Monthly Archives: July 2008

I was able to watch a good portion of yesterday’s parade up sixth avenue from my office building. Players sat in the back of sparkling Chevy trucks which proceeded slowly from Bryant Park to 57th street. When Hank Aaron’s truck stopped in front of my building, I saw a little old lady with a big white hat approach him. She walked right by the police, up to the truck like she came down to the parade to do just one thing. She went right up and shook Aaron’s hand. It was brief. Then she walked back to the sidewalk where a small boy was waiting for her.

As she moved away from Aaron, she clenched her fists and shook them over and over again. It was as she was saying, “Yes. I shook the man’s hand.” I don’t know if she had been waiting for years to make that contact but the moment clearly made her day, if not her whole year.

It must be a strange sensation to be a ball player, knowing that your accomplishments mean so much to so many people. I wonder how many of these kinds of encounters an athltete remembers? They must all blur together after awhile. One thing for sure though, that lady will never forget touching Hank Aaron, even it was just for a moment.

The opening ceremonies were but a distant memory by the time the All Star game merifully ended close to 2:00 a.m. but the sight of George Steinbrenner being carted around the field will be the image I remember most. There was the Boss, with his trademark navy blue blazer and aviator sunglasses, sitting next to his daughter, his son Hal right behind him, bawling like a baby, overcome with emotion. The Fox cameras tastefully kept their distance until Steinbrenner’s cart reached the pitcher’s mound. There, his daughter handed him a plain manilla envelope. The Boss took out four baseballs and gave one each to Whitey Ford, Yogi Berra, Goose Gossage and Reggie Jackson. Ford leaned over and kissed George on the cheek, so did Yogi. Paying their respects to The Godfather. Steinbrenner was then quickly ushered off the field, perhaps for the final time.

It’s funny how things turn out. For as long as I can remember, Steinbrenner has lorded over his team as The Boss, commanding the back and sometimes even the front pages of the local newspapers, hiring-and-firing managers and general managers at an alarming rate, throwing buckets of money at free agents, harassing his employees, berating his players, building championship teams and then tearing them down. He was boorish, obnoxious, paranoid, driven, obsessed. He was also generous, charitable, and unfailingly patriotic. Steinbrenner was a lot of things, and most of all, he was vital, a force.

In 1989, when I was a senior in high school, I honestly believed that the Yankees would never been a winning organization again until Steinbrenner was gone. I was wrong of course, and the Yankees’ run in the nineties was more spectactular and satisfying than the one in the late seventies. Steinbrenner deserves credit for that, even if the team was carefully re-built while he was serving his second suspension from the game, and even if Joe Torre gets most of the ink for the teams’ great run.

Again, it’s interesting to see how things turn out. Instead of a dramatic departure, Steinbrenner has slowly faded, like the air fizzling out of a birthday ballon that is three weeks old. It is humbling. And his many critics have laid off of him as his health has declined. Mike Lupica, one of his biggest foes, has written nothing but glowing things about Steinbrenner for the past few years. And so even an orge gets a moment of grace.

I enjoyed the pre-game introductions. Thought it was typically crass of Willie Mays to ignore Josh Hamilton when the young center fielder took his place next to the Say Hey Kid. Also, is New York the only place in the world where you can get away with following-up Hank Aaron with Reggie Jackson or what? And yo, you had to love them saving Yogi, the best, for last.

The fourth and final All-Star Game in Yankee Stadium started out as something of a dud, but it sure did get interesting before the AL came away its eleventh-straight win after 15 innings and nearly five hours of baseball.

Scoreless after four innings, the early part of the game was notable only for its lack of offense. Derek Jeter singled and stole second in his first at-bat, but was stranded there, ground into a double play in his second trip, and ground out again to kill a fifth-inning rally in his final at-bat. Alex Rodriguez fouled out and struck out in his two at-bats. The AL had five runners in the first four frames, but one was erased by Jeter’s double play, and Milton Bradley was picked off first base after reaching on a Hanley Ramirez throwing error in the fourth. The NL had just three baserunners in the first four frames. Of those three, Albert Pujols was nailed by a laser throw from Ichiro Suzuki while trying to stretch a single into the right field corner into a double. That play was the highlight of the early part of the game, though everyone had a good laugh when Carlos Zambrano’s first pitch to Manny Ramirez in the bottom of the fourth was a curveball that broke over and behind Ramirez’s head.

The NL finally broke the dam when Matt Holliday led off the fifth with an opposite-field solo homer off Ervin Santana that was also the first extra-base hit of the game. The senior circuit added another run against Justin Duchscherer the following inning when Hanely Ramirez and Chase Utley singled to put runners on the corners with no outs, and Lance Berkman plated Ramirez with a sac fly to center.

The game was still 2-0 with two outs in the bottom of the seventh when J.D. Drew tied things up with a two-run homer that plated Justin Morneau (who had doubled to lead off the inning), making Drew the first Boston player to get a genuine cheer from a Yankee Stadium crowd in my memory.

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The NL has the better lineup and the roster that better represents the best of their league, but they haven’t won one of these things since 1996, when the AL was shutout by a nonet of pitchers that included Mark Wohlers, Steve Trachsel, and Phillies closer Ricky Bottalico, and they won’t get last licks tonight.

The NL has had some turnover in its roster since it was first announced. In addition to Corey Hart, who was added via the Final Vote, David Wright, who finished second in that voting, replaces the injured Alfonso Soriano, and Carlos Marmol replaces his bullpen-mate Kerry Wood, who developed blister on his right index finger last weekend. What’s more, today there have been reports that the Giants sophomore sensation Tim Lincecum, my pick to start for the NL squad, fell ill with the flu yesterday and may not even make it to the Stadium. The only roster issue for the ALers was the injured David Ortiz being replaced by Final Vote winner Evan Longoria.

Here are the lineups:

American League

RF – Ichiro Suzuki (L)
SS – Derek Jeter (R)
CF – Josh Hamilton (L)
3B – Alex Rodriguez (R)
LF – Manny Ramirez (R)
DH – Milton Bradley (S)
1B – Kevin Youkilis (R)
C – Joe Mauer (L)
2B – Dustin Pedroia (R)

P – Cliff Lee (L)

National League

SS – Hanely Ramirez (R)
2B – Chase Utley (L)
1B – Lance Berkman (S)
DH – Albert Pujols (R)
3B – Chipper Jones (S)
RF – Matt Holliday (R)
LF – Ryan Braun (R)
CF – Kosuke Fukudome (L)
C – Geovany Soto (R)

P – Ben Sheets (R)

In lieu of FOX’s Zelaskoed pre-game coverage, check our man Alex’s write up on the Stadium over at SI.com, and let’s all hope this won’t be the last night they break the bunting out at the old yard.

More fun: Paul Lukas on All-Star Game uniform shenanigans, including several of those mentioned in my 1977 game recap earlier today.

The last All-Star Game to take place at Yankee Stadium was played on July 19, 1977, five days after the blackout that devastated parts of the city. It was the second season of the renovated Stadium, which had already seen Chris Chambliss hit his ALCS-winning home run against the Royals and the Reds sweep the Yankees in the World Series the previous October. At the break, the Yankees were in third place in a tight race in the AL East, 2.5 games behind the Red Sox and three games behind the Orioles, both of whom would finish the season 2.5 games behind the repeating AL champions.

The Yankees had five representatives at the All-Star Game that year, not counting AL manager Billy Martin and his coaching staff. Reggie Jackson, in his first year with the team, started in right field and was booed loudly by the home crown upon being announced by Bob Sheppard before the game. Willie Randolph, in his second season as a Yankee, made his first All-Star start at second base. Thurman Munson, Graig Nettles, and Sparky Lyle all made the team as reserves.

While the six members of the 1976 World Champion Reds on the NL roster (Joe Morgan, Johnny Bench, George Foster, and Dave Concepcion in the starting lineup, Pete Rose and Ken Griffy on the bench) were booed loudly by the Yankee Stadium crowd, the loudest ovation during the pre-game introductions went to another Red, Tom Seaver, who had been traded to Cincinnati by the Mets just a month earlier. Watching the game now, it’s also striking to see future Yankee stars Dave Winfield and Goose Gossage, both playing for the NL squad, met with near silence by the Stadium fans, and to see Billy Martin cheerfully greet his first base coach, White Sox manager Bob Lemon, who would replace him as Yankee manager the following season.

Orioles ace Jim Palmer started for the AL squad. Having thrown 638 innings over the previous two seasons, Palmer had thrown 187 2/3 innings in the first half of 1977 and was clearly fatigued. Joe Morgan, who had started the scoring in the 1976 World Series with a first-inning home run off Doyle Alexander, led off and put Palmer’s sixth pitch into the right field box seats. As Reggie Jackson ran out of room to chase Morgan’s leadoff homer, he pressed his face against the right field wall and rolled around as if to say "here we go again." The NL had won the previous five All-Star Games and 18 of the previous 20. They would win this one and the next five as well before Fred Lynn’s grand slam off Atlee Hammaker finally broke their dominance in 1983.

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The reason why baseball movies will never get it right is because no amount of clever CGI can ever replicate what we saw from Josh Hamilton, a real life Roy Hobbs, last night at the Stadium. I still feel buzzed.

“If I was managing the team, I would close,” [Jonathan] Papelbon said. “I’m not managing the team, so it don’t matter.”

…”We’ve both earned that right; us, by winning the World Series and having the opportunity of having our manager there and our team being represented, and Mariano by what he’s done for this role, we’re in Yankee Stadium and blah, blah, blah,” Papelbon said. “It’s not that easy. Everybody thinks it’s a cut and dry answer, but it’s not.”
(N.Y. Daily News)

Well, Jonathan Paplebon is an athlete. And I’d rather have a guy who is dumb and good than smart and crappy. So this wasn’t an especially bright thing to say. He isn’t paid to be bright.

ESPN will broadcast the Home Run Derby at Yankee Stadium at 8pm tonight. It will be the first and last Home Run Derby in the Stadium’s history as the Derby only dates back to 1985 and Yankee Stadium last hosted the All-Star Game in 1977.

The balls for the Derby tend to be a bit juiced, so it’s quite possible that there will be balls hit to previously unreached portions of the park tonight. If you follow the link above, you’ll find a video that shows where the furthest-hit balls in this decade’s Derbies would have landed in Yankee Stadium. A several of them would have landed safely in the left field bleachers, a section that’s only been reached once during a game, and one would have hit off the wall behind those bleachers.

Unfortunately, none of the seven hitters responsible for the blasts in that video will be participating tonight. In fact, if you look at the top home run totals over the 2004 to 2007 seasons, Lance Berkman is the only member of the top 10 who will be taking his hacks tonight, and the next participant on the list is Justin Morneau all the way down at 27th.

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Joe Pos takes a look.  Peep, don’t sleep.

Over at New York magazine, Will Leitch weighs in on the latest Alex Rodriguez circus:

As we watch A-Rod’s tabloid excoriation across our tabloid media this week—He’s having an affair with Madonna! No, it’s only spiritual! He dates strippers and bodybuilders! He’s a bad dad!—it’s worth considering that the breakup that has landed A-Rod in his predicament isn’t necessarily the one with his wife, Cynthia; it’s the one he had with Scott Boras last October.

Over the past sixteen years, Boras was the one constant in A-Rod’s life. A-Rod’s job was simple: Hit baseballs a very long way. Boras, his agent, managed his money, public image, contract negotiations, you name it. Then, when negotiations with the Yankees went haywire, he dumped Boras, and Madonna’s longtime manager, Guy Oseary, was hired to remake A-Rod’s image. Which has happened now, spectacularly.

You can say that again.

Rob Neyer has a fine appreciation of Bobby Murcer’s career today at ESPN:

After playing briefly for the Yankees in 1965 and ’66, Murcer was one of the very few major leaguers drafted into the military during the Vietnam War. Inducted into the army during spring training in 1967, he missed all of that season and the next while serving as a radio operator. Murcer worried that his career was over, but would later tell author Philip Bashe, "What I thought was going to be a horrible experience was really a positive thing for me in the long run. I learned responsibility and, obviously, a little bit of discipline. When I got out I was ready to proceed with my baseball career on a much more mature level."

No kidding. Murcer, who had struggled in the majors before going into the army — understandably, considering that he’d been a 160-pound teenager — got off to a brilliant start in 1969. He homered on Opening Day and drove in three runs. He homered in his next game, too. When Murcer hurt his ankle in late May, he was leading the majors with 43 RBIs.

He cooled off after getting back into the lineup, but still led the club with 82 runs and 82 RBIs. Also that season, Murcer finally moved into Mantle’s old spot in center field. Murcer, like Mantle, had been a shortstop in the minors, and he’d stuck there during his first stints with the Yankees. But in 1969 they moved him to third base, an experiment that lasted five weeks and included 14 errors. He spent the next months in right field, and finally moved to center in late August; the transition was complete, and in 1972 Murcer won a Gold Glove (something Mantle never did).

In 1971, Murcer’s first great season (and his best), he played in his first of five straight All-Star Games. They didn’t all come with the Yankees, though. In 1974, Murcer became the highest-paid Yankee ever — his $120,000 salary topped the $100,000 earned by Joe DiMaggio and Mantle. But Murcer hit only 10 home runs in 1974, and shortly after the season the Yankees traded him to the Giants for Bobby Bonds.

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Andy Says:

"If we want to make the playoffs, we have to be better," said Pettitte, who took the loss Sunday. "We stink right now for the most part. As a team, we’ve kind of stunk it up here lately, so we need to play better."

…"We’ve got to find a way to put it all together for an extended period of time with our pitching and our hitting combined," Pettitte said. "It seems like right now, we’re feast or famine."
(N.Y. Daily News)

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Hustle Buck Tater.

The Blue Jays scored four runs off Andy Pettitte in the second inning yesterday, which was more than enough for Yankee-killer A.J. Burnett. The Yanks got a man as far as second just twice through the first eight innings and didn’t break through until Jason Giambi’s opposite-field solo homer off a tiring Burnett in the ninth inning. Jorge Posada followed Giambi with a single to bounce Burnett, but facing closer B.J. Ryan, Robinson Cano bounced into a double play to give Toronto a 4-1 victory in the game and a 2-1 victory in the series.

The Jays got their breakout inning going when Bobby Abreu completely misjudged a would-by fly out to right into a double. Abreu then spent the rest of the game making up for his blunder, but to no avail. Abreu led off the top of the fourth with a double, but the middle of the Yankee order couldn’t even get him to third base. With men on the corners in the bottom of the fourth inning, Marco Scutaro, whose three-run homer capped the Jay’s four-run second inning, lifted a foul ball to shallow right field. Abreu made an impressive ranging catch, whirled, and fired a strike to Posada to nail Scott Rolen attempting to score for an inning-saving double play. In his next at-bat, Abreu reached on an infield single and got to second on an Alex Rodriguez single, but was again stranded at the keystone.

Abreu was the only Yankee to reach second base all day other than Giambi on his ninth-inning home run. Peter Abraham reports that all but seven of the Yankees 32 plate appearances against Burnett were over within three pitches, four of them being three-pitch strike outs. Scutaro was the third opposing in the last week who failed to get down a bunt and then homered in the same at-bat.

The Yankees enter the break having scored 3.67 runs per game in their last 15 contests and 2.15 runs per game in 13 of those 15 games. They are six games behind the first-place Red Sox in the AL East and 5.5 games behind the second-place Tampa Bay Rays. They’re in fourth place in the Wild Card race behind the Rays, Twins (3 GB), and A’s (1 GB), the last of whom they will face in their first series after the break.

Meanwhile, the Futures Game was played back at the Stadium. For all of the promotion the All-Star Game and associated events have received in the past week or so, the Futures Game seemed to go completely unmentioned. The Tino Martinez-managed World team beat the U.S. squad 3-0. Yankee catching prospect Jesus Montero contributed a single in two at-bats.

With the Yankees offense scuffling, Joe Girardi finally made a meaningful tweak to his lineup yesterday, dropping struggling rookie leadoff man Brett Gardner to ninth in the order and moving everyone else up a spot. That meant Derek Jeter, who has hit a Jeter-esque .311/.385/.444 since June 1, leading off, Bobby Abreu batting second, Alex Rodriguez batting third, etcetera. His team responded by scoring nine-runs in the first four innings of the game, kick started by Jeter’s leadoff home run on the second pitch of the game. Tucked away at the bottom of the order, Gardner reached base four times in four trips, with a pair of singles, a pair of walks, a pair of runs scored, and three RBIs.

It worked so well, he’s doing it again today, though with Jorge Posada catching, Jason Giambi playing first base, and Wilson Betemit slipping into the eighth spot in place of yesterday’s catcher, Chad Moeller.

That lineup will look to give the Yankees a series victory heading into the All-Star break with a win against A.J. Burnett in today’s rubber game. Burnett is something of a Yankee killer. He beat them back on April 2, his only start against the Bombers this season, and is the only Blue Jay pitcher other than Roy Halladay to have defeated the Yankees this year. In fact, the only time the Yankees have beaten Burnett since he joined the Blue Jays came in September 2006.

The good news is that Burnett enters today’s game with a 6.91 ERA in last seven starts, has allowed 15 runs (13 earned) in his last two starts, and is pitching on three-day’s rest for just the third time in his career. He’ll face Andy Pettitte, who has a 1.82 ERA in last six starts (5-1) and is coming off eight shutout innings against Rays in which he looked absolutely dominant, allowing just four hits, three of them singles, and walking none.

The Yankees 9-4 win over the Blue Jays this afternoon, which featured Derek Jeter’s 200th career home run as well as Alex Rodriguez’s 537th career bomb (moving him past Mickey Mantle on the all-time list), was overshadowed by the news that Bobby Murcer has passed away.

Murcer was a solid star player for the Yankees during the late 60s and early 70s–good but never truly great–and later, a friendly voice in the broadcast booth. Murcer knocked a game-winning, pinch-hit homer over the right center field wall against the Orioles in September of 1981. I was at that game with my dad and my brother. I’ll never forget watching two drunk guys sitting down the row from us in the upper deck, chanting "Bob-by, Bob-by!" and then all hell breaking loose when Murcer hit the dinger.

George Carlin, now Bobby Murcer. It certainly hits a lot closer to home when you grew up watching and then listening to a guy. Sixty-two is too young, man.  At least he’s not in pain anymore.  Let’s hope he’s at peace.  I know it’s the natural order of things and all, but, good goosh, we’ve been talking an awful lot about death lately.

Time for a win.

Let’s Go Yan-Kees.

Yes, the Yankee offense has been less than inspired of late, but there ain’t much that even the best hitting teams can do when they face a buzz saw like Doc Halladay. The Blue Jays’ ace delivered a vintage performance on Friday night, throwing a complete-game, two-hit, shutout against the Yanks. Jays 5, Yanks zip. Joba Chamberlain pitched well, giving up three runs in 6.2 innings, striking out nine without a walk. Just one of those nights.

Rufus Ratus Johnson Brown, whatta ya gunna do when the rent comes round?

When Dustin McGowan hit the DL, the Yankees thought they were going to get through their final series of the first half without having to face any of the Blue Jays’ best pitchers, but now the Jays have Roy Halladay going tonight and A.J. Burnett going on Sunday. That’s not going to help the Yankees break out of their offensive funk. The Yankees have gone 4-2 against Toronto thus far this season, but their two losses came against Halladay and Burnett and saw the Yankees score a total of 5 runs.

The good news is that the Yanks have Joba Chamberlain and Andy Pettitte opposing those two. Pettitte, who faces Burnett on Sunday, has a 1.82 ERA and a 5-1 record over his last six starts, which includes his stinker against the Red Sox. Since pushing his pitch counts into the 80s with his start against the Astros, Chamberlain, who starts against Halladay tonight, has a 2.22 ERA with 29 Ks in 28 1/3 innings over five starts. The Yankees are 4-1 in those games, though Joba has gotten the decision just once due to the offense’s struggles.

Chamberlain’s only weakness since becoming a starter has been the base on balls, as he has a 5.08 BB/9 over those five starts and has thus only made it past the sixth inning once. That trend started with his first major league start, which came against the Blue Jays at the Stadium and saw the Toronto hitters exploit his pitch limit by taking an inordinate number of pitches. It will be interesting to see if the Jays’ approach differs tonight now that Joba’s no longer on an artificially-low pitch count.

As for Halladay, he’s 1-1 with a 3.46 ERA in two starts against the Yankees this season. He was out-dueled by Chien-Ming Wang on the rain-delayed Opening Day Night, and was the beneficiary of the Jay’s approach against Chamberlain in the start described above. Tonight could be the first of many unencumbered duels between these two AL East aces.

Jorge Posada is finally back behind the plate, as Jason Giambi returns to the lineup as the DH in the American League park, Wilson Betemit slips into Jose Molina’s spot in the lineup at first base, and Brett Gardner returns to the leadoff spot and left field.

If the Yanks can pull out two of three this weekend, it should give the team a boost heading into the break, even if they have to do it with pitching rather than hitting. The Jays have the third-worst offense in the AL and just lost Vernon Wells to the DL with a hamstring strain, so the opportunity is there, but the pressure is on Joba and Andy get it done.

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