Monthly Archives: July 2008

As I’ve watched the Yankees throughout the first half of 2008, I’ve come to the conclusion that they could use someone like Cliff Johnson. Of course, Cliff is 60 years old now, and probably not in condition to bend his knees behind the plate or swing a bat in anger. In actuality, I’m referring to the Cliff Johnson of roughly 30 years ago, when he gave the Yankees the kind of right-handed hitting and bench strength that this year’s Yankees so badly require.

For much of the 1970s, the Yankees tried to acquire some extra right-handed hitting. In 1973, they purchased Jim Ray Hart, who lasted only a calendar year as a platoon DH before it became obvious that he was washed up, in part because of his problems with drinking. After the season, the Bombers acquired switch-hitting Bill “Suds” Sudakis from the Texas Rangers. Sudakis succeeded in one thing—making headlines when he brawled with Sweet Lou Piniella during a road trip in Milwaukee. In the spring of 1974, the Yankees acquired Walt “No Neck” Williams as part of a larger deal with the White Sox. Williams made a splash, but mostly because of his unusual head-and-shoulders appearance. Later that season, the Yankees made a last-minute deal for Alex Johnson, followed by a December transaction that brought in Bob Oliver from Baltimore. Both players had once been highly productive; both players failed to last a full season at Shea Stadium.

In the spring of 1976, the Yankees gave Tommy Davis, one of my favorites, a look-see. He never made it into a game, released on the eve of Opening Day. Then came another favorite, Cesar Tovar, who was also one of Yankee manager Billy Martin’s preferred pets. Tovar could play anywhere, but unfortunately couldn’t hit anything—at least not any more. After the season, the Yankees appeared to have hit the jackpot with the perennially underrated Jimmy Wynn. But “The Toy Cannon” had little fodder remaining; he batted .143 in 77 at-bats and received the boot.

Still searching for a right-handed role-playing bat in 1977, the Yankees then pulled the trigger on a deal just before the June 15^th deadline. General manager Gabe Paul sent three extraneous minor leaguers—first baseman Dave Bergman, infielder Mike Fischlin, and lefty Randy Niemann—to the Houston Astros. In exchange, the Yankees received what they desperately needed on two different counts—a right-handed bat and a backup catcher. Cliff Johnson had finally come to town.

Coming to bat 142 times for the ’77 Yankees, Johnson provided exactly what Martin and Gabe Paul wanted. Heathcliff batted .296 with 12 home runs; more significantly, he slugged .606 and compiled a .405 on-base percentage. When the opponent threw a left-hander at the Yankees, Martin rightly found a place for Johnson in the lineup. Granted, Johnson wasn’t much of a catcher—at six-four and 240 pounds, he was clumsy and owned hands of stone—but he could play the position in short doses. He could also fill in at first base and the outfield corners (though he never did play in left or right field during his Yankee days). Most critically, Johnson could hit—swinging the bat better than any backup catcher the Yankees had featured since the salad days of Johnny Blanchard.

Johnson became an important part of the Yankees’ second-half surge that summer. He also devoured the Kansas City Royals’ pitching staff in the ALCS. In 16 at-bats, Johnson delivered six hits, swatted one home run, and slugged .733, helping the Yankees clinched the American League pennant in a wild five-game series. As far as June 15^th trade deadline deals were concerned, Johnson had become one of the best mid-season acquisitions in Yankee history.

The 1977 season turned out to be the peak of Johnson’s career in pinstripes. In 1978, the bottom fell out of his game. Losing his stroke in his continuing role as a spare part, Johnson batted .184 with only six home runs in 174 at-bats. He became a nonentity in the postseason, going hitless in three at-bats against the Royals and Los Angeles Dodgers. The following spring, Johnson became a liability in the clubhouse. In late April, he took offense at some playful ribbing from Goose Gossage and gave the Yankees’ relief ace a slap of his hand. That led to a full-scale wrestling match—and a tumble into the bathroom toilet stalls. Johnson escaped unharmed, but the Goose endured a torn ligament in his pitching thumb. He would miss the next three months of the 1979 season, which turned into a lost journey for the Yankees.

With that one incident, Johnson signed his Yankee death notice. Within two months, he was gone—shipped off to the Cleveland Indians in a bad deadline deal for a mediocre left-hander named Don Hood. (Hood was better than Billy Traber, though. Hood could have helped the 2008 Yankees, too.) Johnson would eventually resuscitate his career as a power-hitting DH and occasional catcher, and would later become a highly effective pinch-hitter for the Toronto Blue Jays, but his days as a Yankee had come to an ungracious end.

I wish it had turned out different for Johnson. I’ve always liked journeyman ballplayers who aren’t stars, but are still useful players—just like Johnson was. I remember how Phil Rizzuto used to playfully refer to him as “Heathcliff.” That wasn’t his real first name (it’s Clifford), just a clever-sounding nickname. Others called him “Topcat,” for reasons that remain a mystery to me to this day. Not surprisingly, Gossage described Johnson as a “lazy and worthless piece of crap” in his 2000 autobiography, ripping into Johnson for his tendency toward “moping around,” around the bullpen, where he allegedly refused to warm up pitchers from time to time. I read those descriptions with some sadness, mostly because they didn’t jell with the image I had of Johnson as a mammoth man who spoke softly but carried a big bat—literally.

Come back, Cliff Johnson. We could use someone like you in 2008.

Bruce Markusen writes “Cooperstown Confidential” for MLBlogs at MLB.com.

In a post-script to my wrap-up of Wednesday afternoon’s walk-off win against the Tampa Bay Rays, I expressed concern about the Yankees’ continued lack of offense, even through their recent four-game winning streak:

While the Yankees have won four games in a row, they have only averaged 3.5 runs scored over those four games and 3.63 runs per game over their last 11 contests. Setting aside their 18-run outburst against the Rangers a week ago, they’ve averaged 2.4 runs per game in ten of their last 11 games. Take out their two game-winning runs in extra innings, and they’ve scored just 2.2 runs per game during regulation in those ten games.

All of those numbers have gone down as a result of another weak showing last night, this one against Paul Maholm and the Pittsburgh Pirates.

The Bucs got on the board first when ninth-place hitter Jack Wilson led of the third inning by doubling off Mike Mussina and was later plated by a Freddy Sanchez single. Mussina would later single himself with two outs in the fifth inning and be moved to second by a Derek Jeter single before being stranded by a Bobby Abreu strikeout. Moose’s four-year-old son told him he’d hit better if he cuffed his pants high, and Mussina obliged on both accounts, but as always seems to be the case, the inning after the pitcher ran the bases, he gave up another run, though this one was hardly his fault.

In the bottom of the fifth, Wilson again led off with a hit. Nate McLouth then hit a double-play ball to second, but Derek Jeter’s relay throw tailed down and up the line, tipping off first baseman Jorge Posada’s outstretched glove to allow McLouth to reach safely. Posada was playing first in order to get his bat in the lineup against a lefty in a National League park (he went 1 for 4) while also allowing Mussina to pitch to his personal catcher, Jose Molina (Mussina allowed two runs in six innings). Posada didn’t make the most impressive stretch for the ball, which a more experienced infielder likely would have come up with. Still, a better throw from Jeter, who was in no way threatened by the charging baserunner, would have avoided that problem. Two pitches later, McLouth stole second and moved to third when Jose Molina’s throw skipped into center field. On the next pitch, Freddy Sanchez lifted a sac fly to give the Pirates a 2-0 lead.

The Yankees, meanwhile, had nothing going against Maholm. Derek Jeter led off the game with a single and the Yankees had men on the corners with two outs in the first, but Robinson Cano struck out on four pitches. Bobby Abreu walked and stole second with two outs in the third, but Alex Rodriguez flew out to strand him. Mussina and Jeter singled with two outs in the fifth, but Abreu struck out on three pitches.

That was it until the Yankees finally broke through, again with two outs, in the seventh. Justin Christian and pinch-hitter Wilson Betemit singled. Derek Jeter took a 2-2 pitch off the left foot to load the bases, and Wednesday’s hero Bobby Abreu tied the game with a single to right that plated Christian and Betemit. Alex Rodriguez ground out to end the inning, but the two-out rally seemed to signal a shift in the game.

Jose Veras shifted it back with just six pitches. Again Jack Wilson led off the inning by reaching base, this time walking on five pitches (though ball four looked like strike two). Nate McLouth followed by bunting a ball foul and then, like Carlos Peña the day before, crushing a home run to right field on a pitch in on his hands.

Christian drew a full-count walk against Pirates closer Damaso Marte in the ninth to bring Jason Giambi to the plate representing the tying run, but Giambi flew out at the end of a strong seven-pitch battle and Derek Jeter grounded out weakly to end the game and give the Pirates both a 4-2 win and a 2-1 series victory.

Tonight, the Yankees face Roy Halladay. Here’s hoping Joba Chamberlain has no-hit stuff. He may need it.

Pity the poor Pirates. A year ago it appeared that the Bucs were building a strong young rotation with Tom Gorzelanny and Ian Snell on top and Zach Duke and Paul Maholm in the middle. They then overhauled their management both in the front office and on the field in the hope of building around that quartet of young starters. This season, their offense has surged to become the fourth-best attack in the NL thanks to a career year from Xavier Nady (.321/.379/.537), breakout seasons from 27-year-old catcher Ryan Doumit (.318/.362/.568) and 26-year-old All-Star center fielder Nate McLouth (.286/.361/.540), and Jason Bay’s rebound from a 2007 season hampered by leg injuries. More recently, first baseman Adam LaRoche, a second-half performer to rival Robinson Cano, has joined in, hitting .365/.455/.662 since mid-June.

The problem is that their good young rotation has gone belly-up. Gorzellany lost his ability to throw strikes (6.26 BB/9 vs. 5.34 K/9) and has been sent back to the minors for reeducation sporting a 6.57 ERA, and Snell has been only mildly better (5.84 ERA, 5.34 BB/9, 6.55 K/9). That has more than erased the improvements made by Duke and tonight’s starter Maholm, and undermined the strong showing of both the offense and the back of the bullpen (which itself has been hurt by the recent injury to closer Matt Capps). Altogether, the Pirates pitching staff has the worst ERA in baseball.

Worse yet, of those breakout performers on offense, all but Bay stand a good chance to regress to their past level of performance as McLouth is the youngest of the quartet at 26. Just look at Freddy Sanchez, who won the batting title at age 28 in 2005 and is hitting .226/.253/.307 thus far this year. Oh, and Bay will be a free agent after the 2009 season.

So despite the new administration’s willingness to think outside of the box (witness rookie manager John Russell using Doug Mientkiewicz as a four-corners utility man and becoming the third NL Central manager to bat his pitcher eighth), any hope for a meaningful improvement in Pittsburgh has once again receded into the future.

Tonight’s game makes up for one rained out exactly two weeks ago after the Yanks and Bucs split the first two games of a three-game set and, neatly, rematches the two pitchers who started the game that was rained out with the Yankees leading 3-1 in the third inning. Having had that outing erased from his ledger, Paul Maholm has posted a 2.57 ERA in his last four starts and a 2.74 mark over his last seven, and hasn’t taken a loss since May 20. Mike Mussina is coming off his six crucial shutout innings against the Red Sox and has a 2.70 ERA in his last six starts with 30 Ks against just six walks and three homers in that span.

Jose Molina, who starts his sixth straight game behind the plate, continues his personal catching duties for Mike Mussina. Righty-hitting Justin Christian starts in left field over lefty Brett Gardner against the lefty Maholm. Christian bats eighth with the entire order shifting up a spot and Derek Jeter leading off. With no DH, Jorge Posada starts at first base with Jason Giambi looming as a late-game pinch-hitting option.

For what it’s worth, the Yankees outscored the Pirates 15-12 in the first two games of this broken three-game series, with the Pirates scoring all of their runs in Game One.

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Allen Barra pens the Voice cover story this week on New York’s two new baseball Stadiums.   

 Steven Goldman+Josh Gibson+Yankee Stadium= Good Banter.

Mariano Rivera: 42.3 innings, 4 walks, 50 strikeouts, 1.06 ERA.

‘Nuff Said. 

On “Support The ‘Stache” day at Yankee Stadium, Jason Giambi got the Yankees on the board in the bottom of the first with a two-out single that plated Derek Jeter from second base. Sidney Ponson then miraculously made that run hold up for five innings by stranding six baserunners (including three in the third inning) and erasing two others via a first-inning double-play and a caught stealing by Jose Molina, which ended the fifth.

Carlos Peña led of the sixth inning by trying to bunt his way on base, but his attempt rolled foul. Three pitches later, he launched a Ponson pitch into the bleachers in right center to tie the game at 1-1.

And so it remained, through a pair of perfect innings by Jose Veras and Kyle Farnsworth. In the seventh, Melky Cabrera led off with a single and was bunted to second by Jose Molina, but J.P. Howell relieved Edwin Jackson and struck out Brett Gardner and Derek Jeter to strand Cabrera. Mariano Rivera worked around a one-out walk in the ninth. In the bottom of the ninth, DH Jorge Posada led off with a walk and was pinch-run for by Justin Christian, who was then bunted to second by Robinson Cano. After Grant Balfour came on in relief of Howell, Christian stole third base, but Howell struck out Melky and got Molina to pop out to force extra innings.

Mo was perfect in the top of the tenth, and with one out in the bottom of the inning, Jeter worked an eight-pitch walk against Balfour. Bobby Abreu then fouled off four straight fastballs from Balfour, took a slider low for a ball, and then laced another slider into the gap in right center for a game-winning double, his first walk-off hit as a Yankee.

The Yankees thus swept the first-place Rays in their short two-game series and improved to 7-5 against Tampa Bay on the season. The Yanks played loosely and confidently in this series, as evidenced by their embracing Mustache Day (Joe Girardi conducted his entire post-game interview looking like this), and by class clowns Cano and Cabrera dumping a cooler of ice water over Abreu’s head as Kim Jones was preparing to conduct an on-field interview with him after the game.

With the sweep, the Yankees have pulled up to 6.5 games behind the Rays in the AL East. The Yanks are also just a game behind the Twins and a half game behind the A’s in the Wild Card race, though they still trail the Red Sox, who beat the Twins at Fenway today, by 4.5 games.

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I have a friend at work who has been goading me to grow a mustache for a few years now but my wife won’t have any of it.  I’ve never had a mustache, only a dirty upper-lip when I’m too lazy to shave for a few days.  In fact, I knew an Italian kid in the seventh grade who had to shave more then than I do today.  My father (pictured above in the late ’80s with his old friend Wally Hill), on the other hand, always wore a mustache.  It was as much a part of him as his nose.  There are only a few occasions I can remember when he didn’t have a ‘stache, and he looked odd, not himself, without it. 

Jason Giambi looks great with a mustache.  (So awful, it’s great, as Scott Rolen said.)  The greasier and scrubbier Giambi looks, the better, as far as I’m concerned.  (From Page 2, here is David Puner’s look at the great Yankee ‘staches of all-time.) Of course, Giambo’s mustache has caught on and become a real hit.  This afternoon, the Yankees are giving away fake black mustaches to the first 20,000 fans that pass through the turnstiles.

The Bombers are going to need more than an amusing promotional gimmick to survive another start from Sir Sidney Ponson.  It would be great for the Yanks to take another game from the first-place Rays, but I’m sorry if I’m not brimming with confidence in New York’s starting pitcher.

It could be a long, hot afternoon.  Let’s hope the ‘stache power kicks in for the home team and they roll to their fourth-consecutive win. The offense needs to get the Led out.

Let’s Go Yan-Kees! 

Check out this cool bit of technology from SI.com.

I think it is high time for the Yankees and Bernie Williams to patch-up whatever hard feelings may exist between them.  The Yankees should honor one of the great modern Yankees in the House of Ruth Built before the end of the season, don’t you think?

A few weeks back, Rich Lederer ran an interesting post about the state of the newspaper business:

With subscriber rates and advertising dwindling, newspaper profits are getting squeezed due to the decreasing revenues in a high fixed-cost business. It remains to be seen whether these companies can turn things around fast enough to remain viable longer term. In the meantime, look for more consolidation, layoffs, and plant closures to reduce capital expenditures and costs. Shareholders may face possible dividend cuts if cash flow weakens to the point where it no longer can support the current payouts. I wouldn’t rule out bankruptcies or unwanted takeovers from opportunistic suitors, who most likely would finance the majority of such acquisitions with debt. Servicing high-cost bank debt and junk bonds would make it that much more difficult for the old media to survive without major changes to their business models.

If the truth be told, the newspaper behemoths were in the best position to lead, rather than lag, the growth in the online media space. Forward-thinking managements, while perhaps not entrepreneurial enough, could have beaten the Googles, Yahoos, eBays, and Monsters to the punch, ensuring not only their survival but prosperity for years and perhaps decades to come. Instead, newspapers are downsizing while changing their business models to focus on local events and become more like magazines by devoting space to features rather than old news.

An ideal companion piece can be found in the recent issue of the Columbia Jouralism Review, where Robert Weintraub writes about the decline of the big-city sports columnist:

The idea that the sports columnist may no longer be a crucial part of the nation’s best newspapers is something to be lamented. The gifted sports columnist often delivered the best writing in the entire paper (and often commanded the highest salary, as fans bought papers to read his take on the local action). Freed from the Journalism 101 tropes, the sports column was home to more emotional and livelier prose than that in, say, the local political columns. At his or her best, a [Tony] Kornheiser or a [Jackie] MacMullan weaved artistry and insights into 750 words. That blend of beauty and concision is a dying art. By contrast, there is ESPN.com’s popular Bill Simmons, who is knowledgeable and funny, but reading his sprawling pieces can consume an entire lunch hour. The Internet’s boundless newshole is a boon to information delivery, but less so to crisp, disciplined writing.

…The big-city columnist’s demise has not been entirely self-inflicted. His position as the go-to guy for both perspective and insider dope has been diminished by the democratization of information and the ability to quickly disseminate it to the public. When everyone has an opinion, and a way to broadcast it, the ability to get the news in the first place is crucial. Yet the columnist cannot get into the nitty-gritty of a local team’s games, because beat writers and obsessed bloggers tend to know much more about the squad and its doings on the playing field, as they parse every game, every dollop of information, every statistic. The columnist is also outflanked by teams themselves, who use the Internet to bypass the press and break news, and by the growing number of athletes who operate their own Web sites where fans can interact.

I wonder if we’ll ever see a fresh, young, must-read columnist, someone who knows their sports and knows how to write, in a major newspaper again.

My impression is that for much of this year and last, Andy Pettitte has pitched pretty well without particularly great stuff – he has decent control, usually, and he knows what he’s doing out there, and so I remember writing a lot of sentences that began something like, “Pettitte wasn’t sharp tonight, but…”

Well, this wasn’t one of those games. Pettitte was excellent Tuesday night, carrying the Yankees to a 5-0 win, and the fact that this outing came against the Devil Rays is no longer any sort of disclaimer. He went eight innings and allowed just four hits – two of them infield singles, another a bloop. There were some very good (by Yankee standards) plays made behind him, sure, but he was dominant, throwing not just a ton of strikes but really nasty, tricky strikes, exactly where he wanted them. Pettitte’s only remotely tough inning was the seventh, when with Rays on first and third and two outs, he induced Willy Aybar to hit a grounder towards the gap between third and short — at which point Derek Jeter made a terrific play (you heard me), ranging far to his right to snag the ball, then executing his patented twisting jump-throw to nail the runner at second and end the inning.

Pettitte was only half of a tense pitcher’s duel that lasted five innings: Scott Kazmir had very, very impressive stuff, though in the end he wasn’t all that efficient. (Even after all this time I’m reluctant to even mention the name “Scott Kazmir” because it still sends my Mets fan friends into such fits of seething rage. Every GM makes mistakes but I can’t help feeling that if I were Steve Phillips I would forgo the ESPN commentating and dedicate my life to charity and self-abnegation in a futile bid for karmic redemption). For a while there it looked like Kazmir might be gearing up for a no-hitter, he was plowing through the Yankees’ Giambi-less, Damon-less, Matsui-less lineup with such ease. But he flashed a little mortality in the third, when Robinson Cano and Jose Molina managed consecutive singles and, after two frustrating outs, Captain Intangibles himself drove both runners in with a double to right field.

The game stayed taut until the eighth, when the Yanks tacked on off of Rays relievers Gary Glover (good pitcher name, there, vastly better than teammate Grant Balfour’s) and Jason Hammel. Melky Cabrera semi-redeemed himself after some thoroughly lousy earlier ABs with a home run, and Jeter singled, then scored from first on Abreu’s double. After sliding home, Jeter stayed down for a very long second, and I thought for sure he was injured, but apparently not – he gathered himself, got up, and walked back to the dugout with no visible limp, and no one on the Yankees’ staff seemed concerned. Obviously Jeter had a very nice game overall, but in that one moment, it really looked like he was either in significant pain or just bone-tired.

Anyway, after that Mariano Rivera sat down, Edwar Ramirez stood up, Cano eventually singled in Abreu, and the Yanks took a one game lead in their season series against the Rays; they’re now 7.5 games out of first place, and still 4.5 out of the Wild Card (hey, Twins… knock it off!).

I clicked over to SNY after the game to try to get the Mets highlights, and the dudes on SportsNite were all saying that this was a “statement game” by the Yanks. Hmmm… maybe, maybe not. Isn’t it pretty to think so?

Most likely this is simply another period of transition as the 24-year-old Garza works to establish himself alongside lefty Scott Kazmir (also 24) and righty James Shields (26) to give the Rays the best trio of starters their brief existence, prospects from Longoria and Brignac to 2007 top pick and potential ace David Price continue to fight their way toward the majors, and established starters such as Upton and catcher Dioner Navarro attempt to mature on the job. The rate at which each of those things happen will determine the rate of the Rays’ improvement. Heck, by the All-Star break, this team could have Longoria and any of a handful of pitching prospects in place, Garza, Upton and company could be thriving, and the Rays could be well on their way to that 88-win projection, but given their bad luck and self-defeating maneuvers such as the demotion of Longoria, I just don’t see it happening.

While the Rays’ have made incremental improvements in their pitching and defense, their offense should break even as Carlos Peña regresses from his monster breakout season of a year ago. The result is likely something resembling a well-balanced 75-win team, which is a nice step up from a duck-and-cover 67-win team, but it’s not about to change the complexion of the division. At least not this season. –Cliff Corcoran, April 4, 2008

Uhm . . . oops.

To be fair a lot of those “things” that I said needed to happen for the Rays to become a winning team have happened. Longoria was called up and installed at third base just a week after I wrote the above and has since emerged as the second-best third baseman in the American League behind Alex Rodriguez by hitting .283/.354/.535 while playing fantastic defense. Longoria, who has hit .331/.397/.653 since June 1, is probably the most deserving of the Final Vote candidates for the final spot on the AL All-Star roster. Dioner Navarro, who is hitting .317/.371/.436, is already on the All-Star roster and has been the second best catcher in the league in the first half. B.J. Upton has lost a lot of the power he showed last year, but has made up for it with an tremendous improvement in his approach at the plate as evidenced by the drop in his K/BB ratio from 2.37 in 2007 to 1.21 and his .391 on-base percentage against a .277 average. Garza overcame some early-season elbow trouble and has posted a 3.02 ERA in his last 14 starts. Reid Brignac and pitching prospect Mitch Talbot have had tastes of the major leagues already this year.

Everything has gone according to the Rays’ plan in the first half. They have the best defensive efficiency in baseball. That has lifted their pitching from last in the league to third, with both Garza and lefty ace Scott Kazmir, who starts against Andy Pettitte tonight, benefiting greatly on balls in play with BABIPs in the low .260s. Former Dodgers prospect Edwin Jackson, still just 24 year old, has gotten a lift as well with a .281 BABIP and a league-average major league ERA which is more than a run better than his career mark. Rounded out by Andy Sonnanstine, who has a 3.15 ERA in his last seven starts, the Rays have a solid five-man rotation of which the 26-year-old James Shields is the oldest member. More good pitching out of the bullpen and a surprisingly strong offense led by the rookie Longoria, a career year from four-corner utility man Eric Hinske (.264/.349/.524), and the robust on-base percentages of Upton and Navarro, have put the Rays in a position from which they could post a .446 winning percentage the rest of the way and still fulfill PECOTA’s bold 88-win projection.

Odds are they’ll do better than that. Despite all of the above going their way, the Rays have still suffered from repeated injuries to closer Troy Percival and DH Cliff Floyd. Garza and Kazmir have both lost time to injury as well, and Rocco Baldelli hasn’t played above A-ball all year. What’s more, shortstop Jason Bartlett, who came over in the deal for Garza, was supposed to be the anchor of their improved defense, but has been a disappointment in the field and an embarrassment at the plate (.204/.268/.358, only slightly better than Jose Molina). Bartlett is on the DL with a knee sprain right now, opening the door to an improvement at his position as prospect Reid Brignac battles Ben Zobrist for playing time at shortstop. In addition to the upgrade at Bartlett’s spot, the Rays should be able to expect more pop from Upton and more than the league-average production they’ve received from Carl Crawford in the first half.

Good health and those slight improvements on offense could offset some of the expected regressions elsewhere. With 74 games left to play, if the Rays merely played that the level the Yankees have in the first half (.528 winning percentage entering tonight’s game) they would win 94 games, a total that could put them in the postseason, as it did for the Yankees a year ago.

Given all of that, the Yankees have done well to split their first ten games against the Rays this season. However, four of those five wins came in April. In their last meeting in mid-May, the Rays took three of four from the Bombers at the Trop. Coming into this week’s brief two-game set in the Bronx, the Rays are red-hot having won 11 of their last 13 including a three-game sweep of the Red Sox.

The good news is that Kazmir has cooled off after a stretch of six starts in May, including one against the Yankees, in which he allowed four runs in 41 innings. Since then, Kazmir has posted a 4.67 ERA and turned in just one quality start in five tries, that coming back on June 11. Kazmir still isn’t giving up very many hits, but the ones he is giving up are traveling, as he’s allowed a .471 slugging percentage over those five starts with nearly half of his hits allowed going for extra bases. He’s also getting wild again, walking 5 men per nine innings over those last five starts. Over the same stretch, Andy Pettitte was dominant for four starts (4-0, 1.00 ERA) before his ugly outing against the Red Sox on Thursday.

Despite yesterday’s off-day, Jose Molina will make his third-straight start behind the plate tonight with Jason Giambi getting a day off against the lefty Kazmir. Jorge Posada will DH with Wilson Betemit at first base. Those two are hitting fifth and sixth in the order ahead of Robinson Cano despite the fact that Cano is hitting .396/.400/.625 over his last dozen games (note the complete lack of walks, those extra OBP points are from a HBP).

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How do you spell C-O-O-L?

How about this bit of tastiness for your ears? Ideal for keeping it low and slow on another hot day in the Big Apple.

Scott Kazmir and the Rays are ready to rumble in the Bronx. According to Bart O’Connell in the Tampa Trib:

“It’s going to be different. I think the fans are going to be a little more on us, compared to the past,” Kazmir said. “It might be kind of mixed a little bit, because we’ve been beating the Red Sox and they like that, but coming into their park, I don’t think they’re going to be too happy to see us and we’re ahead of them. There’s going to be a lot of tension in there.”

Kazmir does not see this series alone as an opportunity to knock the Yankees out of postseason contention, a possibility some have suggested.

“No, no, no. Nothing like that. We still have a whole half of the season to go, so it couldn’t just be on one game, one inning,” he said. “But if we put the pressure on them these next couple games, and end up finishing strong in the first half, I think it’ll put us in a good situation.”

In the New York Post, Brian Costello has this from Cliff Floyd:

“It used to be going to play the Yankees was a big deal. It’s not a big deal. We’re just going to play baseball. We put ourselves in a position where there’s no pressure.”

Also, from the Tampa Trib:

“Sometimes you could beat them on mistakes, and they don’t make mistakes any more,” [Jason] Giambi said.

…”When you get veterans from other teams saying those kinds of things, that, to me, means as much as anything,” Maddon said after reading Giambi’s words of praise. “I think peer acceptance, peer validation, is the strongest or the one that resonates the loudest. For me, that does mean something and it does matter and we as an organization appreciate those comments.”

Could be a fun two-game series. Sure is a hot one out there…

I used to litter causually, without giving it much thought.  I’d think nothing of stuffing a newspaper between my legs, under my seat on the train when I was finished with it.  Or I’d toss a gum wrapper on the ground. 

Then one day about ten years ago, I was walking down the street with my friend Joey La P and I tossed something on the ground without thinking.  Joey got all over me.  "How about a little respect, bro?"  He didn’t humiliate me, but didn’t let it slide either.  Since that day, I’ve been aware about littering (not that I didn’t know it was a lousy thing to do before that).  So much so that now I’m like one of those reformed smokers, vigilant, judgemental.  I give people the evil eye when I see them blatantly throw their crap on the floor, although I am careful exactly who I stare at and for how long. 

But I’ve become a righteous prig.  What can you do?  Mostly, if I’m really bothered, I just walk over and pick up whatever has just been dumped and, without saying a word, or even looking at the offender, place it in a garbage can myself.  If I’m with a friend, I give them the ol’ Joey La P treatment.  "Yo, how about a little respect?"

Here’s the routine…

Fans have a few days to select the final player for the AL and NL All Star squads.  Our own Jason Giambi is on the AL ballot and is a fine cherce, although I don’t know that I’d vote for him over Jermaine Dye or that kid playing third for the Rays.

Last week, as the voting drew to a close, I posted my preferred All-Star rosters for this year’s mid-summer classic at Yankee Stadium. Yesterday, the actual rosters were announced. My preferences are hardly the final word on the subject, but I thought that by comparing the two we might be able to glean some insight into the current selection process.

American League

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A few months ago I invited myself to Ray Robinson’s apartment, ostensibly to get his list of ten essential baseball books, but really so I could lay eyes on his library of sports books.  Robinson, an author (Iron Horse) and longtime magazine editor, grew up on the Upper West Side, near Columbia.  When he was a kid, Robinson got a delivery job at a local liquor store, and he found himself making stops over at Babe Ruth’s apartment at 110 Riverside Drive. He’d say, ‘Thanks keed,'” Ray told me.  “He called everybody ‘keeed,’ because he couldn’t remember anyone’s name.  And he would invariably honor me with a couple of dollar bills.”

Ray and his wife, Phyliss were wonderful with me.  We chatted in the living room of their comfortable New York apartment for about an hour and Ray shared his selections of favorite baseball books with me.  I poked my nose through his collection and as I was about to leave, Ray said, “Oh, would you like to see my scrapbooks?”

“Sure, I would.”

Ray picked-up a bright orange plastic bag from the bottom of the bookshelf, the kind you’d get from the local Chinese take out.  He pulled out two weathered books, practically falling apart, one dated 1932, the other, 1933.  They were filled with pictures of players from every team in baseball.  Ray cut-out images mostly from The New York Sun, The Saturday Evening Post, assorted baseball magazines as well as baseball cards.  Then, along with some friends, he’d scout the hotel lobbies where the out-of-town teams stayed, to get autographs.

The books are lovingly, obsessively assembled, filled with small notations.  Ray expressed some embarrassment when I complemented him on how wonderful, how personal the books are. He dismissed his sketch of the Babe as being awful, but I liked it and his wife did too.

Ray asked if he should sell the books–after all, he’s got a couple of Lefty Groves in there, a Honus Wagner, Dizzy Dean.  Phyliss said that she didn’t think that was a good idea. I quickly agreed.

“You can’t sell these,” I said.  “They belong in a museum or for your grandkids.”

As I looked carefully through the two books, Ray kept wondering if he should sell them.  I said, “No way,” but when I left I felt foolish.  Who am I to say that he shouldn’t sell them?  There is probably some serious money in those two books.  Still, they feel too personal to part with.  They are not kept under a glass case, they are in a plastic bag on the shelf, a secret baseball treasure on the Upper East Side.

Yesterday, the New York Times featured a short essay by Ray Robinson about his scrapbooks.

Check it out and dig what I was able to see:

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