Here’s the blueprint for a Yankees comeback

But after Monday night’s 4-2 loss to Los Angeles in Game 3 at Yankee Stadium, there remains only one series in MLB history that New York can look to for hope. Not only was it won by the Yankees’ archrivals, the Red Sox, but it came at the Yankees’ expense 20 years ago.

In the 2004 American League Championship Series, the Yankees held a commanding 3-0 series lead, on the verge of their seventh World Series berth in 10 years. But Boston staged the greatest comeback in baseball history, shocking New York by reeling off four straight wins — including the final two at Yankee Stadium — to win the pennant and eventually the franchise’s first World Series title in 86 years.

While regular season games in mid-May aren’t the same as games in the postseason — let alone the World Series — the Yankees did have winning streaks of four or more games eight times this year. Their last came from July 27-31, when New York won five straight (two vs. the Red Sox and three vs. the Phillies).

The Yankees now have no choice but to follow in the footsteps of the enemy. Here’s what would need to happen if the Yankees are going to do the (almost) impossible.

Game 4: Pounce on the ’pen
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said that the plan is for Game 4 to be a bullpen game for Los Angeles. So far in this series, the Yankees have been held to just three runs over 16 2/3 innings by Dodgers starting pitchers. So having a chance to skip right to the bullpen appears to be a welcome proposition for the Bronx Bombers.

The Yankees will have to take advantage of that opportunity by getting more offensive production from anyone not named Juan Soto or Giancarlo Stanton. Those two have combined to go 7-for-23 with two home runs and they’ve driven in four of the seven runs New York has scored in the series. Everyone else in the lineup has combined to bat .152.

This has to be the game in which Aaron Judge‘s bat comes to life. If the Yankees are going to make an improbable run, they need their captain and the heart of their lineup to start producing like he did when he smashed 58 homers during the regular season. Judge continued his prolonged slump in Game 3, and for the series, he’s 1-for-12 with seven strikeouts.

If Judge and the rest of the lineup show life and get the Bronx crowd into the game early, a Game 4 win is certainly on the table in a bullpen game for the Dodgers.

Game 5: All aboard the Cole train
These are the moments Gerrit Cole, the reigning AL Cy Young Award winner, is paid for. With the Yankees’ backs against the wall in the second of what they hope will be four elimination games, the right-hander will need to be at his best. But if he is, he could push the World Series back across the country to Los Angeles.

Cole was outstanding in his Game 1 start at Dodger Stadium, limiting the Dodgers’ explosive lineup to one run over six innings and putting the Yankees in position to grab a 1-0 series advantage. But Freddie Freeman extinguished that possibility with one historic swing in the 10th inning after New York was one out away from victory.

Over his past three starts, Cole has a 2.08 ERA with 12 strikeouts and four walks over 17 1/3 innings. If he can give the Yankees another strong outing, it could keep them alive to fight another day in L.A.

Game 6: A Stantonian effort
Stanton loves going home to Southern California, and he loves playing at Dodger Stadium, where he used to watch Dodgers games as a kid.

It’s not just the proximity to home, however, that makes the venerable ballpark attractive to the hulking Yankees slugger — only one active player with a minimum of 100 plate appearances there (excluding Dodgers players) has a higher career OPS at the venue than Stanton’s 1.060 (the D-backs’ Christian Walker, 1.170).

And when he launched his towering drive just inside the left-field foul pole for a two-run homer off Dodgers starter Jack Flaherty in Game 1, it was Stanton’s 11th career home run at Dodger Stadium.

The Yankees will need Stanton to do what he does when he plays in Chavez Ravine. Then they’ll hope that his broad shoulders can carry them to a Game 7. They’d prefer, of course, that the rest of the lineup outside of Stanton and Soto will have gotten going by this point.

But a Stanton blast or two would be huge in a Game 6 if the Yankees are going to have any chance at pulling off something that’s never been accomplished in World Series history.

Game 7: ‘Anything can happen’
As much as they’d hate to take up the mantra because of who uttered it just before the Red Sox began their epic comeback against them in 2004, the Yankees would need to be thinking that way going into a decisive Game 7.

Prior to Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS, Boston’s Kevin Millar said that if the Red Sox could get to a Game 7 at Yankee Stadium, “anything can happen.”

Game 7, particularly if it’s the first World Series Game 7 played after one team had a 3-0 series lead, could foster chaos. And it would mean the pressure, like it was on the Yankees 20 years ago, would be on the Dodgers as they tried to avoid the ignominy of becoming the first club to blow a 3-0 lead in the Fall Classic.

The Yankees, if they reach this stage, would love if the “narrative” surrounding the Dodgers entering this postseason — that they would have an uphill battle given their thin pitching staff — started to rear its ugly (or, if you’re New York, beautiful) head just in time.

It’s Game 7. Anything can happen. And in this case, “anything” could be historic.