Rangers vs. Tigers Game Thread.
Verlander to bring the heat.
Let’s Go Base-ball.
[Photo Credit: Bitchassbidness]
Tuesday
March 10, 2026
Since 2002
Category: 1: Featured
Observations From Cooperstown: The End of the Season
In the end it wasn’t the pitching that did in the Yankees, it was the hitting. The Yankees could not even score three runs in the most important game of the season. They managed only two runs–on a total of ten hits. It wasn’t for a lack of effort, but there wasn’t a clutch hit to be found the entire night, with the exception of Jorge Posada’s fourth inning single that loaded the bases before Russell Martin and Brett “The Jet” Gardner ended the inning with back-to-back pop ups. By my count, the Yankees missed at least seven or eight down-the-middle fastballs, pitches that were hittable, but ended up as nothing more than foul balls or called strikes.
In the three losses the Yankees sustained, they scored three runs, four runs, and two runs. When the games were close, the Yankees could not score enough. They won the blowouts, but they could not win the one and two-run games that are so prevalent throughout the season, or in this case, a short playoff series.
In a way, I’m not surprised. I’ve heard out-of-town broadcasters refer to the Yankees’ offense as a “powerhouse” or as a “juggernaut” or as “relentless.” My reaction to that is this: these guys didn’t watch the Yankees play much this season. The Yankees’ offense was hardly relentless. They didn’t even finish first in the league in runs scored; they finished second to the Red Sox, whose season went up in flames largely because their pitching staff exploded. The Yankees ran hot and cold offensively, they were very good at times, and they hit a lot of home runs, but they were sporadic with runners in scoring position. They were not a powerhouse. This was not the “Big Red Machine” or “Murderers’ Row.” Not even close.
So what do the Yankees need to do elevate the offense, particularly in the postseason? It would be helpful to break up the futile threesome of Alex Rodriguez, Mark Teixeira, and Nick Swisher, who once again failed to come up big in the playoffs. All of the blame tends to get put on A-Rod, but Tex has been as much of a black hole with his exaggerated uppercut and pull swing. (He needs to do some serious work with Kevin Long in the spring and get back to being the all-fields hitter he was in Texas and Anaheim.) A-Rod and Teixeira are not tradeable because of their long contracts, so it might be time to trade Swisher and make room for some new blood in right field. I like Swisher, and I love his enthusiasm, but his inability to hit in the postseason has become a problem.
It would also help the Yankees if they make Jesus Montero a featured part of their offense. There is no way that Jorge Posada will be coming back; even though he was one of the few hitters who showed up against the Tigers, he was unproductive for most of the summer and was inadequate as a DH. It’s time to get younger. Montero, who should have received more at-bats as a pinch-hitter against the Tigers, can move into the DH role and bat sixth or seventh from day one. He is the real deal offensively, a player who will hit for average and power, and it is time to stop sending him back to Scranton/Wilkes Barre. It is also time to stop shopping him for pitching. The Yankees need a better and younger offense, just like they need better pitching. They need to keep Montero.
This is not to say that the Yankees should make pitching a secondary priority. Regardless of whether CC Sabathia opts out of his contract, they need to think about free agents like C.J. Wilson and Edwin Jackson. They need to think about trading Swisher for a capable No. 4 starter and/or some left-handed help in the bullpen. And, to borrow a phrase from Bill Parcells, they need to take the Huggies off of Phil Hughes and let him pitch every fifth day and let him strengthen his arm by pitching more–not less. If the Yankees do these things, along with bringing Sabathia back, their starting pitching should be stronger in 2012.
In the meantime, we are left with a disappointing finish to a season. Unlike some, I don’t consider the season a total failure without a World Series championship. I can take some solace in Derek Jeter reaching 3,000, Mariano Rivera becoming the all-time saves leader, and the Yankees winning a division title in a year in which the Red Sox were supposed to be the team to beat.
So there is some consolation in that. I just hope that Brian Cashman and the Yankees don’t find too much consolation, because there is work that needs to be done to help the Yankees take three more steps in 2012.
Bruce Markusen writes “Cooperstown Confidential” for The Hardball Times.
Saturday Soul
Yeah, it’s a bummer how the Yankees’ season ended but can anyone remember a two-week stretch this late in the baseball season that’s been this good? Here’s hoping the Championship Series and Whirled Serious measure up.
[Photo Credit: Phelim Hoey]
Brew Ha: Got You All in Check
Brewers vs. Diamondbacks followed by Phils and Cards. Game Five.
Chat here.
[Featured image by: food addict]
No Bleepin’ Way
The latest chatter with the one and only Ted Berg.
In which SNY hits the bleep button.
Diggum, Smack
Another Yankee season is over. This was the ninth season that we’ve covered here at Bronx Banter and once again, it’s been too much fun, hanging with you, growing and living life with you. And we ain’t going anywhere. This is a 365-day-a-year jernt.
Keep coming back. We’ll keep diggin’ up the good stuff fuh ya.
Alex Rodriguez is the Devil
That’s a nice word for what he is. At least according to most of the people I’ve run across this morning. Garbage, choker, loser. Again, that’s the clean version.
The writers are taking their hacks too.
The one good swing he had in that bases loaded at bat–“that’s the best swing he’s had all series,” said Ron Darling–the pitch he fouled back, that’s the one that hurts. He’s their most expensive player so the criticism comes with the territory.
Last night, the Yanks were right there, and I kept waiting for the moment when we could all scream and yell with delight. It never came. Reminded me of the old joke about the sadist and the masochist.
Masochist says, “Beat me, beat me.”
Sadist says: “No.”
[Photo Credit: N.Y. Daily News]
Ah Ha: The Thing With Feathers
Would you believe the sun rose in the east this morning? It’s true. One of the great things about living in New York at a time like this is that you can find someone to commiserate with no problem. But also, there are so many New Yorkers that don’t care, not even a little bit, about what happened to the Yankees last night. And not because they are Mets fans or Yankee-haters but because they don’t know from baseball.
So it’s easy to lose yourself back in life. Yeah, I had some hard feelings trying to get to sleep last night–Alex Rodriguez striking out to end the game, Swisher whiffing with the bases loaded, Russell Martin on his tippy-toes after getting called out looking, man, how many fat pitches did they miss?–but soon they will fade away. Maybe not today or next week but soon enough. And of course, there is reason to be worried about Ivan Nova. But then, there is always something to worry about.
And we do have the memory of Mariano Rivera throwing nine pitches in the ALDS. And all of them were right on the money, weren’t they?
In the Books
On the line at Yankee Stadium tonight, the end of the season versus the glory of the ALCS. Agony or ecstasy in their undiluted forms. Nervous, excited? Sure. Not scared though, that’s not our thing.
Rookie Ivan Nova fired the ball at Austin Jackson to start the game and whatever butterflies were in my stomach were blown away by the gas same as Jackson.
Don Kelly stepped to plate and Nova continued to deal. With a strike to Kelly, he threw his wrinkle curve for the second pitch. Kelly opened up, waited and hooked the spinning orb into the right field seats. You’ve seen Paul O’Neill do it a bunch of times. Same little flick. The next pitch to Dangerous Delmon Young was a change-up. Good idea to the first-pitch-fastball loving Young, but up at the top of the strike zone, the change up is vulnerable. Young, the best hitter in this series from either team, killed it. 2-0 Tigers, and the butterflies returned hauling lead.
Derek Jeter led off the first for the Yankees by swatting a hot shot down the first base line but Miguel Cabrera fell and smothered it with his big belly. I wonder now how difficult a play that really was, but at the time I figured Jeter wuz robbed. The Yankees went quietly after that.
Nova battled with Magglio Ordonez to start the second. Nova kept throwing good pitches, but Ordonez eventually tugged at a low breaking ball and scalded it into the left field corner for a double. Nova retired Avila on a grounder to second and caught a break when Jhonny Peralta shot a bullet right to Alex Rodriguez for the second out. He struck out Ramon Santiago to end the threat. And his night, as it turns out. He had forearm stiffness and could not continue.
Nova was confident and he was aggressive. He threw strikes and looked good with his fastball. But he let up two home runs on poorly executed off speed pitches and put the Yanks in a hole. Nobody is going to blame Nova for blowing the season, but it would have been nice to give the Yanks a crack at drawing first blood.
Mark Teixeira hit a ground rule double with one out in the second. The Yanks could not move him around. Two backwards Ks made the inning especially frustrating. Phil Hughes replaced Nova in the third and had a great inning. He rang up two strike outs and he got Miguel Cabrera to ground out. The best part is that when facing Delmon Young, he merely yielded a laser beam single.
Gardner’s single and Granderson’s walk preceded Cano with two outs in the third. He got a tough strike call on the ump’s favorite corner (again, the lefty batter’s outside corner was given generously) and battled from there. He protected close pitches, though I have no idea if they would have been called strikes. I give Robbie the benefit of the doubt considering the previous calls. He got a couple of chances at hittable pitches and couldn’t produce. He flew out on a high heater to center to end the inning.
Hughes started the fourth and retired Victor Martinez. Ordonez smacked a fastball to right for a single and that was it for Hughes. How far could he have gone? He looked pretty sharp. But trailing 2-0 and a long winter of fishing for CC awaiting the Yankees, Girardi went to Logan to face the lefty Alex Avila. Avila was hitless in the entire series up to that point, so of course he hit the first pitch for a single. Logan got the righties though and the score stayed at 2-0.
Finally in the fourth, the Yankees looked dangerous. Alex walked and Swisher and Posada hit singles after a Teixeira pop out. Bases loaded. Russell Martin popped out. Brett Gardner popped out and the air went of the balloon with a sickening hiss.
CC Sabathia started the sixth facing Austin Jackson. In Game Three, they had several very frustrating match ups. Add another one to the list. Jackson hit a broken bat double on a pitcher’s pitch deep into the at bat. Sabathia responded to strikeout Don Kelly and Delmon Young, though he had to work for it. Girardi called for the intentional walk to Miguel Cabrera. Figure a homer by either Cabrera or Martinez was going to kill the game, so might as well make the less powerful guy end it. Sabathia threw a fat breaking ball down the middle and Martinez served right back into center field for a dreaded two-out RBI. The inning ended there, 3-0 Tigers.
Things looked grim at that point. But Fister did not look good enough to hold the Yankees down forever. He got two quick outs in the fifth and faced Cano. He threw a little cutter or slider toward the inside corner and Robinson turned on it like a woman scorned, launching it into the second deck. 3-1.
CC came back out for the sixth and retired Alex Avila. If Alex Avila could have batted for every single spot in the lineup, the Yankees would have thrown three shutouts and maybe two no-hitters. He walked Jhonny Peralta and gave way to Rafeal Soriano. It was the end of a very sad ALDS for CC. Hope it was not his last game as a Yankee. Soriano got a double play ground ball to clear the slate.
The Tigers went to pen to start the sixth, which I thought was a good idea. Fister had thrown 92 pitches and in a two-run game, no need to push things. Jim Leyland called on Game Two hero Max Scherzer. He looked less than he was in Game 2, but he still got the first two outs. Posada managed to ground another single for his sixth hit of a fantastic ALDS, but Martin whiffed on a change-up two feet inside.
The Detroit pitchers really had it made in this series – at least the two games I covered. The umps gave the pitcher’s a ton of latitude on that one corner, and every pitcher they trotted out had a natural fade right to that spot. The Yankee southpaws were left to swing at pitches on the outside corner or off the corner and not being sure where strikes ended and balls began. The righties had it even tougher, as they almost had to be hit by a pitch to get a ball called on the inside corner.
At this point, let’s just skip past the Platonic Ideal of the Yankee bullpen which retired 11 straight Tigers which ease from the sixth through the ninth. Precision and power; if you blinked, you missed them pitch. Soriano, Hammer, Sandman. Nothing but slack-jawed gawkers in their wake.
The Yankees loaded the bases with one out again in the seventh. Derek Jeter hit a slow grounder and hustled his ass-off for a hit. Joaquin Benoit replaced Scherzer to face Curtis Granderson. Granderson put on his best at bat of the night, worked the count full and guided a low outside pitch into right for a single. Jeter did not realize how deep the right fielder was playing, because he could have made it to third easily. He got there on the next pitch as Cano squeaked it off the end of the bat and it spun past Benoit for an unlikely hit. Bases loaded for Alex. He got one beautiful pitch right down the pipe and he fouled the fastball back. He swung through a change up well out of the strike zone for strike three. You could lick the disappointment oozing out of the Stadium.
Mark Teixeira came up next and took five straight pitches for a walk and a 3-2 game. All five pitches looked like balls, though the one called a strike was on the upper edge which usually does not get called. Benoit threw another five straight balls to Swisher, but this time he recorded a strike out for his troubles. The first pitch, which was both high and outside, was called a strike and it screwed up the rest of the at bat. Benoit just kept aiming near that same spot and Swisher finally swung at a couple of them. He missed.
The bottom of the eighth got quickly to Gardner with two outs. Somehow Benoit was still in there. I thought he was going to blow it on every fastball he threw. Gardner slapped a single through the hole and everybody knew a steal was coming. Benoit threw a high heater, Gardner broke, and Jeter swung. I was shocked, but the ball looked right off the bat. The kind of fly ball to right that just carries over the wall at the last instant. The right fielder Don Kelly got back to the wall and reached up his arms. Their was no kid to pull the ball into the stands, and Kelly caught it against the wall.
Should Jeter have let Gardner steal? My opinion is that when the tying or go ahead run is at the plate, he should have carte blanche to swing away. The best way to win the game is with a home run right there. Jeter almost got it. It was just an out and now I wish he hadn’t swung, but I trust the hitters to make the determination. If they can crush a pitch, they should swing. I don’t fault Jeter for that decision, he gave it a ride.
Trailing 3-2 entering the ninth, the Yankees sent their two best hitters to the plate against the guy who guaranteed he would beat them. It was a pretty great showdown. To beat the Yankees, Jose Valverde would have to beat their best. And if he brought that weak-ass shit he brought in Games Two and Three, the Yankees were going to beat him. The stage was set for a Yankee Classic.
But it never happened. Curtis Granderson worked a long at bat and got two pitches to hit. He fouled off the first one. He popped up the last one. He missed them, plain and simple. Pitches he’s tattooed all year long, he missed them. Robinson Cano got a sweet chance when the first fastball tailed right into his happy zone, but his lumber betrayed him. His swing looked pure, but on contact the bat came into two pieces and the ball lost crucial juice. It went all the way out to fairly deep center where Austin Jackson made the catch. I have no trouble imagining where that ball was headed had the bat maintained structural integrity. It was going to a happy place.
That left it up to Alex Rodriguez. Whatever good will that man built up in this town with his epic 2009 Postseason, he may have squandered tonight. Hopefully we’re not that fickle. He struck with the bases loaded and one out in the seventh when a hit would have tied the game. As the tying run, he struck out in the ninth to end the season. He took a low strike and watched a splitter float over the middle. He finally went right through a fastball down the middle.
*****
Having the season end in ALDS sucks beyond anything else, except not making it in the first place, or of course, losing to the Red Sox. I’d rather get stuck with the hideous memories of the ninth inning of Game Seven in Arizona than be eliminated like this. The Postseason stretches on endlessly, but it’s like a phantom limb for Yankee fans now. We can feel it out there, but we can’t see it, can’t touch it, can’t use it. Reality crashes in and our world opens up for other things to fill baseball’s void. But that happens anyway. A few more weeks was all we asked. And an honest chance at number 28.
All year long, I noticed that the Yankees win big and lose close. That’s the mark of a very good team. I wish they won more games when trailing late. Maybe that’s entirely a function of luck and timing which the players cannot control. The 2009 team did it all year long and then they did it in the Postseason and won a World Series. The 2011 team rarely did it in the regular season and failed in three comeback bids in the ALDS. Each time one swing of the bat at the right time would have won the game for the Yankees. But they never got that swing. In 2009, they easily could have been knocked out by the Twins or Angels if not for Arod’s heroics. If Jeter gets three feet more on his eighth inning drive, the Yankees are the team with heart and character. A few feet short and they’re overpaid losers.
The Yankees are the better team. I don’t think anyone could walk away from this series thinking the Tigers outplayed them. But CC Sabathia went head to head with Justin Verlander and got smacked down. CC got no decisions, but his performances in Game Three and Five went a long way to deciding the series for Detroit. The starting pitching scared many of us before the ALDS, but they Yankees were fine there. It was CC and the bats, scoring nine runs total in their three losses. Not cashing in on any of the big moments in all three losses. Legends were ripe for the making, but not this year.
I covered the end of 2010, and now the end of 2011. I think this is much, much worse than last year. Maybe that’s the fresh sting, but I’m sticking to it.
*****
Couple last things though, because this is baseball, and the Yankees gave us a good season and they don’t deserve to go out in a flood of piss and vinegar. Not what we wanted, given how they ended the year on top, but from where I started with this team, I give them mad props. Thinking they were a third place finisher who might catch a break and snag the Wild Card to winning 97 games at a trot, wow.
We probably will never see Jorge Posada play baseball again. He was one hell of a Yankee. I think ultimately he came up too late in his career to accumulate the numbers he’ll need to be ensrhined in Cooperstown, but I would support an even bigger honor. Having his number retired by the Yankees. What a wonderful ALDS. Thanks for everything Jorge.
And though it will be impossible not to take this loss with us into the upcoming off-season, be sure to take something else with you. Mariano Rivera in the ninth inning of Game 5. Has he ever looked better? He broke bats like match sticks. Martin never moved his glove even a hair. And his pitches spun and cut at breathtaking speed. Vaverde got three saves, got to celebrate, but Mariano reached Nirvana in his final inning of the 2011 season. Take that with you, too.
Do or Die
Down to this. One game. Score Truck, please. And Mariano.
Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Mark Teixeira 1B
Nick Swisher RF
Jorge Posada DH
Russell Martin C
Brett Gardner LF
Never mind the pit in the bottom of your stomach:
Let’s Go Yank-ees!
[Photo Credit: Zoo Y0rk]
Color by Numbers: Winner Take All
Sometimes, drama in baseball can be drowned out by the sea of 162 games. Even in the postseason, urgency can be limited by the margin for error built into a multi-game series. However, once it becomes winner-take-all, all bets are off and the tension really mounts.
Major League Baseball has gone years without a single sudden death game, but now it has already been blessed with three, a total that matches the last four seasons combined. Although the games that force a “double elimination” scenario can sometimes be more memorable (see Don Denkinger, Billy Buckner, and Steve Bartman), it is usually when both teams have their backs against the wall that legends are born in October.
Sudden Death Games by Season, Since the Advent of Divisional Play
Source: Baseball-reference.com
Perhaps the best example of a player going from relative obscurity to immorality is Francisco Cabrera, who, despite having fewer than 400 plate appearances in his career, earned a place in baseball lore by authoring one of the most dramatic moments in the sport’s history. Cabrera’s two-run single, which vaulted the Braves over the Pirates in game 7 of the 1992 NLCS, still reverberates to this day, and it’s easy to understand why. Cabrera’s game winning hit ranks as the highest WPA by any player in a sudden death postseason game, not to mention a single at bat (out of 1,934 games and 5,708 PAs). In other words, there has never been a more significant postseason turning point (which some might argue also reversed the course of the Pirates’ franchise).
Top-10 Sudden Death Games by a Batter, Ranked by WPA
Source: Baseball-reference.com
One year earlier, the Braves were on the other end of a historic, winner-take-all performance. Entering game 7 of the 1991 World Series, everyone expected a pitchers’ duel, but no one could have anticipated that length to which Jack Morris would go, both literally and figuratively. Morris matched zeros with John Smoltz for eight innings, but didn’t stop there. The right hander also shutdown the Braves in the ninth and then the tenth as well, giving his team a chance to squeak across a run and lay claim to victory in one of the most exciting World Series ever played.
By several measures, Morris’ epic game 7 stands out among all other sudden death games. Not only was the right hander the only pitcher to complete 10 innings under the pressure of a winner-take-all scenario, but he also recorded the highest WPA and second highest game score (a mark of 84 bettered only by Sandy Koufax’ 2-0 victory over the Twins in the 1965 World Series). In some people’s mind, on the basis of that game alone, Morris is deserving of enshrinement in the Hall of Fame. Although that point is debatable, what can’t be doubted is the inedible place Jack Morris holds in baseball’s long postseason history.
Top-10 Sudden Death Games by a Pitcher, Ranked by WPA
Source: Baseball-reference.com
For some, sudden death is about more than one moment. Legendary players like Mickey Mantle, Reggie Jackson, Yogi Berra, and Derek Jeter have all had several opportunities to play in October finales, and usually done quite well. However, all of those immortals still take a back seat to a very unlikely legend of the Fall.
Tony Womack’s career OPS+ of 72 is one of the lowest in baseball history among players with a similar number of at bats. At .212/.250/.276, his entire postseason record isn’t much better. And yet, despite his overall futility, the speedy Womack maintains the highest cumulative WPA among all hitters in sudden death games. Even though Luis Gonzalez’ blooper over a drawn-in infield is most often replayed, it was Womack’s game tying double off Mariano Rivera that defined the Diamondbacks’ clinching rally. Considering the relative ability of the two participants, Womack’s hit off Rivera could be the most improbable outcome in postseason history.
Top-10 “Clutch” Offensive Performers in Sudden Death, Ranked by Cumulative WPA
Source: Baseball-reference.com
Although WPA does a good job highlighting the most significant events during a game, it can obscure overall performance by penalizing a player for limiting his leverage by contributing earlier in the game. Using OPS as a barometer, the list of top performers in winner-take-all games looks much more reassuring. Led by Jason Giambi, this group includes several names often associated with clutch performances, which is probably how they earned their reputations in the first place.
Top-10 Offensive Performers in Sudden Death, Ranked by Cumulative OPS
Note: Minimum of 15 plate appearances.
Source: Baseball-reference.com
As previously mentioned, Jack Morris’ only foray into October sudden death was epic. Based on those 10 innings alone, the Twins’ right hander has the highest winner-take-all WPA among pitchers. Not surprisingly, Morris’ mound opponent that game, John Smoltz, ranks third. In three starts and one relief appearance, Smoltz compiled a WPA of .705 and miniscule ERA of .740 in 24 1/3 innings. Only Bob Gibson (2-1 in three games and 27 innings) and Roger Clemens (1-1 in five games and 26 2/3 innings) logged more face time in these crucial games, but their respective ERAs of 3.67 and 4.05 pale in comparison to Smoltz’ stinginess.
Top-10 “Clutch” Pitchers in Sudden Death, Ranked by Cumulative WPA
Source: Baseball-reference.com
As any red blooded player will tell you, individual performance always takes a back seat to the outcome of the game. Devon White probably doesn’t lose much sleep over his 0-6 in the seventh game of the 1997 World Series because the Marlins won the World Series anyway. Similarly, Jim Thome likely doesn’t take much pride in being one of only six players to hit two home runs in a sudden death game because his Indians lost the 1999 ALDS to the Red Sox. That’s why it’s always better to have a ring than a record in October.
No team has won, and lost, more winner-take-all games than the Yankees, who have gone 11-10 in deciding postseason games. Fans of the Bronx Bombers might be happy to know that the Tigers are 2-4. If Cardinals’ fans are looking for a good omen heading into tomorrow’s game 5 NLDS showdown with the Phillies, their team has gone 10-5 when push has come to shove. The Diamondbacks have also had some success in sudden death, winning both times they appeared in such a game, but this time around they won’t have Tony Womack to save the day.
Team Records in Sudden Death Games, By Series
Source: Baseball-reference.com
With three sudden death games on tap, it’s likely that some new postseason heroes, and perhaps a few goats, will be born. However, the real winner is major league baseball, which, fresh off a historic regular season end, seems poised for an epic postseason. Over the next two days. it’ll be winner take all, and six team are going all-in.
Top Notch
The Best American Sports Writing 2011 is out. Good news for us. This year’s edition of BASW is edited by Jane Leavy and features excellent work from the likes of S.L. Price, Sally Jenkins, Wright Thompson, Nancy Hass, Chris Jones, and Paul Solotraoff.
Here’s a sample of one of the best stories in the collection, a bonus piece by Mark Kram Jr. for the Philly Daily News:
CHICAGO – Quietly, Sonia Rodriguez got out of bed and padded into the other room, where the evening before she had laid out her clothes for work. It was Wednesday, 6:30 a.m., and her husband Paco was still asleep, the gray light of a cold Chicago dawn beginning to seep through the windows of the small house that the couple and their baby daughter shared with his parents. Sonia slipped into the outfit that she had picked out, brushed her hair and stopped back in the bedroom to look in on Ginette, who slept in the crib that was wedged against the wall. Sweeping up her purse, she glanced over at Paco and told herself she would phone him when he arrived later that day in Philadelphia. But as she stepped out the door he called to her.
“Oh?” he said, blinking the sleep from his eyes. “Are you leaving?”
She looked over her shoulder and said softly, “Yeah.”
“Come here,” Paco told her. Sonia walked over and sat on the edge of the bed. He reached up, drew her into his arms and said, “I want to say goodbye.”
Goodbyes were not easy for them. In the 5 years they had been together, they seldom had been apart. Even when they were still dating, he would stop by and see her at the end of the day, if only for an hour or so just to talk. But Sonia had not chosen to accompany her 25-year-old husband to Philadelphia, where that Friday evening Paco had a 12-round bout scheduled at the Blue Horizon with Teon Kennedy for the vacant United States Boxing Association super bantamweight crown. Boxing had become a sport that Sonia looked upon with equal portions of acceptance and disdain. She accepted it because of the passion Paco had for it, and even now says that boxing was who he was. And yet part of her held it in disdain and she had stopped attending his bouts because of it, unable to cope with the queasiness that would send her fleeing from her ringside seat whenever Paco would engage an opponent in a toe-to-toe exchange. So when he asked her if she would like to come along to Philadelphia, he was not surprised when she smiled and told him, “No, you go. But hurry back to me.” And he told her he would, adding as always, “I promise you.”
And here’s a bit from Howard Bryant’s profile of Dusty Baker:
CINCINNATI — “Light a candle,” Dusty Baker says, his lone voice softly skimming the looming silence of the empty church. “I’m sure there’s someone out there you want to pray for.”
He lights a candle, points the flickering matchstick downward in his large hands, the athlete’s hands, dousing it into the cool sand. It is here in the solitude of St. Peter in Chains Cathedral — funded by Ohio Catholics who donated 12 cents per month toward its construction in 1841 — where Johnnie B. Baker, born Baptist in California, raised in the traditions of the southern black church, kneels alone among the long pews and nourishes his spirituality.
After several moments of prayer, he rises and walks gingerly toward the altar, marveling at the Greek architecture, the Corinthian columns and stained glass mosaics, comforted, despite its bruises, by the sanctuary and the ritual of the church.
“I come in here before homestands, sometimes a couple of times a week during the season,” said Baker. “I pray for my family, for my team, and for Barack Obama, because I’ve never seen people try to take a president down like this, never seen such anger. I mean, what did he do to anybody?”
And from Gentling Cheatgrass, by Sterry Butcher in Texas Monthly:
THE MUSTANG HAS eyes that are large and dark and betray his mood. His coat is bright bay, which is to say he’s a rich red, with black running down his knees and hocks. He has a white star the size of a silver dollar on his forehead and a freeze mark on his neck. He cranks his head high as a rider approaches, shaking out a rope from a large gray gelding. The mustang does not know what is to come. His name is Cheatgrass, and he’s six years old. In May he was as wild as a songbird.
The little horse belongs to Teryn Lee Muench, a 27-year-old son of the Big Bend who grew up in Brewster and Presidio counties. Teryn Lee is tall, blue-eyed, and long-limbed. He wears his shirts buttoned all the way to the neck and custom spurs that bear his name. He never rolls up his sleeves. A turkey feather is jammed in his hatband, and he’s prone to saying things like “I was out yesterday and it came a downpour,” or, speaking of a hardheaded horse, “He’s a sorry, counterfeit son of a gun.” Horse training is the only job he has ever had.
Teryn Lee was among 130 people who signed up this spring for the Supreme Extreme Mustang Makeover, a contest in which trainers are given one hundred days to take feral horses from the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), gentle these creatures, and teach them to accept grooming, leading, saddling, and riding. Don’t let the silliness of the contest’s name distract from the difficulty of the challenge. Domestic horses can be taught to walk, trot, and lope under saddle in one hundred days; it’s called being green-broke. But domestic horses are usually familiar with people. The mustangs in the Makeover have lived on the range for years without human interaction, surviving drought, brutal winters, and trolling mountain lions. The only connection they have to people is fear. Age presents another challenge. A domestic horse is broke to saddle at about age two, when it’s a gawky teenager. The contest mustangs are opinionated and mature. The culmination of the contest is a two-day event in Fort Worth in August, where the horses are judged on their level of training and responsiveness. The top twenty teams make the finals. The winner takes home $50,000.
For Teryn Lee, however, there’s more at stake than money. Most of his clients bring him horses that buck or bully, horses that have developed bad habits that stymie or even frighten their owners. Teryn Lee enjoys this work, but his goal is to become a well-known trainer and clinician who rides in top reined cow horse and cutting horse competitions. To step up to that level, he’ll have to do something dramatic. Transforming a scruffy, feral mustang that no one wanted into a handsome, gentle, willing riding horse would make people take notice. Winning would get his name out there, he says.
The Best American Sports Writing 2011 can be bought here.
[Featured image photo credit via My Modern Met]
Drum Roll, Please…
In just less than 12 hours the Yanks and Tigers will begin Game Five of the ALDS. It is colder in Manhattan today than it’s been all week. October is here.
Man, it sure would be nice if the Yanks keep their season going. I figure Swisher and Teixeira to be the heroes tonight if the Bombers win. But count me as concerned, very concerned, about Doug Fister. And not as sure as other folks in Ivan Nova.
Nerves aside…tonight will be here soon enough, won’t it? Won’t it?
[Photo Credit: Adria Canameras]
End of the Line?
The Phillies and Brewers can advance tonight with wins. The Cards and D Backs look to force a deciding game.
Open thread, guys.
Let’s Go Base-Ball!
[Photo Credit: Kevin Dooley]
From Ali to Xena: 40
Brass Cannolis
By John Schulian
Every time I landed on a new show, my reputation preceded me. I was the ex-sports writer who had covered so much boxing that people must have thought I typed wearing eight-ounce gloves. Who better to write an episode about the fight racket? It happened that way on “Miami Vice” and when I freelanced an episode of Steven Bochco’s dramedy “Hooperman,” and I suppose I only called more attention to my past by setting a pilot and two screenplays in the world of boxing. The pilot was never shot and the screenplays never sold, but that was beside the point. I was still the guy to whom Muhammad Ali once said, “Pay attention, white boy.”
There was no escaping even at “Midnight Caller,” where I was reunited with my old amigo David Israel, who had covered more than enough fights to qualify for a boxing script. But I got the call. I dreamed up a Mexican boxer who had entered the country illegally and wound up in the clutches of a crooked boxing promoter. As soon as I concocted the promoter’s name – Ralston J. Cashdollar – I started hearing his voice in every line of dialogue I wrote for him. The voice belonged to Hoyt Axton, a rowdy, good-natured country singer who defined the expression barrel-chested. Whether he was doing a duet with Linda Ronstadt or breaking hearts solo with “Evangelina” or just getting silly with “Boney Fingers,” his music made me want to shake his hand. He’d done some acting, too, on TV in “WKRP in Cincinnati” and in movies like “Gremlins” and “The Black Stallion.” I pointed this out to anybody who would listen, and the next thing I knew, Hoyt was playing the promoter. It turned out to be a mixed blessing.
He was nothing if not great fun when he was offering people caramel-covered cashews he’d gotten from a woman in Ardmore, Oklahoma, or dipping into the leaf bag full of pot that he apparently never left home without. But when the time came for him to emote, it was a different story. He couldn’t remember his lines, couldn’t even come close. And every day the episode’s director, Jim Quinn, would call me from San Francisco, where we shot the show, and say, “Guess what the Hoytster did today.” It was funny if you were sitting in “Midnight Caller’s” offices in L.A., as I was. It was life shortening if you a director trying to get a serviceable performance out of Hoyt while the clock ate up the budget.
And yet his mangled dialogue contributed a grace note to his mind-bending time with us. He was supposed to tell our hero he had “some brass cojones.” Not the greatest line in the world, admittedly, but the scene called for it. And then Hoyt unconsciously improved on it – was he ever truly conscious? – by saying our hero had “some brass cannolis.” It stayed in the show, of course. I wish I could claim it as my own.
All in all, there was nothing I didn’t like about “Midnight Caller” except a balky, antiquated computer that I put out of its misery with a baseball bat. (True story. I wrote it for GQ and got fan mail from fellow Luddites everywhere.) After competing as sports columnists, Israel and I meshed perfectly, much to the surprise of Reggie Theus, the ex-Chicago Bulls star, who did a double-take when he saw us hanging out instead of bickering or posturing or whatever it was we’d done in the day. We knew we had a good thing going, and a major reason for that was “Midnight Caller’s” thoroughly professional star, Gary Cole, who has gone on to play, among other roles, Mr. Brady in the Brady Bunch movies and a whacked-out agent on “Entourage.” For us, Gary played an ex-San Francisco cop who had accidentally killed his partner and got a second chance by doing talk radio from midnight to 3 a.m. The kinds of stories we did were as varied as the people who called him, and the characters we came up with enticed a parade of wonderful guest stars to step off our wish list. In episodes that I wrote, the comedian Robert Klein played a burned-out 1960s disc jockey and Levon Helm, the drummer in the Band, played an ex-convict who wanted to go back to prison because it was the only place he knew how to exist.
No TV series is a love fest – too many egos and agendas for that – but “Midnight Caller” came as close to being one as anything I experienced. The writing staff was composed primarily of red-meat eaters, and the crew in San Francisco put together a hard rockin’ band, and our executive producer, Bob Singer, took undisguised pleasure in being in the middle of it all. He was a man of consummate good taste in hiring people whether they were actors, writers, gaffers, or go-fers. And when a certain writer turned in a script that showed he had no feel for the show, Bob zapped him with a line for the ages.
The writer provided the straight line when, in a last-gasp defense, he told Bob, “You know in your heart this is a great script.”
And Bob said, “Carlton, I don’t have a heart.”
It hurts when I mention “Midnight Caller” today and get a blank look in return. It was on NBC for three seasons and I wrote for it for the last two, but the people I find myself surrounded with apparently never noticed because they were watching the mewling yuppies on “thirtyomething.” The yuppies were our competition on Tuesday nights when I got to “Midnight Caller,” and we beat them in the ratings more times than you might think. But their demographics beat our demographics, so the network moved us to Friday nights, when our audience was out cashing paychecks, drinking in neighborhood saloons, or watching high school football. Our audience never came back, and ultimately neither did the show.
It was a dark day when “Midnight Caller” wasn’t picked up for a fourth season, but I had no idea just how dark until I went to work on the show that replaced it on NBC’s schedule, “Reasonable Doubts.” Going in, it looked like a potential hit, with Mark Harmon, a genuine TV star and a first-class guy, as a cop and Marlee Matlin, the deaf actress who won an Oscar for “Children of a Lesser God,” as a prosecutor. On top of that, Bob Singer, who created the show, was running things, surrounded by lots of familiar faces from “Midnight Caller.” Israel had moved on and I had signed on as co-executive producer after Bob told me he wanted “Reasonable Doubts” to be “dark and sexy.” I could do that, I thought, and I hired two terrific writers, Steven Phillip Smith and Kathy McCormick, who thought they could, too. They were perfect for the show. I couldn’t have been more wrong for it.
The worm turned when I handed in my first script. I assume it was dark and sexy, but I’ll be damned if I can remember what it was about. It has been banished to the depths of my subconscious, along with the pain I felt when Bob and I met with NBC and an executive with a reptilian smile ordered my script thrown out and the show reconfigured. The best I could understand, it was now supposed to be a weekly love letter to Marlee’s character. I didn’t do love letters. The only good memory I have from rest of that season is a two-parter about a rape that Bob and I co-wrote, a serious and honest piece of work by anyone’s standards. Other than that, I sat in my office with the door closed, unable to wrap my head around what the show had become, hating the fact that I was letting Bob down, and, most of all, counting the days until the season ended. The great run I’d had in my first six years in Hollywood was deader than the flowers on Marilyn Monroe’s grave.
Click here for the full “From Ali to Xena” archives.
The Grandy Man Can
If you want to know the truth, these recaps usually write themselves. Either you’ve got a ho-hum game that only needs a generic rehashing, or there’s a singular moment that leaps out as the obvious focal point of the story. This isn’t rocket science.
And then there’s a game like this one. Do you start with A.J. Burnett’s shockingly successful start? The eighth inning Score Truck delivery? The positive contributions of Alex Rodríguez, Nick Swisher, and Mark Teixeira?
Maybe we should start in the first inning. After folding quickly in the top of the first against Tiger starter Rick Porcello, the Yankees took the field in the bottom half behind A.J. Burnett. There’s no need to rehash the trials and tribulations of Mr. Burnett, so I’ll just sum it up like this: somehow it felt like the Yankees were behind before Burnett even threw his first pitch.
And then he went about the business of building a small fire. He walked lead off man Austin Jackson, but when Ramon Santiago popped up a bunt and Delmon Young grounded out to third, it looked like maybe our fears were unfounded. Maybe everything would be okay.
Nine pitches later, though, Burnett had walked the bases loaded. Don Kelly was at the plate, Cory Wade was warming in the bullpen, and the Fat Lady was warming in the wings.
Kelly took a ball, then laced a line drive directly at Curtis Granderson in center. Granderson took three or four quick steps in and to his left before realizing the ball would be over his head. He sprinted back towards straight away center, but the ball was just a bit faster. He leapt into the air, fully extended his left arm, and caught the ball just before crashing back to earth.
The inning was over, but it wasn’t hard to imagine what might’ve happened if Granderson hadn’t made that catch. With all three runners moving at the crack of the bat, the Tigers would’ve scored at least three runs on the play, and probably four. Girardi would’ve had to lift his starting pitcher two outs into an elimination game, and Yankee fans would’ve died a long, slow death over the ensuing eight innings. Thankfully, it didn’t happen that way.
The Yankees again went down meekly in the second, but a strange thing happened when Burnett took the mound again in the bottom of the inning. He was good. He needed only eleven pitches to retire the side in order on a grounder to third, another back to the box, and a swinging strikeout. He gave up a two-out walk in the third, but a harmless grounder to short by Miguel Cabrera ended the inning. The old A.J. made a brief appearance in the fourth and yielded a lead off homer to Victor Martínez and then a one-out double to Jhonny Peralta, but he recovered to strike out Alex Avila and Wilson Betemit.
By that point he was working with a lead. The resurgent Jorge Posada was hit by the first pitch of the third inning, and Russell Martin followed that with a single up the middle. If you were scripting a rally, you probably wouldn’t start out by putting a catcher on first and a old catcher on second, but two batters later Posada was jogging home and Martin was racing up his back to score on a Derek Jeter double. Posada scored standing up, but Martin needed a nifty slide to get around Avila’s tag and the Yankees were up 2-0.
Martin started another Yankee rally with another single up the middle to lead off the fifth. Brett Gardner slapped a single to left, and they looked to be in business. When Jeter followed with one of the worst bunt attempts you’ll ever see, allowing Porcello to nail Martin at third, it looked like it might be a lost opportunity for the Yankees.
Porcello had been cruising since his troubles in the first, but he had been helped tremendously by a generous strike zone. When Sabathia was on the mound last night, it was frustrating to see the blue TBS strike zone box riddled with pitches on the corners and edges of the zone that were called balls; it was equally frustrating to see so many of Porcello’s pitches land outside of the blue only to be called strikes. It was clear, though, that his lack of control would eventually do him in, especially since so many of his pitches were leaking up to the top of the zone.
He lost a pitch up to Granderson, and Curtis pounced on it, rifling it to the wall in right field, scoring Gardner and pushing Jeter to third. Tiger manager Jim Leyland made the obvious call and walked Robinson Canó to load the bases for Rodríguez. (Let’s think about that for a moment — he chose to load the bases for a man who’s hit more grand slams than any in the history of the game not named Lou Gehrig. Even so, it was the right decision.)
A-Rod was down 0-2 in the blink of an eye, but Porcello let another pitch drift up in the zone, and Rodríguez was able to get enough of it come up with a sacrifice fly for a 4-1 lead. Teixeira, whose postseason average with the Yankees continues to plummet, struck out looking to end the inning.
Burnett faced only three batters in the fifth, then retired Cabrera, albeit on a blistering liner to Jeter, and Martínez to open the sixth. When Kelly singled and Girardi came out to the mound, I was actually hoping he’d leave him in, perhaps the strangest thought I had all night long. But Girardi knew that Rafael Soriano, David Robertson, and Mariano Rivera were easily fresh enough to get the final ten outs, so he made the move.
Peralta was due up next, and he lifted Soriano’s first pitch towards left center field. This play wasn’t nearly as important as the one in the first inning, but it was spectacular. Granderson had been shading Peralta just to the right of second base, but he got an excellent jump on the ball. He was at full speed almost immediately and closed the gap with fifteen strides before going horizontal and making an incredible grab for the final out of the inning.
Granderson lay on the turf for a minute or two with the wind knocked out of him, but jogged off the field and returned to a hero’s welcome and an embrace from Burnett in the dugout.
Soriano blitzed through the Tigers in the seventh on eight pitches and the game seemed to be in hand. After the top of the eighth, it was out of hand. The Yankees sent eleven men to the plate and scored six runs — one on a balk, another on a wild pitch, and four others on singles by Jesus Montero, Gardner, and Canó. Yankees 10, Tigers 1.
And so the series comes back to the Bronx and everything is rosy again. The bullpen will be fresh, thanks to that eighth-inning outburst and Wednesday’s off day. The offense will be deeper and more potent, thanks to the resurgence of A-Rod. The Stadium will be louder than it’s been all year, thanks to the gravity of the moment. Most importantly, Ivan Nova will be on the mound.
So enjoy your day of rest today, but do so knowing that you’ll enjoy Game 5 even more.
[Photo Credits: Andrew Weber/US Presswire; Leon Halip/Getty Images; Duane Burleson/Associated Press]
Get Your Back Up Off the Wall
Down to this.
Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Mark Teixeira 1B
Nick Swisher RF
Jorge Posada DH
Russell Martin C
Brett Gardner LF
Never mind the praying:
Let’s Go Yank-ees!
[Photo Credit: Comic Book Artwork]
"This ain't football. We do this every day."
--Earl Weaver
--Earl Weaver