I’ve never been to Yankee Stadium. Oh sure, I’ve seen the Yankees play in the Bronx more than one hundred times over the past 20 years, but Yankee Stadium, the limestone behemoth that was home to Yankee greats from Babe Ruth to Mickey Mantle is something I’ve only seen in books, grainy film footage, and in the background of old baseball cards. That cavernous coliseum, with its copper frieze trimming the roof that hung over the upper deck and its career-altering death valley in left center, was destroyed following the 1973 season. Its last game was a forgettable 8-5 Yankee loss to the Tigers that concluded an equally forgettable 80-82 fourth-place season for the home team.

Two and a half years later, in its place, sat a different Yankee Stadium. A modernized, yet instantly-dated, grey, concrete bowl filled with royal blue seats and orange light bulbs that relayed information from a flat-black scoreboard. The copper frieze had been melted down and replaced with a concrete replica that sat on a lower perch atop the outfield scoreboard, like an artifact on one’s mantle. The roof had been largely removed. The wall in left center was now 27 feet closer to home plate and would come in another 31 feet before I ever got to see it in person. Behind that wall, the three marble-and-bronze monuments that had formed a half circle around the flag pole in the grass of center field sat in concrete and were surrounded by a black chain-link fence that separated the two bullpens.

Still, though the structure had been changed, and the field which had played host to 27 World Series and two All-Star Games had been torn up and replaced, there remained a connection between the remodeled Yankee Stadium, as it would become unofficially known, and the original. Just as the Yankees inaugurated Yankee Stadium with the franchise’s first World Championship in 1923, the team inaugurated the remodeled Stadium in 1976 with their first World Series appearance in 12 years and followed that up with championships in 1977 and 1978. In its 33 years of existence, the remodeled Stadium hosted 10 World Series and two All-Star Games. Unless the Dodgers reach the World Series this year, no other stadium will have hosted more than four Fall Classics over that same span. The remodeled Stadium quickly established itself as a worthy successor to the original not because of its own grandeur, which was lacking, but because of the grandeur of the games which took place there.

When the last out at Yankee Stadium is recorded tonight, baseball won’t be losing a great piece of architecture; the remodeled Stadium is no beauty. What it will lose is the living memory of some of the game’s greatest moments. What makes Yankee Stadium great is not the concrete replica of the frieze in center field or the relocated monuments beyond the wall in left field. It’s not even the great views from the upper deck or the camaraderie and passion of the bleacher creatures. It’s the history that was made there.

One can look around the current park and see where legendary home runs by Aaron Boone and Scott Brosius fell into the left field box seats, Reggie’s moon-shot off Charlie Hough clanged off the black batter’s eye, homers by Tino Martinez, Derek Jeter, and Chris Chambliss made post-season history by clearing the wall in right, with and without help. One can envision Mariano Rivera and Goose Gossage appearing through the bullpen gate in left center, Derek Jeter diving into the stands behind third base, David Wells punching the air and David Cone falling to his knees after the final outs of their perfect games. One can see Dave Righetti, Jim Abbott, and Dwight Gooden celebrating no-hitters, Thurman Munson crouching behind home plate as Ron Guidry strikes out 18 Angels, Don Mattingly bringing down the house with a home run into the right-field bleachers, Dave Winfield ripping bullets down the left field line, Rickey Henderson and Mickey Rivers burning up the bases, Willie Randolph turning two, Tom Seaver, Phil Neikro, and Roger Clemens winning 300, Alex Rodriguez hitting 500, and George Brett storming out of the visitor’s dugout, a victim of Billy Martin’s chicanery. One can also see Paul O’Neill meekly slumping his shoudlers as an entire Stadium chants his name, Reggie doffing his batting helmet to the crowd in front of the home dugout, Charley Hayes squeezing the final out of the 1996 World Series, Wade Boggs riding a police horse around the warning track, and both Jackson and Chambliss plowing their way through the swarms of celebrating fans toward the safety of the clubhouse.

Though the field has been torn up, replaced, moved, and lowered, it doesn’t take much imagination to envision the old park. In fact, that has been one of my favorite things to do when visiting the Stadium. I’d squint at the left-handed batters box and imagine Babe Ruth taking a mighty swing and christening the new park with a home run or Lou Gehrig, hat in hand, addressing the crowd. Looking around, I could see Joe DiMaggio kicking the dirt near second base, Mickey Mantle launching a ball off the frieze, Jackie Robinson breaking for home, Yogi Berra leaping into Don Larson’s arms, the Dodgers celebrating Brooklyn’s first and only championship, Roger Maris circling the bases after number 61, and Bobby Murcer chasing a ball around the monuments in center. Because the Yankees were in the World Series with such regularity, all but a select few of the game’s greats (most of them Cubs) played there, from Ty Cobb, to Ted Williams, to Tony Gwynn, Walter Johnson, to Sandy Koufax, to Pedro Martinez, Jackie Robinson, to Curt Flood, and Roberto Clemente, and so on. In 1928, Knute Rockne implored his team to “win one for the Gipper” there. In 1938, Joe Luis beat Max Schmeling there. In 1958, Johnny Unitas beat the New York Football Giants in the NFL Championship Game there.

That is what will be lost. Not the building, but the place and the tangible connection to what happened there. The Yankees may only be moving a few hundred feet to the north to play on a field of similar dimensions in a ballpark with an identical name, but Yankee Stadium, the real Yankee Stadium, in both its incarnations, will soon be resigned to the page, the screen, and the memory of those who were fortunate enough to have seen a ballgame there, whether they witnessed a great moment, or simply gazed out at the field and imagined all the great moments that had come before.

It was a near perfect afternoon in the Bronx yesterday as the Yankees and Orioles played the final day game at Yankee Stadium. Amid sharp shadows and under a cloudless sky, the Stadium gleamed, the cool early autumn air adding a crispness to the day. The Yankees and Orioles played scoreless baseball for eight-plus innings, but the lack of action on the field mattered little as most everyone on hand and watching at home was more concerned about drinking in the doomed ballpark, which has rarely looked more welcoming or more vibrant.

Afredo Aceves got things started off in style in the first inning. Following a Brian Roberts lead-off double, Adam Jones popped up a bunt in front of the mound. Aceves, who has shown himself to be a solid infielder, caught the ball on a lunge before tumbling forward to his knees. He then spun to double Roberts off of second, but Roberts had been running on the pitch and had actually rounded third base slightly, so rather than throw to Cody Ransom covering second base, Aceves, with a big grin on his face, jogged the ball over to second for an unassisted double play, a play rarely turned by a pitcher (paging Bob Timmermann).

Aceves wouldn’t allow a runner past second base all day, and after six innings and 92 pitches, he was replaced by Brian Bruney, Damaso Marte, and Mariano Rivera, who kept that streak intact. The Yankees didn’t do much better against lefty spot-starter Brian Burres. With two outs in the first, Bobby Abreu doubled and moved to third on a wild pitch, but Alex Rodriguez popped out to strand him, and the Yankees didn’t get another man past second until the bottom of the ninth.

Though it would ultimately prove a fitting conclusion to a beautiful day, the bottom of the ninth started off ominously when a 1-1 pitch got away from rookie reliever Jim Miller and hit Derek Jeter on the back of his left hand. Jeter spun to avoid the pitch, but it caught him flush and sent him skipping toward the visiting batting circle in obvious pain. Joe Girardi and trainer Gene Monahan quickly attended to Jeter, who was the DH yesterday to give him a breather before today’s final game at the Stadium, and almost immediately pulled Jeter from the game. Jeter didn’t make a fist with the hand when Monahan was checking him out on the field, and as he headed into the tunnel toward the clubhouse, Jeter slammed his batting helmet on the dugout floor. Fortunately, post-game x-rays were negative and Jeter is expected to be in the lineup for the Stadium’s finale . . . of course.

Brett Gardner ran for Jeter at first base and stole second base easily on Miller’s first pitch to Abreu. After Miller fell behind Abreu 3-0, Orioles manager Dave Trembley decided to make use of that empty base and pass the buck to Alex Rodriguez. Rodriguez took two strikes then hit into a near double play, but managed to beat out the relay to put runners on the corners with one out for Jason Giambi. Trembley called on veteran lefty reliever Jamie Walker to pitch to Giambi, and Walker responded by striking Giambi out on six pitches. Rodriguez stole second on strike three, so Trembley had Walker put Xavier Nady on base and pitch to fellow lefty Robinson Cano. Cano, who still holds the distinction of having hit the last home run at Yankee Stadium, jumped on Walker’s first pitch, delivering a line-drive single just to the right of second base, plating Gardner with the winning run.

So in the final day game at Yankee Stadium, the Yankees beat the Orioles 1-0 on a walk-off single by Robison Cano. Mariano Rivera got the win, and the Yankees staved off elimination for at least one more day. The day was so close to perfect that, in some peverse way, I almost wish yesterday’s game was the last ever at the Stadium. The only way tonight’s game could be better would be for a Yankee to hit a home run and for Jeter to be somewhere other than the trainers’ room when the game ends.

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The just-completed series against the White Sox had some interest beyond the impending closing of Yankee Stadium thanks to Chicago’s fight for the AL Central, Mike Mussina’s still-active quest for 20 wins, the return of Phil Hughes to the Yankee rotation, and the major league debuts of three Yankee prospects last night. This weekend’s series against the Orioles has none of that. These last three games will be about Yankee Stadium and nothing else. With that in mind, here are the three other opening and closing dates in the Stadium’s 86-year history:

April 18, 1923 – the first game at Yankee Stadium, Yankees beat the Red Sox 4-1 behind Bob Shawkey, who scored the first run at the new park on a single by third baseman Joe Dugan in the fourth inning. Ruth followed Dugan with a three-run homer, the Stadium’s first. Second baseman Aaron Ward had picked up the park’s first hit in the previous inning.

Sept. 30, 1973 – the final game at the original Stadium, Yankees lost to the Tigers 8-5 as Fritz Peterson and Lindy McDaniel combined to allow six runs in the eighth inning. Backup catcher Duke Sims, in his only start of the year, hits the last home run at the old park in the seventh. Winning pitcher John Hiller gets first baseman Mike Hegan to fly out to center fielder Mickey Stanley to end the game.

April 15, 1976 – the first game at the renovated Stadium, Yankees beat the Twins 11-4 with Dick Tidrow picking up the win with five shoutout innings in relief of Rudy May and Sparky Lyle getting the save. May gave up the first hit and home run in the remodeled Stadium to Disco Dan Ford in the top of the first. Twins second baseman Jerry Terrell, who led of the game with a walk, scored the first run ahead of Ford. The first Yankee hit was delivered by Mickey Rivers in the bottom of the first. The first Yankee home run at the redone park would come off the bat of Thurman Munson two days later.

The relocated St. Louis Browns first played at the Stadium as the Baltimore Orioles on May 5 and 6 of 1954, losing to Eddie Lopat and Allie Reynolds by scores of 4-2 and 9-0. The O’s first visit to the renovated stadium came in a three-game weekend series starting on May 14, 1976. The O’s took two of three in that series, beating Catfish Hunter in the opener. The first batter in that game was Ken Singleton, who struck out looking, but the next six Orioles delivered hits off Hunter, among them a two-run homer by O’s center fielder Reggie Jackson (!) as the O’s cruised to a 6-2 win behind Ross Grimsley.

For the curious, the action depicted in the Merv Rettenmund card pictured here occurred on August 9, 1970 in the seventh inning of the first game of a Sunday doubleheader. With the O’s leading 1-0 behind Jim Palmer, Rettenmund led off the seventh with a double off Fritz Peterson. Andy Etchebarren then hit a hot shot to third base that Jerry Kenney either booted or bobbled, allowing Etchebarren to reach and Rettenmund to advance. The photo on the card freezes the action as Kenney, ball in hand, checks Rettenmund at third base. The O’s would go on to score three unearned runs in that inning, but the Yanks got two in the eighth and two in the ninth to tie it, the latter two on a single by Roy White after Earl Weaver had replaced Palmer with Pete Richert. White would later end the game in the 11th with one out and Horace Clarke on first base by homering off Dick Hall to give the Yankees a 6-4 win.

Finally, here’s an account of the last game at the original Stadium from Glenn Stout’s outstanding Yankees Century:

The Yankees ended the season on September 30, closing down old Yankee Stadium to accommodate the scheduled renovation. In the final week of the season, the Hall of Fame hauled away a ticket booth, a turnstile, and other memorabilia. Anticipating souvenir takers, the club had already removed the center-field monuments and a hoard of equipment scheduled to follow the Yankees to Queens.

The club hired extra security to head off bad behavior, but the crowd of 32,328 arrived at the Stadium in an ugly mood and packing wrecking tools. Disappointed at the late season collapse, banners urging the Yankees to fire [manager Ralph] Houk ringed the park.

The game was only a few innings old when it became clear that souvenir hunters weren’t going to wait. In the outfield and the bleachers fans turned their backs on the game and started demolishing the park. The Yankees took the lead over Detroit but lost it in the fifth [sic]. When Houk came to the mound to change pitchers, exuberant fans waived parts of seats over their heads like the angry they had become.

As soon as Mike Hegan flied out to end the 8-5 loss, 20,000 fans swamped security forces and stormed the field. The Yanks had plans for objects like the bases, but the mob had other ideas. First-base coach Elston Howard scooped up the bag for a scheduled presentation to Mrs. Lou Gehrig, but he had to fight his way off the field, clutching the base like a fullback plowing through the line. Cops stood guard at home plate to make sure it went to Claire Ruth, but a fan stole second base, and third was nabbed by Detroit third baseman Ike Brown. Some 10,000 seats ended up being pulled loose.

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This below is a very unscientific comparison of the seating bowls in the new Yankee Stadium (on the left from a photo posted on the WCBS web site) and the current Yankee Stadium (on the right from a photo I took three weeks ago). It’s an imperfect comparsion to be sure (the photo on the left appears to have been taken from in or near the press box, while my photo was taken from a seat in the upper deck behind home plate), but the difference in the upper deck seating is striking nonetheless.

As an antidote to my vitriol from this morning, I wanted to share this Star-Ledger story on blind Yankee season ticket holder Jane Lang. Mrs. Lang hales from my home town of Morris Plains, New Jersey, and I remember her coming to my school to give presentations on the Seeing Eye (which was founded in neighboring Morristown) when I was in elementary school. Mrs. Lang has long been an important role model in our community and is a die-hard sports fan (here’s a two-year-old Times article on her trips to see the Rangers at Madison Square Garden). Mrs. Lang can often be seen sitting next to Harlan Chamberlain in the special-needs seating behind home plate (where she’s protected from foul balls by the netting) and was brought upstairs earlier this year to pull the countdown lever. For all of my cynicism about the Yankees organization, the genuine love of the game of fans such as Jane Lang continues to inspire me.

Also, those of you who actually sat through both games the last two nights likely noticed that a fan in the right field bleachers caught home runs in both games. That was not entirely a coincidence. The fan in question is Zack Hample, a Mets fan and Manhattan native who has “snagged” more than 3,700 baseballs and written a book how to do it. Hample has a blog on MLB.com, and you can read his account of the last two nights here and here. Hample is one of the more unusual affirmations of my belief that it’s possible to get better at anything if you work hard enough at it.

As the Yankees play their final games at Yankee Stadium, I’ve come to realize that I’ve never really shared my reaction to the organization’s decision to move across the street into a new billion-dollar stadium built primarily with public money. When they announced the plans for the new stadium in June 2005, I said nothing. When they broke ground in August 2006, I remained silent. Beyond a few kinds words for the old park and some photos of the construction taken out of curiosity and a desire to document a significant event, I’ve almost ignored the entire stadium business altogether in this space.

I realize now that the reason I haven’t said much is that every time I start to think seriously about the move, I become overwhelmed with mixed emotions. Certainly there’s a sadness that comes from knowing that after Sunday I’ll never again be able to watch a game at the old ballpark, which has been a part of my life and my love of baseball for 20 years and which I’ve visited more than 125 times. There’s also a curiosity about what the new place will bring and an optimism about the new memories that might be made there. There’s also resignation, as this moment was sure to arrive at some point during my lifetime, even if it didn’t necessarily need to be now. Above all else, however, there’s anger.

I’ll put it as plainly as I can. The new Yankee Stadium has been conceived and built exclusively for the high-end luxury customer. It is not for Yankee fans; it is for corporations and the super-rich. It is an oversized ATM built primarily with public money, and the cash it spits out will go directly into the coffer of the New York Yankees, a private corporation. It is a monument to corruption, greed, and the failures of our municipal and state governments to act in the best interests of the people they are supposed to represent, and a vile and disgusting insult to all but the wealthiest of Yankee fans.

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Last night, Andy Pettitte had one bad inning, the bullpen couldn’t hold the line, the offense couldn’t break through, and the Yankees lost 6-2. Sing me a new song.

Over the last 14 years, Jeter has helped fill those empty seats behind him.

As early as tomorrow this game will be remembered for just one reason. In the bottom of the first inning, Derek Jeter hit a hard grounder to third base on the first pitch he saw from White Sox starter Gavin Floyd. Sox third baseman Juan Uribe was playing in and dropped to one knee in an attempt to backhand the ball. Instead it shot through his legs. Jeter was awarded a hit, which pushed him past Lou Gehrig as the man with the most hits in the history of Yankee Stadium. It looked like an error to me, but Jeter made that irrelevant with a single in the fifth.

I mocked the attention lavished on Jeter for passing Babe Ruth for second on the Yankees’ all-time hit list, and YES’s coverage of last night’s hit and the hits leading up to it–particularly Michael Kay’s call of the hit (“Hit or error? Error or history?”)–was every bit as over-the-top if not moreso, but I actually think this record is pretty nifty. For one thing, it’s an actual record. For another, as Kay histrionically pointed out on the broadcast, it’s a record that can’t be broken. Sure, Gehrig had far fewer at-bats at the old Yankee Stadium than Jeter has had in the remodeled one, but there’s a purity and an absoluteness to “the most ever” that even applies to Barry Bonds.

Best of all, this is a record that honors not just the man who broke it, but the Stadium in which it was achieved. Yankee Stadium will go dark for good six days from now, but though there will never again be a meaningful game played in the old yard, and the Yankees as an organization have completely punted the opportunity to do something special for the final season of baseball’s most significant ballpark, Jeter was able to give us one last piece of history, and a private kind of history at that. For all of the great performances, accomplishments, and players who have graced the field on the southwest corner of 161st and River Ave over the past 86 years, the player who got more hits on that piece of real estate than anyone else ever has or ever will is Derek Jeter. I think that’s pretty cool.

There are six games left at Yankee Stadium including tonight’s. Last night Alfredo Aceves was the story. Tomorrow night it will be Phil Hughes, but tonight, with Andy Pettitte pitching what amounts to a warm-up for the Stadium’s finale on Sunday, there is nothing else. Yes the White Sox are in a tight race for the AL Central. Yes, Robinson Cano is back in the lineup after his disciplinary benching. Yes, Brett Gardner is finally getting another look in center field and making his fourth-straight start there tonight, but with the Yankees on the brink of elimination (nine games out with 12 left to play), I think we’re finally at the point tonight at which the Stadium will become the primary focus.

The Yankees have a record of 4,128-2,429 at Yankee stadium. That’s a .630 winning percentage. They have to win four of these last six games to avoid dropping below .630. That’s utterly meaningless, but maybe it’s something for them to play for. For a variety of reasons, I’m going to find these last six games very hard to watch, and the six season-concluding road games that follow them will be even harder.

Alfredo Aceves matched Mark Buehrle for six innings last night. Xavier Nady put the Yankees on top with a two run jack to dead center in the second. Aceves uncharacteristically started the fourth by walking leadoff hitter Orlando Cabrera, his only walk of the night, then was made to pay for it when Dewayne Wise turned on an inside cutter and kept it fair into the left field box seats to tie the game. Otherwise, both pitchers kept the game moving (official time: 2:39) and the opposition at bay.

Aceves was inexplicably pulled after just 87 pitches (69 percent strikes and just two three-pitch counts), but Phil Coke worked a 1-2-3 seventh to set up the Yankees breakthrough after the stretch. With Buehrle out after 101 pitches, Xavier Nady led of the bottom of the seventh by coming back from 0-2 to work a walk off sidearming righty Erin Wasserman. Cody Ransom, starting at second base for the still-benched Robinson Cano, then bunted Nady to second, and Joe Girardi sent Wilson Betemit in to pinch-hit for Chad Moeller. Ozzie Guillen called on Horatio Ramirez to turn Betemit around to the right side. Betemit took ball one from Ramirez, fouled a fastball straight back, swung through another, fouled an outside pitch down the right field line, took ball two, then laced ground-rule double over the wall in the left-center field gap to plate Nady with the go-ahead run. Brett Gardner followed with deep fly that moved Betemit to third, and Johnny Damon drove Wilson in with a single through the right side.

Girardi handed that 4-2 lead to Joba Chamberlain, who pitched around an infield single in the eighth striking out two, and Mariano Rivera, who passed Lee Smith for second on the all-time saves list with a 1-2-3 ninth. Rivera’s reaction to passing Smith: “S’arright.” Pete Abe says, “The closer is furious the team isn’t going to the playoffs. Furious.”

As with Aceves’ first start, it was a nice, quick, clean Yankee win. It also moved the Yankees into a tie for third place with the Blue Jays, for what it matters. Elsewhere, the Red Sox pulled into a technical tie for first place by stomping the Rays 13-5, though Tampa Bay still holds a one-game lead in the loss column.

The Yankees haven’t seen the White Sox since late April, when the Yankees took two of three from the Pale Hose in Chicago. Surprisingly little has changed for the Sox since then. The White Sox had a slim 2.5 game lead in the AL Central when the Yankees left the Windy City on April 24, and arrive in the Bronx tonight holding an even smaller 1.5 lead over the Minnesota Twins. The Sox briefly slipped down to third place in early May (though they were never more than 2.5 games out of first), but otherwise have been battling the Twins for the division lead all season long. The two teams haven’t been more than three games apart since June 19, when the Sox had a four-game lead, and the White Sox haven’t been more than a game behind since May 15.

A year ago, the White Sox stumbled to a surprising fourth-place finish with a mere 72 wins due largely to the impotence of their offense, which fell from third-best in the AL in 2006 (5.36 runs per game) to dead last in the league (4.28 R/G). It should come as no surprise, then, that the Sox’s resurgence this year has been led by their resurgent offense, which has scored 5.05 runs per game, the fifth-best rate in the league.

Leading that charge, and thus throwing his had into the ring for league MVP, has been Carlos Quentin, who was acquired in the offseason from the Diamondbacks in exchange for minor league first-baseman Chris Carter, who was subsequently flipped to Oakland in the Dan Haren deal. Slotted in as the D’backs’ starting right fielder last year, Quentin suffered through an injury-plagued season and struggled mightily in his major league stints, but crushed the ball when rehabbing in the minors. A career .313/.413/.527 hitter in the minor leagues, the 25-year-old Stanford product won the Chisox left field job out of camp this year and proceeded to set the junior circuit on fire with .288/.394/.571 rates and the league lead in home runs.

Unfortunately, the fragile Quentin broke his right wrist when punching his bat during an at-bat on September 1 and is out for the season. Similarly, first baseman Paul Konerko is out indefinitely after spraining a ligament in his right knee during a run-down on September 9. Konerko suffered a decline last year that was part of the offense’s problem and has continued that decline this year. Still, his injury moves Nick Swisher to first base, creating a hole in the lineup filled by minor league veteran Dewayne Wise. The 30-year-old Wise has hit well for the Sox this year, but he’s a career .220/.256/.389 hitter in the major leagues even with his solid 91 plate appearances as a White Sock mixed in. Quentin’s injury makes room for deadline acquisition Ken Griffey Jr. to play full time despite his having hit just .245/.330/.347 since returning to the AL.

That all leaves the Chicago offense in the hands of the resurgent Jermaine Dye. Dye was the World Series MVP when the Sox won in 2005 and an MVP candidate in 2006 (.315/.385/.622), but last year he was one of the main reasons that the offense collapsed as he was barely above league average, and was far worse for most of the season prior to a hot August. This year he’s back to bashing (.295/.348/.555), but with Quentin out, the only other man in the lineup who’s meaningfully above average is 37-year-old Jim Thome, who has been healthier this year than last, but less productive on a game-to-game basis.

The Sox’s postseason hopes are further imperiled by the season-ending Achilles’ tendon rupture suffered by Jose Contreras, which has handed the fifth-starter’s job to rookie Clayton Richard, who has a 7.09 ERA in seven major league starts.

Still, this year the Central has been one of those divisions that no one seems to want to win. The Indians came within a game of the World Series last year, but never got off the mat this year and cashed out early by flipping C.C. Sabathia to the Brewers three weeks before the deadline. The Tigers were the preseason favorites, but have traced a parabolic path this season, starting out poorly, looking unbeatable in June, and since falling back below even the Indians. The Twins have been in the fight all season but took an inexplicably long time to bring Francisco Liriano back up from the minors (he’s gone 5-0 with a 1.57 ERA since returning). In fact, that could have been the difference in the division had Quentin not gotten hurt. Now things are back in flux, and the White Sox will arrive tonight desperate to keep their noses out in front.

They send reliable lefty Mark Buehrle to the mound tonight. Buehrle has made 30 starts in each of his eight full seasons in the major leagues and could pass 200 innings for the eighth-straight season with a strong outing tonight. Buehrle had a rough August (5.86 ERA), but has allowed just one run in 13 1/3 innings in September. He’ll face off against Alfredo Aceves, who aced the Angels in his first major league start his last time out and will make his first start in the Bronx tonight.

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The Rays enter their final series against the Yankees in a virtual dead-heat with the Angels and Cubs for the best record in the majors. Everyone saw the Angels and Cubs coming, but even the bold prediction made by Nate Silver’s PECOTA only had the Rays winning 88 games, a total they can achieve with a victory over the Yanks tonight. So what happened? How did a franchise that had never won more than 70 games in a single season and had finished in last place in the AL East in all but one of it’s previous ten seasons suddenly find themselves atop not just the most competitive division on baseball, but challenging for the best record in the game?

The short answer is pitching and defense and just enough offense to make the first two count. A year ago, the Rays went 66-96 while enduring by far the worst defense in the majors according to defensive efficiency. This year they have the majors’ best defensive efficiency. A year ago they turned just 65 percent of all balls put in play against them into outs. This year, they’re turning 70.9 percent of those balls into outs. That’s no small matter. The Rays had roughly 4,500 balls put in play against them last year (not counting home runs, which are typically not playable by the defense). The difference between a 65 percent and 70.9 percent defensive efficiency on 4,500 balls in play is about 265 outs, or the equivalent of nearly ten shutouts. Taken another way, the improvement in the Rays defense has shortened their opponents scoring opportunities by an average of 1.6 outs per game over the entire season. There’s a lot of rounding going on in those numbers, but the impact is clear and impressive, and quite reminiscent of how the Rockies got to the World Series last year.

This improvement was no accident. It is exactly what the Rays had in mind when they asked that shortstop Jason Bartlett be included in the deal that sent Delmon Young and others to the Twins for Matt Garza and another pitching prospect. Bartlett has disappointed in the field, but the team’s decision to move Akinori Iwamura to second base and (eventually) install Evan Longoria at third base has had a lot to do with their improved defense, and the overall effect of an infield of Longoria, Bartlett, Iwamura, and Carlos Peña has done wonders for the Rays’ pitching staff, as has having B.J. Upton in center field for a full season to complement Carl Crawford in left.

One might suspect that superior pitching deserves some of the credit for this statistical improvement on defense, but research has shown that good pitchers to not consistently post above-average numbers on balls in play. Rather, I offer that it’s the defense that has helped the pitching improve. If a pitcher knows that his defenders are more likely to catch up with his mistakes, he’s more likely to pitch with the confidence necessary to challenge hitters, which is a key to success in the major leagues. (Don’t take my word for it, click the Rockies link above and see what Brian Fuentes had to say about the Rockies’ defense last year).

Consider the improvement made by former Dodger prospect Edwin Jackson. Last year he walked 4.92 men per nine innings and posted a 5.76 ERA. This year his walks are down by more than one per nine innings and his ERA is down to a league-average 4.06. Consider also sophomore Andy Sonnanstine, a pitcher who walks almost no one to begin with. Sonnanstine has seen his strikeout rate dip by more than a K per nine innings this year and has been handsomely rewarded for his increased reliance on his defense as his ERA had dropped from 5.85 to 4.47.

Opposing batters are having roughly league average success on balls in play against Jackson and Sonnanstine this year, which is a huge improvement over what happened last year when Sonnanstine’s BABIP was .333 and Jackson’s was .349. Put those two behind lefty ace Scott Kazmir, James Shields, who emerged as a solid number two last year, and Garza, and the Rays have one of the best rotations in baseball. In fact, the Blue Jays, led by Roy Halladay and A.J. Burnett, are the only American League team with a lower starters’ ERA than Tampa this season. A year ago, the Rays had the third-worst starters’ ERA in baseball.

The Rays have experienced a similar turnaround in their bullpen, which was baseball’s worst last year with a staggering 6.16 ERA but has shaved more than 2.5 runs off that mark this year to post the third-best pen ERA in the AL. One big reason for that has been the emergence of 25-year-old lefty J.P. Howell, a failed starter victimized by a .381 BABIP a year ago. Coming into this season, Howell hadn’t pitched in relief since rookie ball, but with that improved defense behind him, he’s thriving in his new role. With veteran Trever Miller around as a match-up lefty (southpaws are hitting .207/.313/.280 against him this year), Joe Maddon has used Howell for longer stints. Howell has responded with a 2.44 ERA and more than a strikeout per inning while leading the Rays’ pen in innings pitched.

Veteran Dan Wheeler, acquired at last year’s trading deadline for utility man Ty Wigginton, has been another boon to the pen, filling in ably when rejuvenated closer Troy Percival has gone down with injuries. An even lower-profile acquisition from last year’s deadline, Grant Balfour, picked up from Milwaukee for Seth McClung, didn’t hit the major league roster until the end of May, but he’s been a revelation ever since, posting a 1.63 ERA and striking out 12.87 men per nine innings. After missing most of 2005 and 2006 due to both elbow and shoulder surgery, former Twins prospect Balfour was similarly dominant in the minors last year and could prove to be a real find, provided he doesn’t get hurt again.

Combine those drastic and related improvements in pitching and defense, and the end result is a tremendous decrease in the number of runs the Rays have allowed. Last year, the then-Devil Rays allowed 944 runs. This year, with just 18 games left to play, they’ve allowed a mere 582. That’s an average of nearly two runs less per game (1.79 to be exact). With their opponents scoring just 4.04 runs per game, the Rays offense has had a much easier row to hoe, which is good, because the offense is the one thing that’s gone backwards this year, though that was the bargain the team intended to strike when it traded Young.

That’s why the Rays have gone from worst to first, but now that they’ve done that, they seem to have a momentum of their own. They’ve won six games more than their run differential would suggest, and early August injuries to stars Longoria and Crawford haven’t slowed them down a lick. In fact, August was their best month of the season as they went 21-7 (.750). You can credit manager Joe Maddon with some of that. As the Yankees saw in spring training, this Rays team has fight. Indeed, after opening September with a 1-6 skid against intradivision opponents (including dropping two of three to the Yankees at home), the Rays staged a pair of late-game rallies to fend off the charging Red Sox at Fenway. On Tuesday they staged a ninth-inning comeback against Jonathan Papelbon to keep the Red Sox from passing them in the standings, and Wednesday night they matched the Sox zero-for-zero for 13 innings before dropping a three-spot in the top of the 14th to push the Sox back another game.

The Rays haven’t changed much since we last saw them. Longoria has been activated, but has yet to return to action (though he could do so this weekend). Former A’s first baseman Dan Johnson has been added to the Rays stock of September call-ups and made an immediate impact with the game-tying home run off Papelbon on Tuesday night in his first at-bat in the majors since April 2. The Rays have also called up former Yankee farmhand-turned-minor league journeyman Michel Hernandez. Hernandez has been with five organizations in five years since making his major league debut as a Yankee in 2003, and has yet to see major league action for any of them. This is his second stint in the Rays’ organization in that span.

Hitting coach Kevin Long has promised to follow Robinson Cano home to the Dominican this winter and rebuild his swing. He has the technology:

The work there will be extensive and represents a complete overhaul of the infielder’s swing.

The promise is of a completely revamped player in advance of Spring Training. Long outlined pieces of his blueprint for Cano by eliminating excess action, while putting him in a better position to hit, squaring up more with the pitcher. Addressing Cano’s strike-zone discipline is also high on the to-do list.

“You’re going to see a huge difference visually,” Long said. “You’ll see less movement, an explosive, compact swing, and you’ll probably see more home runs. I think his average will go way up and I think his walks will go way up.”

MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch as the story.

Yesterday afternooon, for the third game in a row, the Yankees got out to a quick start and emerged with little to show for it. Sure they wound up blowing out the Angels on Tuesday night, but only after Alfredo Aceves had made a 1-0 score hold up for five innings. Yesterday, the Yankees got two runs in the top of the first on a pair of walks, a Jason Giambi RBI single and a balk by Angels spot-starter Dustin Moseley, but Andy Pettitte gave one back in the bottom of the inning on a Garret Anderson double, a wild pitch, and an RBI groundout by Juan Rivera.

Johnny Damon led off the third with a walk, but got picked off ahead of a single by Derek Jeter, who was subsequently stranded at first base. A one-out single by Xavier Nady in the fourth was erased by a 3-6-3 double play off Hideki Matsui’s bat. Then in the fifth, Pettitte fell apart. Singles by Gary Matthews Jr., Anderson, and Guerrero loaded the bases with none out. Pettitte then rallied to strike out Rivera and Kendry Morales, and got ahead of Robb Quinlan 1-2, but Quinlan battled back to a full count before delivering a two-RBI single that gave the Angels the lead which was inflated to 4-2 when Guerrero scored on Nady’s subsequent throwing error.

And that was that. Pettite walked the next batter and got the hook. Jose Veras, Phil Coke, and Joba Chamberlain stopped the scoring there, but so did Moseley and relievers Jose Arredondo and Scot Shields, passing the game to Francisco Rodriguez. Down to their last out, The Yankees mounted a threat with a walk by Giambi and a single by Xavier Nady that put pinch runners on the corners, but Rodriguez got Hideki Matsui looking to earn his 56th save of the year and move into second place on the single-season saves list. He’ll pass Bobby Thigpen soon enough.

At that point attention turned to the Rangers-Mariners game, which was broadcast for the remaining fans on the Angel Stadium scoreboard. The M’s had an early 4-0 lead, but the Rangers tied it up with a pair of two-run homers off M’s starter Jared Wells in the fifth. Seattle got back out ahead with two runs off Kevin Millwood in the fifth, but another two-run homer tied the game back up at 6-6 in the sixth. The M’s took the lead again with a run in the bottom of the sixth and added another in the bottom of the seventh. That was enough to survive a Chris Davis solo homer off Miguel Batista in the eighth and when J.J. Putz struck out Michael Young to wrap up Seattle’s 8-7 win, the Angels clinched the AL West for the fourth time in five years.

As things stand now, the Angels will face the Wild Card team in the ALDS. As of this writing, the Rays had a 1.5 game lead on the Red Sox and the two teams were tied 1-1 in the 12th inning at Fenway. The Angels have faced the Red Sox in the postseason three times, but have lost all three series. In recent years, they’ve been swept twice in the ALDS by Boston and haven’t won a postseason game against the Sox since they held a 3-1 in the 1986 ALCS. The fifth game of that series was the game in which Dave Henderson homered off Donnie Moore in the ninth inning to prevent the Angels from reaching their first World Series. So, you think the Halos are hoping they wind up facing the Rays?

The Angels entered this series with a chance to clinch the AL West and have closer Francisco Rodriguez tie or even break Bobby Thigpen’s single-season saves record, but they exchanged blowouts with the Yankees in the first two games, forcing Rodriguez, stuck at 55 saves to Thigpen’s 57, to wait to make history against some other team. Meanwhile the second-place Rangers failed to help the Angels out last night, and it’s only with a Rangers loss that the Angels could clinch with a win today. The Rangers’ game in Seattle starts more than an hour after today’s afternoon tilt in Anaheim, so even if the Angels do clinch today, they’ll likely be back in their clubhouse when it happens, sparing the Yankees the indignity of watching another team celebrate.

Andy Pettitte, who is now officially in line to start the final game at Yankee Stadium two turns from now, takes the hill for the Bombers. Pete Abe has a story on Pettitte today that blames Andy’s recent struggles on the disruption of his usual off-season conditioning caused by his inclusion in the Mitchell Report:

The workout regime that he believes has been the base of his success was not abandoned. But Pettitte did not put in the amount of time he usually does.

“There were times I didn’t want to leave the house, much less go work out and focus on baseball,” he said last night before the Yankees played the Angels.

Pettitte tried to catch up in spring training, scheduling early-morning workouts and pestering teammates to join him and provide a push. For a while, it appeared to work. Pettitte was 12-7 with a 3.76 ERA through his first 22 starts. Pettitte’s history suggested that he would only improve as he season went on.

He has struggled instead. He is 1-5 with a 6.57 ERA over his last eight starts, putting 82 runners on base via hit or walk over 49 1/3 innings. Opponents have hit .325 against him.

“I was very happy with the first half I put together, then I won my first two starts after the break and I thought, ‘Here we go.’ Personally, it’s been frustrating,” he said.

Though he doesn’t come right out and say it, Pettitte strongly suggested to Abraham that he wants to return to the Yankees next year both to pitch in the new Stadium, and because he believes he can recover his form of a year ago by avoiding any other interruptions to his offseason program. If he does, he stands a very good chance of moving past Lefty Gomez into third place on the franchise’s all-time wins list. Gomez isn’t quite Babe Ruth, but I’d be all for bringing Andy back next year given the struggles of the team’s pitching prospects this season.

In other news, Ivan Rodriguez and Torii Hunter will both serve two-game suspensions starting this afternoon as punishment for their dust-up on Monday night.

Don’t look now, but Alfredo Aceves has passed Ian Kennedy on the Yankees’ prospect list. The two pitchers are very similar. Both are right-handers of unexceptional stature with similar repertoires (91 mile per hour fastball, changeup, curve). Both went from high-A to the major league rotation in their first year of pro ball, and both have impressed in their September call-ups.

The difference between the two is that Aceves did last night all of the things the Yankees have been trying and failing to get Kennedy to do all season. He threw strikes, worked quickly, and mixed in all of his pitches. That last is the most significant. In his various unsuccessful stints in the major leagues this year, Kennedy has been a two-pitch pitcher, throwing straight fastballs to spots (and often missing) and trying to get his outs with his changeup. Last night, Aceves varied speeds and breaks on all three of his pitches (really four as his best pitch is a cut fastball with some impressive movement) giving him an assortment several times more varied than Kennedy’s.

Of course, Aceves maturity on the mound comes from his maturity off it. Aceves may be in his first year of “pro ball,” but he has six years of professional experience in the Mexican League behind him while Kennedy was pitching in college in 2006. Despite that, Aceves is just two years older than Kennedy. It’s possible that Kennedy could learn what Aceves knows in the next two years, but even if he does, he’s unlikely to be much better than Aceves is now. The real question is exactly how good is Aceves now? He’ll certainly be in the mix for next year’s rotation, but is he just a younger, wilier Darrell Rasner, the sort of pitcher who can fill a vacant rotation spot and slide back into a long relief role when the rest of the starters get healthy, or does he have the potential to be a mid-rotation guy like many hoped and even assumed Kennedy would be as early as this year?

Whatever he is, it’s worth recognizing that in one short season he’s passed fellow 25-year-old Alan Horne, Jeff Marquez, and even Kennedy on the Yankees’ list of starting pitching prospects, which may tell you as much about Horne, Marquez, and Kennedy as it does about Aceves.

Last night’s game started off a lot like Monday night’s 12-1 humiliation. Bobby Abreu erased a Derek Jeter single* with an inning-ending double play in the first. In the second, the first three hitters reached on a single, a hit-by-pitch, and a double resulting in a run and putting men on second and third with none out, but Ervin Santana struck out Hideki Matsui and Robinson Cano before getting Chad Moeller to line out to end the threat. In the third, Abreu delivered a two-out single, but was promptly thrown out stealing second with Alex Rodriguez, who had singled to lead off the previous inning, at the plate. The Yankees stranded another two-out single in the fourth and went down in order in the fifth.

What was different was Alfredo Aceves. Making his first big league start in front of 31 friends and family members and 43,011 strangers, Aceves worked quickly, mixed his pitches, threw strikes, and made quick work of the Angels. Pitching to contact, Aceves got into just two three-ball counts all night, both of them full counts, one of which ended in a strikeout of rookie Brandon Wood, and didn’t walk a batter. He consistently got ahead early, throwing first-pitch strikes to 20 of the 26 batters he faced, and after three of his first four outs traveled a fair distance in the air, he got ten of his last 17 outs on the ground and two more by strikeout.

To be sure, the defense behind Aceves’ helped out. The first out Aceves recorded came when Robinson Cano made a great sliding stop to his right, then spun to his feet to throw out the speedy Reggie Willits. Alex Rodriguez made several nice plays at third base including eating up a hard hopper in the second and making a nice backhanded play on a shot down the line in the third.

Robinson Cano made another nice play in the fourth with a diving stop to his left that he tried to turn into a 4-6-3 double play, but Derek Jeter let Cano’s throw clank off his glove as both runners reached safely. That came after the runner on first had reached by lining a ball off the right wrist of a diving Jason Giambi. Though both plays would have been exceptional, they should have been made. Undeterred, Aceves took matters into his own hands by reaching across his body to stab a comebacker and start an inning-ending 1-6-3 DP. Aceves has a face of stone on the mound, but after escaping that jam he pumped his fist and shouted a few words in Spanish.

With the score still 1-0 entering the sixth, the Yankees finally gave Aceves some insurance. Derek Jeter led off with a deep fly into the gap in right center. Gary Matthews, who had just been put into the game in place of Torii Hunter, whose back was acting up, got to the ball, but had it clank off his glove for what was initially ruled a triple (later changed to a three-base error). Bobby Abreu followed with a five-pitch walk, and Alex Rodriguez cashed it all in with a three-run jack that made it 4-0.

Those runs came just in time as Aceves appeared to be fatiguing a bit in the bottom of the sixth. Though he had thrown just 60 pitches through the first five frames, allowing just a trio of scattered singles, his pace slowed in the sixth. Reggie Willits took five pitches to ground out to Cano. Garret Anderson then worked a nine-pitch at-bat (just the second three-ball at-bat of Aceves’s night), eventually winning the battle with a groundball single in the gap past Cano. Mark Teixeira followed by lacing a high fastball into right center for a double, pushing old man Anderson to third. Aceves then got Guerrero and Matthews to groundout, but Anderson scored in the process.

Given two more insurance runs in the seventh thanks to a Chad Moeller single and a Johnny Damon dinger that drove Santana from the game, Joe Girardi sent Aceves out for the seventh. Six pitches later, Aceves was back in the dugout getting congratulated on seven strong innings of one-run baseball against the team with the best record in the majors.

Aceves didn’t blow anyone away last night, and he didn’t show any particularly overwhelming pitches, but, as advertised, he mixed his pitches to a dizzying degree. Aceves throws a fastball, a cutter, a changeup, and a curve, but seems to have a variety of breaks and speeds on each one. His fastball topped out at 93 miles per hour and tended to sit around 91, but he threw some 92 mile per hour pitches that dove like sinkers and some 88 mile per hour pitches that almost looked like splitters, as well as cutters in that same range that stayed level but moved side to side. His changeup sat in the mid-80s, but seemed to have a curve-like hop to it. Later in the game, he threw back-to-back straight changeups at 81 and 78 mph to get the final out of the sixth. His curve tended to be in the high 70s and have a moderate break, but in pursuit of the final out of the fifth, he threw Sean Rodriguez a 76 mph back-door yakker that was a called strike (a generous strike zone from home plate ump Ed Rapuano also worked in his favor), then got Rodriguez to groundout on a less-severe 78 mph curve.

All totalled he gave up one run on five hits (four of them singles) and no walks in seven innings while striking out two and throwing just 89 pitches, 71 percent of them strikes. Save for the lack of strikeouts, that’s a near repeat of his line from his two relief appearances. Dig:

RP: 7 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 2 BB, 7 K
SP: 7 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 0 BB, 2 K

As for the rest of the game, Damon added a solo homer off Justin Speier in the ninth and Brian Bruney and Damaso Marte slammed the door without incident. So the day after taking a 12-1 whooping, the Yankees dropped a 7-1 score on the Halos, who came no closer to clinching as the Rangers beat up on Felix Hernandez to beat the M’s 7-3.

In the other notable out-of-town game, the Rays, leading Boston by just a half game, took a 3-2 lead into the bottom of the eighth at Fenway only to have Dan Wheeler give up a two-run homer to Jason Bay and hand Jonathan Papelbon a 4-3 lead in the top of the ninth. Joe Maddon sent Dan Johnson, who had just been called up before the game, in to pinch hit, and Johnson greeted Papelbon with a game-tying homer over the Red Sox’s bullpen in right center. After a Willy Aybar lineout, rookie Fernando Perez, who had pinch-hit in the seventh, doubled to left and then Dioner Navarro doubled him home to make it 5-4. Troy Percival then walked the leadoff man in the bottom of the ninth, but struck out Jason Varitek, and got David Ortiz to fly out. With two outs, pinch-runner Jacoby Ellsbury stole second and went to third on Navarro’s throwing error only to have Coco Crisp pop out two pitches later to end the game and inflate the Rays’ lead to 1.5 games.

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The Angels can clinch the AL West tonight if they beat the Yankees and Mariners beat the Rangers, but from the Yankees’ perspective, the big story is Alfredo Aceves, who will make his first major league start. A 25-year-old Mexican League product, Aceves is in his seventh year of pro ball, but his first in the U.S. He started the year with high-A Tampa, where he posted a 2.11 ERA, 0.85 WHIP, and 4.63 K/BB in eight starts before being promoted to double-A Trenton, where he posted a 1.88 ERA, a 0.86 WHIP, and a 5.83 K/BB in seven starts.

Aceves was promoted again at the end of June, this time to triple-A Sranton, but a groin injury delayed his first triple-A start. After four abbreviated rehab appearances for Scranton, Aceves returned to his normal starting role, but with less success than he’d had at the lower levels. Aceves’ first four post-rehab starts saw him allow 16 runs in 20 2/3 innings, but he seemed to make the necessary adjustments from there, posting this combined line in his last two triple-A starts before being called up to the majors: 12 IP, 6 H, 2 ER, 5 BB, 16 K. In two major league relief appearances thus far, Aceves has been similarly effective: 7 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 2 BB, 7 K.

Here’s a note from Chad Jennings following those final two starts for Scranton:

After his last start . . . Aceves was talking about using his body more to generate a little more velocity on his fastball. There was in fact a little more velocity last time and this time, but Aceves said he has looked at tape of his last start and no longer thinks he’s doing anything mechanically different. It just felt that way. The key for him is working faster, getting himself in a groove and not thinking about things too much. He picks the pitch he wants to throw, and he throws it. The game moves faster and he works a lot better.

Earlier in the year, less enthusiastic scouts dismissed Aceves as a strike-throwing junkballer who lacks an out-pitch and tops out as a number-five starter in the majors, but I was at his major league debut, and the Yankee Stadium scoreboard was registering his fastball at 94 to 95 mph. That’s likely an inflated number, but there was definitely some zip on his heater, and he complimented it well with his secondary pitches.

Here’s a scouting report from his double-A catcher P.J. Pilittere, courtesy of Thunder Thoughts’ Mike Ashmore:

He’s a guy that’s going to have no patterns when he pitches. He’s got four pitches that he commands real well, and he can throw them at any time in the count. That’s a definite talent to have. He kind of makes my job a little easier because he’s got a really good gameplan, and he really knows himself well. He does a good job on his own of trying to set up hitters, so it’s different and kind of refreshing, almost, to work with someone like that who’s thinking about the game along the same lines I am.

He’s got a really good cutter. What makes it so successful, is it’s not a lot different in speed off of his fastball. It’s pretty similar in miles per hour to his four-seam fastball. His cutter’s a good pitch, and when you have command of a pitch like that and you can throw it when you’re behind in the count, it can really bail you out of some stuff. Him being able to throw it on both sides of the plate is a definite plus for him.

Because he came on so fast and seemingly out of nowhere, it’s hard to say what the Yankees have in Aceves, but with a few good starts in these dog days of September, he could throw his hat in the ring for next year’s rotation.

The Yankees looked like they might have something going against Jon Garland early in last night’s game. Johnny Damon led off with a single up the middle. Derek Jeter followed with a walk. After Bobby Abreu ground into a fielder’s choice, Alex Rodriguez dropped an opposite-field flare in front of Vlad Guerrero to plate Damon. Jason Giambi got ahead of Garland 3-1, but the Angels starter came back to strike him out on a called strike down and in for the second out. Xavier Nady reached on a Baltimore chop to loaded the bases, but Garland got Hideki Matsui to ground out weakly to strand all three runners.

That was all the Yankees would get. After Robinson Cano led off the second with a single, Garland retired 12 men in a row, taking him through the fifth. Meanwhile, the Angels tied the game on a manufactured run in the bottom of the first when Chone Figgins singled, stole second, moved to third on a groundout, and scored on a sac fly. They then took the lead in the third when infield prospect Brandon Wood led off with a solo homer off Carl Pavano.

The Yankees finally got back on base against Garland in the sixth when Bobby Abreu led off with a four-pitch walk, but Alex Rodriguez erased Abreu with a 6-4-3 double play. Jason Giambi tried to reboot the inning with a ground-rule double, but Xavier Nady grounded out on the first pitch he saw to end the inning.

Then the roof fell in. Rookie second baseman Sean Rodriguez led off the bottom of the sixth with a solo homer off Pavano. A hit batsman, a single, and a groundout plated another run, ending Pavano’s night after 75 pitches. Dan Giese came on, fell behind Vlad Guerrero 3-0, got two strikes on foul balls, then gave up a monster two-run jack that ran the score to 6-1.

Torii Hunter followed that homer with a single then stole second and third around a walk to Juan Rivera. When Mike Napoli grounded to third, Hunter broke for home, but he was out by a good 20 feet. Hunter slowed his momentum as he approached Rodriguez, who tagged him out while standing in front of the batting circle, but Hunter still dipped his shoulder a bit and made solid contact with the Yankee catcher. As he proceeded behind Rodriguez, Hunter slipped on Napoli’s bat and bumped into Rodriguez’s back. Rodriguez, already a bit miffed that Hunter didn’t slow up even more than he did, answered back by elbowing the Angel center fielder out of his way as he walked the ball back toward the pitcher’s mound. Hunter took offense to Rodriguez’s elbow, ran up and shoved Rodriguez in the back igniting a bases-clearing scrum that saw little action, but got both players ejected.

Moments later back in the dugout, Yankee pitching coach Dave Eiland, who had been in the middle of the scrum, passed out and fell off the dugout bench. Eiland immediately regained consciousness and was able to walk back to the trainers room with the help of some of his players, but no one really knew why he had fainted. After Wood singled home two more runs to make it 8-1, Girardi went out to the mound to replace Giese with Edwar Ramirez and could be seen explaining to his players that Eiland just flopped over and that he had no idea why. Fortunately, after being examined by one of the Angels’ doctors, Eiland was given a clean bill of health.

Said Girardi after the game, “He’s been fighting a cold, and he worked out hard this morning, and I think last time he ate was 1:00, and he took some medicine during the game. He got lightheaded and dizzy and passed out, but he’s okay now.”

The Rodriguez/Hunter affair also had a happy ending, as the two apologized to one another and hugged it out after the game. Said Hunter of the incident, “The ghetto came out. I hate that.”

That just left the Yankees to wallow in what swelled to a 12-1 humiliation at the hands of the Angels, who could clinch the AL West tonight with a win and a Rangers’ loss. The Yankees are playing the role of jobber to the hilt.

A “jobber,” in pro wrestling terminology, is a no-name wrestler whose primary purpose is to give the popular heroes and villains someone to beat in between hyped-up grudge matches. At this point in the 2008 season, the Yankees are nothing but a jobber. Of course, the jobber can’t let on that he’s only in the ring so that the more famous wrestler has something to do, so they strut about and flex their muscles just the same as the other guy. Joe Girardi has become quite practiced at this, but much like Iron Mike Sharpe or Leaping Lanny Poffo, he’s not really fooling anybody.

In this week’s three-game series in Anaheim, the Yankees could be the jobber against whom the Angels clinch the AL West. Our own Bobby “The Brain” Timmermann believes that could make the Halos the first team to clinch a division against the Yankees since the Blue Jays did so in 1985 (though, unlike those Jays, the Angels won’t be eliminating the Yankees in the process). The Angels magic number entering this series is three. Any combination of Angels wins or Rangers loses totaling three will give the Angels their fourth AL West title in the last five years.

The Yankees could also be the jobber against whom Francisco “K-Rod” Rodriguez ties or even breaks Bobby Thigpen’s 18-year-old single-season saves record. Thigpen saved 57 games for the White Sox in 1990. Rodriguez has 55 saves so far this year. Heck, it’s entirely possible that Rodriguez could tie the record and clinch the division all at once against the Yankees. That’s pretty special. It’s a good thing MLB sent one of their most talented jobbers to take the fall.

The Yankees remain mildly interesting because of their starting pitchers. Carl Pavano will make his fourth consecutive start tonight facing Jon Garland. Hot prospect Alfredo Aceves will make his first major league start tomorrow against Jered Weaver, who was pushed back a day after accidentally cutting his hand in on the bench in the visitors dugout at Comerica Park last Tuesday. Wednesday will find Andy Pettitte, whose Yankee career could be winding down, back on the bump against Ervin Santana.

The Yankees’ primary interest, however, will likely be in scouting pending free agents Garland, first baseman Mark Teixeira, and perhaps even left fielder and former Yankee Juan Rivera. I don’t expect the Yankees to show much interest in Garland, though he could be useful as a league-average innings eater if Pettitte doesn’t return, or Rivera, who is yet another former Yankee farmhand whose reluctance to draw walks undermines his other talents, but they’ll certainly be in the mix on Teixeira, a Gold Glove defender and switch-hitter who has hit .360/.441/.610 since being acquired from Atlanta. Of course, given those credentials, his $12.5 million salary this year, and his agent, Scott Boras, the Yankees may have to take out a second mortgage on the new Stadium to meet Teixeira’s price.

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The Yankees called up Melky Cabrera before last night’s game, but according to Pete Abe’s article on Melky this morning, that had as much to do with the team’s concern over Bobby Abreu having jammed his wrist sliding into second base on Thursday night as with Cabrera’s performance over his three weeks with triple-A Scranton.

Melky’s traveled a winding path since hitting .280/.360/.391 as a 21-year-old rookie in 2006. He opened last season on the major league bench and struggled, but after taking over in center field on June 1, he hit .325/.375/.482 for three months before slumping in September for the second straight year. When Cabrera opened this season with a .299/.370/.494 April (including five home runs against a previous full-season high of eight), it looked like Melky was emerging as the star player the Yankees had hoped he’d become, but he hit just .226/.274/.293 from May 1 through his, by then, overdue demotion in mid-August.

According to Pete’s article, when Melky was sent down, he was charged with improving his play in three ways: “Be more selective at the plate, try to steal more bases and be more vocal in the outfield.” Two of those goals can be measured objectively, while the third pertains to Melky’s defense, which was the least of his problems at the time of his demotion. With that in mind, here’s a quick look at how Cabrera’s reeducation went over the past three weeks.

From May 1 through his demotion, Cabrera walked 18 times (four of them intentional) in 339 plate appearances, a rate of one unintentional walk every 24.2 trips. In 66 plate appearances with Scranton he walked eight times (none intentionally), a rate of one unintentional walk every 8.25 trips. It’s a small sample, to be sure, but I’m willing to believe that improvement can be maintained. As a rookie in 2006, Melky walked 56 times (three intentional) in 524 plate appearances, a rate of one walk every 9.9 trips. What’s hidden in those numbers, however, is the fact that four of those eight minor league walks game in a single game. Factor those four plate appearances out and he walked once every 15.5 plate appearances over the rest of his time at triple-A. That’s still a marked improvement, but not one that gets him back to that 2006 rate, which is really where he needs to be.

In the majors this year, Cabrera stole 9 bases and was caught twice (an 81 percent success rate) in roughly 129 times on base (not counting times he reached on errors or fielders choices). In the minors, he stole one base in four tries in roughly 27 times on base. Its clear that Melky was forcing things on the bases in Scranton. With the Yankees, he attempted a steal once every 11.7 times on base. In Scranton, he attempted a steal once every 6.8 times on base. Then there’s these comments from Chad Jennings pertaining to Scranton’s games on August 22 and 23:

Melky Cabrera got thrown out trying to steal third base in that decisive ninth inning. At the time, the tying run had already scored and Cabrera was in scoring position with one out. [Manager Dave] Miley said Cabrera was running on his own and was none to happy with his decision to go. . . . I understand that Melky Cabrera wants to prove to the Yankees that he’s willing to play hard — and you can’t deny he’s run out every ball and play good, hustle defense — but he was just caught stealing second. Last night he was caught stealing third in tie game in the bottom of the ninth. Sunday he was thrown out foolishly trying to stretch a single into a double. Cabrera needs to show he’s willing to hustle, but right now the greater concern might be whether or not he’s a bonehead.

With regard to the time he was thrown out stretching, Jennings reported that Scranton hitting coach Butch Wynegar said Melky told him he was just trying to show hustle. Wynegar responded by explaining the difference between hustle and bad baserunning. Melky’s a fast player, but he’s not a blazer, and he was stealing at a high percentage in the majors this year, which is the most important thing to consider when evaluating a base thief. Again, the minor league sample is extremely small, but the early returns suggest that the Yankees would be best off leaving well enough alone when it comes to Melky’s basestealing and focusing on smart baserunning instead.

Overall, Cabrera hit .333/409/.368 in Scranton, which isn’t a far cry from what his rival Brett Gardner did down there this year (.296/.414/.422). Going back to Jennings conversation with Wynegar, Melky showed up two days before he was required to report to Scranton and, if nothing else, is aware of the fact that he needs to prove himself to the organization. Melky told Pete Abe, “I tried to have a good attitude. I want to do the work,” and Pete reports that Joe Girardi’s heard good things about Melky’s work ethic with Scranton.

Right now, I expect Melky to start the 2009 season back in Scranton and have to earn his way back up. He’ll still be just 24 next season (he’s almost exactly a year younger than Gardner) so there’s plenty of room for hope and for him to still come away with a long, productive major league career, and the demotion appears to have served as a sufficient wake-up call. The only question now is if the Yankees can focus his renewed determination into the necessary skill set for him to succeed as a major league starter.