The Yankees pounded out 19 hits on Tuesday, 12 hits on Wednesday and I was worried the hittin’ shoes would be all worn out for Thursday’s afternooner, which I’d be attending with the extended family. The Yankees kept on hitting – 15 more hits today – but they stopped at third most of the time and wound up in a familiar spot, the losing end of a Phil Hughes start.

Next time, leave the cycle at home boys, and back up the score truck.

My father has fed a steady stream of criticism to Hughes through the TV this season, so I’m sure he was overjoyed when his Father’s Day gift turned out to feature the much maligned starter. We took bets on his outing: six innings / two runs; seven innings / three runs; four innings / four runs. Overall, we were an optimistic group and came close to nailing the actual line, six innings and three runs.

Hughes got touched for a run on a couple of singles in first, but he struck out Mike Trout on a slider with teeth so you almost had to forgive him. The Yankees were all over C.J. Wilson with hits in every inning and multiple base runners in most of them. But they turned a triple and three singles into only the tying run in the third as Vernon Wells rapped into rally-killing 5-4-3 double play with the sacks packed.

The Angels reclaimed the lead with a quickness in the fourth. It was the bottom of the order, and I don’t know if Hughes let up or if it was just one of those things, but they punched him up for a big double (Erick Aybar), a long sac fly and a 2-out homer (Chris Nelson) that really let the air out of the crowd.

But this is not the limp-bat lineup we’d have written off a few weeks ago. This team had plenty of offense left and, to their credit, the crowd perked up each inning rising to a crescendo in the bottom of the seventh. Robinson Cano and Alex Rodriguez both took big hacks at tying the game. All the kids in my row were really hollering, making up chants and cheers for the hitters. But neither big hack resulted in the much wished for big fly. And this time the air was out for good.

Mike Trout hit a 2003-ALCS-Game-7 double to lead off the top of the 8th and my seats for today’s game (third base side, upper deck) gave me the same vantage point as when Posada hit his double all those years ago. I could see right away that the ball was falling in and instead of watching Cano track into short center, I focused on Trout sniffing the double from about halfway up the first base line. He turned on the jets and, well, damn. That’s the best player in baseball for you.

Trout appeared to be stuck there at second, but with two outs, Girardi got cute, walked a .236 hitter intentionally and set-up the end game. Logan battled the no-stick catcher Hank Conger and lost him to an unintentional walk. Then Chris Nelson wacked him for a grand slam. Nelson had two RBI in ten games for the Yanks earlier this season. He had five RBI and quite possibly won the game this afternoon.

You know, it’s not everyday that you get to see Phil Hughes and Joba Chmaberlain get beat around by the same team – it’s every fifth day. Wocka, Wocka. Hughes wasn’t terrible though, especially for the new-look lineup. The Yanks had one more rally in them in the ninth, but they were too far behind and the final score of 8-4 is both unfair to the Yankees and the Angels in a weird way.

It’s not the 1995 Cleveland Indians or anything, but as currently constituted, this a fairly dangerous lineup and a well-rounded team. It almost looks like a contender if they were starting today.

But they’re not, and that’s why we had a blast at this game. For pennant fever, we watched the scoreboard for Pittsburgh-St. Louis updates (we’ll be in Pittsburgh on Saturday for the D-backs) and for sheer baseball excellence, we watched Mike Trout. And oh-by-the-way, the Yankees have some great players too, as Cano (Henry’s favorite), Arod, Granderson, Soriano and Gardner reminded us with 11 hits and three walks.

Much like Henry and this ice cream cone, the battle was lost but it was a hell of a ride.

I would never try to tell you that I was disappointed when the Yankees traded away Alfonso Soriano for Alex Rodríguez before the 2004 season. Rodríguez was the best player in baseball back then, so it would be hard to argue with that deal even knowing what we know now, but I was definitely sorry to see Soriano go. He should’ve been the hero of the 2001 World Series, he was coming off two spectacular seasons in ’02 and ’03, and even though there were holes in his swing and questions about his work ethic, it was hard to argue with the numbers on the back of his baseball card.

So when my summer tour of the Midwest was interrupted by the news that the Yankees had reacquired Soriano, I was thrilled even if Brian Cashman wasn’t. Even if you accepted that the odds of hanging a twenty-eighth banner this October were slim, it still felt like a good deal to me. Any extra bat added to the anemic attack we’d suffered through over the first four months would have to be a good thing, right?

Of course, no one could’ve imagined what happened over the past two days against the Angels. Soriano had hit two home runs and driven in six runs on Monday night, with all of that damage coming in the final four innings, and he picked up right where he left off on Tuesday.

Jered Weaver was on the mound for the Angels, and I don’t particularly like Jered Weaver. I’m not sure why. Perhaps it’s because he always looks like he’s absolutely miserable. Remember when your dad used to tell you stop crying or he’d give you something to cry about? Well, the Yankees gave Weaver something to be miserable about, but quick. After Brett Gardner and Ichiro made the first two outs of the first inning, Robinson Canó laced a single right back over Weaver’s head, then A-Rod promptly doubled him over to third. The right-handed Weaver played the percentages and gave the left-handed Curtis Granderson four straight balls to load the bases for our boy Soriano.

Statistically, it was the right move, but it didn’t work. Weaver left a fastball right over the heart of the plate, and Soriano did his job. He absolutely crushed it to straightaway center field for a grand slam and a 4-0 Yankee lead.

The heart of the lineup — and this lineup actually has a heart now — did more two-out damage in the second inning. With runners on first and second, Canó ripped a single to right to push the score to 5-0, and after a walk to A-Rod, Granderson singled in another run, making it 6-0. This brought up Soriano, who crushed another ball, this one just a double to score two. 8-0.

An eight-run cushion would be enough even for a fifth starter, but when it’s your ace on the mound as it was on Tuesday, you might as well send everyone home. Ivan Nova didn’t have his best stuff, but he labored through 7.1 innings and only gave up three runs.

As I said, the eight runs would’ve been enough for Nova, but they weren’t enough for the Yankee hitters. When Soriano led off the fifth inning with another home run, his fourth in two games, he elevated himself into some fairly exclusive company. With six RBIs on Monday and seven more on Tuesday, Soriano became just the seventh player in history to total at least thirteen RBIs in consecutive games and only the third player to have six or more RBIs in each of two consecutive games.

The Angels finally wised up and walked Soriano in his fourth and final at bat of the night, but he scored along with Granderson on a Chris Stewart single for the game’s final runs. Yankees 11, Angels 3.

The only downside that I can see to all this is that the Yankees have me believing again. Maybe this lineup is good enough to score on a consistent basis. Maybe Ivan Nova will continue to string together quality starts. Maybe Hiroki Kuroda (the team’s other ace) will do the same. Maybe Derek Jeter will finally get healthy and add even more depth to the lineup.

Maybe this team will make the playoffs. And after that? Who knows.

[Photo Credit: Rich Shultz/Getty Images]

There is a sentiment within and around the Yankees that if they are to make the playoffs, they need CC Sabathia to pitch like CC Sabathia. This is a rather short-sighted point of view. The Yankees have five starting pitchers, and like most staffs, those pitchers can be easily ranked from one through five; the names shouldn’t matter. Contending teams need an ace, a pitcher they can count on to win big games down the stretch, and the Yankees happen to have two of them — Hiroki Kuroda and Ivan Nova. Their third and fourth starters are Andy Pettitte and Phil Hughes, which, in the event that the Yankees make the playoffs, would leave Sabathia as a left-handed specialist out of the bullpen.

So instead of worrying about Sabathia, we should instead be thankful for Nova. He was on the mound for the Yankees on Saturday night, and he did what aces do: he shut down the opposition to give his team a much-needed victory.

With bad news bookending the game (the Yankees pulled Derek Jeter from the lineup to rest his ailing leg and announced that he’d likely miss a game or two, and ESPN reported after the game that Alex Rodríguez will be suspended on Monday through the end of 2014), the nine innings in between were a welcome respite.

Nova took a few innings to find his groove, but he was able to work out of minor trouble early on. He gave up consecutive singles with one out in the first inning, then yielded a lead-off double in the second, but in each case he emerged unscathed. After that second-inning double off the bat of Alexi Amarista, Nova retired fifteen consecutive Padres and never really broke a sweat. Only one of those fifteen batters was even able to work a three-ball count; that was Chase Headley in the sixth, who then struck out on the next pitch.

The problem for the Yankees, though, was that San Diego starting pitcher Tyson Ross was just as good. Ross set down the first thirteen hitters he faced, and did so in fairly dominant fashion, striking out seven of them with a strong fastball, a quality changeup, and a devastating slider. Lyle Overbay broke the spell with a clean single in the fifth, but it wasn’t until the seventh inning that the Yankees were able to make any headway against Ross.

Alfonso Soriano lifted a fly ball that floated just over the infield and landed just in front of center fielder Amarista for a single. Soriano had given up on the play immediately and jogged to first, costing himself a double, but Curtis Granderson erased that minor mistake two pitches later when he launched a home run to right field to give the Yankees a 2-0 lead. Consecutive walks to Overbay and Eduardo Núñez pushed Ross from the game, but the Yanks weren’t able to do any more damage that inning.

Will Venable doubled to lead off the Padres’ seventh, but once again Nova simply bowed his neck against the yoke. He struck out Jedd Gyorko on three pitches, got Amarista to ground out, then followed his first walk of the game with his eighth strike out to end the threat. He had only thrown 85 pitches on the night, but he was done. His final line was impressive (7 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 8 K), but it was really just more of what we’ve come to expect from him. Over his last five starts — a significant sample size — Nova’s numbers look like this: 38 IP, 25 H, 7 R, 10 BB, 37 K, 1.66 ERA, 0.92 WHIP. If it looks like an ace, and walks like an ace, it must be an ace. He’s 3-2 over those five games, but only because the Yankees managed just a total of five hits in his two losses.

David Robertson pitched an efficient eighth inning, the Yankees scored another run in the ninth with a Granderson single, stolen base, and an RBI single from Jayson Nix, and then it was time for Mariano Rivera.

Each of Rivera’s appearances now are bitter sweet. It’s as if you’re eating the most delicious piece of chocolate cake that you’ve ever had. Even as you’re delighting in each heavenly bite, you can’t help but feel a bit of sadness as you watch the piece on your plate growing smaller and smaller. And so it is with Rivera. How many more times will we get to see him take the mound? Fifteen? Twenty? Each one now is precious.

As chants of “Mar-ee-ah-no!” were filtering down from the San Diego crowd, the Great One produced another masterpiece. Venable and Gyorko were retired on fly balls that wouldn’t have scared anyone in a slow-pitch softball game, and Amarista struck out swinging on three pitches. All three men will tell their grandchildren about those at bats.

Yankees 3, Padres 0.

[Photo Credit: Denis Poroy/Getty Images]

Nineteen ninety-eight was a lifetime ago. Personally, I had only just started dating my wife, and we were still just imagining the three children we have now. The Yankees, meanwhile, won every single night and coasted through the first two rounds of the playoffs before sweeping the Padres in the World Series. It was all a lifetime ago, and last night’s game in San Diego was a harsh, harsh reminder.

For one thing, CC Sabathia used to be an absolute stud. Even when things were going well for the Yankees — and I’m not thinking back all the way to 1998 anymore — CC’s games stood out on the schedule. He was the horse who would always pitch seven or eight innings, and even on the nights when he didn’t have his best stuff, you’d still look up in the end and he’d have made it through seven innings while allowing just three runs and earning a hard-fought win. He was that rare quantity — the pitcher on the staff with the best stuff and the most heart.

Because of that, the fall of Sabathia has been perhaps the most unsettling part of this incredibly unsettling season. He was good in April, stringing together three straight quality starts, but it’s been all downhill since then. His monthly ERA numbers have looked like this: 3.35, 4.14, 5.11, and a whopping 6.60 in July. He has been the worst Yankee starter this season, it hasn’t even been close. If his name weren’t CC Sabathia, there would be talk of removing him from the rotation. But since his name is CC Sabathia, he will almost certainly take the mound ten more times this season, and there’s nothing to indicate that those starts won’t go like it did on Friday night.

The Padres didn’t waste any time, as they sent seven men to the plate in the first inning and scored two runs. The first run came on a bases-loaded walk, the second on a ground out to the pitcher. Sabathia made a highlight reel play to get that out, otherwise the inning might have lasted forever.

The Yankee hitters gamely answered with two runs of their own in the top of the second when Eduardo Núñez poked a double down the right field line to score Ichiro, then scored two batters later on a Sabathia ground out. There was reason for hope at that point, but the Bronx Bombers managed only three lousy singles over the next seven innings. Sure, there were at least three or four blistered line drives that died in Padre gloves, a horrific call at first base that robbed Núñez of a hit in the fourth, and another blown call at second in the fifth, but what you see in the box score tells the sad truth. Three San Diego pitchers named Andrew Cashner, Luke Gregerson, and Tim Stauffer held the Yankees to two runs on only seven hits.

Sabathia began to crumble in the top of the fourth. He gave up a long home run to Logan Forsythe with one out, then instead of covering first on Cashner’s ground ball to first, Sabathia stood on the mound like a statue and allowed the opposing pitcher to reach base without a throw. (As egregious as this mental error was, it shouldn’t have been a surprise; Sabathia has not recorded a putout at first base in more than two years.) Cabrera capitalized on CC’s non-error by launching a triple over Brett Gardner’s head in center field to score Cashner and give the Padres a 4-2 lead.

There was more of the same in the sixth inning. Nick Hundley drew a one-out walk, and Cabrera singled him to second two batters later. After Chris Denorfia singled to drive in Hundley, Joe Girardi had no choice but to pull his starter. Sabathia’s line on the night: 5.2 IP, 11 H, 5 ER, 3 BB, 4 K.

Joba Chamberlain gave up a home run to Jedd Gyorko in the seventh, and Adam Warren coughed up another to Will Venable in the eighth, and soon enough it was all mercifully over. Padres 7, Yankees 2.

It can’t be worse on Saturday night, can it?

[Photo Credit: Denis Poroy/Getty Images]

The Yankees returned from the All-Star Break in fourth place in the standings and somewhere around eleventy-th place in our hearts. The first-place Red Sox, palpably better than the Yankees a la 2008 or 1916, took the first game of this three-game series playing it close at 4-2 but without breaking a sweat.

Andy Pettitte pitched into the seventh and put himself in great shape for a win in any other year of his Yankee career, but allowing four runs in front of the 2013 Yankees is a death sentence. And though the bullpen did cough up that last run for Andy, his performance, marred by two early homers, was nothing special.

The Yankee lineup, weak as a kitten under normal circumstances, lost outfielders Zoilo Almonte (hurt ankle) and Brett Gardner (hurt feelings) mid-game to drop them to Threat Level Koala. Let’s put it this way – in the crucial eighth inning, the Yankees had the tying runs in scoring position, two outs, and Luis Cruz, who was released earlier this year by the Dodgers for failing to be a better hitter than any of their pitchers, was allowed to bat for himself.

The season will likely slip away from the Yankees in the next few weeks as they face superior competition on the road. They have one asset that might bring back a meaningful player for their future and that’s Robinson Cano. But will whatever they get back for Cano be better than just signing the best second baseman in baseball to a long term deal? If the Yankees want to keep Cano long term, then they become buyers, but with a long, non-2013, view. And that allows them more flexibility and less urgency at the deadline.

I hate contemplating the end of the season at the break but the team is filled with bad players playing badly. Ichiro, who has been much maligned, is the third best offensive player on the team. Derek Jeter crawled back into his Bacta Tank and I saw Curtis Granderson’s face on a milk carton this morning.

Alex Rodriguez is reported to be coming back though, so the good news is that, finally, we’ll have somebody to blame for all of this.

Our pal Emma on last night’s game.

Here’s more.

[Photo Via: CBS; USA Today]

Over at SI.com, our man Cliff gives us 99 cool facts about the Babe.

It rained early this morning. It was still dark out when I heard the rain drops smack off the air conditioner in my bedroom. Later, when I walked to work the streets were wet and the sky was dark. Still warm but less so. The whole scene was welcome.

Picture by Bags.

You remember what your algebra teacher told you about coin flips, don’t you? The coin has no memory. The probability of each result is always the same, regardless of what has come before. If a certain coin comes up heads, say, six times in a row, the odds on the seventh flip do not change. Only a fool would bet on heads thinking the coin was hot, and you’d be equally foolish if you bet on tails because it was due. A coin, after all, is just a coin.

More and more, these Yankees are starting to look like that coin. Remember when they won six straight and looked to be turing the corner as Mariano Rivera jogged in from the bullpen in the ninth inning of what would’ve been their seventh-straight win? And what about when they forgot how to win and lost three straight, the last two to the lowly Kansas City Royals? Recently it just seems like the Yankees are a .500 team, and the record bears that out. Since emerging from that soul-crushing four-game sweep at the hands of the Mets, the Yanks have come up heads just as often as tails — 19-19. At this point, perhaps they are who they are.

As depressing as that idea is, Wednesday’s game with the Royals was just the opposite. The other side of the coin, if you will. The Yankees scratched out a run in the first without benefit of an RBI as Brett Gardner made a daring dash home on a wild pitch that bounced only two or three yards away from Kansas City catcher George Kottaras. (Ichiro also tried to score on the same play when Kottaras’s throw skipped into the infield, but he was thrown out.) At the time the whole thing reeked of desperation. Gardner had no faith that anyone would drive him in, so he took a chance. Ichiro was thinking the same thing, so he took a bigger one. Heads you score, tails you’re out. 1-0 Yanks after one.

Iván Nova was on the mound for the Yankees, and after yielding two harmless singles in the top of the first, he mowed through the next twelve Royals hitters without allowing a base runner, allowing the Yankee offense to put a few things together. The first big moment arrived in the bottom of the third when Robinson Canó came to the plate with two outs and runners on first and second. Canó’s season has been up and down, but considering that he’s really the only frightening hitter in the lineup, it’s quite amazing what he’s been able to do — or what opposing pitchers have allowed him to do. Why he ever gets anything to hit, I’ll never know.

He got something to hit when Kansas City’s Wade Davis left a pitch out over the plate. Canó stayed with the pitch and drove it out towards the deepest part of the ballpark for a 419-foot home run to left center. It was the first home run by a Yankee starter in eight days, and the Yankees were up 4-0.

(That was probably the most important Canó moment of the night, since it essentially sealed the win, but there was a moment an inning earlier that will stick with me longer. With one out in the top of the second David Lough popped up a ball in the infield. Eduardo Núñez immediately began calling for it, as it looked to be heading towards the shortstop side of second base. But as the ball drifted across the bag into Canó’s territory, Núñez kept tracking it. As Canó realized Núñez wasn’t going to be called off the play, he brought his glove down and crossed his arms in mock indignation. After the out was made, he made a show of pointing out where the play had been made and playfully chided the youngster for overstepping his boundaries. It was the type of thing that of all sports happens only in baseball, and it was the type of thing that we used to see routinely from Derek Jeter — the stone-faced response to every single Hideki Matsui home run or the barely-controlled laughter each time Alex Rodríguez struggled with a pop-up. I can’t imagine Canó would’ve put on such a show had Jeter been the shortstop to wander into his domain, and perhaps Jeter’s absence thus far has allowed Canó to test his leadership skills a bit. Then again, it might simply have been two friends having a little fun. Either way, I enjoyed it.)

But back to our game. Those four runs exceeded the total production of the previous three games, but the bats weren’t done. They doubled that output in the sixth inning, and it only took four batters: Canó single, Vernon Wells pinch single, Zoilo Almonte walk, and a grand slam for Lyle Overbay.

But better than all that was Nova. He wasn’t just getting the Royals out, he was dominating them. He gave up a run in the eighth after walking Alcides Escobar with two outs and then giving up a double to Eric Hosmer, but that was it. Aside from those two mistakes, the last nine batters he faced went down like this: seven groundouts, a strikeout, and a fly out. He was great all night long.

Two years ago I wrote a piece in this space making several predictions about the future of the Yankees, and one of those was the development of Nova into the ace of this staff. I was recapping a game between the Yankees and the Reds that day, and after watching last night’s game with the Royals, I was immediately reminded of that night back in Cincinnati. Please note the similarities in Nova’s stat lines:

6/20/2011: 8.0 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 7 K
7/10/2013: 8.0 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 2 BB, 6 K

Last night’s performance, of course, comes on the heels of what he did his last time out, that complete-game gem against the Orioles. Even more important than that, it stopped a Yankee losing streak and gave them a much-needed 8-1 win. We can only hope that the coin won’t remember any of this tomorrow afternoon, and that the Yanks will come up with another win.

[Photo Credit: Kathy Willens/AP Photo]

I can’t quite believe I’m typing this, but this afternoon the Yankees are going for a sweep of the Orioles and their seventh-straight win. Remember when we used to take these winning streaks for granted? Remember when we only checked the standings occasionally, more out of politeness than anything else? Ah, the good old days.

But some of the good old days might be coming back. Derek Jeter played his first rehab game last night and accomplished his goal — the ankle didn’t break. (Michael Pineda also pitched well; it will be nice to see him in New York finally, perhaps some time after the All-Star break.)

For now, though, let’s focus on the game. We play today, we win today. Dat’s it.

Brett Gardner, CF
Ichiro, RF
Robinson Canó, 2B
Travis Hafner, DH
Zoilo Almonte, LF
Lyle Overbay, 1B
Luís Cruz, 3B
Eduardo Núñez, SS
Chris Stewart, C

Hiroki Kuroda (7-6, 2.95, 1.06) vs. Jason Hammel (7-5, 5.19, 1.40)

Will this be the day that Andy Murray finally finds his destiny and brings home the Wimbledon title for the British masses? (It’s probably been at least a decade since I really cared about tennis, but I have to admit that I’m rooting hard for him.) Early on it certainly looked like it would be Murray’s day, as he jumped out to a two-set and lead and broke the Joker in the first game of the third — then looked to be on the verge of breaking him again two games later — but the tide just might be turning. Djokovic won four straight games to take a 4-2 lead in the third set.

Nothing better than a little drama in the Wimbledon championship.

Amidst all the unpredictability and chaos that has welled up this season, Saturday afternoon’s game was stunningly normal. It was a game we’ve all seen thousands of times, and there was something soothing about it, like a tall glass of lemonade on a hot summer day.

As it started out, it looked more like lemons. Andy Pettitte was on the mound for the Yanks, and he retired the first two batters quickly before giving up a single to left by Adam Jones. As Chris Davis dug in at the plate I wondered if there had ever been a hitter whose reality differs so much from the perception. Davis’s name and appearance are as plain as Peoria, but when his bat lifts off his shoulder he’s suddenly as dangerous as Detroit. After working the count full, Davis produced a high fly ball that concerned no one — not Pettitte, who stood on the mound patiently, not Michael Kay, who calmly described the lazy arc of the ball, not Brett Gardner, who cruised calmly back to the wall in center field, and not even Davis himself, who shook his head in disgust as he trotted out of the box. But then a funny thing happened — the ball just wouldn’t stop carrying, no doubt because of the 100° air, until it landed a few feet over the wall for a two-run homer.

The Orioles scored a third run in the second inning, and this one was also questionable. Nolan Reimold dribbled a ball down the third base line, and Pettitte had no option other than the Jeter Jump Throw™. But Pettitte is not Jeter, and the ball ended up down the right field line, allowing Reimold to make it to second. Alexi Casilla doubled two pitches later, bringing in Reimold and his unearned run.

The old Yankees — and by that I mean the Yankees from a week ago — would have curled up into a ball when faced with a 3-0 deficit against Chris Tillman in the top of the second, but these are the New Yankees! Travis Hafner led off the bottom of the second with a walk, then crisp singles from Zoilo Almonte and Lyle Overbay loaded the bases with none out. Luís Cruz then looped a base hit just in front of Reimold in left field, and the Yankees were on the board, 3-1. Eduardo Núñez stepped to the plate for the first time since May 10th and responded with a sacrifice fly to give the Yanks another run, but Overbay foolishly tried to advance to third on the play. He was thrown out easily for the second out, and the rally was essentially over. Chris Stewart made it official when he struck out looking.

The O’s picked up another run in the fourth when Taylor Teagarden cashed in a J.J. Hardy double to make the score 4-2, but the Yanks came back in the fifth with their new station-to-station offense. Núñez and Stewart opened the inning with singles, then moved over to second and third on Gardner’s sacrifice bunt. Ichiro flipped a looping liner over the mound that was flagged down by Brian Roberts at second; as good as the play was, it saved one run, not two, and the Yanks were within one at 4-3. Canó was up next, and he dumped an excuse-me single in front of Reimold to bring home Stewart to tie the game at four.

Pettitte rolled through the sixth, and the Yanks played some more small ball in their half. Overbay picked up his third hit of the game to lead off the inning, then moved to second on Cruz’s bunt, setting things up for Núñez to be the hero in his first game back. Nuney took the first pitch for a strike, then grounded the next one up the middle for a base hit. When third base coach Robby Thompson sent Overbay chugging around third to challenge Jones’s arm in center field, I was certain it was the wrong decision, but Jones’s throw was a bit up the line and Overbay scored the go-ahead run.

Nothing else really mattered except for the ninth inning and Mariano Rivera. If you look at the play-by-play, you’ll read about two ground balls, a single, and a strikeout, but that hardly tells the story. J.J. Hardy, Nate McClouth, Ryan Flaherty, and Chris Dickerson were all so overmatched that they couldn’t have been faulted had they each asked Rivera for his autograph before leaving the field. Hardy looked at one pitch, then squibbed a ball that barely made its way out to Canó, who flipped to first for out number one. Pinch hitter McClouth then hit another ball out to Canó, this one so soft that the play at first was close. Flaherty managed a base hit, but only because Rivera’s cutter so overwhelmed him that even with a full swing the ball only travelled about ninety feet before fluttering to the grass like a wounded bird in front of second. No matter. Rivera struck out Dickerson on three pitches to end the game. Yankees 5, Orioles 4. Same as it ever was.

It was Rivera’s 29th save of the season (and his 72nd save of a Pettitte victory), putting him on a pace for 54, which would be his career best. Here’s what I wrote about Rivera back on May 9th after he recorded his twelfth save:

Here’s something to watch for. It’s early, but the way this team is constructed, it wouldn’t be a surprise if Rivera actually topped his career high of 53 saves from back in 2004. Then he’d walk off into the sunset with a Cy Young Award, just like Koufax. Wouldn’t that be poetic?

The Cy Young Award seems less likely at this point, but here’s something else that would be poetic. After Saturday’s game we found out that Rivera had been named to the American League All-Star game, but that’s not good enough. Mariano Rivera should be the starting pitcher for the American League. I’m not the first to come up with this idea — I seem to remember Michael Kay suggesting this for the 2008 ASG in Yankee Stadium — but this would be the perfect year to do it.

There’s no need to have an actual starting pitcher start the game, since most pitchers only throw an inning or two anyway, even some of those who start the game. (Max Scherzer would be the starter most likely to start, but Detroit manager Jim Leyland has already indicated that Scherzer probably won’t be available to pitch that day.)

Rivera is having a phenomenal season and could end up with the highest single-season save total of his career. There’s no real guarantee that he would get into the game in the ninth inning, nor is there any guarantee that those final outs would be meaningful. So why not send him out to start? It might seem counterintuitive to have Rivera, the greatest closer of all-time, appear in his final all-star game as a starter (and Rivera might not even want to do it), but what better way is there to honor the greatest pitcher any of us will ever see?

[Photo Credit: Jim McIsaac/Getty Images]

So Alex is on assignment — or perhaps on the run — and he’s left me the keys to the place. You’re all welcome to stop by whenever you like, just don’t act like a bunch of animals. I’ll be in and out myself, but I trust you. Don’t steal anything. If I come back here and anything’s missing, I’m going straight to the police. I mean it.

So now that that’s out of the way, on to the Yankees. Not much going on there, eh? Suddenly a five-game winning streak, capped last night with the Wells Walk-off (though I must admit that I prefer pie to Gatorade), and things are looking a lot different than they were a week ago. Some fans might even be looking with hope towards the top of the standings rather than dread towards the bottom.

Oh, another thing — a guy named Jeter is scheduled to make his first rehab start down in Scranton tonight, and there are whispers that we might see him in the Bronx next week. It won’t be too soon.

And finally, the lineup, featuring the recently recalled Eduardo Núñez (David Phelps was sent down):

Brett Gardner, CF
Ichiro, RF
Robinson Canó, 2B
Travis Hafner, DH
Zoilo Almonte, LF
Lyle Overbay, 1B
Luís Cruz, 3B
Eduardo Núñez, SS
Chris Stewart, C

Andy Pettitte (5-6, 4.40, 1.36) vs. Chris Tillman (10-2, 3.68, 1.30)

Bronx Banter. There is no substitute.

ESPN analyst Orel Hershiser summed things up nicely towards the end of Sunday night’s death march: “The players who should be on the bench are in the starting lineup, and the players who should be in the lineup are on the disabled list.” It’s nothing new, but if Mariano Duncan were still around, he’d probably print up t-shirts with that explanation emblazoned across the chest. Admitting the problem is the first step.

At first glance it seemed as if the Yankees might have had the edge in Sunday night’s matchup in Baltimore, with Hiroki Kuroda going up against Chris Tillman, but Tillman’s been pretty good this year. In fact, the Orioles had won Tillman’s last seven starts, and Tillman had gotten the win in all but one of those games. Any American League pitcher with a 9-2 record and an ERA under four must be doing something right, and Tillman’s doing something right.

Regardless of how good Tillman might be, the Orioles have been carried by their hitting, and it didn’t take long for the Baltimore bats to make themselves heard. With one out in the first inning, third baseman Manny Machado hit a clothesline into the left field bleachers to give the Orioles a 1-0 lead and send a dagger into the heart of Yankee Universe. Even with all the talk we hear about Mike Trout and Bryce Harper, Machado just might be the best of the three, and as he circled the bases I couldn’t help but wonder where the next Yankee hero might come from. The prospects we’ve waited patiently for over the past few years (Jesus Montero, Austin Jackson, Austin Romine, Eduardo Nuñez, Slade Heathcott, Brandon Laird, etc.) have either been traded away, failed to make the majors, or simply evolved into interchangeable parts. In Machado, the Orioles have the face of their franchise for the next fifteen years. Wouldn’t that be nice?

The Yankee hitters weren’t thinking about any of that, though, as they managed to scrape together enough offense to tie the game in the top of the second. With runners on first and third and two outs, David Adams walked to load the bases, and Brett Gardner followed that with another walk to force in a run. It wasn’t exciting, but it was a run!

Just a few minutes later the Orioles struck back with yet another home run from Chris Davis, his 31st of the season and third of the series, and Nate McLouth homered in the next inning to give Baltimore a 3-1 lead.

The Yankees, meanwhile, were hitting as if their bats were made of apple sauce instead of ash. Only nine hitters came to bat in the third, fourth, and fifth innings (Hafner singled in the third but was thrown out at second trying to stretch), and except for a ten-pitch at bat by Brett Gardner in the fifth, Tillman never once had to work hard.

Canó led off the sixth with a solo home run to right center, giving the Yankees just a glimmer of hope, but that hope never amounted to much more than a glimmer, even when they put two runners on in the seventh and again in the ninth. Somehow those two rallies never felt like rallies.

After the 4-2 loss, the Yankees now find themselves in fourth place in the five-team American League East, and it won’t be long before they’re in the cellar. These are dark days, my friend. Dark days.

[Photo Credit: Patrick Smith/Getty Images]

Let’s pick this up at 3-1 in the fifth inning. Leonys Martin had just hit his second homer of the night off Hiroki Kuroda and Yu Darvish had a two-run lead to protect against this year’s gluten-free version of the Yankee lineup. Darvish dropped a little curve ball into Brett Gardner’s trigger zone – low and in – and boom, 3-2.

This curve ball was not the worst curve ball Darvish threw all night, but it was the wrong pitch in the wrong spot to the second best hitter on the New York Yankees (shudder). No, the honors for the worst curve ball of of the night must be split between the loopy bits of nothing Darvish threw to Travis Hafner (in the fourth) and to Jason Nix (in the seventh) which were both also hit for solo jacks.

Yu Darvish has been ridiculously good this year, loading up strikeouts against very few hits and walks. The only thing keeping him from full flight is a few more homers than you’d like to see – 14 after tonight. I can’t speak for the first 11, but for one game at least, he was handing out lollipops.

I snuggled up with Willa, the recent addition in our house and main reason why I’m not around the Banter much this season, and administered her first full-inning dose of Mariano Rivera. She stretched out on my chest and filled her diaper just about the time that Mo’s nastiest cutter reduced Lance Berkman’s bat to so many matchsticks.

Both catchers gunned down potential base stealers in the late innings to ratchet up the excitement a few notches. Chris Stewart pegged Elvis Andrus with the help of Robinson Cano’s nifty sweep tag. But A.J. Pierzynski evened the ledger by wiping Brett Gardner off the map in the bottom of the ninth. If you told me a few years ago that Brett Gardner became the Yankees second best offensive player while simultaneously losing his ability to steal bases, I’d have asked you how you got a hold of Doc Doom’s time machine and why you hadn’t also altered the 2001 and 2004 postseasons if you were planning on creating alternate Yankee universes.

The game seemed destined for extra innings, though with Rivera and Robertson nothing more then empty casings on the dugout floor heading to the top of the 10th, not many extra would likely be required. Then with two strikes and two outs, Ichiro lashed out and bit into a 97 MPH heater from Tanner Scheppers and ended things right then and there. Yankees 4, Rangers 3.

Hiroki Kuroda and Yu Darvish battled to a stand still. Darvish was more brilliant, but inefficient and only lasted six innings. Kuroda had plenty left in the tank and only came out because Leonys Martin had his number. And if any Japanese fans (I know a few who scalped tickets tonight) felt they didn’t get their money’s worth with the double no-decision from the starters, they hit the jackpot when Ichiro said sayonara.

And here’s our newest fan, as captured by my wife just after the homer, happy with a great victory over a good team.

Photos by Jason Szenes (1 & 2) / Getty Images & Kathy Willens (3) / AP & Amelia DeRosa (4) 

We drove up to the Angels Stadium parking lot, and we weren’t asked to pay for parking. Our tickets were scanned at the turnstile, and we were directed down instead of up. When we found the entrance for Section 113, the usher politely asked us to walk down the steps to the fifth row, and then turn left. My son and I took seats 6 and 7, and my wife and oldest daughter sat directly behind us. We were high rollers, at least for a day. As I stood blinking in the sun, only twenty feet or so from the infield grass, a line from a Talking Heads song popped into my head. “Well, how did I get here?”

I teach 7th grade English. Last Thursday was the last day of school, and it was a sad day. Not only was it my last day with the amazing group of seventh graders that I had taught since September, it was also the last day I’d see the graduating eighth graders I’d taught the year before. Included in that graduating Class of 2013 was a group of ten girls who ate lunch in my room every day this year.

We had our final lunch last Tuesday, and they surprised me with a few gifts — a framed photograph that they had all signed, a book I’ve been wanting to read for years, and a fistful of my favorite candy bars. That was already more than generous, but then they gave me one more present — four box seats to see the Yankees on Father’s Day. All of my students know of my love for the Yankees, so these girls certainly knew it would be the perfect gift: something I’ve always wanted but would never have bought for myself.

I thought of those girls as we sat on the third base side, five rows up, about midway between the mound and home plate. The best seats I’ve ever had for a game. An anthropologist could probably do a fairly in depth study comparing and contrasting the different social groups in the different corners of a major league ballpark, and it took only a few minutes to gauge the folks in Section 113. There were other tourists like us, people who took photos of everything because they’d never been there before and doubted they would ever come back. They looked around with wonder, first marveling at how close they were to their heroes, then sneaking glances to the upper reaches of the stadium where they knew they belonged.

And of course, there were the locals — the season ticket holders who sat in these seats 81 games a year and had lost sight of how special this section really was. They arrived casually, an inning or two late, and walked to their seats without direction. One family of six sauntered in with drinks in hand, sat down in the front row, and simply started chatting amiably amongst themselves as if they were picnicking in the park. Imagine Dorothy stepping into Oz and simply saying hello.

I’ve been going to watch the Yankees in Anaheim for more than thirty years now, and the biggest difference between now and then is that Angels fans actually care about their team now. They wear the red, they swing rally monkeys over their heads, and they cheer for their favorite players. They just aren’t as loud as Yankee fans.

When Brett Gardner rifled a double down the left field line to start off the game, I stood and shouted out to him as he stood at second. “There you go, Gardy!” When that rally fizzled, and two innings later another one looked to be headed in the same direction, I worried that this game — that these amazing seats — might not have a happy ending.

But then Travis Hafner did the improbable. With two outs and two strikes, he launched a home run to center field, and suddenly the Yankees were up 3-0. Before the inning was over they had scored five runs, and it felt like fifty. Two older men in their sixties, one wearing a Yankee cap and the other an Angels cap, returned to their seats in front of us after missing the third inning. The Yankee fan turned to me and asked with a smile and a wink towards his friend, “Hey, did we miss anything?” We laughed.

The next five innings were delightfully uneventful. CC Sabathia looked like an ace on the mound for the Yanks, and his dominance combined with the Southern California sun to slowly send Angels fans home. By the seventh inning at least a dozen of the actual ticket holders in our section had gone home and had been replaced by interlopers, always a father and one or two boys. A Yankee fan and his four-year-old son, both in pinstripes, slid into our row for a while, then bounced from one seat to another as they saw fit. When the entitled family in the front row got up to leave in the eighth, they weren’t out of the aisle before their seats were filled. Some things never change.

When Sabathia struck out Peter Bourjos to end the eighth inning, there was a mass exodus of Angels fans — because no one rallies from a 6-0 deficit in the ninth — but Yankee fans stayed put, clearly hoping to see Mariano Rivera record the final three outs. When Sabathia came back out to start the ninth, I was momentarily disappointed, but then I realized I was being greedy to hope for that on what had already been a near-perfect day.

It didn’t make much sense to my wife. “Isn’t it a bit odd that he’s their best pitcher, but they aren’t letting him pitch?” Indeed.

And then it happened. Mike Trout led off with a double to left, and Albert Pujols walked. There was no cause for concern, of course, but it was enough to force Girardi out to the mound. The lower level from the visitors’ dugout to the right field foul pole has traditionally been filled with Yankee fans, but at this point in the game they outnumbered fans of the home team by about ten to one. The second Girardi raised his right arm to signal the bullpen, every Yankee fan in the park stood to give CC an ovation, including that huge contingent across the field from me. It gave me goosebumps.

Also, it gave me hope.

As Robertson was having trouble throwing strikes and looked ready to load the bases after allowing the Angels’ first run, I leaned over and told my son, “I’m not sure if I’m rooting for a walk, or an out.”

As Robertson threw ball four, my eyes immediately found Girardi in the dugout. He didn’t hesitate, and the buzz began as soon as he hit the top step. Everyone knew what was coming.

The bullpens in Anaheim are staggered, with the visitors’ pen elevated and behind the Angels’, so it took longer than usual for Rivera to appear after Girardi signaled for him. When the gate opened up and Mariano broke into his familiar trot, the entire stadium — even those wearing red — rose to give him a standing ovation. I got my son’s attention and then turned to my daughter. “Watch everything he does,” I said. “If you watch baseball for another fifty years, he will still be the best pitcher you’ll ever see.”

Erick Aybar grounded out weakly to first base for the second out, but a run scored from third, cutting the lead to 6-2. My son noticed this. “Daddy, it’s six to two now!” Don’t worry, I told him. It’s Mo.

Four batters later, after three of the cheapest hits you’ll ever see and a walk that loaded the bases, everything had changed. The stadium was in a frenzy as Albert Pújols, the greatest hitter of his generation, came up to face Mariano Rivera, the greatest closer of all-time. With the score suddenly 6-5, any base hit would almost certainly win the game for the Angels. There was a woman in her sixties standing four seats to my left. We were both wearing identical Rivera t-shirts, and we looked at each other for the first time all day. You know the look.

I watched as Pújols walked slowly towards the plate, and the words “rock bottom” started swimming around my head. It would be bad enough to lose this game, a game that would be their sixth loss in a row, but to lose a six-run lead in the ninth inning with Rivera on the mound? A loss like that could potentially destroy the entire season.

But then I looked away from Pújols and focused on Mariano. In that moment I knew everything would be okay. Who else, I thought — in the history of the game — would I rather see on the mound for the Yankees right now than this man? He had yielded four consecutive base runners, something I’m guessing he’s done less than ten times in his nineteen-year career, but nothing about him had changed. He looked in to Chris Stewart to get the sign, bowed slightly as he came to a set, then placed the ball exactly where he wanted for strike one. His next pitch was fouled off for strike two, and the volume turned up a notch as Yankee fans begged for the strikeout.

Rivera’s third pitch to Pújols was meant to tantalize. It was well above the letters, but by the time Pújols realized it was up out of the strike zone, it was too late. He wasn’t able to stop his mighty swing, and the game was over.

The texts started coming in almost immediately. First, a report from New York saying I could be seen celebrating in the background of the YES replay of the final pitch, then two more from people who had seen me on the local Angels broadcast. My brother-in-law sent along a clip of the video, and there we were, all four of us. As Pújols swung and missed, I could be seen pumping my fist in the air in celebration.

Video Clip

We lingered in the stands a bit and eventually took a few photos down by the rail as evidence that we had actually been there. As we finally made our way up to the concourse and walked out of the stadium, I thought about the dozens of Yankee games I had seen in the past. I had seen Don Mattingly hit a pinch-hit home run to beat the Angels in that same stadium, I had travelled to New York for Don Mattingly Day, and I had been lucky enough to take my entire family to see a game in New York in the old Stadium’s final season.

None of those games, though, compared to this one. The game itself was phenomenal, and it was an added bonus to see Mariano, but there was so much more to it than that. I was with my family on Father’s Day, sitting in unbelievable seats courtesy of ten students whom I’ll never forget. I’m sure I’ll be watching baseball for the next fifty years, but I know I’ll never see another game like this one.

This was a cruel game to watch if you were on the east coast (or if you were working with a serious sleep debt on the west coast, like me). Bartolo Colón was on the mound for the A’s, but he was far from his usual strike-throwing self. He had come into the game having yielded only six walks all season long, but he issued two in the first inning alone as he loaded the bases with one out. Even though Kevin Youkilis and Lyle Overbay popped out to end the threat, it still felt like an effective inning. Colón had thrown 27 pitches, and he didn’t have his typical command. With CC Sabathia on the mound for New York, surely it would be good night for the Yanks.

The first warning that the evening might not go as planned came two pitches into the bottom of the first. Coco Crisp lashed a Sabathia pitch into the seats in left field, and the A’s were up 1-0. It didn’t seem fair, to be honest. The Yankee hitters had worked so hard and been so methodical in the scoreless top half, and here Crisp walked into a fat pitch and Oakland had the lead. CC needed seven pitches to retire the next three hitters, and order was restored.

In the top of the second, Sabathia was simply unlucky. If you just read the play-by-play of this inning, you probably imagined that Derek Norris lashed a long double off the wall in right field to score Josh Reddick all the way from first, but that’s not what happened. Reddick sat on first base with two outs, so he was able to take off immediately as Norris popped the ball out towards right field. The ball was headed for no-man’s land as Mark Teixeira, Robinson Canó, and newbie right fielder Overbay converged. It landed untouched in front of Overbay, who bobbled it a bit, allowing Reddick to score just ahead of his throw. As Michael Kay noted on the telecast, it was the first time that the Yankees had paid a price for putting Overbay in the outfield. It was a ball that Ichiro would likely have caught, and even if he hadn’t, he certainly would’ve held Reddick at third. But Ichiro watched the play from centerfield, and A’s were up 2-0.

Derek Norris struck again in the fourth. The A’s had runners on first and second with two outs when Norris came to the plate. Sabathia’s first pitch was a lazy curve ball that seemed to bend right into Norris’s wheelhouse, and Norris sent it deep into the night over the high wall in left center. That 2-0 lead built on a lucky homer and a botched play by a guy playing the outfield for the fourth time in a decade was suddenly a five-run deficit. I fell asleep on the couch soon after this, so I didn’t see Oakland’s sixth run score on a Sabathia wild pitch in the sixth, but that’s probably for the best.

Colón, of course, cruised through his six innings. After that scare in the first, the Yankees never threatened, never even made him sweat. I simply don’t understand how this guy can still be this good. (At this point, the working title for this post was “Colonoscopy.”) When I woke up five hours later and picked up the game where my wife had clicked it off in the top of the eighth, Colón was gone, and suddenly the Yanks decided to make the night interesting. Brett Gardner, reigning A.L. Player of the Week, continued his hot hitting as he led off the inning with his second hit of the night. Canó then singled him to third, and when Teixeira followed that with a single of his own, the Yankees were finally on the board. Two outs later pinch hitter Vernon Wells somehow squeezed a line drive between short and third to score Canó, and it was 6-2.

When Chris Stewart singled with one out in the ninth, there was a spark of hope. When Canó followed that one out later with a double grounded down the left field line to put runners on second and third, that spark had grown into a flame large enough to force Oakland closer Grant Balfour into the game, a small victory in and of itself. Teixeira fell into a 1-2 count but roped a line drive just inches over Jed Lowrie’s leap at second to plate both runners and bring Travis Hafner to the plate as the tying run.

Hafner also got behind 1-2, but he stroked the next pitch to deep left field. The Oakland outfielders had all been standing on the warning track, and I remember thinking that they were playing ridiculously deep, giving away so much of the field, but it turned out they were positioned correctly. Left fielder Seth Smith only had to spring along the track towards left center where he leaped at the wall and caught Hafner’s ball for the final out of the game.

A’s 6, Yankees 4.

[Photo Credit: Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images]

Ah, the inviting right field porch at the new new Yankee Stadium. Good for what ails ya if you are a slumping left-handed hitter. Just axe Mark Teixeira whose line drive cleared the wall last night, good for a grand slam. Cheap or not it counted for four runs and although the Indians would tie the game, big hits by Brett Gardner and Travis Hafner gave the Yanks a 7-4 lead and that’s how it ended when Mariano Rivera got Nick Swisher to fly out to left field to end the game.

Final Score: Yanks 7, Indians 4.

Hits! Runs!

Exhale.

[Photo Credit: Reuters; Bags]

Just two weeks ago the Yankees were the surprise story of the 2013 season as they defied all odds and expectations and put together one of the best records in baseball, injuries be damned. Suddenly they’ve lost seven of their eight games and nine of their last twelve, and there could be any number of reasons for the slide.

This could be a simple regression to the mean. There’s no way a team can sustain injuries to Alex Rodríguez, Derek Jeter, Mark Teixeira, Curtis Granderson, Kevin Youkilis, and Andy Pettitte — not to mention Francisco Cervelli, Eduardo Nuñez, Joba Chamberlain, and Chris Stewart — and expect to be competitive for 162 games. If you believe this theory, then you believe the collapse was due.

Or this could be a case of a team relaxing when it shouldn’t. After pedaling so hard for so long to keep things going while they waited for those injured players to get healthy, there would have to be a tendency to relax once some of the marquee names started coming back. But if you looked at the lineup that Joe Girardi sent out on Sunday night, you saw a nine that wouldn’t strike fear into the average American League pitcher. When the opposition is sending an elite pitcher to the mound, as the Red Sox were in Clay Buchholz, well, things can get ugly.

Hiroki Kuroda has been the most consistent Yankee starter over the past two seasons, and early on he appeared to be equal to the challenge of facing Boston’s ace as he cruised through the first three innings before finding trouble in the fourth. The Red Sox come up with something new every year, which is nice of them, so my feelings for them don’t get stale, and this year’s gimmick is the beard. Ryan Gomes, Mike Napoli, Ryan Dempster, and Dustin Pedroia are all sporting them, probably as some type of Brony ritual. Anyway, the beards came out in force in the top of the fourth as Pedroia singled to lead off the inning, went to third on a single by David Ortíz, then scored on soft groundout from Napoli.

The Yankee offense was already done for the night, having notched a single from Ichiro in the second and another from Austin Romine in the third, so it didn’t really matter that José Iglesias homered in the fifth and Big Papi hit one in the sixth. (It might matter that Ortíz posed a bit after his blast, making with his signature bat toss, then pointing into the Boston dugout as he rounded third. Why he gets away with this shit, I’ll never know. I don’t hate Ortíz, but I hate that people think it’s okay for him to act like a jackass.)

And really, that was about it. The rains came two batters after Ortíz, forcing a long rain delay. Boone Logan took the mound when the tarp came off, but the rain came back after four minutes and that was that. Red Sox 3, Yankees 0. (One interesting note. After Logan got the final out of the top of the sixth, Andrew Miller jogged onto the field to take over for Buchholz. But since the game was called before he was able to throw a pitch, he only gets credit for a game played, not a game pitched, and Buchholz gets credit for a complete game and, I assume, a shutout.)

So where do the Yankees go from here? In just a week they’ve gone from first place to a tie for third, and there’s a certain air of desperation in the Bronx. The Cleveland Indians come to town tonight, and they might be just what the doctor ordered. The Yanks have beaten them three out of four games this season, outscoring them 32-8 in the process. It sure would be nice to see the Score Truck show up on Monday night.

[Photo Credit: Kathy Willens/AP]

Brilliant in the warm sun, cool in the shadows. This picture by our man Bags speaks to what it’s like in New York today.