game five
Start Time: 8:00 p.m. ET
Attendance: 37,802
Venue: Progressive Field
Game Duration: 3:38
Night Game, on grass
Yankees 5, Cleveland 2

Pitching	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	HR	ERA	BF	Pit	Str	Ctct	StS	StL	GB	FB	LD	Unk	GSc	IR	IS	WPA	aLI	RE24
Corey Kluber, L (0-1)	3.2	3	3	3	2	6	2	12.79	17	67	40	15	15	10	4	4	1	0	47			-0.122	0.69	-1.0

First inning:
2. Judge SO swinging
3. Gregorius HR
4. Sanchez SO swinging

Third inning:
2. Judge SO swinging
3. Gregorius HR, Gardner scores
4. Sanchez SO swinging

Didi Gregorius 3, Cleveland Indians 0

After retiring two Yankees in the 4th and then issuing a walk, probable 2017 Cy Young award winner Corey Kluber was relieved by lefty Andrew Miller.

Aaron Judge: 16 SO (80%) in 20 AB in round one; BB/SO .250. Season BB/SO: .611 Friday, October 13, 2017 10:01 AM

Obviously, this post is tongue in cheek and the real point is that the big boys need to step up. Especially, Aaron Judge needs to hit the damn ball!