Daily Archives: September 15, 2008

Alfredo Aceves matched Mark Buehrle for six innings last night. Xavier Nady put the Yankees on top with a two run jack to dead center in the second. Aceves uncharacteristically started the fourth by walking leadoff hitter Orlando Cabrera, his only walk of the night, then was made to pay for it when Dewayne Wise turned on an inside cutter and kept it fair into the left field box seats to tie the game. Otherwise, both pitchers kept the game moving (official time: 2:39) and the opposition at bay.

Aceves was inexplicably pulled after just 87 pitches (69 percent strikes and just two three-pitch counts), but Phil Coke worked a 1-2-3 seventh to set up the Yankees breakthrough after the stretch. With Buehrle out after 101 pitches, Xavier Nady led of the bottom of the seventh by coming back from 0-2 to work a walk off sidearming righty Erin Wasserman. Cody Ransom, starting at second base for the still-benched Robinson Cano, then bunted Nady to second, and Joe Girardi sent Wilson Betemit in to pinch-hit for Chad Moeller. Ozzie Guillen called on Horatio Ramirez to turn Betemit around to the right side. Betemit took ball one from Ramirez, fouled a fastball straight back, swung through another, fouled an outside pitch down the right field line, took ball two, then laced ground-rule double over the wall in the left-center field gap to plate Nady with the go-ahead run. Brett Gardner followed with deep fly that moved Betemit to third, and Johnny Damon drove Wilson in with a single through the right side.

Girardi handed that 4-2 lead to Joba Chamberlain, who pitched around an infield single in the eighth striking out two, and Mariano Rivera, who passed Lee Smith for second on the all-time saves list with a 1-2-3 ninth. Rivera’s reaction to passing Smith: “S’arright.” Pete Abe says, “The closer is furious the team isn’t going to the playoffs. Furious.”

As with Aceves’ first start, it was a nice, quick, clean Yankee win. It also moved the Yankees into a tie for third place with the Blue Jays, for what it matters. Elsewhere, the Red Sox pulled into a technical tie for first place by stomping the Rays 13-5, though Tampa Bay still holds a one-game lead in the loss column.

The Yankees haven’t seen the White Sox since late April, when the Yankees took two of three from the Pale Hose in Chicago. Surprisingly little has changed for the Sox since then. The White Sox had a slim 2.5 game lead in the AL Central when the Yankees left the Windy City on April 24, and arrive in the Bronx tonight holding an even smaller 1.5 lead over the Minnesota Twins. The Sox briefly slipped down to third place in early May (though they were never more than 2.5 games out of first), but otherwise have been battling the Twins for the division lead all season long. The two teams haven’t been more than three games apart since June 19, when the Sox had a four-game lead, and the White Sox haven’t been more than a game behind since May 15.

A year ago, the White Sox stumbled to a surprising fourth-place finish with a mere 72 wins due largely to the impotence of their offense, which fell from third-best in the AL in 2006 (5.36 runs per game) to dead last in the league (4.28 R/G). It should come as no surprise, then, that the Sox’s resurgence this year has been led by their resurgent offense, which has scored 5.05 runs per game, the fifth-best rate in the league.

Leading that charge, and thus throwing his had into the ring for league MVP, has been Carlos Quentin, who was acquired in the offseason from the Diamondbacks in exchange for minor league first-baseman Chris Carter, who was subsequently flipped to Oakland in the Dan Haren deal. Slotted in as the D’backs’ starting right fielder last year, Quentin suffered through an injury-plagued season and struggled mightily in his major league stints, but crushed the ball when rehabbing in the minors. A career .313/.413/.527 hitter in the minor leagues, the 25-year-old Stanford product won the Chisox left field job out of camp this year and proceeded to set the junior circuit on fire with .288/.394/.571 rates and the league lead in home runs.

Unfortunately, the fragile Quentin broke his right wrist when punching his bat during an at-bat on September 1 and is out for the season. Similarly, first baseman Paul Konerko is out indefinitely after spraining a ligament in his right knee during a run-down on September 9. Konerko suffered a decline last year that was part of the offense’s problem and has continued that decline this year. Still, his injury moves Nick Swisher to first base, creating a hole in the lineup filled by minor league veteran Dewayne Wise. The 30-year-old Wise has hit well for the Sox this year, but he’s a career .220/.256/.389 hitter in the major leagues even with his solid 91 plate appearances as a White Sock mixed in. Quentin’s injury makes room for deadline acquisition Ken Griffey Jr. to play full time despite his having hit just .245/.330/.347 since returning to the AL.

That all leaves the Chicago offense in the hands of the resurgent Jermaine Dye. Dye was the World Series MVP when the Sox won in 2005 and an MVP candidate in 2006 (.315/.385/.622), but last year he was one of the main reasons that the offense collapsed as he was barely above league average, and was far worse for most of the season prior to a hot August. This year he’s back to bashing (.295/.348/.555), but with Quentin out, the only other man in the lineup who’s meaningfully above average is 37-year-old Jim Thome, who has been healthier this year than last, but less productive on a game-to-game basis.

The Sox’s postseason hopes are further imperiled by the season-ending Achilles’ tendon rupture suffered by Jose Contreras, which has handed the fifth-starter’s job to rookie Clayton Richard, who has a 7.09 ERA in seven major league starts.

Still, this year the Central has been one of those divisions that no one seems to want to win. The Indians came within a game of the World Series last year, but never got off the mat this year and cashed out early by flipping C.C. Sabathia to the Brewers three weeks before the deadline. The Tigers were the preseason favorites, but have traced a parabolic path this season, starting out poorly, looking unbeatable in June, and since falling back below even the Indians. The Twins have been in the fight all season but took an inexplicably long time to bring Francisco Liriano back up from the minors (he’s gone 5-0 with a 1.57 ERA since returning). In fact, that could have been the difference in the division had Quentin not gotten hurt. Now things are back in flux, and the White Sox will arrive tonight desperate to keep their noses out in front.

They send reliable lefty Mark Buehrle to the mound tonight. Buehrle has made 30 starts in each of his eight full seasons in the major leagues and could pass 200 innings for the eighth-straight season with a strong outing tonight. Buehrle had a rough August (5.86 ERA), but has allowed just one run in 13 1/3 innings in September. He’ll face off against Alfredo Aceves, who aced the Angels in his first major league start his last time out and will make his first start in the Bronx tonight.

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Translated for audiences of all ages and backgrounds. This is good for a quick chuckle.

By Repoz

Michael Burke: “That Irish Son of a Bitch” *

Alistair Mundy’s ascot, that’s what it was…Alistair Mundy’s dandy ascot. After all these years I’ve finally been able to pinpoint former Yankee president/owner Michael Burke’s rediculi éclat de mode sense. (Then again it might have been that unfashionable Old Spice/turtlewreck sweater connection of his, so who knows!)

Now, while this discovery might not be as nootropic-poppin’ as finding out that multi-flasking Clu Gulager was in the 60’s kookifried outré folk group Miriam or that Ron Asheton of the Stooges was seriously tight with origi-Stooge, Larry Fine, and traded zany hair-pulling sound effects at the Elisha Cooked Actor’s Home in L.A. with him (Asheton, I believe, was moonlighting at the time for the prestigious National Eye-Goink Monthly)…but it’ll do.

Years before beers started pouring like spit in a schoolyard, before a gangplank of stringy flesh had been constructed between Jonah Hex’s crevisious lips, before the sweet ravages of gutter-twang swept me off my cleats…there was Michael Burke. Punk hero.

Imagine, a Yankee team president hanging with us lowcon lowlifes. His dappy loafers sticking to the same gum globs, that were probably expungiated by a lifetime of Terrence Aloysius Mahoney vs Glimpy McClusky (unknowingly the model for the spiffy George Sherrill Flat Brim Society line of baseball caps yet to come!) chaw wars, as ours. Johnny Ramone was supposedly part of our roving Stadium gang of roar. Isn’t it odd, some sorta mystical pissmit, that with the 1974 closing of Yankee Stadium and their grubby unrestrooms, Johnny’s trained whiffology led him to the aroma shocktherapy of the CBGB’s bathroom by that September? (Hey, let’s just be happy he didn’t end up spoog-a-loo trough riffing at the notorious Zipper Lips Au-Go-Go Lounge in Jersey!).

But Mr. Burke, quite possibly (I haven’t finished researching Paul Krassner’s Realist site or Taylor Meade’s unreal sight, for that matter, yet) was the only former OSS intelligence officer, CIA agent, Hollywood cutting floor movie star, head of Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus, and CBS executive to speak out against the Vietnam War…which he did, when he read the names of war dead from the pulpit at NYC’s Trinity Church. For someone of Burke’s stature to take such a radical stand at the time, happened about as often as a fire in the Everglades, a moonlanding on the sun, or Charlie Chocks and Zestabs having a subhuman tug-o-war over the magical abra-cadaver pitchman services of Ray Oyler.

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The Yankees beat the Rays 8-4 yesterday at the Stadium and won the season series against Tamps, 11-7. Carl Pavano left the game early with a hip injury and Robinson Cano was yanked in the middle of the game for not hustling after a ball. The Red Sox were in the unlikely position to be rooting for the Yanks this weekend, and both teams helped each other out: the Sox trail the Rays by just one game and the Yankees edge closer to the Blue Jays, who are currently in third place.

Mariano Rivera faced one batter, struck him out, and tied Lee Smith for second-place on the all-times save list with 478.

Alex Rodriguez hit a first-inning grand slam, the 17th of his career. He also had a bloop double in the eighth, his 33rd of the season, his best mark in pinstripes. Rodriguez scored his 101st run and knocked in his 100th RBI. He’s scored 100 or more runs for 13 straight years and has driven in 100 or more runs in 11 consecutive seasons. How about this for consistency: Rodriguez has 1602 runs scored in his career, 1603 RBI.

Jason Giambi hit his 30th homer of the year. In five of his seven years as a Yankee, Giambi has hit 30 or more dingers.

As you may have heard, Derek Jeter passed Lou Gehrig’s mark for hits at Yankee Stadium. Jeter had a wondeful weekend, smacking three hits in each game. He saved the best for yesterday, adding a home run to the bleachers in right-center field. With the season fading away, it’s no surprise that the announcing crew on YES made a big deal about Jeter catching the Iron Horse. That’s understanable and I can appreciate it, even if it was much at times. However, one thing they didn’t provide us is context. I would like to know, for instance, how many games and at bats it took Gehrig to reach the mark and compare that with Jeter’s figures. Moreover, I’d like to see how many home runs and doubles figure into the mix as well. It’s no knock on Jeter if he’s not nearly the hitter Gehrig was, Jeter is a great player and a future Hall of Famer. Still, I would have liked to see more context.

Let’s face it, the Yankee announcers, some newspapermen, and a lot of fans are not rational when it comes to all things Jeter. Again, I find it annoying at times, but I get it. And I do love Jeter too. But he doesn’t need to be puffed up constantly. When Jeter hit into a sharp 5-4-3 double play in his final at bat yesterday, Paul O’Neill mentioned that Jeter never hits into double plays. Well, actually, that was the 23rd double play Jeter hit into this season, a career-high (beating his previous career high of 21, set last year).

Oh, and one last number. The Yanks “tragic” number. It’s down to 5.