Daily Archives: October 10, 2008

The only uniform number the Tampa Bay Devil Rays have retired is Wade Boggs’ 12. Boggs’ 26, meanwhile, remains unretired (though also unused) in Boston. Here are a few other sartorial notes about this year’s LCS participants:

Nine major league clubs featured pinstripes on their home uniforms this year, but after the Yankees, whose use of the pinstripes dates back to 1915, the Phillies are the major league team with the longest uninterrupted use of pinstripes on their home uniform. The Phillies adopted the original version of their current home duds in 1950, the year the Whiz Kids got swept by the Yankees in the World Series. They had one major redesign that stretched from 1970 to 1991, but still featured pinstripes at home, then switched back to an updated version of the Wiz Kids uniform. The alternate home unis which the Phils wore in Game 1 of the NLDS are a variation on the the home duds they wore from 1946 to 1949.

Similarly, the Red Sox and Dodgers have been models of sartorial consistency. The design of the Red Sox’s home uniforms dates back to 1933 and, save for some variations striping and piping, the only significant change it has experienced since then was a six-year flirtation with pullover v-necks in the ’70s. As for the Dodgers, save for the addition, removal, and restoration of names on the back and the swapping out of the “B” on their caps for an interlocking “LA,” their home uniforms have remained unchanged since they introduced the red number on the front in 1952, while the distinctive Dodgers script dates back to 1938. Also, their current road uniforms are a variation on the road flannels they wore for their first 13 years in Los Angeles.

The Rays, of course, have brand new uniforms this year along with a brand new color scheme and their sort-of-new name. I think they could beat the Sox in six in the ALCS that starts tonight, but it’s more likely that the series will go to a seventh game, which means the Sox will win because they’ll have Jon Lester on the mound for Game 7. My preview of today’s games is up on SI.com

By Kat O’Brien

Unlike many of you, my first experience at Yankee Stadium was recent. I grew up in the Midwest, never came to New York until 1999, and didn’t get the chance to go to a game at Yankee Stadium until the 2004 playoffs. Yes, those playoffs that Yankee fans would love to forget and fervently wished had never happened and had never let the Red Sox get back in the World Series.

Because my in-person experiences at Yankee Stadium are all within the past five years, what stands out most are the larger-than-life events that have been held there. To me, that’s the way it should be, since Yankee Stadium has held big events since its inception. Along with playing host to so many World Series games, people remember great boxing matches held there by the likes of Muhammad Ali and Joe Louis; Notre Dame’s “Win for the Gipper” over Army; and several Papal visits. Mostly, though, it’s all about baseball.

I remember in 2001, watching on TV as baseball resumed at Yankee Stadium after 9/11. I remember vividly the attempted return to normalcy amid tremendous emotion. I was not yet covering baseball, so I could root for teams. I had never been a Yankees fan, had followed the Cardinals growing up, but I wanted the Yankees to win the World Series that year. That sentiment isn’t unique in any way, but I felt like maybe something good could happen there to make New Yorkers smile after tragedy.

Then I remember the playoffs and the in-season series against the Red Sox, which always feel like postseason games. I covered that American League Division Series in which the Yankees beat the Twins (Alex Rodriguez’s first playoff series in pinstripes) and the American League Championship Series where the Red Sox broke the Yankees’ hearts. The crowds were so into those games that it was a huge thrill just to be in attendance – even when some of the games ended so late that deadlines were a mess.

And finally, I remember the All-Star Game this year. The Yankees did a tremendous job of bringing back greats from the past few decades of All-Star Games. And the spectacle was a perfect sendoff for the Stadium, a celebration of all the great baseball that has been played at Yankee Stadium for so many years. Having the Yankees’ own World Series greats, from Yogi Berra to Reggie Jackson to Derek Jeter to Mariano Rivera; there made it oh-so-memorable. I believe most of us thought, even at midseason, that there would eventually be a sendoff in the playoffs. That wasn’t to be, but I’m sure Yankees fans will always remember the All-Star Game as an emblem of the greatness that has been Yankee Stadium over the years.

I enjoyed my last few trips to the Stadium, peeking in as the 4 train rolled up to the 161st Street Subway. To me, seeing the Stadium before it’s open to fans always feels like you’re stealing a glimpse.

Kat O’Brien is the Yankee beat writer for Newsday.

The Yankees finished 2008 with an 89-73 record and missed the playoffs for the first time since 1993, leading many to wonder what went wrong. There was a sense of uncertainty surrounding this team going back to last November and December, when amid the fallout of another ALDS loss, the managerial situation, specifically how the team handled Joe Torre’s contract, mushroomed to a PR disaster. Anyone stepping into that mess, whether it was Joe Girardi, Don Mattingly, Larry Bowa, would have felt squeezed. Throw in the A-Rod contract situation and the World Series drama with Scott Boras, Andy Pettitte’s vacillating between retiring and returning before signing the $16 million deal and being named in the Mitchell Report and Hank Steinbrenner’s impersonation of his father, and it was an offseason to forget.

On the field, the Yankees did what they’ve done each of the last four years: dug themselves a big hole with a slow start. While they valiantly tried to extricate themselves, they just did not have the horses to climb over a handful of teams to play October baseball in Yankee Stadium II’s curtain call. In short, as a team, the Yankees were incomplete. There were some debilitating injuries — losing Jorge Posada and Chien-Ming Wang for the last 3 ½ months were crushers, to be sure. But overall, the maladies that plagued the Yankees for the better part of the last three or four seasons caught up with them. Age, poor situational hitting, and erratic pitching and defense were recurring ills. During down times, those holes were gaping. Alex Rodriguez, despite the six-week absence in April and May, could not and did not carry the offense as he did a year ago. With 32 HR, 103 RBI and 104 runs scored, he had a down year — for him. According to Baseball Prospectus, A-Rod posted below league-average numbers in RBI situations (he drove in 15.1% of runners during RBI situations overall, and a conversion rate of just 33.7% with runners on third), and in at-bats where the double play was in effect, his 15.3 GIDP percentage was the fourth-highest among MLB third basemen.

A-Rod wasn’t the only one under fire Robinson Cano got the big contract and regressed. Melky Cabrera proved what scouts have said for the better part of two years — he’s a fourth outfielder at best. Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy, the two supposed stalwarts of the Yankees’ future starting rotation, bombed. The bullpen was a mess. Even Mariano Rivera was not immune to the scrutiny: his numbers in save situations.

And unlike the Red Sox, who were able to infuse their lineup with youngsters like Jed Lowrie, who has made Julio Lugo expendable, the Yankees had little in the minors to fill the holes.

How did the numerous media outlets treat the Yankees? Relentlessly until they figured out that the Yankees would miss the playoffs and they were a non-story.

As usual, all the action around the Bronx made for interesting reading and viewing, which brings us to the 2008 Yankee Pankies, which cover the good, the bad, and the ugly of the Yankees’ on-field play and the media’s coverage of it.

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You might find this shocking, but Joe Torre’s big brother doesn’t exactly think the world of Hank Steinbrenner.  Go figure that.