Food 52 Contest Winner:  Sho ‘Nuff.

[Photo Credit: Sarah Shatz]

Smooth out the R&B.

Mariano Rivera shredded the Twins last night to seal a thrilling victory. Joe Mauer, one of the greatest batsmen in the game, was the second out. Mauer saw one pitch, an insistent, boring cutter and it destroyed him.

Mariano breaks a lot of bats. And he’s caused a few guys to chuck their bats after missing entirely. But what he did to Mauer, I’ve never seen before. Mauer hit the ball – a dribbler to second base – and still lost his bat into the seats. This wasn’t a guy slipping or getting fooled; Mariano literally knocked the bat out of his hands.

I thought of a good-guy gunslinger shooting the bad guy in the hand, or a fencer twirling the epee out his opponent’s grip. But more powerful than that. Maybe one of these moments captures it best:

[Featured Image: Getty]

Check out this moving story by Josh Wilker.

[Featured Image: David Goldman]

A friend recommended this book to me. I read it last month. It is beautiful.

At the New Yorker blog, The Book Bench, Kelly Stout writes:

At the suggestion of a colleague, I picked up William Maxwell’s “So Long, See You Tomorrow,” which first appeared in The New Yorker in two parts in 1979, and for me, falls into that category one semi-secretly curates: Books I Really Ought To Have Read Already. But no matter; now seems as good a time as any for a novel about nostalgia. Maxwell’s narrator—who is sometimes thought to be a shade of the author himself—remembers a moment in his youth, following the death of his mother, when he “had inadvertently walked through a door that I shouldn’t have gone through and couldn’t get back to the place I hadn’t meant to leave.” The boy develops a habit of dwelling in the skeleton of the house his father and stepmother are building for their new life, when he discovers “I had found a way to get around the way things were.”

Edward Mendelson wrote in The New York Review of Books that “in Maxwell’s realistic fiction no one learns and no one changes,” and indeed, “So Long, See You Tomorrow” is a study in craving the past, even for characters like the narrator’s forward-looking father, who solves the problem of his first wife’s death with a marriage to someone new. The narrator tells this story just about a half-century after it happens, timing that recalls the forty-year cycle of nostalgia that Adam Gopnik writes about in the magazine this week. The novel is a balm for anyone attracted to the half-soothing, half-sinister sense that everything was better just before it got bad. Without earnestly condemning his own impulses toward glancing backward, the narrator laments that, “Between the way things used to be and the way they were now was a void that couldn’t be crossed.”

Here is the Mendelson article cited above:

William Maxwell was a plain-speaking, seemingly realistic novelist who wrote autobiographical stories about middle-class life in small towns and urban neighborhoods. At first he tried to imitate Virginia Woolf’s lyricism, but he soon cleansed his style of ornament and exaggeration. He wrote in taut, laconic rhythms that evoked the spare speech of his native Midwest, and portrayed his characters’ inner and outer lives with economical clarity and nuance. His props and characters were indistinguishable from real settings and persons from Lincoln, Illinois, where he was born in 1908, and Manhattan, where he lived most of his adult life until his death in 2000. Almost every episode in his fiction was reconstructed from events in his life, rearranged for concision and elegance. In a few heightened moments in his novels and stories, he imagined what the furniture and fixtures in a room might say if they could speak among themselves, unheard by human ears, but he presented these moments as metaphors for the sad reality of human moods.

Maxwell had two separate careers as a writer; both overlapped his third career as fiction editor of The New Yorker. His first career, as a writer of realistic novels and stories, began when his first novel appeared in 1934 and continued in such books as The Château (1961) and So Long, See You Tomorrow (1980). In 1946, a year after he married a young painter, he began a second career as a writer of magical folktales in the style of Mother Goose and the Brothers Grimm. In these tales the magic hidden beneath the surface of his realistic fiction emerges with explicit and often comic force, and their world is partly the familiar modern one, partly a timeless fairyland, and wholly his own invention.

[Photo Credit: Hengki Koentjoro]

This was the song I didn’t want to listen to yesterday. Thought it would make me too sad. But then I did listen to it and I played it again and again and marveled at its power. A friend of mine said, “It doesn’t convert you to the Confederacy or anything, but it kinda makes you understand the Confederacy, which is a bold thing.” Amen.

And here is a great version from “The Last Waltz.”

Rest in Peace, Levon.

 

I’ve always had this image of Yankees’ radio announcer John Sterling working on his game during the off-season. He’s sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee, a copy of the latest roster, and a shaky understanding of what listeners might find clever or cool.

“Teixeira… Teixeira… Mark Teixeira… Hmm, what about this? On your Mark, get set… Go Teixeira! No, that’s not gonna work. C’mon, big John! Wait — I got it! You’re on the Mark, Teixeira! That’s gold, baby, gold!”

Some of Sterling’s catch phrases are simply awful, but others are, admittedly, a bit catchy. I’ve always liked the line he usually drops when Curtis Granderson goes deep. “Who can do it? The Grandyman can!” Sure, it’s easy, but I like it.

It’s my guess that Sterling never thought he’d have to go to the well three times in one game for Granderson, so I’ll forgive him his regrettable call of Grandy’s third home run on Thursday night. (Yes, you read that correctly, the Grandyman went deep three times, and I have to believe Sterling is still kicking himself for not coming up with this line instead: “Curtis, you’re once, twice, three tiiiiiimes a Grandy!”)

Ah, but there was a game, so we should get to that.

Aside from Granderson’s historic night, I felt like I had seen this game before. First, a Yankee regular was given half a day off at DH, and Eduardo Núñez was inserted into the lineup. I can understand the urge to rest veterans like Alex Rodríguez and Derek Jeter, but Robinson Canó?

It took only three batters for this decision to blow up. With one out and a runner on first base, Joe Mauer pounded a routine ground ball out to second. Núñez fielded the ball cleanly, but then threw the ball high and wide to first. Teixeira was able to snag the errant toss, but he was pulled away from the bag and Mauer was safe.

Phil Hughes was on the mound, and he responded by striking out Josh Willingham for the second out, then proved he’d been paying attention during the first three game of the series by walking Justin Morneau on four pitches. Hughes could’ve gotten the next batter and no one would’ve thought about Núñez’s error again, but he didn’t. Ryan Doumit singled to left to score two runs, then Danny Valencia followed with a double to score two more, and the Yankees were down 4-0.

There’s a strong temptation to point out that all four of those runs were unearned and lay all the blame at the feet of Mr. Núñez, but Hughes has to shoulder at least half of the responsibility. Games often turn on a single at bat when the pitcher either makes his pitch or doesn’t. Hughes didn’t make his pitch, but as it turned out those mistakes to Doumit and Valencia didn’t determine the game.

Granderson started the climb back with a one-out solo home run in the top of the first, and three batters later Teixeira launched a two-run shot to bring the Yanks to within 4-3. Then a funny thing happened — Hughes started making his pitches.

For a four inning stretch from the second to the fifth inning, Hughes allowed just two hits and never felt much pressure from the Twins.

Meanwhile, the Yankees kept clawing their way back. Núñez did his best to make up for his earlier error by doubling with two outs in the second, then scored when Jeter rifled a single into right field, the 3,110th base hit of Jeter’s career, tying him with his boyhood idol, Dave Winfield. Just as we were digesting this and thinking about all the Hall of Famers Jeter’s likely to pass on the hits list in the next month, Granderson struck again, belting his second homer of the game to grab a 6-4 lead. Two innings later he’d hit his third of the game, another solo shot, and the score was 7-4.

The weight of Hughes’s long first inning finally took its toll in the sixth. After wisely walking Morneau to lead off the inning, Hughes floated a change up to Doumit. Doumit rubbed his eyes in disbelief, licked his chops, and dispatched the ball deep into the night. The lead had shrunk to 7-6 and manager Joe Girardi had no choice but to lift his starter, but it didn’t matter. The bullpen was coming in, so the game was over. Boone Logan, Rafael Soriano, David Robertson, and Mariano Rivera (or, LoSo-RoMo) came in and turned out the lights: 3.2 IP, 4 H, 4 K, zero hope.

Much has been made of the ineffectiveness of the Yankee starters and their paltry total of three quality starts, but the bullpen has been the yin to that yang. If we award starting pitchers a quality start for lasting six or more innings and yielding three or fewer runs, why not give an entire bullpen a Quality Finish for an equally effective closing? (For all I know, this statistic might already exist, but please allow me to continue thinking that I made it up.)

Let’s say that a team will get a quality finish when a game is closed in one of two ways: two innings or less with no runs allowed or three or more innings with one run allowed. Using that definition the bullpen has notched ten quality finishes. The folks at Elias will have to tell you how that compares to the rest of the league. I can tell you that the bullpen ERA sits at 1.83, which is pretty good.

Before we go, here’s an interesting note about Jeter. He’s currently riding a ten-game hitting streak, the 44th double-digit streak of his career, which ties him with Al Simmons for fourth place all-time behind Tris Speaker (47), Hank Aaron (48), and Ty Cobb (66), Hall of Famers all.

A nice win for the Yanks. Here’s hoping they bottled that bit of momentum and took it with them up to Boston.

Yankees 7, Twins 6.

[Photo Credit: Frank Franklin II/AP Photo]

Phil Hughes and the Yanks look for a win and a series split vs. the Twins.

1. Jeter SS
2. Granderson CF
3. A-Rod 3B
4. Cano 2B
5. Teixeira 1B
6. Swisher RF
7. Ibanez LF
8. Martin C
9. Nunez 2B

And if the early results have you down, check out this bit of hilarity from the one and only Ted Berg.

[Image Credit: Clker.com]

 

Backup catcher can be a thankless job. Off all the bench positions, the second string backstop is arguably the most scrutinized and most criticized, particularly because so many people tend to overlook defense and hone in on their typically meager offensive contributions.

Most Games by a Yankees’ Catcher, Since 1918

Note: Includes games in which the player PH for the existing catcher.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

Over the years, the Yankees have been blessed with several elite catchers. From Bill Dickey to Yogi Berra, Elston Howard, Thurman Munson, and Jorge Posada, the Bronx Bombers have often enjoyed a comparative advantage behind the plate. Combined, that quintet has played 44% of the team’s “catcher games” (based on total games played at catcher, not in each season) and accounted for around 50% of most statistical contributions from the position. However, these all-time greats have had some help along the way.

The Best vs. the Rest: Comparison of Yankees’ Catchers, Since 1918

Note: Includes games in which the player PH for the existing catcher.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

In addition to the All Stars mentioned above, the Yankees have had 114 catchers since 1918, ranging from Billy Shantz, who appeared in only one game but never had an at bat, to Rick Cerone, who played 567 games as a catcher and finished seventh in the 1980 MVP balloting.  This less than stellar group of backstops has compiled a batting line of .254/.326/.367, which, while paling in comparison to the rates posted by the team’s better catchers, still seems respectable (for context, major league catchers hit a combined .245/.313/.389 in 2011). However, those totals include the contributions of several starters, and today, we’re only concerned with the backups.

Most Games as a Yankees’ Backup Catcher, Since 1918

Note: Includes games in which the player PH for the existing catcher. Backup role defined as any catcher but the one with the most games behind the plate in an individual season.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

Norwegian-born Arndt Jorgens ranks as the most prolific backup catcher in Yankees’ history. From 1929 to 1939, Jorgens served as a second stringer to Bill Dickey, joining the likes of Benny Bengough, Buddy Rosar (both of whom also rank among the top five) and Joe Glenn in that role. Interestingly, Dickey’s Hall of Fame successor, Yogi Berra, also ranks as the second most tenured backup. Berra was a second stinger, at least in terms of catching, both at the beginning of his career and the end, when he moved to the outfield to make room for Elston Howard. Turnabout was fair play for Howard, who spent the first five years of his career alternating between the outfield and Berra’s primary backup.

Top-10 Career OPS by a Yankees’ Backup Catcher, Since 1918

Note: Includes games in which the player PH for the existing catcher. Backup role defined as any catcher but the one with the most games behind the plate in an individual season. Totals above exclude years in which the player led the team in games behind the plate. Minimum of 150 career plate appearances.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

Older Yankees’ fans probably remember Ron Hassey very well. In 1985 and 1986, the plodding catcher posted a prolific OPS of .846, while serving as Butch Wynegar’s primary backup. In the process, he also earned the nickname “Babe” because his lefty swing and titanic homeruns resembled the Bambino. In the 1990s, Mike Stanley was a similar-styled player. Before ascending to the starting job in 1993, his bat made him a fan favorite when he was Matt Nokes’ backup in 1992. After becoming the lead man, Stanley turned the role over to Jim Leyritz, who provided steady offense behind the plate in nine seasons as a second stringer for the Yankees. However, Leyritz greatest notoriety came in the postseason, during which he authored two of the most dramatic home runs in franchise history.

10 Best/Worst OPS Seasons by a Yankees’ Backup Catchers, Since 1918

Note: Includes games in which the player PH for the existing catcher. Backup role defined as any catcher but the one with the most games behind the plate in an individual season. Minimum of 75 plate appearances and seasons by Yogi Berra and Jorge Posada excluded.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

Considering the relatively limited playing time of a backup catcher, their offensive performance is difficult to predict. For every Benny Bengough who surprises with an exemplary season, there’s a Joel Skinner who consistently makes fans groan every time they see his name penciled into the lineup. Although the Yankees have recently had some success getting offense from their backup catcher, Jose Molina (2007) and John Flaherty (2003-2004), for the most part, the team’s second stringers have been light with the bat. Luckily, there is organization depth at catcher because as frustrating as it is to have a backup who can’t it, it’s much worse when the same is true about the starter.

“Taxi” by Saul Leiter (1957)

 

Pat Jordan plays golf with Justin Verlander:

Verlander stops the cart, and we go into the woods to look for his ball. Two egrets, each standing on one leg, point it out. He drives it out of the woods and into a sand trap. We get back into the cart. Frankie ambles by and says, “There’s some pretty flowers in the woods, huh?” I say, “Yeah, Justin’s showing me the whole course — woods, rough, water hazards.” Verlander replies, “I’m just trying to be a good host, show you all aspects of the course.” I say, “Then why don’t ya show me one of the greens?” I pause, and then say, “With your ball near the pin.” Verlander glares at me, and then laughs. “People in real life don’t get ballplayers’ humor, the way we talk in the clubhouse,” he says. In “real life,” people say things they don’t mean. Ballplayers do the opposite. Verlander says, “I’m always hurting someone’s feelings.”

He sprays sand out of the trap, his ball barely reaching the green. Three shots later, we head off toward the next hole. His fastball topped out at 86 mph his senior year of high school, and scouts weren’t interested. So he went to Old Dominion University in Virginia and spent the winter lifting weights. He gained 20 pounds, and by the end of his freshman year, his fastball had been clocked at 96 mph. “All 20 pounds of muscle went to my legs,” he says, which helped him drive toward the batter with his fastball. “Blessed, I guess,” he says. “I was born to be a pitcher.”

[Photo Credit: Ben Walkter/AP]

 

At the barber shop uptown we talk baseball and listen to music and sometimes nobody says anything and that’s okay, too.

 

There is an excerpt from Frank Deford’s new memoir in SI this week: “When the NBA Was Young.” 

Fun read. For more on Deford, check out this fine podcast with Richard Deitsch.

Over at Food Republic Chuck Thompson writes about 7 types of ballpark eaters.

[Photo Credit: Hoarded Ordinaries]

Indeed.

[Photo Credit: Elevated Encouragement]

 

One Night Only

By John Schulian

As soon as they heard Levon Helm was coming, the guys in the band began to imagine him sitting in with them, playing the drums, maybe even singing “The Weight.” It was one of the songs they did when they got together on Friday nights, finished with another week’s filming of a TV drama called “Midnight Caller,” just letting the music ease them out of the harness. There was music everywhere on that show, from the old MGM Studios in L.A., where we wrote it, to San Francisco, where we filmed it. You couldn’t go a day without someone turning you on to an album or talking up a concert. Or you’d walk into the executive producer’s office and find him practicing a new lick on his guitar, a pleasure that almost always seemed to come before business. But the executive producer knew he was a better singer than a guitarist — fitting, I suppose, since his name was Bob Singer. He sang lead for the band that came into being when four kindred spirits found each other on the soundstage, and the band bore his name, Bobby and the Bonemasters. All of which meant it was Singer who would have to ask Levon Helm if he was interested in hanging out with a bunch of rock-and-roll dreamers.

Of course Levon’s primary purpose on “Midnight Caller” had nothing to do with music or his history as the soul of the band known as the Band. He was guest starring as an ex-convict who wanted to go back to prison because it was the only place he knew how to exist. The script was my contribution to the proceedings. I had pictured Levon in the role from the day in 1990 that the idea hit me, not because he was a trained actor but because he was one of those naturals who seemed as real as calloused hands when he was on camera. He had been pluperfect as Loretta Lynn’s father in “Coal Miner’s Daughter,” and it was hard to forget his easy grace as he lit Robbie Robertson’s cigarette in “The Last Waltz.” What I didn’t find out until later was how much acting he’d had to do in that documentary about the Band’s final concert at full strength. He was brimming with anger because he thought Robertson was sacrificing everything they had accomplished for his own selfish purposes.

But acting ability ceased to matter as Singer tried to work up his courage to approach Levon on the Bonemasters’ behalf. It was Levon’s earthy, soulful voice that haunted Singer now — the juke-joint joy of “Rag Mama Rag,” the grief and defiance of “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.” Levon had plunged into the musical fires of the Sixties with Dylan and emerged playing the most quintessentially American rock ever with the Band. But he was its only American, a cotton farmer’s son from Marvell, Arkansas, surrounded by four Canadians. He drummed, took an occasional turn on the mandolin, and like the Band’s other two singers–Rick Danko and Richard Manuel–made memories with his voice. He had been on stage at Woodstock and the Isle of Wight and on the cover of Time magazine, and now Singer was going to invite him to the Bonemasters’ lair in the lunchroom of the converted San Francisco printing plant where “Midnight Caller” had its soundstages. Somehow that didn’t compute.

To calm himself, Singer concentrated on remembering how gracious Levon had been when they’d met in L.A., a true Southern gentleman with a bushy beard that made him look older than the 50 years he was then approaching. Singer figured that if he got shot down, it would at least be painless. So he took a deep breath, explained about the Bonemasters and offered his invitation.

“Y’all gonna have any beer?” Levon asked.

“Oh, yeah,” Singer said. “We’re gonna have beer.”

“I’ll be there.”

That was, in its way, a historic moment. Other musicians had guest starred on the show, but only Levon said yes to the Bonemasters. When Billy Vera, a rhythm-and-blues stalwart from L.A., turned them down, it was with a contempt that suggested he would rather eat road kill. Hoyt Axton, the country singer whose mother wrote “Heartbreak Hotel,” never got invited because he was too busy living the life that enabled him to open concerts by saying, “Hi, I’m what’s left of Hoyt Axton.” But Roger Daltrey would have been welcomed if the part he played hadn’t cranked up his anxiety level by requiring him to sing a non-Who song. Still, he gave the cast and crew something to remember by loosening his vocal chords with a kick-ass version of “Hey Joe.”

Some of the Bonemasters started thinking their night with Levon Helm would be solid gold when filming wrapped at 8 that Friday, a good three hours earlier than usual. Singer, however, wasn’t one of them. He was worried that Levon would get a load of the lunchroom, with its linoleum floor and pea-green walls, and decide it was too small-time for him. Or maybe he’d get chased off if Jim Behnke, “Midnight Caller’s” unit production manager, went on one of his guitar solos that got lost in space. Or maybe Singer himself would do the chasing if nerves cracked his tobacco-cured baritone.

Levon walked into the room as if he understood that a heavy step might destroy the equilibrium. The Bonemasters were already playing, so he grabbed a beer and one of Singer’s harps, then plugged into an amplifier and settled in a corner. Everything was fine until he started to play along with the band. “I’m not getting any sound,” he said. “The amp’s not working.”

Great, Singer thought. He’s been here 10 minutes and we’ve already proven what rank amateurs we are. He’s going to take off.

But Levon didn’t so much as blink even when he discovered there wasn’t another amp. He just played the guitar Singer wasn’t using, and when it came time to blow harp, he did it into the microphone. It didn’t sound as good as it would have through an amp, but the important thing, the absolutely crucial thing, was that he stayed.

At first the Bonemasters looked to Levon for requests–they were up for anything–but he told them, “You go on and play what you want to play.” So they dove into a repertoire that included songs by the Beatles, the Stones, the Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd. As usual they were at their tightest when they did “Honky-Tonk Woman.” “Boys,” Levon said, “I’d keep that one in the set.”

The next thing the Bonemasters knew, he was teaching them some country songs, the kind he’d been listening to since he was six years old and saw Bill Monroe and The Blue Grass Boys at a tent show in Marvell. And when they got back to rock and roll, Gary Cole–the Bonemasters’ drummer, the star of “Midnight Caller,” and the future Mr. Brady in the Brady Bunch movies–asked Levon if he would like to take a turn on the drums. Levon couldn’t resist. He sounded just the way he did on all those albums with the Band, the tasteful fills, the clever way he got behind the beat, everything so tight, so perfect. Cole and Singer stood off to the side and hoped they weren’t gawking.

They were seeing more than a great drummer at work, though. This was Levon’s life in microcosm, a life filled with nights like the one they were living with him, nights that go beyond getting rich, famous, high or laid and exist for the undiluted joy of making music. You could trace them back beyond the Band and Dylan to Levon’s stops with Ronnie Hawkins’ Hawks and the Jungle Bush Beaters, all the way to those stolen hours as a kid listening to Jimmy Reed and Muddy Waters on the radio and imagining himself in their world. And if you follow his trail forward from his session with the Bonemasters, you will find more of the same, as a solo act, with the RCO All-Stars and the reconstituted Band, right up to the midnight rambles he hosted in Woodstock until throat cancer sent him off on his last ramble.

After a life so full musically, it is hard to imagine that Levon remembered sitting in with the Bonemasters, but there are pictures to prove he did. One of “Midnight Caller’s” prop masters came down to the lunchroom and snapped a bunch of them -– Levon surrounded by Singer, Cole, Behnke and Kenny Collins, the assistant director who played such solid bass. When the guys in the band checked out the pictures later, there was no denying that Levon looked like he was enjoying himself. But there shouldn’t have been any doubt as soon as he said his friend Clarence Clemons was in San Francisco and offered to invite him over to play some saxophone, the way he did for Bruce Springsteen. It didn’t happen, though, because one of the guys had kids at home and a babysitter going off duty at midnight, and that’s the way the real world goes around.

So the Bonemasters reveled in what they got with Levon, which was more than they ever expected and remains the first topic of conversation on those rare occasions when they run into each other more than 20 years later. In fact, the only thing Levon wouldn’t do that night was sing one of the Band’s songs, not that Behnke didn’t try to tempt him by playing the intro to “The Weight” at every opportunity. “The Weight” was a Bonemasters staple and it begged to be sung, but Singer, who usually did the honors, felt sheepish about it. After all, the man who put the song over the top for the Band was there with them. Finally, Levon said, “You sing it, Bob.”

There was no backing out–the load was right on Singer. He tucked into “The Weight” with no goal beyond getting to the end of it. It’s a surreal parable about a good deed that consumes its doer, and it’s filled with the kind of characters more often found in Flannery Connor’s novels than a rock-and-roll song. By the time he finished with Crazy Chester, Jack the Dog and all the rest of them, Singer wasn’t sure if he should take a bow or run for the hills. Then he looked over and saw Levon grinning and flashing him a thumbs-up. A fellow could live a long time and not have a finer moment.

[Featured Image by Ahron R. Foster]

In the classic Soundgarden tune “Outshined”, Chris Cornell writes:

I just looked in the mirror
And things aren’t lookin’ so good.
I’m looking California
And feelin’ Minnesota.

That brief stanza may be an apt way to describe Hiroki Kuroda’s start Wednesday night. He was both looking and feeling California in the home opener last Friday against the Los Angeles Angels. In the song, “feeling Minnesota” is a euphemism for feeling terrible. On the field, Kuroda wasn’t feeling Minnesota, Minnesota was feeling Kuroda. Four of the first five Twins to come to the plate in the first inning got hits and scored. By the time Kuroda had thrown 13 pitches, the Yankees were in a 4-0 hole.

Kuroda’s downfall was Justin Morneau. His two-run home run in the first inning put the Twins up 4-0, he singled and scored in the third, and he belted another home run in the fifth — a solo shot — to end Kuroda’s night. (Not to question X’s and O’s, but Morneau’s fifth-inning home run came on a 2-0 count. Was anyone else thinking, “Hey, the bases are empty, walk him and take your chances with someone named Chris Parmelee?”).

The Yankees’ lineup, which was without Alex Rodriguez and Brett Gardner but had Mark Teixeira back, did their best to bail out Kuroda, responding with three runs of their own in the bottom of the first. Trailing 4-3, they loaded the bases with one out and a realistic chance to post a crooked number until Eric Chavez ended the threat by grounding into a double play.

Three different times the Yankees would get to within one run of the Twins, but not once could they tie the game. Three straight innings — the fifth, sixth and seventh — the Yankees put the leadoff man on base and mounted threats, but couldn’t score. After the first inning, the only runs they were able to manage came off solo home runs from Robinson Cano and Derek Jeter.

6-5 final, series finale with Phil Hughes on the mound Thursday. Are you confident?

ROOT FOR THESE GUYS

Alex Belth’s profile of Kuroda, posted here in February, made us want to root for him for reasons beyond his simply wearing the Yankee uniform. Wednesday was one of those nights sinkerballers tend to have. If the sinker doesn’t sink, it stinks.

“He was just up all night,” manager Joe Girardi said. “He didn’t seem to have it from the get-go.”

Despite the poor result, which raised Kuroda’s ERA to an even 5.00 and his WHIP to 1.61, Kuroda remains an integral component to the Yankees’ starting rotation, based on his skill set, veteran presence, and experience. We’ll have about 30 more chances to root for him.

Opposing Kuroda was native Long Islander Jason Marquis. Marquis, who grew up in Staten Island and still lives there, was making his American League and 2012 season debut. Marquis had pitched in New York before, but at Shea Stadium and Citi Field, but had never pitched a major league game in the Bronx.

Marquis’ debut was delayed; this story has been well document. He left the Twins with two weeks to go in Spring Training to attend to his daughter, who lacerated her liver in a bicycle accident. Ken Rosenthal does a tremendous job of portraying the details of the story here. As a father of one little girl and another on the way, I applaud what Marquis did. There’s no decision to make.

His daughter had four surgeries and is recovering well. According to reports, a full recovery is expected within three months. How fortunate Jason Marquis was to be home with his family, and STAY home when he joined his new team. As a bonus, his family got to be on the field with him yesterday (nice work by YES taking video and showing that B-roll during the bottom of the first inning).

And he got the win.

Hiroki on the hill at the Stadium tonight after his terrific debut last week.

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

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Picture Credit “Waterfall in Summer” by Hiroki Imada (1998)]

Our pal Summe Anne looks at some fresh baseball art. Dig it.

[Featured Image by Summer Anne Burton; Reggie by Peter Chen; Bake McBride by Will Johnson]

 

“Crouching Boy” by Michelangelo (1530-33)