Daily Archives: April 12, 2003

YANKS BEAT RAYS ON GODZILLA’S RBI SINGLE

The Yankees are off to their best start since 1988 (oh, what a year that was). After grounding into a double play with the bases loaded in the 7th inning, Hideki Matsui smacked a 1-out single through the left side with the bases juiced in the bottom of the 9th to win the game for the Bombers.

“I put the team in a bad spot,” said Matsui, who hit into an inning-ending double play with the bases loaded in the seventh. “I was relieved to get that hit at the very end.”

…”I’m happy to come up in situations where there’s a lot of pressure to make something happen,” Matsui said through an interpreter. “Maybe if I didn’t get that hit I wouldn’t have come back alive. I might have been bombarded by the fans.”

…”We’re certainly giving him a lot of opportunities to be dramatic,” New York’s Todd Zeile said. “The true sign of a professional is that after the first time with the bases loaded when he tried to do too much and hit into a double play, he didn’t let the same mistake happen.”

I didn’t get to see the game, but how impressive is D-Rays rookie Rocco Baldelli? Rocco went 3-4 this afternoon, and extended his hitting streak to 11 games.

Here is what Rob Neyer wrote about Baldelli in his “Quick Hits” column:

It’s not hard to see what people see in Rocco Baldelli.

He can run. Baldelli gets out of the box as quickly as any right-handed hitter I’ve seen since Bo Jackson.

He can throw. In the 15th inning last night, Baldelli prevented what looked like a sure go-ahead run with a perfect throw to nail Trot Nixon at the plate.

And he looks like a ballplayer. He’s big and he’s strong and he’s got “the good face” (as old scouts like to say).

But can he field? Monday, he turned a line-drive single into something worse.

And can he hit? Tuesday, he collected three base hits … none of which left the infield.

As you might have heard, Baldelli played 23 games at the Triple-A level last summer and drew the grand total of zero walks, which suggests that he’s still got a few things to learn. And that’s OK, because he’s still just a baby of only 21 years.

So no, Rocco Baldelli isn’t Joe DiMaggio yet. But it should be fun watching him try to get there.

Peter Gammons added:

Red Sox coach Mike Cubbage got Devil Rays rookie Rocco Baldelli at 3.8 (seconds) from home plate to first base, the best mark in the league. There have been few right-handed batters over the years who could top that. In the last 30 years, Alex Johnson, Ron LeFlore and Bobby Valentine come to mind going down the line under 3.8. Scouts got Cincinnati’s Wily Mo Pena at 3.9 in spring training.

FRUITY NUM-NUM

I don’t want to make a federal case out of this, but it’s always seemed apparent to me that Roberto Alomar is gay—even before he came to the Mets. It’s an observation that is based completely on my own gut instinct, nothing more. I’m not bringing it up because I want to seem sensationalistic or because I have a moral judgement about it one way or the other. But when I read Rafael Hermoso’s article on Alomar’s mother in Friday’s New York Times, the amatuer psychologist in me just couldn’t resist bringing this up once again.

Robbie, the baby of the Alomar family, and is uncommonly close to his mother. Does that make him Gay? I suppose not, but it’s a good place to start. Witness:

“I had a bad season because you didn’t cook for me,” [Alomar’s mother,] Velasquez recalled him saying. She laughed and then stopped. “I know it hurt him last year that I wasn’t there for him,” she said. “He relaxes me, and I relax him. He’s single. Sandy is married and has someone to talk to.”

…Velasquez says she thinks her son was a bit lonely last season, living in a Long Island City apartment. His girlfriend then, the tennis player Mary Pierce, was traveling and treating a sports injury. He has since been linked romantically with the Puerto Rican singer Gisselle, and Velasquez said they were good friends.

…Alomar, the youngest of the three children, is private and guarded and discusses little of his personal life, but he spoke unabashedly of his mother in an interview at Shea on Sunday. Roberto and his mother call each other best friends and speak nearly every day.

“She’s the one reason I’m doing what I’m doing,” Alomar said. “People ask me about Mother’s Day. Mother’s Day is every day for me.”

…Velasquez has grown to love baseball, although it has kept her family separated. Sandy Jr. pursued motocross, surfing and tae kwon do. Roberto cared only about baseball. He stubbornly told his mother he could go to college after his playing career and shrugged off his parents’ warnings about the hard life of a player.

“I know when he’s sad,” Velasquez said. “I know when he’s happy, when something’s bothering him inside and we talk. I never tell him what to do, because he knows what to do. He asked for help. ‘Mami, I need your support.’ He’s always been like that since he was a child.”

I dont’ think Alomar has the kind of personality to be the first star ballplayer to come out of the closet. That’s fine. I sure don’t think any less of him cause I think he’s Queer either (actually it kind of makes me like him more, especially since I hear Rickey Riccardo’s voice every time I see him play). That kind of thing doesn’t matter much to me, and certainly not how I regard a specific player. The question of sexuality does however remain a huge bug-a-boo in professional sports. But I’m still surprised that Michael Piazza was the only member of the Amazins clubhouse last year who was targeted as “The Gay Met.” I felt like saying, “Am I crazy, or does Robbie have something on the entire New York media which is preventing them from breaking this story?”

Maybe it’s a story that isn’t ready to be broken yet. Perhaps the taboo of one’s sexual orientation is the last place sports writers care to venture. Still, part of me can’t help but wonder if there are just too many boys in a place like New York to keep Robbie’s focus completely on the field.

Maybe we should ask him mother.

HEY NOW

Joel Sherman had a column in Friday’s Post comparing the current Yankee team with the ’98 squad. Sherman is the most reliable voice at the Post, though I find him to be an unspectacular writer. He tends to conform to the shrill sensibilities of his paper (fair enough), and brings the Shakespeare line, “Me thinks thou dost protest too much,” to mind often, whether he’s writing a positive or negative piece. Curiously, Sherman comes across as an aimiable and more even-handed on his stints on television (he is a guest analyst on MSG from time to time).

It’s a bit premature to compare the 8-1 Yanks to the ’98 version, but that’s what Sherman gets paid for. Still, without getting ahead of ourselves, he does make some decent points:

Like a great horse in the starter’s gate, the Yanks seemed to sense the beginning of the race. You could feel it building in that last week of spring training. Their focus. Their effort. Their seriousness. They came out for the season hitting and pitching and defending, and they haven’t stopped yet.

There had always been a sense that Jeter and Rivera were the indispensable Yankees during the Torre era, too valuable to lose for an extended period. But the Yankees are more than surviving without them. It makes you start thinking 1998 thoughts about what this team could be if Jeter, Rivera and Karsay return over the next several weeks at full production.

“It would be too premature to compare to our 1998 team,” Cashman said. “That team went through a lot to become one of the elite teams of all time. This team is still in its infancy. It is not fair to compare any team to the 1998 team.”

…What those ’98 Yankees had was a ceaseless sense of purpose this version still must demonstrate.

…”I watch from the bench,” Todd Zeile said, “and I wonder what the scouting reports must look like for other teams.”

ALL’S WELLS THAT ENDS WELLS

David Wells pitched a 3-hit, complete game shutout on Thursday afternoon to give the Bombers their ninth consecutive victory over the Twins. Johan Santana pitched 4 innings of middle relief for Minnie and struck out 8 of the 12 batters he faced, living up to the advanced billing he recieved during the winter.

Wells, who loves pitching in cold, crappy weather was terrific, and displayed yet again why the Yankees have kept him around in spite of all his mishegoss: dude can pitch. However, Wells told Michael Kay on ESPN radio yesterday that he was close to quitting the team and leaving baseball this spring after his book controversy set Yankee camp on its ear.

According to Jack Curry in the Times:

“He offered to quit,” [GM Brian] Cashman said. “That was in the first discussion in Clearwater. It was his first reaction when we confronted him with him what might be in the book. He said, ‘Listen, I’ll just shut it down and quit.’ We told him he was being emotional and to relax and calm down.”

Torre said “wow” when told that Wells had disclosed his desire to quit and added: “He was emotional. He felt hurt that he was hurting people. I think that’s where he wanted to walk away because he felt he let people down and stuff like that. Again, it was an emotional thing and we told him it’s not time to make that decision.”

LONG GONE

The Hall of Fame canceled a screening of what many people consider the most satisfying baseball movie to date, “Bull Durham,” on the count of the leftist politics two of the films stars, Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins. I think Robbins is a talented actor on the screen, and an arrogant putz in real life, however, whether I agree with his opinons or not, I certainly agree with his right to express them. I’m not sure what the Hall was trying to accomplish here, but boy, have they generated reams of bad press over the incident, which is a wet dream for liberal editorialists.

For full and comprehensive coverage, look no further than Jay Jaffe’s Futility Infielder. I had the pleasure of spending some time with Jaffe last weekend, and I’m pleased to report he is as good a guy as he is a writer (plus, he bears an uncommon resemblance to Robin Ventura, which can’t be bad now can it?).

For some reason I wasn’t able to link the specific articles, but they are the last two he’s posted. So get going, Meat, and get yourself schooled.

YES, WE HAVE NO BRONX BANTER

I’m taking a few days off to be up north in Vermont with my girl Emily, who is recovering from her surgery slowly but surely at her folks place (it’s hard to believe the operation took place a month ago). Sorry that I didn’t mention that before I took off. My bad. Fortunately, they’ve got a computer up here, so let me take this time to catch up a bit…