Daily Archives: July 17, 2007

Andy Pettitte and Roy Halladay both entered yesterday’s game trying to get on track after a series of ugly outings. After the first inning, it looked like this just wasn’t going to be their night. Pettitte threw 25 pitches in the top of the first, allowed a run on a single, a walk, and a Frank Thomas double, and was fortunate to strand runners on second and third. Halladay threw 28 pitches in the bottom of the first starting with a five-pitch walk to Johnny Damon, who moved to third on a pair of groundouts. With two outs, Alex Rodriguez drove Damon home with a single and the Yankees proceeded to load the bases only to strand all three men when Robinson Cano grounded out.

To recap, that’s 53 pitches, seven base runners, and a 1-1 score after a single frame.

Pettitte threw another 23 pitches in the top of the second, but avoided giving up a run when Reed Johnson’s two-out double near the line in left bound into the stands, forcing Royce Clayton, who had singled, to hold up at third. Pettitte then struck out Alex Rios to preserve the 1-1 tie.

Then everything changed. Halladay retired the Yankees in order in the second. Pettitte did the same to the Blue Jays in the third on just nine pitches, including a three-pitch strikeout of Thomas. Suddenly it was the top of the eighth and the scoreboard still read 1-1.

Halladay and Pettitte matched each other almost exactly:

Halladay – 7 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 3 BB, 6 K, 112 pitches
Pettitte – 7 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 3 BB, 7 K, 116 pitches

With Pettitte staring down 120 pitches, however, Joe Torre needed to bring in someone else to pitch the eighth. Luis Vizcaino would have been the obvious choice based on recent performance, but he had pitched in each of the last two games and in four of the last five. Scott Proctor pitched two innings on Monday and has allowed eight base runners in his last 2 2/3 innings. Ron Villone’s last outing was a blown save. Edwar Ramirez hadn’t pitched since before the All-Star break and remains an unknown quantity. Mariano Rivera, having closed each of the last three games and four of the last five, was not a candidate to go two innings. Mike Myers is a specialty guy whom Torre is now refusing to use even for that purpose (more on that below). That left supposed “eighth-inning guy” Kyle Farnsworth and Brian Bruney, both of whom were fully rested. Torre chose the wrong guy.

I doubt there was a Yankee fan watching who didn’t assume the Blue Jays would take the lead when they saw Farnsworth taking his warmups in the top of the eighth. Indeed, Frank Thomas led off with a single. Toronto manager John Gibbons pinch-ran with Howie Clark, and Aaron Hill doubled Clark home to give Toronto a 2-1 lead.

It was actually a bit more interesting than that. Farnsworth, who made a wild throw to first in the 11th inning of a 1-1 game against the Angels just before the All-Star Break, yanked a pickoff throw past Andy Phillips to send Clark to second base. The best part is that Clark was standing on first base when Farnsworth threw over; he hadn’t even taken his lead yet. Curiously, Lyle Overbay then lined out directly to Phillips, who was playing back because he didn’t have to hold on Clark, but it was all rendered meaningless by Hill’s RBI double.

The Yankees staged another two-out rally in the eighth against lefty reliever Scott Downs. Hideki Matsui and Jorge Posada both singled to put the tying run on second base with two outs, but Downs threw Robinson Cano six straight looping curve balls, and Robinson missed badly at the first two and the last to end the inning.

Having burned through Farnsworth, Joe Torre then called on Brian Bruney in the ninth. Bruney retired the heart of the Blue Jay order (Alex Rios, Vernon Wells, and Troy Glaus) in order on 11 pitches, seven of them strikes. Here’s hoping Joe noticed.

Andy Phillips, who had the game-winning hit in each of the previous two games, lead off the bottom of the ninth with a single against Jays closer Jeremy Accardo. Torre then pinch-ran for Phillips with Miguel Cairo, and Cairo stole second on a 1-0 count to Melky Cabrera to put the tying run in scoring position. Melky then attempted to bunt Cairo to third (as he should have), but bunted foul for strike two (he had purposely swung through the pitch on which Cairo stole second). Melky then followed that failed bunt attempt with a single through the hole into right field. Larry Bowa sent Cairo home as Alex Rios fired to the plate. Cairo slid to the outside of the plate as Gregg Zaun lept for Rios’s throw. As Zaun came down with the ball, he collided with Cairo, who was reaching in for the bag. Having received a hip-check to the head, Cairo was stopped cold and tagged out. Had Cairo headed directly for the plate, he would have been safe easily, but there was no way for him to anticipate that the play would unfold as it did.

Fortunately, Melky moved to second on the play, so, after all of that, the Yankees still had the tying run in scoring position with one out. With a 2-1 count on Johnny Damon, Cabrera stole third as Accardo appeared to have forgotten about him. Accardo then walked Damon and, as Cabrera and Damon danced of third and first respectively, Accardo came set, bent his back knee, and stepped off the rubber, balking home the tying run. Suddenly the Yankees had the winning run on second with one out, but Derek Jeter and Bobby Abreu, who were a combined 0-for-10 in the game, both grounded out to push the game into extra innings.

Called in for emergency duty, Luis Vizcaino, despite missing a few miles per hour off his fastball, pitched around a one-out single to send the 2-2 tie to the bottom of the tenth. Casey Janssen, in for Accardo, opened the inning by plunking Alex Rodriguez on the elbow pad with a 0-1 pitch. Janssen then threw a 2-2 pitch to Hideki Matsui in the dirt and Rodriguez alertly moved to second as the ball squirted into fair territory and Zaun stumbled attempting to corral it. Earlier in that at-bat, Matsui missed a game-winning home run by mere feet, pulling a ball about three seats foul into the front row of the upper deck in left. Janssen rallied to strike out Matsui on a bad pitch up in the zone that was such a miss that it fooled Matsui completely. With first base open, the Gibbons then walked Jorge Posada to pitch to Robinson Cano, who had twice failed to deliver the hit that could have made the difference in the game, leaving five men on base in the process. This time, Cano laced Janssen’s first pitch into the corner in deep left, plating Rodriguez and winning the game, 3-2 in ten innings.

It was a great win for the Yankees, and puts them in a great position as most had assumed that with Kei Igawa starting for the Yankees on Monday and Roy Halladay starting for the Blue Jays last night, the Yankees would lose at least one of those games. The game also comes with a lesson.

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The Yankees have won 9 of their last 12 games and the last four games they’ve lost have been started by Scott Kazmir, John Lackey, Johan Santana, and Dan Haren. You really can’t complain about that, though it is cause for concern heading into tonight’s game against another big name pitcher, Toronto’s Roy Halladay. Here’s the good news: after a fantastic April (4-0, 2.28 ERA), Halladay’s been something of a mess, posting a 6.35 ERA over his last eleven starts and a 6.85 ERA over his last four. The bad news is that it seems a significant part of that has been bad luck. Halladay has allowed 92 hits in his last 66 2/3 innings, which can be traced to his inflated .323 opponents average on balls in play. That cannot, however, be traced to the Toronto defense, which is fifth in the majors at turning balls in play into outs and puts a solid in field quartet behind the groundballing Halladay.

More bad news is that Andy Pettitte’s recent history is actually worse than Halladay’s. He’s posted a 6.99 ERA over his last eight starts, a 9.00 mark in his last five, and a whopping 13.14 in his last three. More encouraging signs are that Pettitte fell just one out short of a quality start in Tampa last week, and handled the Blue Jays expertly in a hard-luck loss back in late May when he was undone by poor defense and run support and Aaron Hill’s steal of home. Halladay last faced the Yankees in September of last year, leaving the game after 3 1/3 innings with a forearm strain.

By Will Weiss

At the Winter Meetings in 2003 in New Orleans, not long after news broke that Gary Sheffield—then a free agent—would sign with the Yankees, I asked his former manager at the time, Bobby Cox, the kind of player he was, how he would fit in the Yankee clubhouse and most importantly, and how he would get along with Joe Torre.

“Joe’s gonna love him. He never gave me a problem,” was Cox’s response.

While Sheff was in uniform for the Yankees—for the first two years at least—he was arguably the most important hitter in the lineup. He provided protection for Derek Jeter in the three slot and for Alex Rodriguez or Jason Giambi if he batted fifth, got on base and drove in runs. His right-handed bat gave Torre the option to alternate lefty-righty from one through nine, which he loved. And he had a competitive, angry edge from an everyday player not seen since Paul O’Neill’s retirement. He played hurt and he played hard. His teammates respected him.

That reputation, at least among his former Yankee teammates, is likely gone.

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The Yankees won the kind of game last night that they’ve been losing all year. Kei Igawa was doo doo, getting killed by the long ball (after being ahead in the counts, no less). But he escaped trouble in both the first and second inning, a turn of events that would prove costly for Toronto. Scott Proctor later gave up a game-tying homer, still the Yanks prevailed, thanks to a two-out, two-run single in the seventh by Andy Phillips.

“It’s a lot of joy to see what he’s doing, especially with what he’s been through,” said Jorge Posada, who singled to start the two-out, tie-breaking rally against Josh Towers. “He’s come out here and getting a chance to play, and he’s doing everything we ask for. It’s a lot of fun to see.”
(Tyler Kepner, N.Y.Times)

Hideki Matsui, Robinson Cano and Alex Rodriguez all homered as the Yanks beat the Blue Jays, 6-4. Mariano Rivera gave up a lead-off triple to Troy Glaus in the top of the ninth–Glaus narrowly missed hitting his third dinger of the night–but then struck out The Big Hurt swinging, Lyle Overbay looking, and got Aaron Hill to ground out to third to end it.

It was Mo’s third save in as many games. The Bombers have won four of the first five games since the break. It’s nice to see them playing better but I’m not letting myself get too excited yet. Let’s see how they fare tonight against Doc Halladay.