Daily Archives: July 29, 2008

After winning eight straight, the Yankees can’t seem to get out of their own way.  They lost again to the Orioles, this time 7-6.  This one was a heartbreaker.  Not because it was such a well-played game.  But because the Yankees came back and had their chances to win but couldn’t get over the hump.  This game was a hump.  And so was Aubrey Huff. 

Darrell Rasner wasn’t that bad.  He gave up two runs through the first six innings.  But Brian Roberts led off the seventh with a base hit and then Rasner plunked Adam Jones.  Damaso Marte came in and Rasner was last seen cursing at himself in the dugout.  Nick Markakis fought off a fastball for a cheap hit. Bases juiced.

Then Aubrey Huff wacked the first pitch deep to right, but it hooked foul.  He swung through the next pitch, a fastball, then crushed the next pitch, another fastball that caught too much of the plate, into the gap in left center field, clearing the bases.  Melvin Mora doubled Huff home off the first base bag to put the Yankees down 6-1.

Daniel Cabrera pitched well…again.  But in the bottom of the seventh, he plunked Alex Rodriguez–who homered in his previous at-bat–and was thrown out of the game.  (There was no further incident).  Couple of batters later, Robinson Cano singled with the bases loaded and nobody out, scoring two and the Yanks were in business, down 6-3.  But Wilson Betemit whiffed, then Melky Cabrera lined out to center (the ball almost took off on Jones, who did a late little leap to snag it), before Xavier Nady struck out looking at a nasty breaking ball to end the inning.

In the top of the ninth, the YES cameras showed a red lady bug on the right side of Mariano Rivera’s hat as he warmed up. Then freakin Aubrey Huff blasted the first pitch he saw from Rivera deep into the upper deck.  It went foul but it was closer to a homer than his shot against Marte.  Two pitches later, Huff cranked another lousy fastball over the wall in right for a dinger.  Got-to-be-kidding-meSomehow, Huff should be credited with more than just one homer, don’t you think?   

It prooved to be the difference.

George Sherrill, Baltimore’s All Star lefty, gave up a single to Johnny Damon to start the bottom of the ninth. He got ahead of Jeter 0-2, but walked him.  Bobby Abreu laced the first pitch he saw into left scoring Damon and putting runners at second and third with no out.  Rodriguez got a good hack on a breaking pitch but hooked it foul and struck out on a fastball in his kitchen.

Giambi fell behind 0-2 and then lined a 1-2 pitch up the middle.  It bounced off the mound, right past Sherrill, into left field.  Two runs in, Yanks down by one.  The “Yanks are showing some guts showing some grit,” Michael Kay said on on TV.  

Justin Christian replaced Giambi and stole second on the first pitch, a strike, to Cano.  “See that, see Michael,” Paul O’Neill said, as if he was showing Kay the goose bumps on his arm, “That just gives me a thrill.”  Then he talked about guts as Cano struck out on three pitches.  Leaving it all up to Betemit.  Ah, Betemit.  Right-handed, no less.  What happened?

Betemit struck out and so did the Yanks.

A tough loss. Sox fell too, almost got no-hit. But the Rays won.

Joba needs to stop the bleeding tomorrow afternoon.

No, not Dalkowski, the patron saint of erratic flame throwers, but Daniel Cabrera, tonight’s starting pitcher for the Orioles.  Cabrera sneers and looks sinister–unlike Dalkowski.  Drives me nuts when the Yanks are done in by the likes of this chucker.  So time for Rasner to have a good outing, and time for the Yankee offense to make mince meat out of that big goon Cabrera.

Kick em in the grill, boys.

Let’s go Yan-kees!

I’m friendly with Rob, the token booth clerk at 238th street on the 1 line. He’s in his early fifties, but you’d never tell by looking at him–he looks at least ten years younger. Rob is a big Yankee fan and is a charming, gregarious man. He’s been at 238 for three years and knows at least sixty percent of the customers that pass through the station. When I have the time, as I did last Friday afternoon, I stop and chat.

So there we were, talking about the Yankees. Rob was saying how impressed he’s been with Mussina. I told him that I hoped Moose comes close to winning twenty games this year. Then I said, “I hope Alex hits forty homers too.”

Just then, a squat, disheveled man walked into the station–which is three flights above ground level (the 1 train is elevated in the Bronx).

“Did you say you are going to hit forty homers” he said, slurring his words.

“No,” I said, now smelling the stench coming off the guy, a mixture of dried sweat and alcohol, “I said I hope A Rod hits forty.”

“Why not make it sixty?” He roared and slapped me on the shoulder, then staggered away. Rob tilted his head to the side and raised an eyebrow.

The man stood in front of the turnstiles for a few minutes. Rob and I continued our conversation, with one eye on Ned the Wino. Then we heard the sound of an approaching train. Several people, out of breath, came into the station and went through the turnstiles.

The drunk man looked ahead and said, “If only I was younger.”

He took a step back from the turnstile as the train rushed into the station, put his right hand into the back of his jeans (he was not wearing underwear) and pulled out an unopened can of Fosters. With the beer in his right hand, he lifted his left leg, as if he was going to hop the turnstiles.

Rob did not raise his voice but said, “Uh…No-no.”

The man remained frozen in the pose for a minute, as if he was a fat, washed- up wrestler about the climb into the ring. Then, defeated, he lowered his leg and placed the beer back in the crack of his ass. Then he turned around.

“I guess I’ll be walking to Staten Island,” he said as he wobbled past Rob and me out of the station.

“That’s some long walk,” said Rob.

Rob and I looked at each other and we both raised our eyebrows. Just then, a sleek young Spanish woman walked in and the foul smell was replaced by the warm scent of vanilla and feminity. Rob chatted with her, she batted her eyes, and I smiled, gazing at her narrow waist, amazed at how quickly the smell in the place changed. I was also amazed at the drunk. Why climb three flights of stairs if you aren’t going to bust out and jump the turnstiles? I couldn’t remember the last time I saw a benign, completely harmless wino like that.

Anyhow, made my day.

Perfect grace consists not in exterior ornamentation of the substance, but in the simple fitness of its form.

—I Ching

All forms of great artistic expression are paradoxes at their core. Each work of art must have some sort of underlying unifying principle. To succeed, the elements of that artwork have to both connect with that underlying principle in order for the work to cohere, and at the same defy that principle in order for the work to surprise and delight. Jazz songs, for example, typically start off with a basic melody played straight, off of which the musicians will then improvise for the remainder of the song.

When I visit a new ballpark, I love to start out by finding a place where I can stand and absorb a panorama of the ballpark. What’s this park about? What’s the melody that holds this thing together? Often, this isn’t something you intellectualize–you just get an overall feeling of the place. Once, I’ve got that sense, I like to go around and photograph all the little elements of the park that surprise and delight me.

Last Sunday, I made my first and only lifetime visit to Yankee Stadium. My usual modus operandi was thrown off from the start, as I was informed by Cliff Corcoran that if I want to see Monument Park, I should go straight there as soon as the gates open, or I won’t get in to see it at all. So my first impression of Yankee Stadium was not a panorama, but a crowded throng of humanity being led by ushers with bullhorns up and down and around and through narrow, low-ceiling ramps and barricaded corridors in a 95-degree heat:

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