NEW YORK — For two nights, Jazz Chisholm Jr. looked like the star the Yankees thought they had. He hit a home run in three straight plate appearances, and each one mattered.
On Monday, he drove a curveball into the right-field seats for a three-run first, then wrapped a slider around the foul pole for a go-ahead shot in an 8-5 win over the Pirates. Five runs batted in, two swings, one loud answer.
A night earlier, he had beaten the Dodgers with a go-ahead homer in the eighth to avoid a sweep.
It was the best two-day stretch of a season he had just described in blunt terms. And it pointed straight at the puzzle the Yankees now have to solve.
Chisholm has become the most confusing player on the roster, dreadful with runners in scoring position yet elite in the biggest late-game moments. That contradiction sits at the center of a walk year that will force the Yankees into a hard call.
A star pressing to be someone he is not
Chisholm has carried an added burden with Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton sidelined by injury. He said he tried to shoulder too much, swinging as if he could win games by himself in a lineup missing its biggest bats.
“I felt like I was trying to overdo it. Losing trying to hit a 5-run home run with nobody on base,” Chisholm said. “Realizing that we do this as a team and everybody play their game ’cause none of us are Aaron Judge.”
He credited teammates for pulling him out of the spiral, saying they leaned on the one thing that fuels him. The message, he said, came from nearly the entire clubhouse.
“They know I’m firm on confidence and that’s the biggest thing,” Chisholm said. “They were like, ‘Let’s not forget who you are, you are the greatest in the world. You are Jazz Chisholm.’”
Two nights that flipped the script
Monday’s outburst came against Pirates starter Braxton Ashcraft. Chisholm’s first homer, a three-run drive, capped a four-run first inning, and his second, a two-run shot in the third, put the Yankees ahead for good in the 8-5 result. It was the 10th multihomer game of his career, and it drove in five runs.
The night before, in the nightcap of a doubleheader against the Dodgers, Chisholm had ended an otherwise lifeless offensive game with a solo homer in the eighth off Evan Phillips, saving the Yankees from a sweep.
The two games pushed his season total to 16 home runs. They also captured, in miniature, exactly what has made him so hard to read.
A split that confuses Yankees
The numbers behind the hot streak reveal a player pulling in two directions at once. In the situations that decide close games, he has been one of the best hitters in baseball. In the more ordinary chances to build a lead, he has been one of the worst.
Chisholm is hitting .163 in 97 plate appearances with runners in scoring position this season. That includes a first-pitch popout Sunday that helped waste a bases-loaded, none-out chance in the fifth inning against the Dodgers.
Yet in 58 high-leverage plate appearances in late-and-close games, he is batting .321 with a 1.040 OPS and four home runs, several of them game-changing swings.
The disconnect mirrors his team. The Yankees have 16 wins this season when tied or trailing in the eighth inning or later, the most in the majors, even as they have looked unreliable in routine spots.
What the Yankees have to weigh
The stakes go beyond one hot series. Chisholm can become a free agent after the season, and his uneven year has muddied his value and the Yankees’ plans at second base heading into the trade deadline.
He entered Monday hitting .224 with a .705 OPS, numbers far below what he posted a year ago and what he expected of himself. Monday nudged the line to .228 with a .726 OPS, still modest for a player who reached the 30-30 club last season.
Manager Aaron Boone has kept a steady public stance, framing the season as unfinished rather than lost. He argued that a strong close would put Chisholm back in line with his recent track record.
“Hitting’s hard, man. He’s in position here with a couple of good months to be right in line with what he’s had the last couple of seasons,” Boone said. “He’s in position to hopefully go out and do something special for us the rest of the way.”
The Yankees sit at 56-44, 1.5 games behind Tampa Bay in the AL East, with more than two months left to sort out who Chisholm will be down the stretch. He, for one, believes the story is not written.
“There’s a lot that can happen in 2 1/2 months, especially on a baseball field,” Chisholm said. “For me, I feel like there’s more than enough time to just flip the whole season around.”
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