Daily Archives: August 4, 2003

Early last Friday morning, I had a bad dream. Call it a premonition or a nightmare, here’s what happened: I’m in my apartment watching the Yankee game. They are playing the Sox at The Stadium; it’s a night game. The Yankees are leading 5-1, late. My girlfriend Emily is downtown hanging out with a friend of mine that she’s never met in real life (funny how the subconcious works). They are waiting for me to arrive.

As I’m talking with her, the Red Sox start a rally. Meanwhile, I’m feeling stressed because I don’t want to ride the subway for an hour and miss the end of the game. An old, fat lady is now batting for Boston. Right-handed hitter. She faces Benitez and lofts a lazy pop fly to Mondesi in right (even though he had already been traded in real life). Mondesi inexplicably bolts toward first base and the ball falls in right field with nobody near it.

Suddenly, it’s 5-4 Yankees. Armando Benitez is pitching. There are two outs, and it’s the ninth inning. That was when I woke up.

I wasn’t sweating but my heart was racing. There isn’t much to figure out here, except why a fat old lady was batting for the Sox. But I think my anxieties about Armando Benitez should be familiar to Yankee fans everywhere, whether it keeps you up at night or not.

Today is an off-day for the Red Sox and Yankees, but ESPN has two articles about the age-old rivals in case anyone has gotten bored in the last 12 hours. Bob Klapisch writes about the Yankees’ front office hysteria, while Peter Gammons explores the friendly relationship Brian Cashman shares with Theo Epstein.

According to Epstein:

“It’s ridiculous when people try to make it seem as if we have a personal rivalry,” says Epstein. “It’s just the opposite. We are good friends, as much as we can be in our business. We shook hands and joked with one another after each one of our three games at Fenway last weekend. He is one of the general managers I admire and respect most; hey, he’s one of the most respected, period. He doesn’t obsess about what the Red Sox do and I don’t obsess about what the Yankees do because it can be costly and counterpdroductive.”

The Gammons piece concentrates on Epstein’s open-minded way of running things in Boston:

“Theo likes having a lot of people with imput and the constant buzz of ideas,” says one of his assistants. “You have the sage, experienced and fearless voice of Bill Lajoie, and Josh Byrnes. Then there are a bunch of us who brainstorm with him every day. What is most interesting is that he wants voices that disagree. He wants every side to every issue, and encourages contrary opinions.”

This is the reason why Epstein is so appealing, and why the Sox are an extremely likable team. (It was much easier to despise them when Dan Duquette was running the team.) Reading this article reminded me of something that Oakland’s assistant GM, Paul DePodesta said in “Moneyball:”

“It’s looking at process rather than outcomes,” Paul says. “Too many people make decisions based on outcomes rather than process.”

Focusing on the process is not a luxury Brain Cashman can afford working for Boss George, which makes what he’s been able to accomplish in New York all the more impressive.

Baseball is always under criticism for not being what it once was, or what it should be. But are we in fact living through a “Golden Age?” A writer named Tom Keaton has good an article dispelling a few of the most commonly held myths about baseball’s problems.

Rich Lederer has another wonderfully original article up on his site. This one is about some of the most obscure home run hitters of all-time. Certainly worth perusing.

Pettitte vs. Mulder. Not a thinking-manís delight, but a big boy special instead. Andy is 6í5 and Mulder is 6í6. They are both guys you want to call “Meat.” Mulder has been striking guys out recently, but Ben Jacobs thinks it could cost him in the long run. Pettitte has enjoyed an excellent string of pitching winning his last eight starts.

Iíve been critical of Pettitte this year. Here is a portion of a letter I received last week from a reader named Steve:

“I think the thing with Pettitte that gets him in trouble on the hill is that he has a pretty wide repertoire of pitches and too much Mike Mussina in him. Mussina is a thinker but I think he’s a confident thinker. He’s playing chess out there and always seems to be on the attack. Andy on the other hand starts questioning himself, and always seems to default to the cutter when he questions his other stuff. I think (and this is totally subjective and I could be very wrong) that Andy is at his best when he trusts his breaking stuff and doesn’t try to overpower guys. When he gets fastball happy he gets knocked around.”

Mulder starts off well and so does Andy. The Aís have the only hit through three (a single by Jose Guillen that was misplayed by Soriano; could have been an error, but it was a tough play). Mulder is quick and efficient. This guy makes it look easy. Heís got the Yankees anxious, swinging at pitches early in the count. Cruising through the early innings without breaking a sweat. He retires the first twelve without incident.

The Aís are hitting a ton of ground balls to Boone at third.

Funny how humbling the game can be, but Eric Byrnes, who played so well against the Yankees early in the year, is in a deep funk. Since he hit for the cycle in June, Byrnes came into Sundayís game 8 for his last 80.

Mulder retires the first two batters in the fifth, and then Aaron Boone laces a double over Eric Byrnesí head. Soriano follows with a hard-hit one-hopper to short. It narrowly misses hitting Boone, who bends his back to get out of the way, as if he was avoiding a tag in a rundown. Tejada times his leap for the ball perfectly, but it takes a funny hop, and skips past his glove into center for a single. (It was slower than he thought.) Tejada slaps his glove on the ground, and Boone scores his first run as a Yankee.

After giving up a hit in the first, Pettitte has retired 14 in a row through five. Byrnes is now 8 for his last 82.

Jeter singles to start the sixth. Bernie flies out to right on the first pitch. That helped Mulder out a lot. Boos for Giambi. Michael Kay is ‘sticking upí for Giambi. (Spare us.) Giambi grounds into a 3-5 double play (Chavez is the only infielder on the left side of the infield in the Giambi shift) to end the inning.

Terrance Long skies a pop foul to the left side. Matsui runs for days to catch it, but he makes the play for the first out. Eric Piatt follows with a hard liner to center field, but itís right at Bernie Williams who makes the catch for out number two. Thatís probably the hardest hit ball for the Aís all day. Pettitte walks Mark Ellis on five pitches. The first man to reach in sixteen batters. Now Pettitte works out of the stretch. Andy rears back and Kís Jose Guillen on a high heater, out of the zone (thank you Rocket Clemens Workout!) to get out of the inning. (Andy seems to be throwing his change-up effectively today too.)

Yanks 1, Aís 0.

(44,528 announced crowd in Oakland. The largest of the weekend.)

Top of the Seventh

Posada leads off. Mulder never steps off the rub. Heís perpetually ready to pitch. He gets Jorgie swinging in the dirt at a good off-speed pitch for his sixth strike out of the day. One out. Curve ball, outside to Matsui, 1-0. Fastball, strike. Slider, low, 2-1. Swing and a miss foul, 2-2. (Matsui broke his bat.) Breaking ball, 55-footer, 3-2. Fastball, on the outside corner. Delayed call

Whatís the best way to avenge a tough loss? Beat the snot out of Barry Zito. Oh, baby, when I heard that Giambi hit a three-run bomb off of his old teammate, in the second inning, I was set with my pleasure quotient for the weekend. Whatever else happens, it was worth it for that. Bernie responded too, going 4-5. He hit a homer, his first since May 10th. Godziller and John Flaherty went deep as well and the Yanks won a slugfest, 10-7 (Tejada had two more hits and Chavez went 4-4 for the Aís).

The 1973 Aís were honored before the game and my boy Reginald Martinez Jackson threw out the first pitch. (You were expecting Blue Moon Odom maybe?)

Jeff Weaver started, and had a mediocre start. He have up two in the first, one in the second, and one in the third. But he got through the middle innings before running into trouble again in the seventh. He hung in there on a lousy day is the way I look at it. I am not discouraged with the start. Of course if the Yankees had lost 4-1 I would be a little less forgiving.

Zito fell to 8-9, even though he still sports an excellent 3.30 ERA. I like Zito personally, but I love to hate him on the field. Heís just so nasty, that beating him is almost like beating Pedro: a treat to be savored. (Cause it wonít happen often.) Mulder is too non-descript to hate, and I love Hudson too much to hate him. Even when heís sticking it to the Yankees, I love him so much I want to marry him.

The beauty part is that the Red Sox lost again to the Orioles. Boston led 2-1 going into the bottom of the sixth when Baltimore plated seven runs. The Oís won, 11-2. Derek Lowe took the loss. Mike Timlin and Ramiro Mendoza both gave up runs, and Todd Jones gave up two in relief.

The Yankee lead is now 4.5. The Sox are in a slide since they played the Yankees and received all sorts of glowing reviews for their performance on and off the field. Red Sox fatalists are probably saying ‘I told you so,í at all of those who foolishly jumped on the bandwagon. But this Boston team has been resilient and instead of wilting against the likes of the Mariners and Aís (14 straight games starting August 11th), I think they could step up and excel in those games.

You never know.

Mike Mussina and Tim Hudson lived up to advanced billing on Friday. They both pitched seven innings and gave up four hits apiece. Hudson walked three and struck out five; Moose walked one guy and whiffed nine. Hudson threw 119 pitches, Mussina 98. And Mike Mussina led going into the eighth, 2-1.

But the Yankee bullpen couldnít hold the lead and the game went into extra innings. Orosco started the eighth and promptly stuck out Terrance Long. In comes Harmando who struck out pinch-hitter Billy McMillon. Mark Ellis singled, and then Hatteberg drew a walk. What else? That was it for the big guy. Torre called for Rivera.

Up steps Miguel Tejada. Mo shatters his bat. Sharp grounder to second. Soriano boots it. Ellis scored from second, and the game was tied. Mo broke Erubiel Durzoís bat too; he popped out to Jeter to end the inning. Soriano was dropped in the batting order to eighth last night for the first time all year. He took the move in stride, but went hitless and made a crucial error.

Antonio Osuna gave up a solo bomb to Tejada in the 10th, and the Aís pulled out a 3-2 win. The loss for the Yankees is similar to the two games they dropped to the Red Sox last weekend. Gut-wrenching to watch; clearly games they were in control of winning. Games that cost them in the standings.

Before the game started, I knew that the Sox had already lost to Baltimore, 2-1. The Sox managed four hits, and wasted another good outing from old man Burkett. So the Yanks failed to gain another game in the standings.

Having no desire to subject myself to such craziness, I went to bed after watching the first couple of innings. So I didnít have to suffer and lose sleep over it. After all, I condition myself during the week to not watch or listen to the games, and can do it fairly easily, even on a Friday night. In the spirit of “Moneyball,” Iíve become more efficient as a fan; I realize how much stress I can take, and I adjust accordingly. (There is only so much drama that Iím willing to take in early August.)

The most interesting part of the night was seeing Aaron Boone play third base for the Yankees. They showed a clip of Ventura in the Dodgers dugout, and he had a distracted, far-away look. Actually, the showed him so briefly it was hard to detect his expression at all. It was blank and calm as always. I projected the other stuff onto him. But suddenly, I missed him more than I ever thought I could. I missed the idea of having him around. In a jolt, I felt a surge of emotion that made me connect with all of the Ventura fans that I know out there. So thatís what theyíve been talking about. Okay.

Boone looks more like his father than his brother. Brett Boone is compact but powerful. Like Barney Rubble with springs. Aaronís face is narrow, and he had dark hair, and dark eyes. Itís a completely different energy. Itís also very different from Ventura. Hudson struck Boone out with ease in his first at bat. Boone hit sixth and had a single to go with another strike out. (I bet Boone wished he could have joined the Yanks back home against Texas.)

The first thing I thought about when I first saw Boone was Roy Smalley. Iím not saying there is anything to it; Iím just reporting the first thing that came to my mind. The analogy doesnít really work when you think it through, but there is something similar in the look.

Bernie went 0-5 and whiffed twice, Matsui was 0-4, Giambi 0-2 (with two walks).