My uncle once told me a story about a great uncle who was famous for teasing and talking to children as if they were adults. My uncle was three or four and he was in the bathtub one evening and the great uncle happened to be there, I don’t remember why. The older man shook is finger at the boy and said, “You’re All Wet!” And my uncle started to cry.
The Yankees are all wet and we’re doing a lot of crying right about now. They lost again to the Red Sox and are seemingly finding new and painful ways to do it. This time it was 4-3, a real kick in the groin. The Yanks held a 3-1 lead going into the bottom of the eighth–Alex Rodriguez’s two-run double broke up a 1-1 tie moments earlier–when CC Sabathia ran out of gas (a shame, as he pitched a terrific game). The Sox scratched together three runs in a heavy rain and the Yanks were lucky it was just three. But with Jonathan Paplebon closing, the one-run lead was more than enough. Mark Teixeira lined out hard to end it.
This one was painful but not entirely surprising. It is so bad right now that it’s almost comic, especially with the Yanks playing well against the rest of the league. The Sox own them right now and that’s all there is to it. The Yanks aren’t helping themselves either. Nick Swisher made an bad fielding error last night and had a couple of inexcusable base runner mistakes tonight.
We’ll see how long this holds up. (Are the likes of Brad Penny going to come up onions is against them indefinetly?) David Ortiz can’t hit anymore but he handles the Yankees? I never felt confident about the Yankees beating the Sox over and again in the late Nineties because I thought the law of averages had to catch up eventually. Sure enough, they did. Well, this isn’t going to hold up either. It just won’t. The Sox are good but they aren’t that much better than the Bombers.
The Yanks will have their moment against the Sox once again. But they are going to have to wait for a minute before they get the chance; they don’t play again until August. Meanwhile, they’ll lick their wounds and return to the Bronx to face the Mets, who lost two painful games to the Phillies the past couple of nights.
This one smarts, but they get to start fresh tomorrow. The pain doesn’t have to last long. Thank goodness they do this everyday.
Met the friends out for some beers tonight to catch the game. Left in the 8th, up 3-1. Got home at 4-3. The dreaded "C" word keeps creeping into my head. C'mon. Win one already.
While they do play games every day, they don't play Boston every day. Coming into this series, the Yankees hadn't beaten Boston. Exiting this series, I think it's more accurate to say the Yankees can't beat Boston...not because they are better, but just because.
It's really hard to look past this 0-8 because no matter how well they play from this point forward, their ultimate goal will likely take them through Boston, and that seems like a dead end for this team.
if we happen to go 0-18 vs. Boston in the regular season and still meet them in the ALCS... as long as we're the first to 4 wins in that series, i'll be cool...
I miss the days when Boston could beat up on us in May and Sox fans would taunt me and I'd issue a two-word response with the haughty nonchalence of one swatting away a mosquito, "It's May." and the Sox fan would be forced to concede timidly, "You're right."
Oh well, to everything there is a season, I suppose.
[4] hey man, i'm on the way back to the studio. i've gotta put in at least a solid hour of prak. i'm afraid i'm not in a bashing, double bass mood. sorry, bro! i think i'm gonna start with a little linear funk and finish with some odd-meter jazz.
i'll have to get your aggression out at another practice session! ; )
Exiting this series, I think it’s more accurate to say the Yankees can’t beat Boston…not because they are better, but just because.
Better starting pitching? Check.
Better bullpen? Check.
Better clutch hitting? Check.
Nah, that they're not better. Hank just needs to bust out the Patton quotes then everything will be better.
[5] Heh heh! Have a great session, friend. Music is life.
The scary thing is, I just thought, well, it can't get any worse. Then I thought - maybe it can. The mind reels.
[6] I think the point is that the Red Sox are better, but that's not entirely why the Yankees have been incapable of beating them. After all, the Red Sox have lost to other inferior teams, teams worse than the Yankees
[6] The Red Sox have had better starters, and better bullpens and better "clutch hitting" than the Yanks before, but to my knowledge they've never ran out to an 8-0 series lead.
Sox have a better pen top-to-bottom, absolutely.
Rotation I think is debatable, you can make an excellent case for Boston but you can make a pretty good case for the Yanks too. Not saying Boston isn't better, but its at least debatable.
as far as "clutch hitting", you might as well throw "grit" and "heart" into the equation too
Feh. Meh. I got nothing. But I'm not gonna panic. It's not even the ASB yet.
The Red Sox have beaten the Yankees in almost every conceivable way and they've beaten them eight straight. When the Red Sox need to make a play, pitching, hitting, or in the field, they make it. When the Yankees need to, they don't. 3 for 23 with RISP - or whatever the number is - signifies an extended choke job.
The players can front all they want with their "just another game" talk, but the fact is they hadn't lost even two in a row for over a month, then lose three straight to their primary division rival, going from one game ahead in first place to two games out. If the Yankees did this to the Red Sox everybody would be celebrating.
Man has the tide turned along with my stomach. I was at the game Tuesday and just sat there like I'd been gob smacked. Stats aside, the Sox are where they were a century ago: better team, better organization and better swagger. My hope is that we can turn the world right side up sooner than later.
Sorry for the poor prose.
If the Yankees did this to the Red Sox everybody would be celebrating.
Considering that I didn't when they did (most notably during Massacre II), I'd say not everybody :)
[15] Fine; most people, then. The vast majority except for a few weirdos ; )
[15] Well I'd be celebrating . . . but consider this: Take away those 8 wins and the Sawx are only 4 games over .500. How much better are they, really?
If the yanks feel half as bad as I feel right now, I don't know how they show up to play today.
this is like hero to zero. In 3 days they managed to swipe away the nice memories of the mid-May and early June team. those exciting come-back games seem like 4 years ago...
Hey Dwight, move over I'll join you in your car "everybody hurts"!
[17] I don't know. Better enough to reel off eight wins and no losses.
Wait a second, take away their eight straight wins against the next best team in the league? That makes no sense.
We make a lot of lip service toward statistical significance, but then when a statistically insignificant (so far) data series appears, it gets a lot of reaction.
The Yankees total record has some validity right now. Fortunately, the 8 losses, even if they were back to back (can you imagine how bad that would make you feel?) still would be at the very edge of marginal significance. A sample size of 8 tells you very little about what will happen the 9th time, and that's without considering all the variables that go into a W or an L.
It makes my belly churn and my head spin to lose to the Sox, but I couldn't be happier with where the team is generally given how April and its injuries were looking. In fact, I don't think anyone on this blog thought the season would be going this well at this point.
Let's celebrate what we know and disregard what we don't (even if what we don't know looks bad).
[20] LOL, god bless your little heart.
So Girardi says Melky bunted of his own accord in the second game, late. Girardi needs to communicate more clearly with his young players, I guess.