The fifth and deciding game of the ALDS between the Rangers and the Rays features a fantastic match-up of left-handed twirlers. In fact, it’s been raining lefties in the ALDS, with four Cy Young candidates showing off their stuff. CC Sabathia and Francisco Liriano faced off in the Yankee-Twin opener, and Cliff Lee and David Price go at each other for the second time tonight. Throw in the fine performances of Andy Pettitte and CJ Wilson and left-handed batters have not felt very comfortable since the regular season ended.

I’ll never forget my introduction to the lefty’s breaking ball. For left-handed batters, it’s a rite of passage. Mine came in the ultimate setting, the batting cages near the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. I was eight or nine years old and I had never seen a batting cage that spit out breaking pitches. The cage with the shortest line featured a lefty slide-piece and I jumped in without a clue for what was in store.

The first round was not a happy experience – the bend was just too unsettling. The ball came directly at my front, right shoulder before succumbing to the laws of physics and dropping down and towards the plate. I realized that even though the pitches looked like they were going to hit me, they always broke down and away before impact. I just had to trust it, keep the front shoulder pointed at the machine, and wait for it.

After attention-getting success in the second round (after all this time, I can remember the special feeling of a gathering crowd behind the cage) , the baseball gods decided that this was too much, too fast. Or maybe one of the balls was just worn down too much to generate the proper spin when released from the machine. As it came hurtling toward my front shoulder, I dug in and waited for the break. It never broke. The ball just bore in and in and plowed into my lead arm. It stung badly and I watched, through tears, as the last few pitches sailed over my head. The balls whacked the backstop with that depressing thud. 

I understood something there on the ground. This was the deal you made when facing a lefty. If you want to cover that pitch, you have to give in, trust the break and accept the consequences. That’s how these pitchers keep us from hitting everything they throw. Among other dastardly things, they can move us off the plate; they can drill us in the arm.

Cliff Lee and David Price are both incredibly tough lefties, but that doesn’t mean that facing them is a similar experience. Look at their release points. David Price comes at you from the sling-shot arm slot, like a Randy Johnson-lite. The fastball and the breaking ball sweep across the left-handed batter’s box, but the fastball materializes suddenly on the hands while the breaking ball just keeps slipping down and away. Distinguishing one from the other is the difference between a difficult at bat and an impossible one.

Cliff Lee comes more over the top, which might be preferable for some lefties. But because of the expert way Lee hides the ball, and the movement he generates on all his pitches, he replaces the sweeping motion of Price with dart-gun precision and an unpredictability that the sling-shot lefty does not possess.

Both Lee and Price have success at limiting left-handed batters, but in two of the last three years, Lee actually had better numbers against righties. Price displayed the more traditional platoon advantage this year. Small sample sizes are in play for both, but I can believe that Price’s sweeping approach makes things more difficult for lefties but is slightly easier to track from the right-handed batter’s box. Meanwhile, Cliff Lee’s overhand style sacrifices some advantage versus lefties to better contend with the righties.

Outside of Ben Zobrist, none of the Rays did much with Cliff Lee in the first game. And then the righty-heavy lineup did even less with CJ Wilson in Game Two. I wonder if Joe Maddon will be tempted to start some of the lefties tonight, since the offense finally put runs on the board in Texas. Ron Washington has a much easier decision. His right-handed sluggers damaged Price the first time around and he can feel confident in trotting the same team out there again.

I expect Cliff Lee to be excellent, and I expect David Price to be much better than last time. But I don’t think he will be good enough. I expect the Rangers will win a low-scoring affair, 3-1. But no matter the outcome, Yankee fans can look forward to seeing a tough lefty in Yankee Stadium in Game 3 of the ALCS.

The Yankees rested comfortably for the second consecutive day Monday, and when the American League Championship Series begins Friday night, either in Arlington or St. Petersburg, they’ll have gone five full days without game action. Not even the All-Star break presented such a respite.

Much has already been written about the long layoff and whether or not it will benefit the Yankees. The consensus is that it could either help them, or hurt them. Well yes, but which one?

The facts are these: CC Sabathia will be pitching on eight days’ rest. Whatever their assignments — we’ll know officially later today — Andy Pettitte and Phil Hughes will be pitching on similar rest. Kerry Wood, Boone Logan, David Robertson and Mariano Rivera will be rejuvenated. Joba Chamberlain will be woken up and told he may be called for duty in the ALCS.

As for position players, Brett Gardner, Mark Teixeira, Jorge Posada, Nick Swisher, Derek Jeter, and Alex Rodriguez, all of whom played through injuries and other struggles in September and collectively helped the team limp into the wild-card position, are using this time to heal. (Based on the latest news from Esquire Magazine, Jeter might be healing the best out of all of them.) For guys like Curtis Granderson, the long layoff may kill the mojo he had going against the Twins.

I thought the layoff would prompt Joe Girardi to consider shelving AJ Burnett and going with a three-man rotation for at least this next round. With three well-rested arms, Sabathia could go on three days’ rest if necessary, as could either Pettitte or Hughes. But alas, my thought — ah, hell, let’s be honest, wish — was that Girardi would take that risk. He did not.

From GM Brian Cashman, on a conference call yesterday, as reported by the locals:

“I don’t think it will be a secret that (a four-man rotation is) probably the best route for us to go. Is (a three-man rotation) the best way to go? I don’t know if it’s the best way to go. I do think we’re deeper than that. I think we need to prepare to go with a four-man and see where that takes us and prove that we’re not just built for a division series with off days that are beneficial to us. In this round and probably the next round, we’re going to have to prove that we’re deeper than that.

“…October can bring out a competitive side in people, and I know AJ’s got a lot of competition in him. I know he’d like to eradicate everything that’s occurred here in the second half. A terrific start would go a long way toward doing that.”

Cashman is right. He’s diplomatically defending a five-year, $82.5 million investment, and he should. The Burnett signing was Cashman’s, and he’s holding himself accountable to the media. Even the AJ naysayers in the Banter community would like to see Burnett eradicate the bomb that the 2010 regular season was. But we also know he can eradicate the playoff run with a “Bad AJ” performance that features a lot of looks over his shoulders, and facial expressions normally reserved for the bathroom. Both Girardi and Cashman seem too conservative to hedge this risky of a bet.

(more…)

According to Brian Cashman, A.J. Burnett will get a start in the ALCS.

The postseason schedule is so relaxed, it’s now actually napping. As a result, we’ve got five whole days to kill before the Yankees play again, and while we figure out what to do with ourselves as we wait, I can only assume the players are doing the same. Some uneducated guesses as to how the Yankees are passing the time:

Robinson Cano: Hanging with his cousin Burt Reynolds*, tearing around Texas with a truckload of beer and eluding the sheriff with help from some friendly CBers.

*(No, really. I watched Burt Reynolds play for the Hudson Valley Renegades against the Brooklyn Cyclones this summer with, as you might imagine, considerable glee, and the discovery that he is Robinson Cano’s cousin just absolutely made my day.)

Alex Rodriguez: Sitting for a portrait of himself as a gryffin.

Derek Jeter: Oh, you know. Just chilling.

Andy Pettitte: Carefully planning ahead so that he will have just the right amount of stubble for Game 2 on Saturday.

Jorge Posada: Urinating on his hands a few extra times, spitting a lot, trying to hold his knees together with Fun-Tak, chewing gum, paper clips, and twine.

Nick Swisher: Finally getting that neck tattoo.

Mark Teixeira: Stroking a fluffy white cat and working on his sinister plan for world domination (well, I assume. No one is really that bland).

Joba Chamberlain: Wandering the streets and accosting random strangers to make sure they can see him.

A.J. Burnett: [sitting in front of the mirror]: “I’m going to pitch a great game next week! And I’m gonna help the team! Because I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and, doggonit, people like me!”

C.C. Sabathia: Watching fit, trim Cliff Lee and David Price as they pitch on absolutely nothing less than full rest, pointing, laughing, having another cheeseburger.

–

Mariano Rivera: Being the speaker. Being the listener. Being the giver. Being the sustainer. Protecting us from the front and back. Protecting us from the north and the south, from above and below. Protecting us from all directions.

 Being full of perfect knowledge of truth and awareness. Being full of bliss and pure consciousness. Being truth, consciousness and bliss. Being the absolute awareness. Being full of supreme wisdom and knowledge.

Being the earth, water, fire, air and the space. Being the root foundation of speech. Being beyond the physical, mental and causal bodies. Being beyond the three aspects of time: past, present and future. Being eternally established in the muladhara chakra. Having three shaktis: action, knowledge and will.

(Griffon via Christian Damm at conceptarg.org, Photo via the AP)

“The Last Boy,” Jane Leavy’s long-awaited biography of Mickey Mantle hits bookstores tomorrow. Last week, SI ran an excerpt that is sure to whet your appetite.

Dig:

In the spring of 1957 Mickey Mantle was the king of New York. He had the Triple Crown to prove it, having become only the 12th player in history to earn baseball’s gaudiest jewel. In 1956 he had finally fulfilled the promise of his promise, batting .353, with 52 homers and 130 RBIs. Everybody loved Mickey. “Mickey who?” the singer Teresa Brewer chirped. “The fella with the celebrated swing.”

Men wanted to be him. Women wanted to be with him. His dominion was vast, and his subjects were ardent. (One fan asked Lenox Hill Hospital for Mantle’s tonsils, which doctors there had removed following the 1956 season.) Mantle accepted his due with that great drawbridge of a smile that yanked the right-hand corner of his mouth upward to reveal a set of all-American choppers. “When he laughed, he just laughed all over,” his teammate Jerry Lumpe said.

Why wouldn’t he? Wherever Mantle went in the great metropolis—Danny’s Hideaway, the Latin Quarter, the “21” Club, the Stork Club, El Morocco, Toots Shor’s—his preferred drink was waiting when he walked through the door. Reporters waited at his locker for monosyllabic bons mots. Boys clustered by the players’ gate, hoping to touch him. It wasn’t enough to gawk at his impossibly broad shoulders and his fire-hydrant neck. They wanted tactile reassurance that he was for real. They scratched his arms, his face and the finish of every car he rode in. A burly security detail became mandatory.

Women—none more beautiful than he was—waited in hotel lobbies. Arlene Howard, the wife of Yankees catcher Elston Howard, says that when she met Mantle for the first time, she thought, My God, who is that? Just the physical body, I’d never seen anything like that. There was something about his presence that was just absolutely stunning.

“He was adorable,” said Lucille McDougald, the wife of Yankees infielder Gil McDougald. “We used to joke about it: Who wouldn’t hop into bed with him, given the opportunity, just for the fun of it?”

I think David Price and the Rays will find a way to beat Cliff Lee and the Rangers tomorrow night. Either way, neither Lee or Price is likely to start Game One of the ALCS against the Yankees. Over at the Pinstriped Bible, Steve Goldman takes a look at the possible pitching rotation for the New Yorkers:

Now, we know that the Rangers are reluctant to use Lee on short rest, but perhaps young Price won’t be subject to the same limitations. Yet, moving up Price, or Lee for that matter, doesn’t change anything. Whether they pitch Saturday (three days) or Monday (five days), they’re getting two starts in the seven games. If they pitch on regular rest on Monday, they have the benefit of their usual recovery time, and the manager retains the option of asking them to come back on short rest for Game 6 or regular rest for Game 7.

After the first four games, determining the matchups becomes difficult and depressing. Given Andy Pettitte’s fragile physical state, it seems spectacularly unlikely he would pitch on short rest for Game 5. That means A.J. Burnett or Ivan Nova or Waite Hoyt or someone who wouldn’t ideally start is going if Game 5 is necessary. One alternative, and it’s probably not a good idea or even a realistic one, is Hughes pitching Game 2 . This would open up the possibility of shis tarting Game 5 on three day’s rest. Then Pettitte would pitch Game 3 and would line up to pitch in the seventh game if, for some reason, Sabathia couldn’t make another short-rest start.

Well, kids, get your Rays gear on, because if this series goes five games, that means no Cliff Lee or David Price in Game 1 of the ALCS. Which we can now talk about freely without jinxing anything! (Again, not that I believe in any of that jinx stuff, of course).

Anyway, they’ll always be the Devil Rays to me; I was so annoyed when their silly name change actually worked. But I’ll be pulling for ’em today.

Playoff baseball returns to the Bronx tonight as Phil Hughes takes the hill for the Yanks. Yanks win, they advance; lose, and CC goes tomorrow night.

‘Nuff said:

Let’s Go Yan-Kees!

[Picture by Bags]

…Why’d it have to be the Twins?

First of all, I’m going to be very careful not to get too jinxy here – ahem, Mayor Bloomberg, what the hell?!  – because of course it’s entirely possible that the Twins will come back; they’re plenty good enough to win three games in a row. (Not that I actually believe in jinxes, of course. I would never walk all the way down five flights and two blocks over to find a tree so I could knock on wood because there was none in my platic-metal-glass office, for example. Nope, never done anything like that, certainly not during the 2005 postseason, not that it worked anyway).

That said, it’s not looking good for the Twinkies right now, and although of course I want to see the Yanks move on, I wish it could be any other team. Minnesota’s been my second-favorite AL club for a long time now: I like how they’ve managed to succeed with a small market and a relatively small payroll; I loved reading about them on Bat-Girl back in the day; I have issues with some of his strategic movies but I find Ron Gardenhire to be a likeable and twinkly little baseball gnome; I am in awe of Joe Mauer even though there’s no way he’s actually that wholesome and one day I’m sure they’ll find a bunch of heads in his freezer or something. I liked Joe Nathan, I like Orlando Hudson, because I am a red-blooded American I of course adore Jim Thome, and then I always root for my guy Denard Span, the only other Span I’ve ever come across outside of immediate family.

The presence of useless wretch Carl Pavano helps, of course, but even he can’t make the Twins unlikeable all by his lonesome.

Back in August, I went to Minnesota for a college friend’s wedding on a bison farm outside of Rochester (not a typo). My traveling companion and I figured, how the hell often are we gonna be in Minnesota? So we flew in a day early, got standing-room tickets, and drove our rental car the 90 miles up to the Twin Cities. The park itself is lovely (only complaint: they need to get something better than a few dull-looking trees out there in center field), but I was more impressed by how psyched the fans were – for outdoor baseball, for their first-place club, for Jim Thome.

Also, the cheese curds. Mmmm… cheese curds.

Their fans were enthusiastic and engaged without being quite so rabid as I’m used to here in New York – which has both advantages and drawbacks, I suppose (I grew up surrounded by rabid fanbases, and a game watched without surrounding spittle and bile doesn’t quite seem like a game to me). Almost everyone at the ballpark seemed to have some kind of Twins gear, and even though Carl Pavano got crushed by the White Sox, the crowd never turned sour or hostile. (They did boo A.J. Pierzynski every time he came up, but that’s both understandable and praiseworthy). It was just a nice atmosphere, and while I’m generally used to shrugging it off and enjoying myself when the Yankees crush small-market competitors, I feel no bloodlust for the Twins. I hope they lose tomorrow, but I want the best for them.

If they do come back and beat the Yanks somehow, then as soon as I get past a brief mourning period, they’ll have my support all the way. And if they don’t… well, I hope they run into somebody else next year.

[Photo via 1) http://www.gephartelectric.com and 2) stolen from my traveling companion without even asking]

The first five innings of Game One and the first three innings of Game Two provided too many flashbacks to the putrid way the Yankees played over the final two months of the season. They looked listless, uninterested, and generally helpless against the opponent’s starting pitcher. Thankfully, the Yankees made the most of the later innings in both games, giving us ten good frames that accounted for two wins in two nights at Target Field. With two memorable playoff games in the books, it’s time for some random postseason thoughts…

It took a little over two months, but Lance Berkman finally made a major impact as a Yankee. I was exceedingly impressed by his gargantuan home run in Game Two, which easily cascaded over the left-center field wall at cavernous Target Field. Frankly, I haven’t seen that kind of opposite field power from a left-handed Yankee batter since the halcyon days of Reggie Jackson in 1981. As if that left-field blast wasn’t sufficient, Berkman then burned Denard Span with a deep drive to center field, resulting in a run-scoring double that broke a 2-2 tie in the seventh inning. Berkman’s bat effectively carried the Yankee offense, which managed to score five runs against a hittable Carl Pavano and a parade of Twins relievers.

In some ways, Berkman is a lame duck DH for the Yankees. As a free agent, there is almost no chance that he will return to New York in 2011. The Yankees would like to make room for the younger and less expensive Jesus Montero, who can split DH and catching duties with Jorge Posada. Furthermore, ever since Berkman joined the Yankees, rumors have swirled that he would like to go back to the Astros. Houston’s impressive finish to the regular season has likely only reinforced Berkman’s thinking. If the Astros can find someone to take on Carlos Lee’s contract, they can create an opening at first base for Berkman to make his return.

Whether or not he is merely making a cameo in New York, I hope Berkman has a big postseason. If he helps the Yankees return to the World Series, the trade that sent Mark Melancon to Houston will be more than justified. Berkman has been a tremendously productive power hitter for most of his career, perhaps not a Hall of Famer but the kind of player who ranks only a rung below Cooperstown. He has slugged over .600 two times, drawn more than 100 walks three times, and driven in more than 120 runs four times. Yet, he hasn’t received full credit, mostly because he has been stuck on a number of also-ran Astros teams, with the exception of Houston’s 2002 and 2005 clubs. If it takes a little postseason glory with the Yankees for a standout hitter like “Big Puma” to receive his due, then so be it…

I’m just going to come out and say it: I love the way that Curtis Granderson plays! Even before his late-season tinkering sessions with Kevin Long, Granderson has always impressed me. He runs hard from the moment he hits the ball, a trait that helped him reach third base with that game-changing triple in Game One. He is a smart base runner, in an era when base running has become a lost art, even amongst star players. He also plays a fundamentally sound center field, whether it’s squaring up on catches so as to put himself into good throwing position, or showing a willingness and ability to hit the cutoff man.

Off the field, Granderson is one of the most thoughtful and well-spoken of all the Yankees. He is unfailingly polite, even when faced with difficult questions during his early season struggles. If there was one player on the Yankees who could serve as a model of proper behavior, Granderson might just be the best choice.

(more…)

I figure Andy Pettitte is a borderline Hall of Famer, but if he keeps winning playoff games, who knows?

[Drawing by Larry Roibal]

I had a good time reading from Lasting Yankee Stadium Memories in Brooklyn last night. I went on first and by the time I was finished the Yanks held a 3-2 lead. When I got to the subway, it was 4-2 and that’s the last I knew from anything until I reached Dyckman Street in uptown Manhattan. I sat on the 1 train, clutching my phone, waiting for the train to exit the tunnel so I could get a signal. The anticipation…oh, the anticipation. When I saw the score, the game was final–Yanks 5, Twins 2. I raised my right arm and let out a “Yeah.” A woman sitting across from me looked up and knew. “What’s the score?” she said.

“Yanks won,” I said.

A few more people looked up and we were all smiling.

I waited for the bus on 231st street and called Jay Jaffe for a recap.

When the bus arrived, I said hello to the driver.

“How you doin?” he said.

“The Yanks won, I’m great.”

I found a seat in the back and then I heard the driver’s voice over the loudspeaker.

“What was the score?”

“5-2” I yelled.

Bus full of sleepy but happy New Yorkers.

I have a confession to make. I don’t hate Carl Pavano. I know that’s not the Banter-party line, and I often exploit his rampant unpopularity for jokes at his expense, but really, I don’t have any hard feelings about the guy. When the Yankees acquire someone via free agency, I don’t care how much they spend on that player, just so long as I never hear them use that contract as an excuse for why they can’t go obtain another player down the line. After 2004, the Yankees needed starting pitching. The free-agent market was not strong, and they foolishly sent some money Pavano’s way. And then he never really pitched for the Yankees over the four years of his contract.

Yeah, that sucked, but it’s not like that money prevented them from getting Roy Halladay or some other great pitcher. He didn’t even occupy a spot in the rotation after 2005, so it’s not like he blocked a spot for some promising prospect or tied Cashman’s hands when it came to other trades or signings. I know that $40 million would have been better spent elsewhere and it probably would have benefitted the Yankees in some tangible way, but sometimes free agent signings don’t work out. If you must hold a grudge, I say pin at least some of it on Cashman or George.

I have no painful memories of the guy – he never disappointed me in any way. He was off my radar-screen by the middle of the 2005 season, only popping up occasionally (ok, more than occasionally) as the butt of a joke. But the rest of the Twins are either bland or likable or absurd (yeah, I’m talking about you, Orlando Cabrera), so Carl Pavano is the easy choice for villain of this ALDS. And he has graciously accepted this role and donned the facial hair to support his performance.

How do you spot such a villain?

And he probably throws a change-up.

Pavano pitched well enough into the seventh, but he was not dominant. The Yankees lined up a few hits in front of Arod’s sac fly and Lance Berkman whipped out his fairway wood for a home run to the opposite field. Pavano may have sustained more damage if Robinson Cano had run hard out of the box in the fourth, or if Cano had waited for a good pitch to hit in the sixth. In the sixth Cano was overanxious, but not offensively so. But in the fourth Cano posed and postured on his liner to the right field wall and when Swisher followed, the double play was still very much in order and the Yankees could not cash in a runner on third with less than two outs. I would love it if all Yankees would just run hard out of the box every time, but I think that’s just a thing of the past.

In the seventh, the Yankees finally dismissed Pavano – hopefully for the rest of the ALDS. Jorge Posada worked the first Yankee walk of the night and Berkman, opting for the 3 iron this time, lined one over the center fielder’s head for a run scoring double. Berkman was victimized on a soft change-up off the outside corner in his first at bat and seemed to sit on it as he tagged a similar pitch for both the home run and the double. He was sitting on the outside change so hard in the seventh, that Pavano was able to slip a fastball in there for what should have been the third strike, but the home plate umpire missed the call. Irate due to the double, Ron Gardenhire argued the call and was thrown out of the game. I guess he decided his team needed firing up, because with the score only 3-2 Yankees, the game was still firmly in reach.

After the ejection, third baseman Danny Valencia misplayed a very good bunt by Brett Gardner and Derek Jeter lunged out into the opposite batter’s box to serve one into right field just in front of the diving Jason Kubel to plate Berkman. Jeter’s exaggerated follow through as he moved up the first baseline was priceless – he knew he was getting away with something. That was it for Carl Pavano and, unfortunately, that was it for the Yankees in the seventh. After Gardner’s attempt to give the Twins the first out of the inning failed, Granderson succeeded. His sacrifice paved the way for an intentional walk to Teixeira, thus loading the bases for Alex Rodriguez and Robinson Cano. Arod got a meat ball on the first pitch from Jon Rauch, but could only foul it back. He went down swinging and Cano popped out to second. The game was hanging there for the Yankees, and they just couldn’t blow it open.

Andy Pettitte was just wonderful tonight. He had one bad inning, which wasn’t even that bad. He allowed a pair of singles, a walk and a pair of productive outs in the second. That made the score 1-0 Twins. And then he was just straight nails for the rest of the game, apart from a hanging cutter to Orlando Hudson in the sixth. Hudson lashed it over the left field wall to match Berkman’s homer and tie the score at two. Now that I have seen Andy Pettitte go seven strong, I am far more optimistic about this entire postseason.

Backing up Andy Pettitte was Walter Johnson. Or was it Bob Feller? Whoever he was, he was wearing Kerry Wood’s jersey and throwing sinister stuff. Put it this way, Kerry Wood was brilliant for the Yankees this year allowing only two runs in 26 innings and striking out 31. Apart from a surplus of walks he was almost like the Joba Chamberlain of 2007. And his eighth inning tonight blew any of those previous 26 out of the water.

The Yankees got another run in the ninth when Gardner and Granderson conspired to speed around the bases. Old man Derek Jeter tried to join them, but couldn’t leg out an infield hit. Still, his dribbler advanced Gardner to second. For there Gardner stole third and scored when Granderson won a tough battle with fireballer Matt Capps and dumped a single into center.

With a 5-2 lead headed into the bottom of the ninth inning, Mariano Rivera came in with more margin for error that he has had lately. He didn’t need it. Mauer’s a great hitter and I look forward to his at bats against Mariano. He really just can’t get comfortable up there. He managed a single as he fisted it into left field, but I think the confusion remains. Delmon Young rapped into a 6-4-3 and Mariano retired Jim Thome on a pop out to left to end the game for a second night in a row. The Yankees won 5-2 and now lead the ALDS two games to none. How about the positioning of Gardner on that play? Jim Thome’s farts go more than 300 feet, and yet there was Brett, perfectly placed, hugging the line in shallow left. I bet Jim Thome gets a hit on that ball 99% of the time.

Before the series, I was assigned the “Why the Twins Will Beat The Yankees” article. I thought the Twins had something special brewing in Minnesota, and I wasn’t sold on Andy Pettitte’s health. But with CC, Andy, Mariano and Wood throwing darts, and a deep, powerful lineup with newcomers Curtis Granderson and Lance Berkman getting big hits, this Yankee team is superior to the Twins and they have showed it. This series is not over, but the Yankees have put themselves in the best possible position to advance. Phil Hughes will start the biggest game of his life in game 3, but with a lot less pressure on him than could have been. Can’t wait.

Huge game for the Twins as they look to even the series. The Yanks–and their fans–would love nothing more than to give Carl Pavano a beatin’ and return home up, 2-0.

Should be a good one. I expect Pavano to do well, but hopefully, not too well. And I’ve got no idea if we’ll see Good Andy or Bad Andy. He’ll need to be careful to Delmon Young, who owns him. Otherwise, time for the Score Truck to take it to the Bridge.

Let’s Go Yan-Kees!

Alyssa Milano might be the only other entity that regrets a four-year relationship with Carl Pavano more than the Yankees. Granted, the beloved Middle School crush of my age group wasn’t with the man George King of the Post dubbed the “American Idle” as long as the Yankees, but neither relationship was successful for the parties on Pavano’s arm. For Yankee haters, the thought of Pavano dominating the Yankees after he stole $39.99 million from the team from 2005-2008, spreading 26 starts, pitching 145 2/3 innings and amassing a 9-8 record and more ridiculous excuses for landing on the DL, is sublime. For the rest of us, well, the nausea hasn’t subsided.

Somewhere down South, a grinning Pat Jordan is polishing off a gun for Alex.

The Yankees’ saving grace, as it has been in seemingly every Game 2 of every playoff series in which he’s appeared as a Yankee since 2003, is Andy Pettitte. Pettitte won Game 2 of every series in ’03. He won the clinching game in every series of last year’s World Series run. He represents the championships, reliability, leadership, and stability in the rotation.

But he also represents the age of this Yankee team. At 38, Pettitte has not shown the ageless superhuman qualities of his bullpen colleague Mariano Rivera. Thursday night will mark only Pettitte’s fourth start since coming off the disabled list. Pettitte admitted his success in Baltimore in his return was based on adrenaline. His next two starts — both against Boston — didn’t feature the command he displayed in that first outing. Will the adrenaline of the postseason, the knowledge of what it takes to win in these circumstances, especially now that he’s been bolstered to a 1-0 lead, be enough to get by?

With all due respect to Banter colleague Hank Waddles, Pavano’s presence on the mound for the Twins has nothing to do with audacity. In fact, there’s precedent for the possibility of him dominating the Yankees Thursday night. Pavano allowed four runs and held the Yankees to a .224 BAA in his two starts against them during the ’09 regular season. In four career postseason appearances (three against the Yankees), Pavano has an 8-to-1 strikeout-to-walk ratio, a 0.95 WHIP, and has allowed just 22 hits in 26 1/3 IP. Pavano started Game 4 of the ’03 World Series — the infamous “Jeff Weaver Game” — and held the Yankees to one run in eight innings of the pivotal contest. Last year, Pavano and Pettitte engaged in a great duel last year in Game 3 of the ALDS; what proved to be the final game ever played at the Metrodome. Pavano made two bad pitches in his seven innings of work. They resulted in solo home runs by Alex Rodriguez and Jorge Posada in the seventh inning. Pettitte, meanwhile, also pitched into the seventh, holding the Twins to just three hits in 6 1/3 innings, and he struck out seven. Pavano was a hard-luck loser. A step up from the first-class loser he was as a Yankee.

Spin forward to Thursday’s Game 2, given the current state of affairs with the two starting pitchers, the edge goes to Minnesota (Pavano’s 4.85 ERA since August 1 notwithstanding). Groin injuries can get reaggravated very easily. If there’s a Burnett or Meat Tray sighting within the first four innings, you can almost guarantee a loss for the Yankees.

A quality start from Pettitte will go a long way toward answering not only the questions posed above, but the broader questions regarding the viability of the Yankees’ playoff rotation behind CC Sabathia. I have to see it to believe it, though.

Prediction: Twins 5, Yankees 2

Joe Pos on The Great Mariano:

There’s nothing left really to say about his greatness. We all know the story. He throws that cutter precisely where he wants, it turns left just as it gets to the plate, and there has never been anyone quite like him.

Still, watching him break four bats on Wednesday night — I’m pretty sure he broke Denard Span’s bat when getting the last out of the eighth, then broke Orlando Hudson’s bat, Joe Mauer’s bat and Jim Thome’s bat in the ninth — was another awe-inspiring reminder. He clearly does not throw as hard as he once did. Teams have broken him down on video for more than a decade. We all KNOW exactly what he’s going to do. And still, major league hitters come up, they swing at his cutter, the ball breaks in two inches more than they expected, they break their bat. In Las Vegas, I’ve seen David Copperfield make a car appear out of thin air, and I’ve seen Lance Burton duel someone in a costume who turns out to be Lance Burton. I’m sure I could watch those tricks 50 times and never figure out how they are done. I’m sure I could watch those tricks 100 times and never figure out how they’re done.

But Mariano Rivera has pitched 1,150 innings in the big leagues. He has pitched another 135 or so postseason innings. He has faced almost 900 different big league hitters. And this same trick, precisely this same trick, works almost every time. The Twins may or may not be good enough to come back in this series. They will obviously need to beat up on the Yankees’ second-string starting pitchers, and try to hold their own against this relentless Yankees offense. What they do know is this: They ain’t going to win it in the ninth inning. Mariano Rivera turns 41 next month. He is aging just like the rest of us. But for one more year, it sure looks like nobody is going to beat the Yankees in the ninth inning.

C.C. Sabathia pitched pretty well, but pretty well wasn’t going to get it done against Francisco Liriano tonight. No, scratch that. Liriano was magnificent, but in the sixth inning his slider turned back into a pumpkin and the Yankees – no, never mind, in the sixth inning Sabathia lost it and the Twins finally – nope. It was Curtis Granderson – no, it was Mark Teixeira who – it was Mariano – the blown call in the ninth could’ve… screw it, the Yankees won, 6-4.

I went through quite a few different ledes tonight.

Initially, it looked like Francisco Liriano was going to out-ace C.C. Sabathia. The Hefty Lefty wasn’t bad, but his mistakes were taken full advantage off: a two-run Michael Cuddyer home run in the second inning, and a failure to cover first base quickly enough one inning later — combined with heads-up Orlando Hudson base running and a Posada passed ball — led to a 3-0 hole for the Yankees. At the time, that seemed like a lot of runs.

Meanwhile, for the first five innings, Liriano alternated between merely pitching well and making the Yankees look ridiculous. During his streak of 10 New York batters retired in a row, hitters like Gardner and Granderson and Alex Rodriguez were cutting loose with swings that came nowhere near the ball in either time or space.

But then all of a sudden Liriano turned mortal – or perhaps, to be less dramatic about it, in their third time through the order the Yanks just got a better feel for him. Mark Texeira got things started with a double, and Alex Rodriguez, who had struck out flailing on three pitches in his previous at-bat, worked a walk. Robinson Cano singled, and after a rather hapless-looking Marcus Thames struck out, Jorge Posada had a fantastic at-bat and pushed a single into right. Curtis Granderson’s triple finished the Yanks’ scoring in that inning, and also finished Francico Liriano’s night.

The bottom of that inning wasn’t any kinder to Sabathia, who had a very un-C.C. meltdown (“you’re being very un-Dude, Dude”). A walk, a double, and another walk loaded the bases, at which point Sabathia walked in the Twins’ tying run in the person of Danny Valencia (who has been a pleasant surprise for the Twins this season and is about to become an unpleasant surprise for a lot of Yankee fans). Yoicks. He recovered to strike out J.J. Hardy and end the inning, but the lead was already gone and everyone headed into the seventh inning all tied up at 4.

It was Texeira who led the second Yankee comeback, too, following a Nick Swisher single with a high, slow two-run home run just fair to right field. (I don’t know if it was an actual phenomenon or just a product of weird camera work, but the fly balls hit tonight seemed to have an unusually long hang time; I could’ve recited “Jabberwocky” in its entirety while waiting for that ball to come down on one side of the foul pole. Joe Girardi was shown yelling “Stay fair! Stay fair!” and his leadership skills with inanimate objects must be impressive, because it worked). So now the Yankees had a 6-4 lead, but with as many reversals as this game had, nobody was relaxing.

The Yankee pen kept things right there, although not without a few terrifying moments. It took the combined efforts of Boone Logan, David Robertson, and Kerry Wood to get the ball to Mariano Rivera, with two outs in the eighth and runners on second and third. And Rivera — who one of these days will start showing some cracks in his 40-year-old facade, but not today — got Denard (“No Relation Unless He Has Some Short Uncoordinated Jewish Relatives We Don’t Know About”) Span to do what hitters traditionally do against Mariano Rivera, and ground out.

The ninth inning would’ve been another by-the-numbers Rivera classic except that the third out, a shoestring catch by defensive replacement Greg Golson, was incorrectly ruled a trap by the umpires. As if we needed yet another argument for instant replay in the postseason, and if the Yankees had gone on to lose I would’ve suggested a Tweet-up at MLB Headquarters with pitchforks and torches. Instead, Jim Thome popped up the first pitch he saw, and the 6-4 lead held up.

For all the tsuris over how hard the Yankees should play for the Division as opposed to the Wild Card, the Twins lost their home field advantage along with this game. Andy Pettitte starts Game 2 tomorrow for roughly the 300th time in his career, and with the Yanks up 1-0 in the Series, I look forward to actually being able to breath during that one.

How do you follow-up a no-hitter?

The Yanks and Twins begin their series in the shadow of Roy Halladay’s great feat. So be it.

We’ll be rooting! (Enjoy the comments section and be mindful of our house rules–feel free to curse, just don’t curse at each other.)

This is what we’ve been waiting for. Never mind the fancy introductions…

Let’s Go Yan-Kees!

[Picture by Bags]