The rain she ain’t a-stoppin’. No telling if they are going to get this one in, but it don’t look likely…
I’m headed over to Two Boots in Grand Central to see Josh Wilker, Greg Prince and a Mess-o-Mets bloggers. Yee-haw.
[Photo Credit: No One Can Remeber the End]
Movin’ in the right direction…
Light in August, By Willem de Kooning (1947)
First thing that pops into my head about tonight’s game is: If Josh Beckett plunks someone will there be a fight? In a chat at Boston.com, our old chum, Pete Abraham thinks so. There hasn’t been a good brawl between the Yanks and Sox in a few years. I used to like fantasizing about them, but now, I’m not so keen on the idea. Jeez, the last thing the Yanks need is to get somebody else hurt.
How will the last portion of Derek Jeter’s career play itself out? That’s one of the burning questions we’ve been asking around these parts for a few years now. Joe Pos takes a look at Jeter’s chance to catch Pete Rose for the all-time hits record (slim to none), and checks out how poorly even the best middle infielders age:
– Cal Ripken had his last great offensive year at 30, and his last good offensive year as a part-time player at 38.
– Robin Yount moved from shortstop to center field, the move many people believe Jeter will eventually make. Even so, he was barely a league average hitter after 34, and he retired at 37.
– Craig Biggio played until he was 41 — but he posted a 95 OPS+ his last eight seasons.
– Rogers Hornsby was a part-time player after age 33.
– Frankie Frisch was a part-time player after age 35.
– Charlie Gehringer played until he was 39, but he hit .225 his last two seasons.
– Robbie Alomar was done as a great player at 34.
There are a some old-time middle-infielders — Eddie Collins, Luke Appling, Honus Wagner — who played until their young 40s. Wagner played in a very different time, Collins was a shell of himself, and Appling was a very different hitter from Jeter (no power, hardly ever struck out, etc.).
Truth is, when you look at Derek Jeter’s comps … none of them aged especially well, except maybe Johnny Damon who is aging as we speak. Barry Larkin, Alan Trammell, Ryne Sandberg, Lou Whitaker — none of these guys were effective players into their late 30s.
[Picture by Walker Evans]
From Nick Cafardo in the Boston Globe:
Red Sox fans won’t want to read this, but here goes.
Great players do great things. And Alex Rodriguez is one of the greatest.
Sox fans will resist every inkling in their bodies to admit that. They’ll bring up steroids, and incidents such as the ones with Jason Varitek and Dallas Braden. They’ll never give him his due, but the fact is he stepped to the plate with his team trailing, 9-7, in the bottom of the ninth inning last night and slammed a two-run homer on the first pitch from Jonathan Papelbon to tie the score.
Since we are still riding high from a sweet win, why not get right to some eats. Buddy of mine has been watching Treme and got to hankerin’ for some Hubig’s Pies, a New Orleans specialty.
I’ve never had one. They look sweet, gross, n’ great. Hu-dat?
[Photo Credit: YatBazaar]
Random thoughts from a crazy 11-9 Yankees victory that had highs, lows, and a lot of agita in between…
The lead-up to this quickie two-game set between the Yankees and the Red Sox featured several back stories:
1) The Red Sox were not a threat. They entered Monday night’s action in fourth place, three and a half games behind the Blue Jays, the starting pitching reduced to mediocrity, the bullpen reduced to tatters, and riddled by the combined struggles of David Ortiz and Victor Martinez, and injuries to Mike Cameron and Jacoby Ellsbury.
“The Red Sox don’t scare me,” so said 1050’s Seth Everett on Sunday. “They’re not a threat. David Ortiz doesn’t scare me. Not even now that he’s started to hit a little bit.”
“It’s not a rivalry right now,” said Mike Francesa. “It’s not a rivalry until the standings dictate that it’s a rivalry.”
To paraphrase Buster Olney, who subbed on “Mike and Mike in the Morning”: “By the end of May, Theo Epstein will evaluate and look at this team and restructure with 2011 in mind.”
Thank you, Cliff Corcoran, for bringing some sanity to the matter and giving the “Sox are dead” sayers a nice punch to the stomach. The Red Sox don’t suck and they proved it. (More on this later.)
2) Because Mariano Rivera hadn’t given up a run to date and was inhumanly infallible at Age 40, the fact that he yielded his first grand slam at home since 1995 and first grand slam since Bill Selby in July of 2002 to blow the save Sunday meant that something was wrong and the end was near. The likes of Olney, Craig Carton, and Mike Francesa all thankfully decried this notion. Olney said Rivera was allowed to have a bad day, Carton pointed to Teixeira’s drop of a line drive that would have ended the inning, and Francesa downplayed the importance of a Sunday game in May against a team the Yankees have owned in recent years.
3) Javier Vazquez is incapable of starting against the Red Sox, regardless of location. Monday morning, stories appeared stating that manager Joe Girardi planned on using Vazquez in the bullpen this week against the Sox and Rays to supplement a start. He struck out Kevin Youkilis on four pitches in the ninth inning — and was the winning pitcher — but even with that appearance, there’s a chance he may not start against the Mets at Citi Field Friday, in favor of the inimitable Sergio Meat Tray. If Vazquez is not good enough as a starter to get the Mets lineup out, in a National League ballpark, then why trot him out to the mound at all? That might be the kind of situation to get his confidence back.
In his postgame presser, Girardi got testy when the words “Javy Vazquez,” “skipped,” and “because of the Red Sox” were used in the same sentence.
“Absolutely not,” Girardi said. “I want to make this clear, OK?” His voice was stern and he was waving his hand in a karate chop motion. “He was not skipped because of that situation. Our bullpen is a mess. I needed a long guy today. We could not activate Chan Ho Park if you didn’t have a long man.”
Fine, but he was still skipped a second time during a Red Sox series. The reporter was right to ask the question. Girardi, to his credit, added that he didn’t want to use Vazquez because he still wanted to be able to start Vazquez on Friday, but with Joba Chamberlain unavailable after getting up twice to warm up on Saturday, and David Robertson unavailable, he had few options. After throwing just four pitches, Vazquez can still go Friday.
