Monthly Archives: July 2009

The Twins in a nutshell: average offense, average rotation, excellent defense and bullpen.

The offense is three-tiered, with the MVP-quality performances of Joe Mauer (.389/.465/.648) and Justin Morneau (.323/.399/.601, 21 homers, 69 RBIs) on top, the similarly alliterative Jason Kubel, Michael Cuddyer, Joe Crede, and, uhm, Denard Span at or above league average in the middle, and the punchless skill positions of shortstop, second base, and center field (currently occupied by Brendan Harris, Nick Punto, and Carlos Gomez, respectively) dragging things down from below.

The manner in which the Twins are punting offense at those three skill positions is a throwback to the days when teams couldn’t really expect to get much production from their middle infielders, which is to say, it’s outdated and inappropriate to competing in the DH league in 2009. The Twins are at least getting elite defense from Gomez in center and Punto at second base, but Harris is a complete dud on both sides of the ball, which underlines just how poorly Alexi Casilla (.180/.242/.225 and since demoted to the minors) and Matt Tolbert (.184/.275/.232 and benched) had to perform in order for Harris to make his way back into the lineup.

The presence of Harris in the lineup while Delmon Young rides pine behind Cuddyer, Kubel, Span, and Gomez underlines just how much the Matt Garza trade has blown up in the Twins’ faces. Young has now hit .285/.326/.392 in 204 games as a Twin and is well south of that overall mark this season. Meanwhile, Rays shortstop Jason Bartlett is headed to the All-Star Game on the strength of two and a half flukey months of hot hitting. Bartlett’s bat will come back to earth, but his glove will continue to outshine Harris’s. Meanwhile, Matt Garza helped the Rays reach the World Series last year as the ALCS MVP.

The Twins aren’t hurting for starting pitching. Their rotation of Scott Baker, Kevin Slowey, Nick Blackburn, Francisco Liriano, and Glen Perkins is comprised entirely of home grown pitchers 27-years-old or younger and includes two lefties (Liriano and Perkins). They have so much home-grown pitching that even their injury replacements come from the farm, as is the case with 23-year-old Anthony Swarzak, who will start for the injured Slowey on Thursday. Still, Garza was likely the best of their bunch given Liriano’s disappointing post-Tommy John performance, and while they tried to deal from that strength to correct a weakness, all they managed to do was create an additional weakness at shortstop. Young is just 23, leaving open the possibility of significant improvement, but he’s heading in the wrong direction for the Twins to hope for a way to salvage that trade.

The Johan Santana trade isn’t looking much better, though that comes as less of a surprise given the lack of bargaining power the Twins had and their rejection of superior offers from the Yankees and Red Sox. Like Young, Gomez is just 23, but he’s never shown any ability to hit in the majors. Most agreed that the Mets rushed him in 2007 due to injury-created need and that the Twins needed to give him more development time in the minors, but Gomez hasn’t spent a day in the minors since joining the organization. He might be the best defensive center fielder in baseball, but that doesn’t make up for his .250/.293/.353 line in 225 games as a Twin.

As for the three minor league right-handers included in that deal, Phil Humber was designated for assignment earlier this year, Kevin Mulvey has been solid but ordinary as a 24-year-old righty in Triple-A this year (4.17 ERA) and is trapped behind the aforementioned home grown starters, and Deolis Guerra has yet to impress in his third full-season in the Florida State League (though he is just 20).

The Yankees swept the Twins in a memorable four-game series in the Bronx in mid-May. The first three wins were all walkoffs, two of them coming in extra-innings. The difference in the entire series was five runs. Since then, the Twins have dropped two of the losing pitchers, letting the A’s claim lefty Craig Breslow off waivers and demoting Jesse Crain to Triple-A. You can bet the Twins remember that series all too well and will come out with some extra fire for this week’s three-game set in the Homer Dome.

Things kick off tonight with a battle of aces. Scott Baker doesn’t lead the twins in any major pitching category, but his 1.41 WHIP and 4.11 K/9 add up to make the 27-year-old righty their best starter despite his 4.99 ERA and .500 record. Indeed, Baker fell one inning short of his sixth-straight quality start in his last outing, but still held the Royals to one run over five inefficient frames. Over those last six starts, Baker is 4-0 with a 3.20 ERA, a 0.97 WHIP, and a 4.38 K/BB. Much to my surprise, Baker hasn’t faced the Yankees since 2006, when he beat them twice.

CC Sabathia takes the hill for the Yankees. CC’s coming off a disappointing outing in which he couldn’t locate his pitches yet still struck out eight Mariners in 5 2/3 innings. Two starts prior to that, he was pulled in the second inning due to tightness in his bicep. Otherwise, he lasted a minimum of seven innings in each of his other nine starts since May 8, going 6-1 with a 2.75 ERA in those outings and only passing 113 pitches once (tellingly in the one loss).

Francisco Cervelli catches CC yet again tonight. Brett Gardner roams center. Hideki Matsui hits fifth behind Alex Rodriguez with Nick Swisher batting sixth and Robinson Cano dropping to seventh ahead of Gardner and Cervelli.

Finally, this series marks the Yankees last trip to the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome barring an only moderately unlikely postseason matchup. Good ridance, I say. I’m happy to have the place confined to my 1987 World Series box set, bringing us one step closer to the end of Astroturf and indoor stadiums in baseball.

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While much of the country is glued to their computer screens and TV sets watching the Michael Jackson memorial in what already seems to be an endless mourning (cashing in) period, here is the irrespressible Charles Pierce on the return of Manny Ramirez:

I thought the hype ladled onto Manny’s return was excessive, even by ESPN’s elephantine standards for excess. (I mean, honestly, breaking into ESPNews for every minor league at-bat? What if there had been a sudden fantasy-baseball emergency somewhere?) That’s Bonds treatment. Or A-Rod. I always thought Manny Ramirez was a notch below them as a subject for hyperpituitary voyeurism. However, it was of a piece with Manny’s greatest gift as a professional athlete—his innate ability to make everything about baseball that is self-reverentially loathsome look ridiculous. In the great, hushed temple that baseball is perennially building for itself in its own mind, it’s Manny’s who provides the dribble glasses, the whoopee cushions, and the exploding cigars. It is his holy mission to take the living piss out of the self-important, the moralistic, and the people who cling to baseball in order to defend their inherent right to be 13 years old for the rest of their lives.

…At his best—not as a hitter but as a public person—Manny Ramirez always has been most valuable in his ability to be a walking (if an occasionally completely unwitting) satire on baseball’s pretensions, which sorely need to be mocked on a very regular basis. He worked to fashion himself into one of the most feared hitters in the game. By any reasonable standard, he has “respected his talent” a hell of a lot more than did, say, Mickey Mantle, who left too many of his best days on a barstool in Manhattan. Without ever being completely aware of it, he spoofed the whole notion of baseball “professionalism,” which should have been left a bleached pile of bones by the side of the road back in 1970, when Jim Bouton published Ball Four. He was more than a flake. Flakes—like Bill Lee or Moe Drabowsky—generally are aware that they’re flakes. They glory in it. Manny is something sui generis—as natural and instinctive an eccentric as he is a hitter.

When Deron Johnson died in 1992, the notion of baseball mortality really started to hit me. Oh, I had already been assaulted with the tragic mid-career losses of Roberto Clemente and Thurman Munson, but their deaths had occurred while I was still a child, when I still didn’t fully appreciate life and death. By the time that Johnson died, I was 27 years old and working fulltime. Here was a guy I remembered well from my earliest days watching baseball. Deron was strong, sizeable, and seemingly unconquerable.

A burly right-handed slugger who won the National League’s RBI title in 1965 with the Cincinnati Reds, Johnson died in the spring of ‘92 while still employed as the batting coach of the California Angels. Johnson, only 53, had been diagnosed with lung cancer the previous June. After the diagnosis, Johnson asked the Angels’ beat writers not to mention his illness in print. He continued to coach while carrying an oxygen task with him. For those player and coaches who knew him, such toughness was typical of Johnson. Even after he became too ill to coach, he continued to refuse hospitalization and treatment because he wanted to live out his remaining days at home. Once again, for those who knew him, such a decision typified a family man like Johnson.

Throughout his career, Johnson struck a gruff, intimidating pose. (Like Alex Karras in Blazing Saddles, he once punched a horse, which had kicked him.) In reality, Johnson was a soft touch, a likeable man who developed a close rapport with teammates, and later as a coach, with his hitting pupils. Johnson was so well liked, by both players and front office types, that the Philadelphia Phillies once dealt him to the Oakland A’s as a way of helping him earn a World Series ring. Phillies president Paul Owens received only minor league utilityman Jack Bastable, a non-prospect who would never make the majors, in return from the A’s. Owens could have held out for more, but he wanted to send Johnson to Oakland, where he would have a better chance to play in his first World Series.

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PBS has been airing re-runs of the great Jacques Pepin and Julia Child show, Jacques and Julia. Last night, Em and I watched their beef episode. Emily watched in horror while I was greatly amused–both at Jacques and Julia as well as Emily’s reaction.

It’s incredible how much filming food has changed in recent times (it looks so much better now). Anyhow, you can’t ask for more than these two, who genuinely liked each other. They just got together, drank wine, and cooked. They let the editors piece it together into a show. Some poor writer had to watch each episode and piece together the recipes because J & J made them up on the spot.

In his seminal essay Comedy’s Greatest Era, written for Life magazine, the critic James Agee wrote of Buster Keaton:

Very early in his movie career friends asked him why he never smiled on the screen. He didn’t he realzie he didn’t. He had got the dead-pan habit in variety; on the screen he had merely been so hard at work it had never occured to him there was anything to smile about. Now he tried it just once and never again. He was by his whole style and nature so much the most “silent” of the silent comedians that even a smile was as deafeningly out of key as a yell. In a way his pictures are like a transcendent juggling act in which it seems that the whole universe is in exquisite flying motion and the one point of repose is the juggler’s effortless, uninterested face.

Agee went on to describe Keaton as having a “mulish imperturbability under the wildest of circumstances.” Remind you of anyone we know? How about our man Rivera. In his latest column for SI.com, Joe Posnanski writes:

His career almost ended before it began, and he was almost traded (twice) before the Yankee pinstripes looked right on him. On the field, he has triumphed under the most intense glare in American sports. Off the field, he has been quiet to the sound of invisible. And all the while, he has looked calm, stunningly calm, the sort of superhuman calm that Hollywood gives its heroes.

Yes, if there is an expression that conveys the Yankee myth, it would be the countenance of Mariano Rivera in the ninth inning.

This picture was drawn by an illustrator named Larry Roibal who keeps the most fantastic blog of his drawings.

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John Hirschbeck’s umpiring crew got, by my count, four calls wrong in Sunday’s game. They split them between the two teams, three going against the Yankees, one against the Blue Jays, but there were moments when it seemed the actions of the players were taking place in a distinct and separate reality from the results of the plays. That didn’t matter much when the Jays were leading 7-1 on the strength of six strong innings from starter Ricky Romero and home runs from Alex Rios (a key three-run shot to the first row of the left-field box seats in the third) and John McDonald (a solo shot in the seventh, his first home run in nearly a year), or when Brian Bruney was helping the Jays add insurance runs in the top of the seventh. When the Yankees mounted a comeback that brought the final score to 7-6, however, one once again began to wonder how things might have been different had the calls been correct.

The first blown call is the one that drew the most post-game attention. After Andy Pettitte worked a 1-2-3 top of the first, Derek Jeter led off the bottom of the first with a walk, was balked to second when Romero stepped toward home on a throw to first, then tried to steal third. Catcher Rod Barajas’s throw beat Jeter to the bag, and Scott Rolen got the tag down, but Jeter, sliding head-first, made a swim move with his right hand, successfully avoiding the tag and reaching the bag before Rolen could adjust and tag his chest.

Nonetheless, third-base umpire Marty Foster called Jeter out. According to Jeter, Foster explained to him in the subsequent dispute that, “I was out because the ball beat me, and that he didn’t have to tag me. I was unaware of that change in the rules.” Baseball is a game of phantom tags and neighborhood plays, and it is often true the when a ball beats a runner, the call will go to the defense, but by telling Jeter he was out because the ball beat him, regardless of the tag, Foster was admitting that he’d blown the call. It’s no wonder, then, that Joe Girardi went out and got himself ejected just two batters into the bottom of the first.

Nick Swisher followed Girardi’s ejection with a single and moved to second on a wild pitch. Was that blown call at third the run that cost the Yankees the game?

The call that went the Yankees’ way came in the bottom of the third. With two out, Swisher hit what looked like a double to left field, but Jose Bautista, who made two great and ultimately game-changing running catches in left, played the ball perfectly and fired a strike to second base. Swisher, realizing he’d been beaten, popped out of his feat-first slide and attempted to vault over John McDonald’s tag. He was called safe, but second-base umpire Wally Bell failed to notice that McDonald tagged Swisher on the foot before Nick completed his leap. Mark Teixeira, whose 0-for-5 day was as much to blame for the Yankee loss as anything else, struck out to strand Swisher, making the blown call moot.

That blown call came on the heals of another miss by Bell in the top of the third. With one out and Aaron Hill on first, Vernon Wells hit a bouncer to the shortstop hole. Derek Jeter gloved it and made a jump throw to second base to force Hill, but Bell called Hill safe. Guess what? Hill was out by at least a foot. Andy Pettitte struck out Scott Rolen for what should have been the third out of the inning but was actually just the second. Bonus batter Alex Rios then stroked his three-run jack, giving the Jays an early 4-1 lead. Was that blown call the difference in the game?

Believe it or not, Bell blew a third call, this one coming in the bottom of the seventh. With none out, Melky Cabrera on second, and Hinske on first, both via singles, Brett Gardner hit a bouncer to second. John McDonald threw to second to initiate a double-play, but his throw sank in front of the bag, forcing Marco Scutaro to come across the bag and trap it in the dirt. The throw beat Hinske by a mile, but Scutaro was clearly well off the bag by the time he caught the throw and never went back to tag the base. Nonetheless, before Hinske could scamper over to second, Bell called him out on what I can only assume was a neighborhood call.

If Bell thought Scutaro actually had the ball and his foot on second base at the same time, he’s a worse umpire than yesterday’s game made him seem. That play left runners on the corners with one out. Derek Jeter followed with a walk, and Nick Swisher singled home both Cabrera and Gardner before Teixeira and Rodriguez struck out to strand the remaining runners. Was the run Hinske wasn’t allowed to score the difference in the game?

Down 7-1 heading into the seventh, the Yankees got scored those two runs to make it 7-3, another in the eighth to make it 7-4, then staged a two-out rally in the bottom of the ninth when Jorge Posada singled, Cano doubled, and Hideki Matsui drove them both in with a pinch-hit single to make it 7-6. That brought it back around to Hinske, who made a nice diving play in the top of the first, then homered off the right field foul-screen in the fifth. Looking to cap off his Yankee debut in style, Hinske, facing Frasor, took to 3-1, checked his swing on a 94-mile-per-hour fastball below the knee but fouled it off to run the count full, then swung through a gut-high slider to end the game. Hinske later said that the first called strike was a slider in the same spot that dropped into the zone. Expecting the same movement, he swung under the 3-2 pitch, which stayed up.

Hinske’s hero-to-goat act should have been the story of the game. Instead it was the umpiring.

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It hasn’t been pretty, or even all that encouraging given the injury to Chien-Ming Wang and Joba Chamberlain’s  first major league disaster start, but the Yankees are on the verge of sweeping this unusual wrap-around series of day games against the Blue Jays. I was going to title my series preview, “Toronto Blue Jays: You Ain’t So Tough,” but I didn’t want to jinx anything. With three games in the bag, however, I figure there’s no harm now.

Then again, if the Yankees thought they took care of the hard part by out-lasting Roy Halladay on Saturday, they likely failed to notice that this afternoon’s starter, former first-round pick Ricky Romero, enters today’s game with a 20-inning scoreless streak and a 1.91 ERA over his last six starts. Romero completed at least seven innings in five of those starts, all of the Toronto wins. In the exception, Romero lasted just 6 1/3 and the Jays lost 1-0.

Romero faces fellow lefty Andy Pettitte, who is coming off his best home start of the season, a seven-inning, two-run, 98-pitch gem against the weak-hitting Mariners. Andy beat the Blue Jays at the Rogers Centre earlier this year, but needed 106 pitches to get through six and walked four. He’ll have to do better than that to beat Romero this afternoon and deliver the sweep.

Eric Hinske makes his Yankee debut in right field today as Nick Swisher plays first and Mark Teixeira gets a half day off at DH. Hinske can’t hit lefties, so Joe Girardi has set him up to fail in his debut in front of the home crowd. Good job, Joe. Johnny Damon gets a full day off as Melky plays left, giving the Yankees a bottom three of Cabrera, Hinske, and Brett Gardner.

Today’s news is powered by the match-up between a swordsman and a baseball pitching machine:

• Three Yankees headed to the All Star Game:

Mark Teixeira was not glued to the progress reports of fan balloting for the 2009 All-Star Game, but his friends and family made sure to keep him updated. All he knew was this: there was ground to make up.

Teixeira’s back-and-forth battle with Red Sox counterpart Kevin Youkilis to serve as the American League’s starting first baseman ended on Sunday, and the slugger is headed to the July 14 contest at St. Louis’ Busch Stadium, joined by Junior Circuit leading vote-getter Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera, both 10-time All-Stars.

“I’m so appreciative of the fans,” Teixeira said. “Since I’ve been here, I’ve said they were the best fans in the country. I want to thank all of the fans for going out there and voting. It just shows how passionate Yankees fans are.

[My take: The recognition is nice, but after a while, I think these guys would like a three-day vacation in the middle of the long season.]

• No Tex in the Home Run Derby:

Teixeira said after the Yankees’ 10-8 win over the Jays on Sunday that he would not accept an invitation to perform in the hitting exhibition at St. Louis’ Busch Stadium on July 13, saying that his one experience before the 2005 Midsummer Classic was more than enough.

“I’m just not a Home Run Derby guy,” Teixeira said. “It doesn’t fit well for me. If I go out there and just hit two or three home runs, I’d rather let someone else go out and do it.”

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I watched Sunday’s Yankee game out of the corner of one eye. It was a turgid, ugly game that thankfully ended with the Yanks on top, 10-8. Alex Rodriguez was given the day off but Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada and Hideki Matsui provided the thunder. Joba Chamberlain, on the other hand, pitched a dog of a game (even if just three of the eight runs scored on his watch were earned), and didn’t make it out of the fourth inning. The Yanks led 4-0, trailed 8-4, and then came back, thanks to dingers by Matsui and Jeter. Alfredo Aceves gets props over here for his four excellent innings of work. Mariano Rivera, Phil Hughes and Phil Coke were not available, so Aceves finished the game and earned the save.

The win keeps the Yanks just a game behind the Red Sox. New York has the second best record in the league, third best in baseball.

I couldn’t properly concentrate on the game because I was still trying to calm down after watching the entire Wimbledon final. My nerves were shot. Last year’s five-set match between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal was epic. Yesterday’s match, which saw Federer out-last Andy Roddick in the longest fifth set in Wimbledon history–a freakish 16 games to 14!–has to be in the discussion of the best matches in the tournaments long history.

As it stands, Roddick played the game of his life…and lost. I thought he’d pull it out. I thought Federer, who had a career-high 50 aces, would fold. Instead, Federer won his 15th major in style. Simply put, it was greatness defined, an absolutely exquisite sporting experience.

Yanks look to stay hot this afternoon against the Jays. It is a blazing summer day here in New York.  Joba is on the hill for the New Yorkers. He will look to be more efficient this time around.

Let’s Go Yan-Kees!

Correct me if I’m wrong, but if Venus and Serena Williams were men, they’d be a whole lot more popular than they are, right? Is that what it is? That they are women? Is it tennis? Or is it that they are black? Or perhaps because they are not cutie-pies, known to be ungracious in defeat, or because their old man is as unappealing as they come? Are they just not likable? Or maybe it’s because their personal rivalry is without much drama. The sisters love each other and while they have different personalities–Venus is elegant yet removed, Serena, effusive, with a wide, beautiful smile–they don’t have much visibile angst or tension toward each other. Or if they do, it’s private. So watching them play each other feels drained of drama–they won’t let us in.

They aren’t the girls next door, or pin-up blondes. They are physical marvels in the tennis world–Venus is long and strong, and Serena is a tank, with the thighs of a fullback. Serena is also pretty in a conventional way, with a winning smile, and an ample bossom. She’s a bombshell trapped inside a weighlifters body. Certainly a long way from Tracy Austin. But what makes the Williams sisters great is their staying power. 

 Why aren’t they more popular? It’s a combination of many things, but there it is–the Williams sisters are holding up women’s tennis and somehow they are not huge celebrities here in the States.

The Williams girls played each other in the Wimbledon final on Saturday morning and Serena dispatched her older sister in straight sets giving her an 11-10 edge over Venus in head-to-head play. It was Serena’s third Wimbledon title, the first since 2002. She has the career Grand Slam–the Austrailian Open, the French Open, Wimbledon and the US Open–winning 11 majors in all. Venus has won Wimbledon and the US Open, but hasn’t won a French or Austrialian Open. I got to wondering how Serena, the better of the two, stacks up against the greatest women tennis players of all-time.

She’s got a ways to go. Billie Jean King won 12 majors, Martina won 18 and Steffi Graf won 22.

Still, where would women’s tennis be today with out Serena and Venus?

Roger Federer is shooting for his record 15th major title this morning against Andy Roddick…

Michael Kay loves calling extra innings “bonus cantos,” but when they come in a regular season game that began with a compelling starting pitching matchup, they feel like anything but a bonus. Saturday afternoon’s contest between the Yankees and Blue Jays began with Chien-Ming Wang dueling Roy Halladay, but ended in the twelfth inning with Brett Tomko and Sean Camp. The Yankees won, but I still feel a little bit ripped off. Some of that feeling likely comes from the fact that, while the Yankees unexpectedly won a game started by Halladay, something they hadn’t done in six tries since Wang bested Halladay on Opening Day of last season, they may have lost Wang.

Wang pitched well for five innings yesterday, getting ten of his 15 outs on the ground. He got into a bit of trouble in the second by walking Lyle Overbay with one out, then giving up a ground-rule double to Vernon Wells and a two-RBI bouncer up the middle to Alex Rios, but killed that rally there by getting Dave Dellucci to hit into a double play. He then allowed just one more baserunner over the next three innings until Marco Scutaro led off the sixth with a double and, after an Aaron Hill groundout, Adam Lind homered to right, erasing what had been a 3-2 Yankee lead.

Wang’s next pitch sailed low and away from Scott Rolen. Jorge Posada, who immediately ran out to the mound and called out the trainer, later said Wang “didn’t throw that ball, he seemed like he kinda spotted it in there.” Wang was immediately removed from the game with what an MRI later diagnosed as a shoulder strain and bursitis. That ruined what had been a long, but seemingly fruitful comeback by Wang, who won his first game in more than a year against the Mets his last time out and entered the sixth with a lead on the great Halladay.

The Yanks got to Halladay early, scoring a run in the first on a one-out walk to Johnny Damon, a groundout that moved Damon into scoring position, and an RBI single to right field by Alex Rodriguez on which Damon just beat Raul Chavez’s tag at the plate. They then added another in the second on a solo homer by Hideki Matsui and yet another in the fourth on a lead-off homer by Posada, which gave the Yankees that 3-2 lead.

Making just his second start since returning from a groin injury, Halladay was clearly off his game. Having walked just 15 men and allowed just seven home runs all year, he issued three of each in this game and ultimately gave up five runs. David Robertson coughed up another run after Wang’s departure by walking the first two men he faced then giving up another RBI single to Alex Rios, but Halladay couldn’t hold the 5-3 lead. With his pitch count in the high-90s, he opened the seventh by giving up a single to Derek Jeter and a game-tying Yankee Stadium homer to the third row in right field to Johnny Damon.

And so it stood for the next five innings as Phil Hughes, Mariano Rivera, Phil Coke, and Brett Tomko combined for five hitless innings (two of them by Coke). The Yankees had their chances before the twelfth. Hideki Matsui hit a one-out ground-rule double off Brandon League in the eighth, but Melky Cabrera couldn’t move him over, and Brett Gardner struck out to strand him. Derek Jeter led of the bottom of the ninth by working a nine-pitch walk off Jeremy Accardo. After Damon struck out, Jeter moved to second on a fly ball to deep center by Mark Teixeira. Cito Gaston then had Accardo walk Alex Rodriguez and brought in Jesse Carlson, who got Robinson Cano to ground out to strand both runners.

Cano was nearly the goat again in the bottom of the twelfth. Teixeira led off with a double off Camp, again prompting Gaston to have Rodriguez intentionally passed. Cano was then assigned to bunt the runners up, but Camp didn’t throw him a strike, so Cano took to 3-0. One pitch away from loading the bases, Cano inexplicably bunted the 3-0 pitch (Girardi later said, “he misunderstood something”). Not only that, but he didn’t get the ball far enough away from home plate, and Teixeira, who was expecting Cano to take and was thus headed back toward second base as the ball neared the plate, was easily forced out at third.

No matter, Jorge picked his teammate up by delivering a game-winning single to center. Game over. Yankees win 6-5, take a 2-0 lead in the wrap-around series, emerged victorious from a Roy Halladay start on a beautiful Independence Day Saturday, and pulled within one game of the Red Sox, who lost to the Mariners. Just try not to think about Chien-Ming Wang’s shoulder while you’re watching things blow up in the sky tonight.

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Roy Halladay will face the Yanks today (George Steinbrenner’s birthday) and looks to put a damper on the holiday festivities in the Bronx. It will be a tall task to beat him but stranger things have happened. It’s sunny and beauty-ful in New York.

Let’s Go Yan-Kees!

Why is it that whenever I hear the name Eric Hinske, I automatically think of the “Penske File” from Seinfeld? Perhaps I’ve watched too many episodes of the show, or maybe I’ve just watched too much baseball, I’m not sure which. More to the point, I like the acquisition of the ex-Ray, Red Sock, and Blue Jay, mostly because he brings some much-needed power to a punchless bench. His left-handed swing should be well served at the new Stadium.

I also applaud the pickup of Hinske, acquired from the Pirates for two low level minor leaguers, because of his ability to spell Alex Rodriguez from time to time at third base. Hinske has recent experience at the position, having played three games there for the Pirates this year and eight games for the Rays in 2008. He doesn’t have much range, but his hands are good, as is a resume that includes several American League East pennant races and two World Series appearances.

Last year, Hinske platooned with the pennant-winning Rays, splitting his time between DH, right field, and left field. He’ll certainly play less often with the Yankees, backing up at the infield and outfield corners and coming off the bench to pinch-hit for the likes of Brett Gardner and Jose Molina (whenever he returns). That should bode well for the Yankees because Hinske is one of those players by which you can measure your ballclub. If he’s playing everyday for you, your team is probably not a pennant contender. But if he’s playing in a platoon role, or coming off the bench, as he will be doing for the Yankees, then that’s a sign that you have a good club…

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It wasn’t spectacular, it wasn’t especially memorable, but the Yankees 4-2 win over the Blue Jays on Friday afternoon at Yankee Stadium was satisfying, a fine way to follow-up Thursday’s clunker. Roy Halladay will pitch the Yankee Doodle Dandy affair tomorrow, so today’s “w” was a good start to this four-game series.

AJ Burnett had good control and threw seven strong innings, allowing just two runs on six hits and a couple of walks.  His record is now 7-4 with a 3.83 ERA. The two Phils–Coke and Hughes, teamed-up to get three outs in the eighth and That Man Rivera, the old gunslinger, pitched a one-two-three ninth, striking out two batters. Robinson Cano and Alex Rodriguez hit solo homers to bookend the Yankee scoring–they got two more on a bases loaded walk and a wild pitch.

Just before Rodriguez homered into the right center field seats, I ate a couple of sour cherries that I bought last week. They were plump and juicy, like a fat grape, but the taste was pure cherry–tart and sour. It was almost carnal and I savored them as I watched the dinger. How sweet it is, I thought. It got even sweeter watching Rivera, the most graceful, elegant and efficient player I’ve had the pleasure to watch.

It doesn’t get old. In fact, Rivera is like a fine wine–each outing seems even sweeter now more than ever before. To think, he suffered blowing a save in Game 7 of the 2001 World Serious. That game could have finished a guy, buried his career, even a player of Rivera’s stature. Instead, he got better after that. He’s older, he’s given up some runs this year but he’s whiffed 42 batters in 33.2 innings. Oh yeah, he’s walked three guys.

Has any player ever given us Yankee fans the same feeling that Rivera has? I think not. He’s “the one.” We all know enough to be grateful. We’ll never see the likes of him again.

I said my piece on the Blue Jays’ hot start on SI.com when the Yankees were in Toronto in mid-May, so let’s see how things have changed since then.

Entering their series with the Yankees on May 12, the Blue Jays were 22-12 (.647), the best record in the American League at the time. Since then, they’ve gone 20-26 (.435) and fallen back to their expected place as the fourth-best team in the AL East.

At the time, I pointed to the unexpected health of the Jays’ starting nine as one reason for their early-season success, saying “Injury seems sure to strike the offense at some point, and several of the team’s batting averages, including [Aaron] Hill’s .346, catcher Rod Barajas’ .307 and platoon left fielder/utilityman Jose Bautista’s .311 seem sure to regress.”

The starting nine has stayed healthy, but Hill has lost 45 points off his average, Barajas has shed 40 points, and Bautista has lost 57. Hill was the Jays’ best hitter in the early going, but since going 2-for-4 with a homer in the first game against the Yankees on May 12, he’s hit just .255/.294/.452. Barajas has hit .228/.267/.378 since the start of the Yankees series; Bautista .191/.353/.309.

Scott Rolen, on the other hand, is hitting like he did before his shoulder problems derailed his path to the Hall of Fame. Rolen went 6-for-11 with three doubles against the Yankees and has hit .341/.405/.508 since, though with just six homers on the season. Accordingly, Cito Gaston has moved him back to the cleanup spot after having demoted him from that spot upon taking over for John Gibbons last June. Adam Lind and Lyle Overbay have also maintained their hot starts, the latter by virtue of not having to face left-handed pitching thanks to the presence of platoon partner and Yankee killer Kevin Millar. Marco Scutaro has come back to earth a bit, but has hit a still-respectable (for a fine fielding shortstop) .290/.364/.403 since the Yankee series and still leads the league in walks (though Nick Swisher is in hot pursuit).

On the flip side, Alex Rios and rookie slugger Travis Snider weren’t hitting in mid-May, and they’re still not. Rios, another Yankee killer, still managed to go 4-for-10 with a double and a homer against the Yankees in May, but has hit just .256/.311/.421 since. Snider was demoted to Triple-A then aggravated an old back injury and has since been replaced by former Yankee David Dellucci, who was released by the Indians at the end of May and signed a minor league deal with the Tribe. Dellucci was just called up this morning.

As for the pitching, I raised red flags about the unsustainably low opponents’ batting averages on balls in play being recorded by starters Scott Richmond and Brian Tallet, and relievers Jason Frasor, Jesse Carlson, and Bill Murphy. Richmond, who starts Sunday, was bounced by Yankees in the second inning on May 13, but rebounded with seven shutout innings against the White Sox and has posted a 3.18 since his Yankee disaster. His season BABIP has actually dropped a point over that stretch. Similarly, Tallet, who starts this afternoon, has been solid with a 4.30 ERA over his last nine starts while his BABIP has also shifted just one point (up to .228).

The rotation suffered from Roy Halladay’s DL stay, but Halladay is back and will pitch on Saturday, still leading the majors with ten wins. Meanwhile, the return of former first-round pick Ricky Romero has further solidified the rotation. Romero will bring a 20-inning scoreless streak into Monday’s game and has posted a 1.91 ERA in six starts since the calendar flipped to June.

As for those relievers, Frasor’s BABIP has increased by 54 points, but that hasn’t hurt his bottom line much. Carlson’s BABIP has increased 85 points, as has shown up in his performance as he’s posted a 7.32 ERA since the start of the Yankee series. Murphy was optioned to Triple-A right after the Yankees left town.

The man Murphy made room for was B.J. Ryan, who has posted a 3.14 ERA since coming off the DL, but with more walks than strikeouts and without a single save opportunity. Those opportunities were going to Scott Downs, but he’s replaced Ryan on the DL, leaving the closing duties to Frasor and his tight-rope act and 2007 closer Jeremy Accardo, who started the year in Triple-A after a forearm injury ended his 2008 campaign prematurely.

All of that adds up to . . . well, the fourth-best team in the AL East, just like everyone thought.

A.J. Burnett faces Tallet today in the first game of an unusual, wrap-around, Independence Day weekend series in which all four games will start at 1:05pm. Burnett gave up five runs in 7 2/3 innings to his former team on May 12, but has been nails in his last three starts posting this line: 20 1/3 IP, 10 H, 2 R (1 ER), 10 BB, 26 K, 0.98 WHIP, 0.44 ERA. Amazingly, A.J. lost one of those three starts, having matched up against the ace of his other former team, Josh Johnson of the Marlins.

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I’ve spoken with a few people recently who are jazzed-up to see Michael Mann’s new movie, Public Enemies. I admire Mann as a director though I find his movies humorless and grim. He makes serious-minded pulp. Public Enemies? Why not? I like a good genre movie as much as the next guy. Then I read a few reviews that were not impressed with the movie and figured, eh, I can skip it.

Writing in today’s New York Times, Manohla Dargis, who like the great Pauline Kael is prone to writing effusive, adoring reviews when she falls for a movie, has a different take:

Michael Mann’s “Public Enemies” is a grave and beautiful work of art. Shot in high-definition digital by a filmmaker who’s helping change the way movies look, it revisits with meticulous detail and convulsions of violence a short, frantic period in the life and bank-robbing times of John Dillinger, an Indiana farm boy turned Depression outlaw, played by a low-voltage Johnny Depp. Much of what makes the movie pleasurable is the vigor with which it restages our familiar romance with period criminals, a perennial affair. But what also makes it more than the sum of its spectacular shootouts is the ambivalence about this romance that seeps into the filmmaking, steadily darkening the skies and draining the story of easy thrills.

…When not in pirate drag, Mr. Depp can be a recessive, even inscrutable screen presence, which is crucial to his strengths and performative limits. He’s a cool cat, to be sure: veiled and often most memorable when he’s staring into space while the camera soaks in his subdued but potent physical charms. He might have made a great silent star, as earlier roles suggest. Part of his initial appeal was that he seemed almost Garboesque in a movie world that increasingly makes no room for sacred idols.

Mr. Depp looks good as Dillinger — few contemporary actors can wear a fedora as persuasively — but the performance sneaks up on you, inching into your system scene by scene. The same holds true of “Public Enemies,” which looks and plays like no other American gangster film I can think of and very much like a Michael Mann movie, with its emphasis on men at work, its darkly moody passages, eruptions of violence and pictorial beauty. Mr. Mann’s digital manipulations, in particular, which encompass almost pure abstraction and interludes of hyper-realism, is worthy of longer exegesis, one that explores how this still-unfamiliar format is changing the movies: it allows, among other things, filmmakers to capture the eerie brightness of nighttime as never before.

I’m particularly curious about how the film looks. Richard Corliss thinks it comes off as cheap:

Shot and projected digitally instead of on film, the picture gains in gradations of night shades but loses in visual clarity. Some shots look like iPhone photos enlarged to 50 feet; any sharp camera movement results in a blur.

Is it ground-breaking or cheesy? Hmmm.

A brief one heading into the holiday weekend:

• Catching conundrums:

. . .  although (Joe) Girardi said the Yankees have not yet begun discussing what to do with (Francisco) Cervelli once (Jose) Molina returns, it’s unlikely that they would carry three catchers.

“We’ll cross that bridge when it comes,” Girardi said. “Our roster has one infielder and has a couple extra outfielders, but we’ll cross that bridge when it comes.”

Though Cervelli has shown extraordinary growth in his first extended stint in the big leagues, he is still just 23 years old and would presumably benefit more from playing every day in Triple-A than from catching sporadically in the Majors. The Yankees, meanwhile, are paying Molina well — more than $2 million this season — to be their backup.

• PeteAbe has a nice appreciation of Ken Griffey, Jr.:

If you’re a fan of baseball history, you had to appreciate watching Ken Griffey Jr. hit a home run at Yankee Stadium last night.

It was No. 621 in his career, 39 shy of Willie Mays. The new Stadium also became the 44th park he has homered in, one short of the record held by Sammy Sosa . . .

It’s hard to believe, but Griffey has received only one vote in the MVP balloting in the last 11 years and has been an All-Star twice in the last decade. He’s like a cameo of his greatness.

Griffey is a guy that the young players in the clubhouse were thrilled to see, much like Chipper Jones. In a game lacking heroes, those are two players you can respect.

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I watched last night’s game from the Todd Drew Memorial box high above home plate. It was a warm, muggy night. There was lightning and thunder before the game, which was delayed for thirty minutes, but just a few drops of rain. The Yanks were poised for a sweep but CC Sabathia offered up a stinker and the Yanks lost to the M’s 8-4. Sabathia just couldn’t put hitters away. He got to two strikes then then faltered. Franklyn Gutierrez, Kenji Johjima and Ryan Langerhans (5-6-7 in the order) hit the ball squarely against Sabathia each time up. Heck, even the lowly #8 hitter Chris Woodward had a couple of hits and a couple of RBI last night.

The Yanks scored four runs against Seattle’s starter, the slop-throwing Jason Vargas, who lasted all of four innings. But then Miguel Batista, Mark Lowe, and David Aardsma held them scoreless the rest of the way. Mark Teixeira made a throwing error and narrowly missed a line drive in the first inning off the bat of Ichiro, that wasn’t called an error, but from where we were sitting was a play he normally makes. Teix has been brilliant in the field this year but has made a few mistakes this week.

A game to forget for the Yankees. But at least I had the honor of watching them from Todd’s seats. This time I kept score and everything.

CC and the Yanks look to make it eight straight tonight. Rain could be a factor. Let’s hope it doesn’t mess with a nice winning streak.

Let’s Go Yan-Kees.