This is how winning streaks are built–by winning the close ones. The Yanks snatched victory from the jaws of defeat on Friday and they survived a shaky outing from their set-up relievers, and got big time contributions from the Boras Boys, Mark Teixeira and Alex Rodriguez, to beat the Twins in extra innings on Saturday afternoon, 6-4.

The M&M boys from Minnie did their thing too–Joe Mauer homered for the second straight day and Justin Morneau hit his third dinger of the series (and his second against Phil Coke), but the Yankees’ demolition duo got the last laugh.

During the broadcast, Paul O’Neill said that the team hasn’t defined itself yet and I couldn’t agree more. It’s hard to figure who they are yet. For all of their top-shelf talent, they are not a crisp team fundamentally; Melky Cabrera made a crucial mistake, over-throwing the cut-off man, in the eighth, which allowed the go-ahead run to score. I also get the feeling that too many of the hitters are tantalized by dreams of the home run highlight in big spots (Nick Swisher, I’m looking in your direction). Nevermind the mess in the bullpen–had the Yanks lost the game, I was going to title the post “Where’s that confounded bridge?”

Still, they’ve won plenty of games in the late innings this year, haven’t they? That’s got to count for something.

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Watching Friday night’s game I was struck by just how difficult it is to play the game and remain healthy. First, there was the play at first base where Carlos Gomez almost took Mark Teixeira’s hand off. “That’s twice,” shouted an angry Teixeira to Gomez (I didn’t catch the first incident). Teixeira does not strike me as a red ass, which made his outburst more compelling. He knew how close he was to being seriously hurt (I looked away from the TV when they showed the replay of Bubba Crosby running through Brian Roberts’ left arm several years back). Then in the ninth, Brett Gardner slipped on first base and wiped out, his legs getting tangled like a young Colt. Nothing twisted or turned, Gadner recovered and still managed to reach third.

None of this shows up in the box scores, of course. But they were both hold-your-breath moments. Fortunately, nobody came up lame.

This afternoon, Joba Chamberlain, who, according to the New York Times, is trying a new pre-game routine, hopes to lead the Yankees to their fourth-straight win.

It is cool, foggy, and wet in the Bronx today, with rain in the forecast. 

Perfect day some of this…Break it down, Biba:

Finally Friday.  I’m goin to the record shop.

Dig this Demo:

Then I’m off to Brooklyn for barbeque and the Yankee game with Johnny Red Sox. Be nice to see A Rod crack one tonight. And it’d be cool if Phil Hughes can throw a good game too.

Am I right or what?

Francisco Cervelli, who was struggling to maintain sea level against Double-A pitching, has looked competent as a major league hitter, but it is his catching skills that draw the majority of my praise. After watching Cervelli catch two games against the Orioles last weekend, I came away thoroughly convinced that he’s a keeper. From a defensive standpoint, Cervelli does everything you want a catcher to do. He squarely sets his target, and as he receives the pitch, he frames the ball skillfully, holding his glove in place in order to give the home plate umpire a longer look. (In contrast, some Yankee fans might remember the way that Matt Nokes jerked his glove back toward home plate, which is just about the worst way to frame pitches.) Cervelli moves smoothly and quickly behind the plate, allowing him to backhand wide pitches and block those thrown in the dirt. On stolen base attempts, Cervelli comes out of his squat quickly and follows through with strong and accurate throws to second base.

On the offensive side, Cervelli will probably never hit with much power, but he is patient at the plate and willing to take pitches to the opposite field. If Cervelli can mature enough offensively to become a .consistent 270 hitter who continues to draws walks, he will become a very good backup catcher. That might sound like an example of damning with faint praise, but solid No. 2 receivers have become like gold in today’s game. There are only a handful of standout backup catchers in either league: Chris Coste in Philadelphia, Henry Blanco in San Diego, Kelly Shoppach in Cleveland, and Mike Redmond in Minnesota. Cervelli has a chance to become the Yankees’ best backup catcher since a fellow named Joe Girardi, who last played a game in pinstripes in 1999. Yes, it’s been that long…

As uneven as the Yankees’ play has been through six weeks, they haven’t experienced the same kind of schizophrenia displayed by their Triple-A affiliate, the Scranton Yankees. The Scrantonians began the International League season by winning 23 of first 28 games, and they did so by clubbing the opposition with a powerhouse offense. Then came Scranton’s recent four-game stretch. Through Wednesday night, Scranton’s offense had failed to score a run in 44 consecutive innings—a simply remarkable run of futility. The Triple-A Yankees have suffered four consecutive shutouts, in addition to six scoreless innings left over during a previous loss last Saturday. Suddenly, Scranton’s record is a more earthly 23-10.

So what happened? As with the major league Yankees, injuries have hit Dave Miley’s team hard. Second baseman Kevin Russo and outfielders Shelley “Slam” Duncan and John Rodriguez, representing a third of Scranton’s starting nine, are all hurt. And the healthy players are slumping, none worse than third baseman and former No. 1 pick Eric Duncan. Duncan was wallowing in an oh-for-33 hammerlock before finally breaking out with a double on Wednesday. The slump, which dropped Duncan’s average from .309 to .206, probably cost Duncan what little chance he had of a promotion to the Bronx.

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 “I’m sorry, guys,” Oritz said. “I don’t feel like talking right now. Just put down, ‘Papi stinks.’ ”
(Boston Globe)

Mark Teixeira has not hit well so far this season.  After one week, Alex Rodriguez is not there yet.  The Yanks are a .500 team.  The Red Sox, however, are playing relatively well while getting nothing from David Ortiz.  It has gotten to the point where you have to wonder if Ortiz, a proud bear of a man, will ever be half-the player he was in his prime.  Yesterday, he reached a new low, stranding twelve runners on base.  Mo Vaughn, your life is calling.

Couple of big dudes on the mound on Thursday night in Toronto. You know from CC, baseball’s answer to Andre the Giant. But Brian Tallet, is just as tall and he looks even taller because he’s not as wide as Sabathia. Sporting a scrubby mustache, Tallet looks like he stepped out of a time machine from 1987. He could be Frankie Viola’s cousin, or an extra from the movie Copland.

Either way, both men pitched well, each allowing just a couple of runs. But Sabathia was just that much better as the Yanks earned a satisfying 3-2 win over the Jays. There wasn’t much hitting. Alex Rodriguez’s timing is not back fully–he hit a couple of deep fly balls and put some good swings on a few other pitches that he just fouled off and was robbed of a double by Scott Rolen. But Brett Gardner made a nice throw from center field and scored the game-tying run in the seventh (he was driven in on a classic bloop single to right by Derek Jeter).

Hideki Matsui’s solo home run was the difference and our man Mariano Rivera worked a perfect ninth, striking Rod Barajas out swinging to end it.

The Yankees improve their record to 17-17 and finish the six-game road trip 4-2.

Baby steps, but it’s a start.

We’re all waiting for the Yanks to go on a run. That would entail winning a mess-o-games in a row. They’d have to start with tonight. Tonight would be nice.

Roy Halladay dominated the Yanks two nights ago. Time for CC Sabathia to return the favor. His last start was stellar. He’s expected to be on par tonight.

C’mon, big fella. You’re the Rock.

I still love this scene.

Another old friend of Bronx Banter, poet, historian, and editor, Glenn Stout, has just started a blog. Glenn’s new book, Young Woman and the Sea: How Trudy Ederle Conquered the English Channel and Inspired the World, the story of the first woman to swim the English Channel, is due out this summer. I’m in the middle of reading it. Did you know that women were not allowed to swim during the Victorian Age? Thinking about it now, it makes sense, but man, I never knew that. Terrific book, by the way, and not just for young women. I’ll get together with Glenn to talk about it as the release date approaches.

For now, bookmark Glenn’s blog, Verb Plow. He’s sure to fill it with thought-provoking goodies.

Jeff Pearlman, author of one of two new books about Roger Clemens, wasn’t impressed with the Rocket’s performance earlier this week on ESPN radio.  No suprise there, but I have to admit, I like the defiance that Clemens is displaying.  It may be pathetic, delusional, or both, but it is keeping in line with his personality, and for that reason, I think it’s amusing as hell.  Clemens has turned into Slim Pickens riding the bomb.

Hey, don’t mess with Texas, right?

I caught this goodness over at Baseball Think Factory.

Check it out.

No, this man will not be the next catcher signed by the Yankees. As much as the Yankees’ catching corps has been overwhelmed by injuries, they’re not that desperate. Close, but not quite.

Contrary to appearances, Larry Haney was not a left-handed throwing catcher. It only looks that way in this 1969 Topps card. In contrast to the way that Hank Aaron and Dale Murphy achieved baseball card glory by being featured in reversed negative photographs, Haney earned only a momentary glimpse of trading card fame. In 1957, Topps released an Aaron card that showed the eventual home run king in a left-handed batting pose. And then in 1989, Upper Deck issued its Murphy card with a similarly wrong-handed pose, again the result of the photo negative being accidentally reversed.

Haney never received as much attention as either of these more celebrated cases, in large part because of his mediocre status as a good-field, no-hit backup catcher. There might have been another factor at play here, as well. Some collectors might have thought that Haney was trying to gain some notoriety by intentionally wearing a left-handed catcher’s mitt and pretending to play the position with the wrong hand. Yet, a conversation with former Topps president Sy Berger, who visited the Hall of Fame several years ago, revealed otherwise. Topps simply made a mistake in its photo processing; Mr. Haney had nothing to do with the “error.” In fact, the 1969 card features the same photo that was used by Topps in the 1968 set. Only that time Topps had the image right.

In many ways, Haney was the Jose Molina of his era. A lifetime .215 hitter with no power, Haney excelled at the defensive side of the game. For his career, he threw out 39 per cent of opposing basestealers. The Oakland A’s thought so much of Haney’s catching skills that they acquired him three different times, including twice during their world championship run from 1972 to 1974.

Originally signed by the Orioles in 1961, Haney played sparingly in three seasons for the Birds. After being taken in the 32nd round of the 1968 expansion draft by the Pilots, Haney appeared in only 22 games for Seattle, but did stake two claims to fame in the Great Northwest. He hit a game-winning home run in his first major league game. Later on, he set a Pilots team record for catchers by committing two errors in one game. Such uncharacteristic defensive pratfalls probably played little influence in the Pilots’ decision to trade him on June 14, 1969 (just before the old trading deadline), as they shipped the veteran receiver to the A’s for second baseman John Donaldson. From there, Haney went to the Padres’ organization (but never actually donned the lovely brown and yellow of the Pods), then came back to the A’s, spent a brief time with the Cardinals, came back to the A’s yet again, and finished his career with the Brewers in 1977 and ’78. Long since retired as a player, Haney worked for years as a scout for the Brewers—who used to be the Pilots, the same team featured on that 1969 Topps card.

Coincidentally, Haney was involved in another card error, albeit of a different kind. His 1975 Topps card displays an in-action photograph of an Oakland catcher awaiting a throw at home plate, but it’s not Haney in the picture. It’s actually former A’s catcher Dave Duncan, who had long since been traded away to the Indians as part of the George Hendrick-Ray Fosse swap.

So for a guy who had a mostly unremarkable career as a backup catcher, that’s two significant error cards. At least the card collectors will never forget Mr. Haney.

Bruce Markusen writes “Cooperstown Confidential” for MLB.com. He can be reached via e-mail at bmarkusen@stny.rr.com.

Bronx Banter Interview

Our old pal Allen Barra sat down with me recently to talk about his new book, Yogi: Eternal Yankee.

Bronx Banter: You make the argument that Yogi was a better catcher than Johnny Bench. How close was Roy Campanella to Yogi during the Fifties? Was there any catcher even close to these two at the time?

Allen Barra: In Rio Bravo, Walter Brennan asks John Wayne if Ricky Nelson is faster than Dean Martin. “I’d hate to have to live on the difference,” says Duke. The real truth is that if you take Campanella at this peak, there’s probably very little difference between Berra, Bench and Campy. The only thing I might add to that is that it’s possible that, if given the same material to work with, Johnny and Roy could have gotten as much out of as many mediocre pitchers as well as Yogi did. But Yogi did do it, and that has to give him the edge.

BB: Did Yogi really deserve the 1954 and ‘55 MVP awards? In ‘54 the Indians won and Bobby Avila had a big year, also playing a key defensive position, and Mickey Mantle had a monstrous year. And in ’55 Mantle again had another ridiculous year.

AB: That’s a tough question. I don’t know if anyone’s done a “Value over Replacement Factor” kind of analysis for those years, but it’s arguable that Yogi might have had the highest value over anyone who could have replaced him at that position. In 1954 my guess is that the difference between Mantle and Berra wasn’t that great. Avila played a key defensive position, but not more key than Yogi’s. It probably should have been Mantle in ’55, but then I think there’s an equally good case that it probably should have been Yogi in 1950 instead of Phil Rizzuto. What’s interesting is that so many people thought that it should have been Yogi those years. I think that tells us something very important about him.

BB. Was there any year that Yogi should have won an MVP when he didn’t?

AB: Well, as I just mentioned, there was 1950. And you could turn the ’54 argument on its head and ask why Al Rosen, an Indian, wins the MVP [in 1953] when Yogi’s team won the pennant. I’m not saying Rosen didn’t deserve it, I’m just saying that if Yogi had won it, nobody would have gone to the barricades to say he didn’t deserve it, and I’d argue that he was also one of the top five players in the league in 1952. It’s more difficult to figure the value of a top-flight catcher. He did so many things to hold his pitching staffs together back then, I just don’t know if you can figure his worth compared to payers at other positions.

BB: It ‘s well known that Yogi helped Elston Howard when he joined the team but did Yogi ever question or go on the record about the Yankees’ institutional racism?

AB: No, I’m not aware that anyone in that period did. For one thing, when you talked to the players of that era, they all say, “Well, every year we heard that they were brining black players up through the minor league system, and we thought each year would be the next year.” I think there’s something to that – Gil McDougald told me something to that effect. I mean, the Yankee players were ready for it. They had no objections at all to integrating the team. It was only after a few seasons of George Weiss signing a black player for the minor league system and then trading him that they began to catch on. I’d have to say, though, that while the Yankees front office was as racist in its policies as the Boston Red Sox, the Yankees themselves got good marks from Elston and Arlene Howard and Larry Doby for their overall attitudes. Both the Howards and Doby put Yogi at the top of their list of good guys. Arlene Howard told me that Yogi and Elston “hit it off right away.”

BB. I know that walk rates were up in the Fifties and comparatively Yogi didn’t walk that much. But he was contact hitter and it’s hard to point this out as a major flaw. That said, were there any noticeable holes in his game, either offensively or in the field?

AB: No, none, and it ought to be mentioned that though Yogi didn’t walk that much, his on-base average was actually six points better than Johnny Bench’s in about the same number of games, and that’s what’s important. No, Yogi had no flaws. We all know he wasn’t much of a catcher until Bill Dickey learned him all of his experience, but by 1949 he was a very good catcher, and by 1950 the Yankee staff was pretty much relying on him to call their pitches. Or rather, he knew them well enough to call their pitches for them – did I just make some kind of Yogiism? Anyway, all that crap in David Halberstam’s The Summer of ’49 about Allie [Reynolds] and Yogi not getting along is fiction. All the Yankees told me so.

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The Yankees have no shame about promoting the exclusivity of their new park. Kids cannot watch batting practice from the sweet seats in the outfield.

Check this out:

The complaints about batting practice did not draw much sympathy on Tuesday from Lonn Trost, the club’s chief operating officer, who spoke after a news conference announcing the sale of mementos from the old stadium.

Referring to the high-priced Legends Suite tickets clustered around home plate and the infield, Trost said that it was an area that fans without suite tickets would not be allowed to enter.

“If you purchase a suite, do you want somebody in your suite?” Trost said in remarks reported by The Associated Press. “If you purchase a home, do you want somebody in your home?”

Yikes. Nobody is likely to apply the term “friendly confines” to the mallpark in the Bronx.

Is they?

My first job right out of college was as a production assistant on Ken Burns’ “Baseball” documentary.  The gig lasted about five months and when it was over I couldn’t find another paying job in the movie business so I spent most of the summer in central park watching softball. I pretended to look for work but really I hid out in the park instead.  I was a regular goldbricker, but was not alone.  I discovered a group of regulars who would hang around the great lawn and watch games all afternoon.  Fat guys with red bellies who would rotate around the fields to stay in the sun.  A skinny black dude, Smokey, used to sell Snapple, water, soda and beer.  I’d follow an animated umpire named Butch and watch all of his games.

My favorite league was the Press League (This may be the same league that our man Cliff later played in when he was with Viking).  The games just had more juice than the Broadway League.  The New York Times had a wonderful second baseman at the time, an older woman who wore braces on both knees.  She was a fluid fielder, the kind of person you just wanted to talk baseball with.  The kind of person you’d be honored to have a catch with.

I thought about her a few days ago when I read this piece about the Press League in the City Section of the Sunday Times:

Each spring for at least three decades, starting in late April or early May, media softball with all its pranks and rivalries returns to the diamonds of Central Park. The undertaking involves dozens of players, largely in their 20s, 30s and 40s.

And this season, coming as it does on the heels of possibly the worst year in memory for the publishing industry, the idea of repairing from the office to the green of the park seems especially appealing.

Over the past year, caught between an ailing economy and the struggle of print publications in an increasingly digital age, one after another title has trimmed its sails, migrated to the Web or closed up shop entirely. The shock has been felt especially in New York, home to so many publications and to so many who read them or work for them. And the body count continues to rise, with the attendant impact on the softball season.

February brought the folding of Trader Monthly, a magazine for the financial community, whose team planned to play this year. On April 30, Condé Nast announced the closing of Portfolio, its glossy business monthly, laying off more than 80 people. It had planned to play the New Yorker on June 16.

The past 10 days have seen an immense range of stories leapfrog to the forefront of New York sports fans’ collective consciousness. In no particular order, with some analysis and commentary mixed in…

• The Yankees slashed prices for the primo seats, an altruistic move that still leaves many of us thinking, “You know, you have your own network, and it’s on my cable system. I’ll contribute to your bottom line that way and I won’t feel like I got stabbed in the wallet.”

• Alex Rodriguez did everything necessary in extended spring training and returned to the lineup Friday. He punctuated the return with a home run on the first pitch he saw, thus fulfilling his job as the media-anointed savior of the team’s season. He proceeded to go 1-for-10 with two strikeouts in the remainder of the series, and perhaps fearing aggravating the hip injury, didn’t hustle down the line to run out a ground ball, thus reclaiming his role as the team’s most prominent punching bag.

• The Yankees lost two straight to the Red Sox at home and have lost the first five meetings of the season. (Sound the alarms! Head for the hills! There’s no way the Yankees can win the division without beating the Red Sox! Except that they can, and they have. In 2004, the Yankees went 1-6 in their first seven games against the BoSox, ended up losing the season series 8-11 and still finished 101-61 to win the American League East by three games.)

• Joba Chamberlain 1: His mother was arrested for allegedly selling crystal meth to an undercover officer. Following Chamberlain’s own brushes with the law during the offseason, it stood to reason that the tabloids attacked this story like starving coyotes. It’s remarkable that he was able to pitch at all given the negative attention he received.

• Joba Chamberlain 2: Flash back to Aug. 13, 2007. Chamberlain struck out Orioles first baseman Aubrey Huff in a crucial late-inning at-bat to end the inning and in the heat of the moment pumped his fist in exultation. Yesterday, following a three-run home run in the first inning that gave the O’s a 3-1 lead, Huff mocked Chamberlain’s emotional outburst with his own fist pump, first while rounding first base, and again when crossing home plate. Apparently, Mr. Huff holds grudges. Thanks to the New York Daily News’s headline, “MOCKING BIRD” with a photo of the home-plate celebration, this story will have wings when Baltimore comes to the Bronx next week. Even better, as it currently stands, Chamberlain is due to start in the series finale on Thursday the 21st. Get ready for a rash of redux stories leading up to that game.

• Mariano Rivera surrendered back-to-back home runs for the first time in his career last Wednesday night, a clear signal that something is wrong. Maybe.

• The team as a whole. The Yankees are 15-16 through 31 games, and some rabid fans (the “Spoiled Set,” as Michael Kay likes to call them; the group of fans between ages 18-30 that only knows first-place finishes for the Yankees) are calling for Joe Girardi’s head. As in the above note on the Red Sox, some context is required. The Yankees’ records through 31 games this decade:

2000: 22-9 (finished 87-74, won AL East)
2001: 18-13 (finished 95-65, won AL East)
2002: 18-13 (finished 103-58, won AL East)
2003: 23-8 (finished 101-61, won AL East)
2004: 18-13 (finished 101-61, won AL East)
2005: 12-19 (finished 95-67, won AL East)
2006: 19-12 (finished 97-65, won AL East)
2007: 15-16 (finished 94-68, won AL Wild Card)
2008: 15-16 (finished 89-73, missed playoffs)
2009: 15-16 (finish TBD)

No one is going to make excuses for the team with the billion dollar stadium and the highest payroll, least of all your trusted scribes here at the Banter. Looking at the last three years — including 2009 — it should be noted that similar issues of injury, age, and woes throughout the pitching staff have befallen the Yankees.

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I’m a day late with this, but here’s a terrific Happy Mother’s Day clip:
 

Peace to Matt B for the link.

Dig this piece of angst from Bronx Banter contributor, Hank Waddles:

A Long Week’s Journey Into Night

By Hank Waddles

I am thirty-nine years old. I have a wife and three children. I teach 8th grade English. I am a good person. But as much as I hate to admit it, my daily mood still changes based on the fortunes of the New York Yankees.

Things have been good for quite a while now, obviously. If you were to put my feelings about the Yanks on a bar graph, the past thirteen years would look a lot like the Himalayas – a few dips here and there, but mostly peaks, the tallest peaks in the world.

Sure, there were dark moments along the way – Luis González in ’01, the Boston Meltdown in ’04, every single time Kyle Farnsworth took the mound – but nothing compared to the darkness that descended on my world the night of May 7, 2009. Tampa Bay 8, New York 6.

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Pitching with a burst blood vessel in his right thumb, Joba Chamberlain looked shaky in the first inning of yesterday afternoon’s rubber game in Baltimore. Five of the seven batters he faced in that frame got a hit, and Aubrey Huff gave the Orioles an early lead with a three-run homer to right center. However, Huff’s was the only extra-base hit of the inning, Melvin Mora, who followed Huff with a bunt single, got picked off (2-3-6-2-4-3), and the Orioles failed to add to that early tally. Just as he did in his previous start, Chamberlain shut the door after the first, holding the O’s scoreless for his remaining five innings.

Koji Uehara’s line was similar, with a solo home run by Mark Teixeira in the top of the first being the only run he allowed in six innings. Uehara threw just 94 pitches in those six innings, but Dave Trembley decided to go to his bullpen in the seventh, calling on lefty Jamie Walker to face the bottom of the Yankee order. Walker struck out switch-hitter Nick Swisher (though it took him nine pitches), but gave up a solo home run to actual lefty Robinson Cano, who just happens to be crushing lefties this year (now .371/.405/.657 vs. LHP on the season). After Walker got switch-hitter Melky Cabrera to fly out for the second out, Trembley called on righty Jim Johnson to pitch to rookie catcher Francisco Cervelli. On 2-1, Cervelli hit a very slow ground ball into the second-base hole that he just beat out for an infield single. Derek Jeter followed with another infield single, a squib to the left side that Mora was unable to get to in time to make a throw. Despite playing matchups with the bases empty against Cervelli, who had two major league hits coming into the inning, Trembley left the righty Johnson in with the tying runs on base to face lefty Johnny Damon, who had hit .462 with four home runs over his previous six games. Damon took Johnson’s first five pitches to run the count full, then launched a three-run homer to right-center that gave the Yankees a 5-3 lead.

With Joba at 104 pitches, Phil Coke pitched a perfect seventh and worked around a one-out single in the eight to get the ball to Mariano Rivera in the ninth. Coming off his surprising loss in Thursday’s game, Rivera issued his first walk of the year, to Felix Pie with one out, but struck out ninth-place hitter Robert Andino and got Brian Roberts to ground back to the mound to end the game and give the Yankees the 5-3 win and a much-needed series victory.