Daily Archives: October 21, 2009

The Dodgers turn to one V. Padilla tonight as they hope to bring the series back to L.A.

Man, oh man, it is going to be tough to beat the Phillies though.

Skillz.

Mark Lamster’s second book was released this week. It is called Master of Shadows: The Secret Diplomatic Career of the Painter Peter Paul Rubens.  Dig this essay from the Wall Street Journal:

Today, Peter Paul Rubens is best remembered as the Old Master with a penchant for fleshy, pink nudes and baroque grandiosity. These perceptions suggest a man of unchecked libertinism, but Rubens was in fact a man of controlled appetites, with a modest disposition and a reputation for tact and discretion. Almost inevitably, given his proximity to monarchs and statesmen across Europe, he was conscripted into political service as a covert diplomat and spy; his artistic work could always provide cover for his clandestine activities.

Because we think of Rubens primarily as an artist, and because the political affairs of the 17th century are so remote, Rubens’s diplomatic career is neglected when it is not altogether forgotten. But a review of Rubens’s correspondence, along with other archival sources, suggests he played a central and active role in European statecraft. Indeed, many of his contemporaries considered him as skilled a diplomat as he was an artist, and he was then almost universally revered as a painter without rival.

Rubens worked primarily as an operative for the Spanish crown, which was engaged in a prolonged war with the nascent Dutch republic, an intractable conflict that had engulfed all of Europe’s powers and that extended fully around the globe. Rubens believed he could resolve this perpetual war, and he devoted several years of his life to this effort, risking all that he had achieved. His plan was triangular: he would arrange for a peace between Spain and England, with the expectation that England would then force its Dutch ally to compromise with Spain. It was a savvy bit of strategic thinking, but it would not work unless Rubens could convince England and Spain, traditional enemies, to come to terms.

Mark, known around these parts as the co-founder of YFSF, is nothing if not versatile and wildly talented.

I received my copy of the book this morning and it is stunningly handsome. Once the baseball season is over it’s at the top of my reading list. Congrats to Mark on the publication of what looks to be a terrific book. What an accomplishment, man. We’re proud to know him, count him as a friend, and wish him nothing but success.

Maybe one day he’ll post a picture of the 1975 Yankees bumper sticker he once showed me.

CC Sabathia’s performance in the fifth and sixth inning last night–bend don’t break, son–was the season for me. That was an ace out there. And Alex Rodriguez’s home run was about as satisfying as it gets. I knew they didn’t want Scott Kazmir to face Rodriguez again, not after Rodriguez had a good hack in his first at bat, and hit a line drive up the middle the next time up. So they bring in a reliever who threw a good pitch, down and in, and Rodriguez jacked it over the fence in left.

Mmmmm.

Oh yeah, and Johnny Damon’s home run in the eighth was none too shabby either.

Still one very big win left. So I ain’t countin’ no chickens. And, dag, for such a compelling win, there sure was some ugliness–Mr. Posada and Mr. Cano, I’m looking at you. But in the end, yeah, that was the way to respond to a tough loss, wasn’t it?

Today’s news is powered by “Chicago Transit Authority”, circa 1970:

• Mariano Rivera did NOT load up a baseball:

A video clip spreading all over the Web on Tuesday shows Mariano Rivera holding the ball in his hand in the 10th inning of Game 3 on Monday, and — gasp — spitting downward. . . .

As first reported by Joel Sherman, Major League Baseball acted quickly on this one, investigating the incident and exonerating Rivera. They found photos that showed the spit passing his hand well past the ball.

“From the available video and still photography we have, there is no evidence that Rivera spit on the ball,” said Patrick Courtney, M.L.B.’s vice president for public relations.

(more…)

In some ways, and all the most important ones, this game went according to plan: C.C. Sabathia dominated, because he eats three-day rests for breakfast; A-Rod bashed the hell out of the ball again; and this time his teammates even decided to join him. The Yankees won emphatically, 10-1, and are now up three games to one in the ALCS.

In other ways, though, it was a bit of a mess; as I wrote earlier, if this game were an interwar German Expressionist film, it would be “The 1,000 Mental Errors of Dr. Mabuse”. Yankees and umpires alike made some baffling decisions this evening, though in the end the New York boomsticks made them pretty much irrelevant.

Sabathia started out strong, and got stronger. He went eight innings on only 101 pitches, allowed one run, struck out five and walked two. He was still touching 96 mph on FOX’s radar gun when Girardi pulled him and and, with a then-six-run lead, let Chad Gaudin (the bullpen’s Lonely Man) finish the game. It’s really impossible to overstate just how terrific Sabathia has been this October, and how valuable; the Yankees piled on the hits today, but even if their woes with runners in scoring position had continued, it might not have mattered.

Angels starter Scott Kazmir kept the Yankees off the board for three innings, but he looked plenty shaky in the process, with leadoff hits and walks and a metric ton of pitches thrown. (This might be some minor comfort to Mets fans after their painful season, if only it had been another team doing the damage). Finally, in the fourth, the rains came: A-Rod singled, moved to third on a Posada double, and scored with a close play at the plate on Cano’s fielder’s choice; then Nick Swisher walked to load the bases, and with the Yankees on an 0-for-26 skid with RISP, Melky Cabrera knocked a refreshing two-RBI single into left-field to put the Yanks up 3-zip.

The fourth inning also brought us the first of many blown calls, when Nick Swisher was caught too far off second base and tagged out by a foot, but was nonetheless called safe. Third base ump Tim McClelland then evened the blown-call score by calling Swisher out for supposedly tagging up from third too soon on Johnny Damon’s fly ball… even though replays showed he did not. (If a runner is wrongly called out when he should have been out on a previous play anyway, does it make a sound?) These shenanigans were only prelude to an incredibly odd series of events in the fifth, wherein both Robinson Cano and Jorge Posada were tagged out at third base during the same play, but only Posada was called out, and I’d like to explain it in more detail but frankly it still makes my head hurt, so just watch for yourself.

Anyway, before the ump oddness, the Yankees tacked on two more runs in the fifth with a Mark Teixeira single (nice, but his only hit of the night, so it’s too soon to say if he’s out of his slump) and then… you’ll never guess… yes, an Alex Rodriguez home run. Seriously. Another one. He is now slugging 1.000 in the ALCS, which is just stupid. In the bottom of that inning, Sabathia faced his only major threat of the night – a Kendry Morales solo shot and two singles – but he recovered and pretty much cruised from there on out. Three postseason starts, three earned runs.

The later innings were pretty low-stress for a change – and a good thing too, as Yankee fans have been, let’s just say, a mite on edge these last few days. Johnny Damon hit a two-run shot, Melky knocked in another couple of runs, and there were no terrifying extra-inning contortions to endure. This is the Angels we’re talking about, so I will not be lulled into a false sense of security, but I’m glad my stomach lining got a chance to recover before Thurday’s Game 5. Enjoy the off-day, Banterers.