When I write a recap for this site, I always try to remember that I’m writing for two distinct audiences, those who watched every pitch, and those who did not watch at all. With that in mind, I have to give something of interest to those readers who already know everything I know about the game, but I also know that those who didn’t watch are looking for something more than they’d get in a generic recap over at the World Leader. They want to get a sense of the feel of the game, they want little details that would only be important to someone who lives and dies with the team. They want these one thousand words to make up for the three hours they weren’t able to spend in front of the television.

So how exactly do you do that for a game like this? Lemme give it a shot.

After registering a fairly convincing win over the Baltimore Orioles in the first game of Saturday’s split double header, the Yankees took no prisoners in the night cap as they scoretrucked the O’s, 17-3.

The home half of the first started out innocently enough, as Baltimore’s Zach Britton struck out Derek Jeter for the first out of the game. But here’s how the rest of the inning went: single, walk, single, error, double, single, single, single, single, pitching change, strikeout!, double, single, home run, walk, ground out.

It was 12-0, and the game was over — except that there were still eight innings left to play.

Ivan Nova was the beneficiary of all these runs, and unlike Phil Hughes a few days ago, he didn’t spit the bit. He made it through seven innings, allowing just two runs on six hits and a walk while striking out six. I listened to the radio feed for the first few innings, and John Sterling kept reminding us that you can’t really evaluate a pitcher when he has a fifteen-run lead, but if I were Phil Hughes, I’d be a little nervous.

Here are a few interesting notes from the game:

• Robinson Canó finished 5 for 5 with two doubles and 5 RBIs.
• Yes, I said RBIs and not RBI. Let’s all get over it.
• Zach Britton is one of the top prospects in the Baltimore system, but here’s the combined stat line from his last two starts, Saturday and July 8th against the Red Sox: 1.0 IP, 13 ER, 13 H. That’s an ERA of 117.00.
• Not surprisingly, Britton is the first player in major league history with back-to-back starts in which he allowed eight or more runs without completing the first inning in either start.
• All nine Yankee starters had a hit in the first inning (Canó had two).
• This was the first time the Yankees had ever scored twelve runs in the first inning.
• Rafael Soriano made his first appearance since May, striking out two to close out the game in the 9th.
• Contrary to several reports, this game will only count as one win.

The Yanks play two against the O’s today as the trading deadline enters the home stretch. Rob Neyer has a piece on the summer trade-a-thon in today’s New York Times:

The most important thing to know about baseball trades made in July is that most of them do not amount to much. Few of the stars traded to contenders will be the difference between winning and losing, and few of the young prospects traded for stars will become stars. Still, we have had a flurry of activity leading to Sunday’s deadline for nonwaiver trades (don’t ask), with stars like Carlos Beltran, and numerous lesser lights changing teams and kindling hope among their new teams’ fans.

And although most of these deadline deals are ultimately good for all parties — contrary to popular opinion, baseball executives are generally intelligent — there have been a few notably disastrous deadline trades over the years.

Meanwhile, at the Stadium, Bartolo Colon takes the hill.

1. Gardner CF
2. Nunez SS
3. Teixeira DH
4. Cano 2B
5. Swisher RF
6. Chavez 3B
7. Posada 1B
8. Dickerson LF
9. Cervelli C

Long day of baseball ahead of us. Stay hyrdrated and:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Photo Credit: Natasha Dominguez via Je Suis Perdu]

On July 28th, the St. Petersburg Times had nine journalists write about a game between the Yankees and Rays:

FIFTH INNING

Meter tells a story that the box score doesn’t

ST. PETERSBURG — In his taxi parked outside the stadium, Steven “Sven” Erikson cautiously admitted that he is not a big Rays fan. He followed the game on his laptop so he’d have something to talk about with his fares afterward.

In his 60 years, Erikson said he has been a wrangler in Colorado, sold men’s clothing in New York City, attended seminary in Pennsylvania and worked as a financial planner in Michigan. Tired of corporate culture, he moved to Treasure Island a couple of years ago and got a job driving a cab.

Some fans are giddy after a win, or despondent after a loss. Some drink too much and can barely remember where they live. A few offer an opinion on the Rays’ stadium debate. In the first inning, a woman who forgot to lock her car hired Erikson to drive her a mile to where she parked. She didn’t like the $5.80 fare and tipped him 20 cents.

Back in line, the Rays put two men on before Longoria hit it deep to center where Curtis Granderson snagged the ball at the wall.

The Yankees fans he drove home never mentioned it.

Chris Zuppa, Times staff writer

Most cool.

I’m a frequent traveler to New England, got in-laws stretching from Worcester, through Boston, up Cape Ann and into Maine. I lived in Boston one summer. And now I take long vacations there to visit family and friends.

I have never had a bad experience regarding my Yankee hat. Some light-hearted ribbing here or there. Most just ignore it completely. But there’s one caveat to this track record. Every time I’ve been up there for an extended period, the Yanks have been on top.

That summer I lived in Boston? 1998. I think they made it a Federal crime to pick on Yankee fans that year.

So I now I trek up for week’s vacation into the heart of Red Sox country wearing the lessor team’s hat. I wonder if they’ll treat me differently? I’ll let you know next week as I relay the choicest encounters leading up to the Yanks visit next weekend.

Could the Yanks figure out a way to take that series and get back in the Division race for reals? It would certainly make my return to New York all the sweeter.

AJ Burnett is now 31-33 since joining the Yankees.

AJ Burnett is like a golfer who shoots good scores, but has two or three bad holes per round that sully the scorecard. Friday night’s start was indicative of just that. Burnett, for the most part, was solid against a Baltimore Orioles lineup that has some punch. He pitched eight innings, struck out a season-high 10 batters, and walked only two. He ended five of the eight innings with strikeouts. That was the good. The bad: five poor at-bats led to four runs.

In the second inning, Burnett walked Derrek Lee with one out, and then left a fastball on the outer half to Mark Reynolds, who launched it over the right-center field fence into the Yankees’ bullpen. The same part of the order bit him in the fourth inning. Consecutive doubles by Vladimir Guerrero and Lee made it 3-0. In the sixth, Lee victimized Burnett yet again, this time with a home run to right-center. That blast completed the Orioles’ scoring.

Overall, Burnett’s night was the equivalent of shooting 74 or 75, with five or six birdies, but a bunch of bogeys submarining what could have been a fantastic round.

Paul O’Neill summed up Burnett’s night perfectly during the top of the ninth inning on the YES telecast: “AJ Burnett didn’t make too many mistakes tonight — far fewer than in his last game — but the mistakes he did make ended up going for home runs and doubles.”

The loss left Burnett winless in July. It is the third winless month in his Yankees career. How goofy of a season has this been for Burnett? Friday marked the third time this season that he’s pitched into the eighth inning. The Yankees have lost each of those games, and Burnett has been the pitcher of record.

The burden of the 4-2 defeat should not fall squarely on Burnett, though. It was the type of game that if the vaunted Yankees offense did anything to support him, the outcome would have been different. Jeremy Guthrie, a pitcher the Yankees have owned over the last two years, turned the tables and was in complete control. Of the 69 strikes Guthrie threw, 19 were called strikes and 21 were foul balls. He had mid-90s velocity on his fastball with good movement, and he changed speeds effectively to keep the big bats off balance.

Watching the game, the telltale sign that it would not be the Yankees’ night was that the second and third time through the order, usually when they make minced meat of pitchers like Guthrie, the grinding at-bats the Yankees are known for didn’t yield positive outcomes — Mark Teixeira’s solo home run in the sixth inning notwithstanding. When they did put runners on base, Guthrie made a pitch to get the Yankees out. They were 1-for-9 with runners in scoring position; a common refrain when analyzing Yankees losses over the course of this season.

A ninth-inning rally against Kevin Gregg fell short when Brett Gardner, who swung through nearly every hittable pitch that came his way in previous at-bats, capped an 0-for-5 performance by striking out swinging to end the game. The key pitch in the at-bat was the fastball Gregg threw with the count at 3-and-1. Gardner thought it was outside for ball four. Gardner turned toward first base and was three steps up the line when home plate umpire Mike Dimuro called the pitch a strike and ushered Gardner back the batter’s box. Replays confirmed the pitch was off the plate by a few inches, but it was too close to take.

Following the whiff, Gardner slammed his bat on the ground in frustration, cracking it in half. Given that the Red Sox lost to the White Sox and another chance to cut into the 2 1/2-game deficit was wasted, they should be frustrated.

Yanks vs. the O’s. Four games. Preview, Clifford.

1. Gardner LF
2. Jeter SS
3. Granderson CF
4. Teixeira 1B
5. Cano 2B
6. Swisher RF
7. Chavez 3B
8. Posada DH
9. Martin C

Never mind the competition, just win, baby and:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Photo Credit: the most gifted Joel Zimmer]

Oh, Raquel.

[Top picture via forums france2]

Hey Now Friday, from that drooltastic site, Worship The Feminine.

R.I.P. Jerome Liebling. He will be missed.

Butterfly Boy, 1949.

The trade rumors continue to swirl. Yanks in the mix on many fronts, or none at all.

No game tonight so schmooze-away.

[Photo Credit: David Tribby]

There is a report (in Japanese) that former Yankee pitcher Hideki Irabu is dead. It is believed that he committed suicide.

[Photo Credit: Friday 1970]

Yo, I was on Jesse Goyd’s Buckshot Boogaloo Podcast recently where we talked about Lucian Freud, Francis Ford Coppola and Mariano Rivera. Dig it.

Henri Matisse

Robinson Cano has always had one of the sweetest swings in the big leagues. Even as a rookie, he was often compared to seven-time batting champion Rod Carew, but a lack of plate discipline always prevented him from reaching his full potential. In 2010, however, Cano finally put it all together. Or so it seemed. A year after establishing himself as one of the top position players in all of baseball, Cano has again taken a step back. This year, he barely ranks among the game’s best second basemen.

Top-10 Second basemen, Ranked by Average WAR

Note: AvgWAR = bWAR + fWAR/2
Source: baseball-reference.com and fangraphs.com

The most noticeable area in which Cano has regressed is plate discipline. In 2010, the free swinging second baseman worked a walk in 8.2% of his plate appearances, but this season, he has returned to a rate of 4.5%. Although it should be noted that 14 of his career-high 57 walks in 2010 were intentional (this year he has only received four), Cano’s overall approach in 2011 has reverted back to a relative lack of selectivity, which in turn has seemingly resulted in less production.

Looking at Cano’s plate discipline statistics can be a bit misleading. For example, in 2010, when he had his best season and highest walk rate, the All Star second baseman also swung at what was then a career-high percentage of pitches out of the strike zone. For that reason, it’s hard to confidently blame his 2011 regression on this year’s rate, which at 39.8% is even higher than last year’s. However, maybe, the issue isn’t that Cano is swinging at too many pitches out of the zone, but the count in which he is doing it?

Robinson Cano’s Plate Discipline Breakdown, 2005-2011

O-Swing%= pitches a batter swings at outside the strike zone; Z-Swing% = pitches a batter swings at inside the strike zone; O-Contact% =  times a batter makes contact when swinging at pitches outside the strike zone; Z-Contact% = times a batter makes contact when swinging at pitches inside the strike zone; Zone% = pitches seen inside the strike zone.
Source: fangraphs.com

What jumps out most from Cano’s 2011 count-based splits is how poorly he has performed when he should be in the driver’s seat. In 134 plate appearances with the pitcher in a hole, Cano has only managed a very pedestrian line of .304/.403/.530, which equates to a situational OPS that is 5% below average. This level of underperformance is even more dramatic when you consider extreme hitter’s counts, such as after working the count to 3-0 and 3-1. In such instances, Cano has posted a sOPS+ (OPS relative to league average in the split) of 72 and -3 (!), respectively. For comparison, Cano’s 2010 sOPS+ in those counts were 109 and 137.

Robinson Cano’s Splits by Count, 2010 vs. 2011

Note: The baseline for OPS+ is 100. For example, a score of 105 is considered to be 5% above average.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

In just about every count favoring the batter, Cano has underperformed last year’s output, in some instances by a dramatic margin. In fact, the All Star second baseman rates below average after working his way into every hitter’s count but 1-0 and 3-2. On the flip side, Cano has remained well above average in every pitcher’s count but 0-1. Considering his ability to make good contact on pitches off the plate, the latter isn’t much of surprise. However, Cano’s significant decline in hitter’s counts is certainly perplexing.

Based on the data above, Cano’s troubles haven’t resulted from an inability to work the count. Rather, things have gone awry once he has reached a favorable position. Without access to more granular plate discipline data, it’s hard to explain why this might be. After all, a hitter with Cano’s ability should feast on pitchers who have to throw him a strike, just as he did in 2010. However, based on observation (which, admittedly, is inherently flawed), it seems as if pitchers have been reticent to challenge Cano when behind in the count. One reason for this development could be Cano’s own reptutation, which was greatly enhanced by his MVP-caliber 2010 campaign, although the relative weakness of the hitters batting behind him in 2011 probably hasn’t helped (Yankees’ sixth place batters have hit .219/.317/.344). Whatever the reason, pitchers now seem more than happy to walk Cano. Unfortunately, he hasn’t been as willing to take it.

In order to return to the more prolific output of 2010, Cano will need to once again refine his approach at that plate. Otherwise, the Yankees will have to settle for a more muted level of production from their second baseman. Although the current incarnation of Cano is not a bad consolation prize, 2010 proved that he can be even better. Cano still has the sweet swing of Carew, but, like the Hall of Famer, can he develop more patience?

I missed “Cedar Rapids” when it was in the theater but caught it on TV last week. It is a modest movie without being precious about its smallness. There were no hilarious set pieces but it didn’t lag. It was crispy and tidy and altogether satisfying. A sweet nothing that is worth your time.

Michael Cuddyer of the Twins has a flickr page. Check out his pictures.

Oh, Ms. Bardot.

Well, it wasn’t going to last forever, was it? The M’s had to win sometime. Phil Hughes didn’t pitch poorly. He went six innings and was trailing 2-1 when the bullpen took over, the Yankee defense stumbled, and the Mariners hopped, jumped and skipped to a 9-2 win.

Tomorrow gives a day of rest then four games against the O’s this weekend.

[Photo Credit: particular particules]

It’s King Felix vs. Phil Hughes this afternoon and the smart money has the M’s ending their losing streak.

But, stranger things have happened.

Brett Gardner LF
Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Mark Teixeira DH
Robinson Cano 2B
Nick Swisher RF
Russell Martin C
Jorge Posada 1B
Eduardo Nunez 3B

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Picture by Bags]

Schulian vs. Israel, or Vice Versa

By John Schulian

Once the word got out that the Daily News was going belly up, life got real interesting.The Tribune took another run at me, a serious one this time, and the Sun-Times wanted me, too. But the brain trust there had a fallback plan if I jumped: they would hire my old friend David Israel. If I landed at the Sun-Times, the Tribune would hire him.

I don’t know how the executives we were dealing with felt, but Israel and I had a hell of a good time. We told each other what the kind of money we were being offered, and we wound up settling for pretty much the same deal, Israel at the Trib and yours truly at the Sun-Times, which was where I belonged. The people who were running the paper were the same ones who had hired me at the Daily News. It was great to tweak their noses-–you’ve got to keep the big cheeses honest, you know-–but it also would have been severely bad form to turn my back on them a little more than a year after they gave me the chance of a lifetime.

The end result of all the wooing and courting was supposed to be a showdown: Schulian vs. Israel, or, if you prefer, Israel vs. Schulian. All I can tell you is that I did what I did and he did what he did, and we were both damn good at it. We weren’t going to make anybody forget Red Smith and Jimmmy Cannon battling for the heavyweight championship of New York’s sports pages, but we gave the people what was probably the best show of its kind for the next couple of years.

Israel made the Trib’s sports section better by walking in the door. With his brains and writing talent, he forced the sleepwalkers on the staff to step up and do better work.He still loved to stir things up, too, especially when he was ripping Larry Bird, who was an uncommunicative dolt in college. And yet Israel wasn’t as outrageous as he’d been when he was the Washington Star’s enfant terrible. Maybe he had outgrown that stage, or maybe he was already looking for a life beyond sportswriting. He’d seen Dan Jenkins and Bud Shrake make the jump from Sports Illustrated to doing books and movies, and he wanted to do the same. After the 1981 Final Four, he left the Tribune to take a job as a city columnist at the L.A. Herald Examiner. It was his first step toward a new life in Hollywood.

I thought he’d made a smart move, but even though I’d had show business in the back of my mind since I was a kid, I still saw myself as a newspaperman. There was something exhilarating about writing four columns a week and having a magazine piece to do on the side. I was making more money than I ever dreamed of (but never as much as some people thought I was), and I’d be a liar if I said I didn’t like the awards and kind words, too.

Just when I’d start to need a bigger hat, though, I’d have one of those days where, to borrow a line from Red Smith, I didn’t have anything to say and I didn’t say it very well. Amazing how something like that can remind you how great you aren’t.

Click here for the full “From Ali to Xena” archives.

Here is W. C. Heinz’s most famous newspaper column:

Two generations later, writers are still deconstructing Heinz’s work to figure out how he got everything so right. And we return to “Death of a Racehorse” because it is about economy, precision, and restraint. And it was written on deadline. Jeff MacGregor, who wrote a memorable piece about Heinz for Sports Illustrated, once called the column, “the Gettysburg Address of sportswriting. A run of words so slender and moving that nothing can be added or taken from it.”

In a message board chat, MacGregor added:

There’s so much going on here that’s remarkable, let’s just talk a little about story architecture. Check the meter and the sentence length at the beginning. And then at the end. Compare the sentence, “‘Air Lift,’ Jim Roach said. ‘Full brother of Assault.'” to the last sentence in the piece. Compare the long sentence beginning “Assault, who won the triple crown…” to the last sentence in the piece. Notice the reiteration of the statement, “Full brother of Assault,” in the middle of the piece.

The column is built a little like a poem or concerto. Certain meters and phrases recur and repeat. Heinz knows going in how he wants the column to land, so he front loads the phrase “Full brother of Assault,” then reinforces it again halfway along. By the time he strings together that last long sentence, with its inexorable drive, those now-familiar meters and phrases have the rhythm and power of music in them, and the story resolves, like a great song, on a chord that is not only completely satisfying, but at once surprising and inevitable. Hence the chill most people feel when reading it.

This piece is a tiny, nearly perfect machine of art and engineering. There’s a lot to learn here about story structure, and lyric, and what’s possible in only a small space. Heinz learned a lot of that from Hemingway. Heinz’s powers of observation and description and his matchless ear for dialogue are his own, of course, but he was a true student of Hemingway’s work, and often reread him very closely in order to figure out exactly how a certain effect had been achieved.

So maybe part of the lesson here is that to become better writers, we need to become better readers.

Chris Jones, in an appreciation for the Nieman Storyboard, writes:

Heinz never makes the mistake of telling us too much, of becoming sentimental or maudlin. We see the blood. We hear the jockey’s crying. We shiver with each clap of thunder and the coming rain. These are the only things that matter in the world.

…He doesn’t do much else to set the scene. Yes, he describes some of the crowd, but only vaguely. He describes the coming storm. But he hasn’t written so much as he’s reported. Nearly every sentence in this story contains a fact and that’s about it. There are no metaphors or similes, unless you count his note that the gun is shaped like a bell. There are very few adverbs, and every quote is said – not exclaimed or opined or bleated. And in this place where this horse died, there was a pile of loose bricks.

Finally, back in 2008, Gare Joyce wrote a fine portrait of Heinz for ESPN. Worth checking out.

My grandfather gave me his copy of “The Elements of Style” in 1988 when I was a junior in high school. The edition was published in 1959. I keep it on my night table and return to it often. “Death of a Racehorse,” understated and beautifully crafted, is like that.  Something to revisit to see how it’s supposed to be done.

“Death of a Racehorse” is reprinted with permission from Gayl Heinz.