#Yankee Stadium silence can be music to Giancarlo Stanton’s ears

The pandemic spared the diabolical Astros widespread abuse for their scandalous sign-stealing cheatathon, and maybe, just maybe, no boobirds in the Yankee Stadium stands this season will prove to be a boon to Giancarlo Stanton.

If Stanton strikes out five times in a game again, he won’t hear them.

Such is life when you sign a $325 million contract and Derek Jeter unloads you after the 2017 season and Aaron Judge is the homegrown Yankee slugger, and you are not.

“It kinda reminds me of back in the day with [Mickey] Mantle and [Roger] Maris. … Judge is the modern-day Mantle, and no matter how well Stanton plays, he’s gonna play the role of Maris, ’cause he was traded to the team,” YES Network’s Ken Singleton said. “When they had that great home run race in ’61, people were rooting for Mickey Mantle.”

And:

“A-Rod would never be Jeter in the eyes of the Yankee fans,” Singleton said.

But Giancarlo Stanton, 30 years old, same as Reggie Jackson when the magnitude of his star arrived in 1977 to help make sure The Bronx was Burning, should recognize that it ain’t over ’til it’s over.

Because there are reasons to believe that this unprecedented 60-game sprint — if there is to be a 60-game sprint — will afford him his best chance to change his Yankees narrative.

The Grade 1 calf strain Stanton suffered during spring training 1.0 has healed well enough for him to concentrate on DH without worrying about playing left field, at least for now.

The baseball gods were unusually cruel to him in 2019, when he battled a strained left biceps and sprained right knee strain and batted only 72 times.

But when the Yankees season begins on Thursday at Nationals Park against Max Scherzer, Giancarlo Stanton will not be American Idle.

A healthy Judge and a healthy Stanton, batting in a frightening lineup behind DJ (The Machine) LeMahieu, back in The Bronx following a bout with COVID-19, gives them a chance to be modern-day Bash Bros, which they teased again with back-to-back home runs Wednesday night off James Paxton.

And perhaps Stanton would have better acclimated to The Bronx in his third season in pinstripes even with fans in the stands. Perhaps.

But after the abuse he endured during his five-strikeout, 0-for-7 nightmare on April 8, 2018, against the Orioles, the sounds of silence will be deafening to him should he suffer a similar meltdown this season.

“You put up a performance like that, you should get some boos,” Stanton said afterward.

He won’t have to ask Bobby Bonilla to send him his old earplugs now.

“Maybe you’re right,” Singleton said. “With no fans in the stands, they won’t get on the strikeouts. Conversely, they won’t cheer for the home runs either. So he’s sort of like in no-man’s land in that regard.”

Because 38 HRs and 100 RBIs during a 211-K 2018 season wasn’t enough bang for the 25 million bucks following his 59-HR, 132-RBI 2017 NL MVP season, Yankees fans booed him in the second game of his ill-fated 2019 season. And again in his first game back from a series of injuries three months later.

Stanton slashed .288/.403/.492 in 18 games last season with an .850 OPS in the playoffs. A-Rod didn’t have a signature Yankees moment for more than a Big Apple minute either.

“If he gets a big hit in a playoff game or a World Series game, one of those mammoth home runs he’s capable of hitting … I don’t think anybody hits the ball harder than him,” Singleton said.

Stanton, who is signed through 2027 with a team option for 2028, bent over in horrified disbelief in the box when he struck Masahiro Tanaka in the head with a 112-mph screamer July 4. Fortunately, Tanaka worked crisply off a mound on Thursday and is on his way back. Stanton might consider it a good omen.

“Maybe Yankee fans feel, ‘Well he didn’t earn that money here. Let him earn the rest of it here,’ ” Singleton said. “With the injuries and stuff, he hasn’t quite lived up to it.

“But I think he’s primed. I really do.”

They’re planning on pumping in artificial crowd noise at MLB stadiums. There will be no artificial boos at the Stadium. See no evil, hear no evil from the stands. Music to Giancarlo Stanton’s ears.