And So. We didn’t sleep well, ok.  And yeah, we’ve got all day to wait before greeting Mr. Burnett tonight. Fine. At least we’ve got a game to watch. And anything can happen.

[Photo Credit: Martin Fuchs and Joel Zimmer]

Many of you will remember that our old pal Todd Drew was a true believer. He was a Yankee season ticket holder. Never left his seat once the game began. He clapped until his palms were red, didn’t matter if the Yanks were getting blown out. When the game was over he went downstairs and waited by the players gate. He’d cheer on the rookies and offer words of encouragement to the losing pitcher.

Todd didn’t live long enough to see the new Yankee Stadium, never saw A.J. Burnett pitch for his team, but he was alive when they signed Burnett and was excited about it. He liked Burnett’s arm, in spite of his erratic career. More than anything, Todd believed in Burnett’s potential. In 2009, Burnett did reasonably well for the Yanks. The past two years, he has been lousy. He starts tonight and it is easy to think that the Yankees’ season will be over before long.

But hope is the thing with feathers, not without. Todd isn’t around to watch the game. But he’s with us in spirit and he’d be clapping and rooting until the final out. So should we.

Never mind that glass looking half-full:  Let’s Go Yan-kees.

Derek Jeter banged the first pitch of the night back up the box for a lead off single. Justin Verlander threw a high fastball, several notches below his best velocity. Jeter was ready. Curtis Granderson saw a few more of the third-tier heaters, and then lashed at a high one out over the plate. It’s rare you see a hitter manage to hit a ball with such authority on a pitch so fast and so elevated in the zone, but Granderson beamed it over Austin Jackson’s head just left of center for a run-scoring triple.

Verlander decided that was enough of the mid-90s junk and loaded the gun for maximum cheese. The look on his face said that Granderson was not scoring. And the look was almost right. He struck out Robinson Cano on fastballs of 98 and 100 mph. Cano was blown away. Arod looked for the same treatment, but saw filthy curves instead. And just when he got used to the bend, Verlander flashed 100 again. Alex fouled the first one back. He snapped the bat on the second, but the dribbler to short scored Granderson and the Yankees led 2-0. Verlander struck out Teixeira to end the first and must have been thinking, “Damn, if I threw my best fastball to Curtis, could he have gotten on top of it like he did?”

CC Sabathia staked to two runs should give Yankee fans a warm and fuzzy feeling. But Sabathia was off from the first batter. The umpire gave nothing on the left-handed batter’s box side of home plate, and Sabathia set up camp there all game. When he was out there, he walked guys. When he came over the plate, the Tigers did a little damage. Sabathia walked the lead off man, Austin Jackson, on a pitch that looked to be strike three. He got a double play on the next batter. He walked the next two hitters, but got out of the inning with the 2-0 lead intact.

Deep breath for everybody. It was just a bumpy start. He’ll settle down. He’ll figure out the umpire. He’ll be good. Before an out was recorded in the third, we had our answer. No, he wouldn’t be good. Unable to throw precise strikes on the ump’s corners, and unable to coax the Tigers to chase his off speed stuff down below the strike zone, Sabathia combined a mix of high and out side balls and hittable fastballs at the belt and over the plate.  The Tigers took their walks when given and took their rips when appropriate.

Brandon Inge, the first batter of the bottom of the third, doubled into the left center gap. CC went up 1-2 on Austin Jackson as he tried to bunt Inge to third, but then CC lost the zone completely and Jackson walked again. CC went up 0-2 on Ramon Santiago, as he too tried to bunt, but could not put him away. Santiago ripped a single into left and Inge scored the Tigers first run. Sabathia got lucky when Miguel Cabrera got out in front of a relatively benign breaking ball and rolled into the third double play in the first three innings. That tied the game, but allowed the Yankees to escape the big inning.

If not for the twin killings, Sabathia might have already been out of the game.

The Yankees chipped at Verlander, but never bothered him. Posada singled in the second but was erased on Martin’s double play. Brett Gardner accidentally had a great bunt to lead off the third, but was erased on Jeter’s double play. Gardner and Jeter tried to work a hit and run, but Jeter was forced to swing at a ball and fouled it off. It was not a bad call. On a 2-1 pitch, Girardi expected a fastball for a strike and didn’t get one. The straight steal might have put Gardner in scoring position and had Jeter sitting on a 3-1 count. But it worked the other way, left the double play in order and Jeter couldn’t resist. Jeter singled to lead off the sixth, but Verlander ate the heart of the order for dinner. Strike out, pop out to left, strike out.

I left out the fifth, in which Verlander struck out the side on 10 pitches. No contact. Just one ball away from an immaculate inning. The score was 2 to 2, but the Tigers must have felt that they were in firm control as long as the two starting pitchers remained in the game. Fans on both sides were just wondering in which inning Sabathia would crack. The big guy had little to nothing and little was late for a bus.

But give the big guy credit. He never did crack. He got hit. He let up runs, but he averted catastrophe each time. And when his gas tank was officially empty, Rafeal Soriano averted it for him. In the fifth, Inge looped a single and scored on a deep double by Ramon Santiago. But that was it for the fifth. Defensive replacement Don Kelly dragged a bunt to lead off the sixth. Jhonny Peralta took his turn with a deep double and made the score 4-2. After a sac bunt, Rafeal Soriano relieved CC and coaxed a pop out and a whiff. The game had no business being close, but there it was.

Let me rephrase, it was close in the sense that two runs is usually considered “close.” But the way Verlander was dealing, two runs did not feel close. He started the seventh with two quick outs and just as he was about to settle Jorge Posada for his tenth strikeout of the game, Cy Young became Cy Twombly. He walked Posada on four straight balls. He plunked Martin. With a full count on Brett Gardner, he got beat. Gardner saw six straight heaters and finally had the timing. He served Verlander’s 96th pitch, a 100 MPH fastball, into left center for a game-tying double.

The game had a fresh anything-can-happen vibe for a few moments, but then Delmon Young dinked one over the right field wall. The Tigers should play in Yankee Stadium. They are the masters of the oppo dink homer in this series. It’s hard to complain about that, considering how many dink homers the Yankees have hit over the years. Also, Miguel Cabrera hit the next one 419 feet and had nada to show for it. Still, it sucks to have the series turn on the dink homer.

The Yankees still had Verlander to contend with in the eighth. Granderson took aim at the right field wall and came up a few feet short. Robbie got jobbed on a high strike for the second out. A-Rod worked a 3-0 count and let loose when Verlander pumped a get-me-over fastball down the middle. The get-me-over fastball with two outs in the eighth? 100 mph. A-Rod took his best swing of the series, but only could foul it off. He did stick around to work a walk, but the human pop out machine follows him in the lineup, so all hope was lost for the inning as soon as Alex dropped the bat.

David Robertson hammered through the eighth without any trouble, so the Yankees were facing a tired closer who couldn’t throw strikes needing one run to tie the game. It just so happened that the closer was the same guy who guaranteed that Detroit was winning games three and four. Jose Valverde threw a lot of leaky fastballs (drifting towards the right handed batters), most of them for balls, and looked ripe for the plucking.

The Yankees didn’t pluck. Nick Swisher saw stars in his eyes and popped up a honey of an 2-0 pitch, right down the pipe. Jorge Posada walked to get the tying run on a base. Russell Martin made a bid for the shorter wall in right and came up a foot short of where Granderson came up short. Brett Gardner walked on four pitches setting the stage for Derek Jeter. Valverde woke up. He reined in his leaking fastball just enough to nail the inside corner a few times. Jeter got a break on a close 1-2 splitter (the first I saw of the inning) but swung through a well placed fastball up and in to end the game.

Tigers 5, Yankees 4. The Tigers lead the best of five ALDS 2-1 and can wrap it up tomorrow night.

Justin Verlander was excellent, throwing eight innings and striking out 11. But the Yankees got to him for four runs and acquitted themselves pretty well against the best pitcher in the league. CC Sabathia was bad and coughed up an early lead. He managed to keep the game close, but his performance was disappointing, and a massive letdown for all the people expecting to see the two best pitchers in the league show their stuff. Losing this game was not destined, but the way CC pitched, it was certainly deserved.

Where do the Yankees go from here? AJ Burnett. That’s as bad as it sounds. But facing elimination, the Yankees have no choice but win. So we have no choice but to root them on. Our best did not measure up to their best, didn’t come close, and that’s a kick in the gut with a steel tipped boot. But the series is not coming down to those guys. It’s coming down to everyone else. And the Yankees have a great everyone else. Get Mariano in a game that matters and show this Valverde clown something about pitching and about class.

C’mon Yankees, winning two in a row is simple as rip, boom, bash, hammer, snap. Get to it.

 C.C. vs. Verlander. Top Billin’.

Score Truck, please. Pretty please?

YANKEES

Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Mark Teixeira 1B
Nick Swisher RF
Jorge Posada DH
Russell Martin C
Brett Gardner LF

TIGERS

Austin Jackson CF
Ramon Santiago 2B
Delmon Young LF
Miguel Cabrera 1B
Victor Martinez DH
Magglio Ordonez RF
Jhonny Peralta SS
Alex Avila C
Brandon Inge 3B

Never mind tomorrow: Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Photo Credit: Joe Ism]

David Price goes against the Rangers this evening. Game thread.

[Photo Credit: City Life]

Good new Director’s Cut over at Grantland. Rafe Bartholomew interviews Don Delillo about “Pafko at the Wall.” And then, they offer up an excerpt.

Check it out.

Scorsese’s George documentary airs on HBO this Wednesday and Thursday.

Alex Rodriguez had a bad game at the plate yesterday but he is not panicking. Neither is hitting coach, Kevin Long. Josh Thompson has more.  Over at Hardball Talk, Matthew Pouliot thinks it is time for the Yankees to drop Rodriguez down in the order. I don’t see it happening, at least not yet, but you never know…

[Photo Credit: Farther Off the Wall]

Here is Pauline Kael’s 1966 essay on Brando for The Atlantic:

Brando represented a reaction against the post-war mania for security. As a protagonist, the Brando of the early fifties had no code, only his instincts. He was a development from the gangster leader and the outlaw. He was antisocial because he knew society was crap; he was a hero to youth because he was strong enough not to take the crap. (In England it was thought that The Wild One would incite adolescents to violence.)

There was a sense of excitement, of danger in his presence, but perhaps his special appeal was in a kind of simple conceit, the conceit of tough kids. There was humor in it–swagger and arrogance that were vain and childish, and somehow seemed very American. He was explosively dangerous without being “serious” in the sense of having ideas. There was no theory, no cant in his leadership. He didn’t care about social position or a job or respectability, and because he didn’t care he was a big man; for what is less attractive, what makes a man smaller, than his worrying about his status? Brando represented a contemporary version of the free American.

Because he had no code, except an aesthetic one–a commitment to a style of life–he was easily betrayed by those he trusted. There he was, the new primitive, a Byronic Dead-End Kid, with his quality of vulnerability. His acting was so physical–so exploratory, tentative, wary–that we could sense with him, feel him pull back at the slightest hint of rebuff. We in the audience felt protective: we knew how lonely he must be in his assertiveness. Who even in hell wants to be an outsider? And he was no intellectual who could rationalize it, learn somehow to accept it, to live with it. He could only feel it, act it out, be “The Wild One”–and God knows how many kids felt, “That’s the story of my life.”

A few years after this essay was published, Kael praised Brando’s “comeback” in movies like “The Godfather” and, especially, “The Last Tango in Paris.”

Al Hirschfeld and his daughter, Nina.

Serious Eats finds the best Vietnamese sandwich in New York.

[Photo Credit: Plate of the Day and Serious Eats]

Pete Dexter’s first book report in 55 years appeared in the New York Times Book Review yesterday. It is about Jim Harrison’s latest novel, “The Great Leader”:

To enlighten and to entertain: what else is there? And while good books — even so-so books — serve both functions, if you ever have to choose one over the other, keep in mind that a book that entertains without enlightening can still be a guilty pleasure, but a book that enlightens without entertaining is algebra.

… I would mention that for me, Harrison set the hook deep and early, in a novella called “Revenge.”

There is a scene in that story of almost incomprehensible savagery — Harrison by the way is as good at writing violence as anybody, and particularly gets the weirdness of the incubation period — and he accomplished this particular violence by interrupting himself and manually moving readers to the fireplace mantel, where they could watch without getting hurt.

It was one of Harrison’s moments of instinctive genius, I think, perhaps the only way to bring off the scene without changing the mesmeric sound coming off the pages to something more ordinary, and I mean it as no disrespect to speculate that these moments are in some way out of Harrison’s hands, and very close to magic.

War Stories

By John Schulian

In the space of two and a half years, I got fired from the Chicago Sun-Times and divorced, moved from Chicago to Philadelphia, changed careers, lived through the death of my father, moved from Philadelphia to L.A., tried to get my feet under me in show business, and wound up spending two weeks in the hospital with the back problems that afflict me to this day. I’m not a doctor, nor do I play one on TV, but my diagnosis is that my cumulative stress had to go somewhere, so it went to my back. Of course the problem is more complicated than that, but I truly was wrung out from the roller coaster ride I’d been on. The ride wasn’t over, though. I was simply changing roller coasters.

When I got out of the hospital, I turned down a chance to return to “Miami Vice” because there was a new dramedy on ABC called “The ‘Slap’ Maxwell Story” that sounded like it wound be fun to write. Slap was a sports columnist, which made me right for the show, and he was played by Dabney Coleman, who specialized in self-centered misanthropes who made audiences laugh. ABC had to beg Dabney to do the show, though, and he didn’t say yes until a prickly comedy genius named Jay Tarses agreed to write the pilot and produce the series. Conveniently overlooked was the fact that they hated each other.

They had worked together several years earlier on “Buffalo Bill,” a wonderfully twisted comedy that went off the tracks when it addressed a subject that remains tetchy to this day. Dabney’s character, an oblivious Buffalo, New York talk show host, got his girl friend pregnant – “So, who’s the lucky father?” he asked – and she had an abortion. Ratings went in the toilet, Dabney went through the roof, and that was it for the Tarses-Coleman connection, or so everyone thought.

“Slap” was supposed to be the corrective for all that, but the era of good feeling lasted until the second or third day of shooting, when Dabney announced for one and all to hear that he wouldn’t say a line because it was “sitcom bullshit.” Jay, who had written the line and everything else in the marvelously quirky script, got up from his director’s chair – he was the director, after all – and stomped off the set. The battle lines were drawn.

Nobody bothered to mention that to me when I showed up for my interview with Jay. He was an easy guy to get along with unless you were a troublesome thespian or a network or studio executive. No artifice, no overweening ego. He even liked sports, which wasn’t always the case with the people I met in Hollywood. The business may amount to nothing so much as a boys’ club, but the boys don’t always care about who won last night. Jay cared. But even so, I was caught off guard when he asked me, “Why do you want to do this? You had the best job in the world.”

The way he emphasized “this,” leaning on it almost contemptuously, should have been a warning. But I was still in my fantasyland stage and wouldn’t come out of it until my first official day on the job as one of the show’s story editors. (Story editor is a synonym for writer, just as executive story editor, co-producer, producer, supervising producer, co-executive producer, and executive producer can be.) Jay invited me to sit down with him and one of the show’s writer-producers as they punched up a script that was about to shoot. Encouraged to sound off with any lines I thought might work, I spoke up and Jay put both of my suggestions in the script. Just like that, I felt like I was part of the team. Then Dabney walked into the outer office, talking in a voice that would have cut through granite. Jay scarcely looked up from the changes he was making before he uttered the words that snapped everything into focus for me: “Oh, the asshole is here.”

“The ‘Slap’ Maxwell Story” was cancelled after one season.

When I moved on to my next TV job, as executive story editor on “Wiseguy,” our star, Ken Wahl presented a different problem: self-destructiveness. He had risen beyond his talent and developed all the bad habits typical of too many half-bright actors. What’s more, his tendency to put on weight had the writing staff joking that the name of the show should be changed to “Wideguy.” But blubber and bad behavior, and so-so ratings aside – can’t forget the ratings – “Wiseguy” was much loved by critics and viewers in search of a crime drama that welcomed their intelligence instead of insulting it.

Because “Wiseguy” was a Stephen Cannell production, Cannell is hailed as the mastermind behind it. Not so. He created a classic in “The Rockford Files,” a monstrous hit in “The A-Team,” and such exceedingly cool failures as “City of Angels” and “Tenspeed and Brownshoe,” but “Wiseguy” was his and co-creator Frank Lupo’s in name only. The brains of the operation was David Burke, who came out of TV news, was the son of a New York radio talk show host, and possessed an ego that was even bigger than his talent. Burke put his stamp on “Wiseguy” with a writerly verve inspired by his hero, Paddy Chayefsky, and stories that ran in arcs of four or five episodes, sometimes even more. He created beguiling, multidimensional villains like Sonny Steelgrave and Mel Profit and made them part of the pop culture dialogue in the early 90s. To watch him in action was to see a man possessed by both his work and the fame and wealth he was getting closer to by the day.

Twenty years later, however, you never hear Burke mentioned in the same sentence with David Kelley or Dick Wolfe or the cable grit-masters who work the territory he might have, David Simon and David Chase. I’d feel bad for him if I hadn’t walked into his office at “Wiseguy” office one morning just in time to hear him tell a producer, “I’m a genius and I’ve got the clippings to prove it.” That would be press clippings, of course, and I’m surprised that Burke, as smart as he was, never learned that they weren’t to be believed.

But let me not leave “Wiseguy” on a sour note. Better I should tell you about the show’s garment district arc, which, to my mind, was the crowning achievement for Burke and his mordant, ferociously hard-working right-hand man, Steve Kronish. They found something special inside themselves as they conjured up a tale about fathers and sons and risks that come with rewards that have a trap door beneath them. They didn’t do it alone, though. In fact, they were off trying to launch a Cannell series about serial killers – think body parts in a refrigerator every Thursday night — when Ken Wahl was injured during filming of the first garment district episode. It was Al Ruggiero, our square-shouldered, motorcycle-riding co-producer, and I who had to create an undercover agent to replace the one Wahl played and re-write the script in a weekend. Anthony Dennison got the part when he was still hot after doing “Crime Story,” and the first thing he said to us was, “This is better than any of the feature scripts I’ve read lately.” Burke and Kronish never bothered to thank us.

We were left to find our satisfaction in the performances of the movie-quality cast that brought our script to life. From the get-go, “Wiseguy” had been a magnet for emerging stars like Kevin Spacey and reclamation projects like the doomed Ray Sharkey. I still remember how impressed I was when Paul Winfield showed up at our office in a sport coat and tie and told us he’d just flown in from New York after reading Langston Hughes at the 92nd Street Y the night before. And it got even better when we shined our light on the garment district. Consider this cast: Stanley Tucci, Ron Silver, Joan Chen, and – I mention him last only for effect – Jerry Lewis. We wanted Lewis because we’d seen his bravura performance as the talk shot host in Martin Scorsese’s “The King of Comedy.” What we failed to consider was that movie making is done at a glacial pace and while TV shows are made at warp speed. The mercurial Mr. Lewis had trouble adapting to the lavish speeches we’d written for him. He could probably remember every joke he’d ever told, but dialogue was something that brought him to his knees until we promised to trim the excess from all of his speeches.

For Christmas he gave everybody connected with the show Jerry Lewis watches with his likeness on them. On the last day he worked, he told everybody that doing the show had been the greatest experience of his career. All right, so maybe he was exaggerating. That morning, in fact, when a producer had gone to him with dialogue changes, he had not been the ray of sunshine he was when he exited stage left. “You heard of Jerry Lewis’ reputation, pal?” he said. “I’ll show you Jerry Lewis’ reputation.” Better the dialogue changes should wind up in a wastebasket. And they did.

Click here for the full “From Ali to Xena” archives.

There is an older woman I see on the train often, looks like Selma Diamond (if only she spoke like Selma Diamond). She wears gold and fiddles with her phone. This morning, one stop away from where we both get off, a middle-aged woman with long hair sat next to her. I missed what started it all but they began to argue. Selma got up, “There, now you can have all the space you need.”

“Good, I do need it.”

“I bet you do, bitch.”

“I’m not the bitch, you’re the bitch. Old bitch.”

“Look at you,” said Selma, “Aren’t you too old to be acting like a bitch?”

“I’m a good bitch. What are you going to do about it?”

“I’ll beat you up.”

This is when the middle-aged woman with long hair stood up and shook her finger at Selma. But Selma had her head turned, earphones in her ears,  and the middle-aged woman sat down. They kept at it some but it wasn’t going to get worse, just two cranky ladies on a Monday morning cursing at each other.

I was left with one thought as I got off the train. When does “I’ll beat you up” stop being part of your arsenal in an argument?

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that you’ve seen all this before. It wasn’t too long ago that the Yankees were facing the Detroit Tigers in the Divisional Series, and you’re noticing some similarities. You remember the Derek Jeter Love Fest from Game 1 of that series, and you can’t help but compare it Robinson Canó’s big performance in Game 1 of this series. You remember that Alex Rodríguez struggled terribly in that series and was famously — and ridiculously — dropped to eighth in the batting order for Game 4, and you’ve noticed that he’s 0 for 8 through the first two games of this series amidst calls for a similar lineup demotion.

You’ve seen this movie before, and you didn’t like how it ended the first time, but I’m here to tell you to relax. This was one game. A magnified game with magnified importance, but still just one game.

Freddy García was on the mound for the Bombers, and the most disappointing aspect of this game for me was that García pitched well enough to win, if that makes any sense. Certainly I’d have been depressed and despondent if he had been lit up early, but I’m not sure I’d have been surprised.

He gave up a two-run home run in the first inning on a pretty good pitch that Miguel Cabrera reached for and poked into the right field stands to give the Tigers an early 2-0 lead. After that, however, García put it on cruise control. He retired the side in order in the second inning, gave up a two-out single in the third, and set down six straight over the fourth and fifth innings.

The problem, of course, was that Detroit’s Max Scherzer was even better. It was only a few years ago that Scherzer was one of the top pitching prospects in baseball, but the Diamondbacks gave up on him and shipped him to Detroit in that three-way deal that netted Curtis Granderson for the Yankees and sent Ian Kennedy to Arizona. (Speaking of IPK — 21-4/2.88/1.09? Seriously?)

Scherzer’s been great for Detroit over the past two years, so while it certainly wasn’t expected that he’d be as good as he was on Sunday, it wasn’t terribly shocking either. He labored a bit in the first inning, walking Canó on four pitches and A-Rod on five before falling into a 3-0 hole to Mark Teixeira, but he recovered by getting Teixeira to pop out to second. It was an opportunity lost, but at the time it certainly seemed like it would be the first of many. It wouldn’t be.

Scherzer went on to retire the next ten hitters in order before yielding a one-out walk to Jorge Posada in the fifth. He then hit Russell Martin to give the Yankees an illusion of a rally, but that rally died quickly when Brett Gardner lined out to third and Jeter grounded into a fielder’s choice. Not only were the Yankees still scoreless, they were hitless as well.

Austin Jackson — another player from the previously mentioned ménage à trois — led off the sixth with a grounder to short. Jeter had to range a bit to his left, but he made the play and rushed his throw a bit in an attempt to get the speedy Jackson at first. His throw bounced in the dirt several feet in front of the bag, and Teixeira wasn’t able to corral it. Magglio Ordóñez laced a hit-and-run single to right, pushing Jackson all the way to third, and suddenly things looked dangerous.

García had already given the Yankees all they realistically could’ve expected — five quality innings — but the Yankee hitters had been absolutely silent. If the Tigers were to score a run here, or even two, Game 2 might be out of reach. From there the mind raced ahead. Justin Verlander was lined up for the Tigers in Game 3, and A.J. Burnett was scheduled for Game 4. If I were a Tiger fan, I wouldn’t have to think too long or too hard about laying some scratch on that exacta.

Joe Girardi, of course, was likely thinking about all of that, but I don’t think he had anywhere to go. I suppose he could’ve gotten David Robertson ready to pitch to Cabrera, who was two batters away, but there would probably have been more questions about a move like that in the sixth inning than are now about the move he chose — which was to keep García in there. Fearless Freddy responded by striking out Delmon Young, and again the mind leapt ahead. What if Cabrera grounds into a double play? What if the Stadium crowd erupts? What if that eruption breaths some life into the listless offense? What if the big bats due in the bottom half (Granderson, Canó, A-Rod, Teixeira) channel that emotion into production?

It took just a few pitches for Cabrera to erase that line of thinking. He lined a single to center, scoring Jackson, and two pitches later Victor Martínez repeated the feat, scoring Don Kelly, who had come in to run for Ordóñez. It was 4-0, but at the time it felt like 40-0. Boone Logan came in for García and almost instantly made things worse by balking the runners to second and third, but he rebounded to strike out both Alex Avila and Jhonny Peralta. The damage had been done.

The Yankees’ first hit finally came in the bottom of the sixth, a Canó blooper to left that Young probably should’ve caught, and their first run came in the bottom of the eighth on a long Granderson home run to right. If there was hope of a Yankee comeback, it was dashed when the Tigers stretched their lead back to four with a manufactured run (HBP, sacrifice bunt, single) in the top of ninth.

And there was hope again. Nick Swisher homered on the first pitch of the bottom of the ninth from Tiger closer José Valverde, and Posada followed with a legitimate triple to the wall in center. (Incidentally, Posada became only the second forty-year-old to triple in the post season.) After Russell Martin worked an eight-pitch walk, the tying run was suddenly at the plate in the form of Andruw Jones, and it didn’t take a lot to imagine a home run.

To Jones’s credit, he didn’t allow himself to get caught up in the moment like the rest of us did. He took what Valverde gave him and lashed a line drive towards right field. For one brief, beautiful moment I was sure it would find the grass, scoring another run and pushing Martin around to third, but it didn’t happen that way. The ball hung in the air long enough for Kelly to grab it, but Posada was able to score to cut the lead to 5-3.

Here’s where things got crazy. The weather had been fine throughout the game, but suddenly the heavens opened up and it was raining as hard as it had been at any point on Friday night. Jeter was at the plate, but both he and Valverde struggled throughout the at bat, both trying to deal with the downpour. Jeter was constantly wiping the brim of his helmet in a futile attempt to keep the rain from dripping into his face, and Valverde kept his throwing hand tucked first under his arm and then comically between his legs in an equally futile attempt to keep his hand dry. As much as we expect Captain Clutch to come through in these situations, it wasn’t a surprise when he struck out.

And then things got crazier. Granderson came to the plate and the MVP chants began pouring down as thick as the rain. He worked the count to 2-0, but then he skied a popup towards the Tigers’ third base dugout. Avila tossed away his mask and quickly headed towards the spot where the ball would land and the game would end. The ball wasn’t in the air for very long, but it was long enough for every Yankee fan to contemplate what had happened that afternoon and sort through their fears about the two games to come in Detroit.

Avila shuffled, shuffled, shuffled… then slipped on the rain-slicked on-deck circle and fell on his ass. A second later the ball fell harmlessly next to him. When Tiger manager Jim Leyland was later asked how he felt as all that transpired, he calmly said, “Well, it wasn’t my finest moment.”

I’m not sure how I feel about Leyland, by the way. He’s a bit too comfortable for my taste, as if nothing really matters to him. I know it’s just a game he’s playing with the media, and that everything he says is not-so-secretly directed at his players, but I miss the old Jim Leyland who seemed to be dancing on the edge of a razor as he managed the Pittsburgh Pirates back in the 1990s, fighting back the stress by chain smoking in the dugout during the late innings. But I suppose if you’ve been managing in the big leagues for twenty years you’ve probably seen enough to help you through anything, even a play like Avila’s pratfall.

As Granderson returned to the plate with his new life, it seemed like something was happening, something divine. Surely that ball wouldn’t have dropped if it weren’t supposed to have dropped. Surely Granderson would extend the rally. Surely he’d give Canó the chance to stand at the plate as the winning run.

He would.

Granderson took another strike, but then two more balls for a walk, and Canó came up to win the game — or at least that’s what I was thinking. Valverde didn’t mess around, pumping four straight fastballs, the last three of which Canó fouled off. I’d seen this before. I was sure that Canó would continue spoiling pitches until he found one that he liked. I imagined his beautiful swing, his momentary pause at the plate, the deafening roar from the stands, and the thrill of a walk-off postseason victory. But it wasn’t to be. Valverde came in with a splitter, Canó bounced it out to second base, and the game was over. Tigers 5, Yankees 3.

In 2006 the Yankees never got a look at either game in Detroit, losing 6-0 in Game 3 and trailing 8-0 in Game 4 before tacking on a few cosmetic runs in that elimination game. It’s conceivable that things could go that way again, but I don’t think so. Verlander has had a long season and has never pitched on short rest, so he’s far from a sure thing. CC Sabathia, meanwhile, is about as close to a sure thing as the Yankees have. In Game 4, spontaneous combustion is just as likely for Tiger starter Rick Porcello as it is for Burnett, so that game could be just as competitive as Game 3.

So step off the ledge. There’s a game to watch tonight.

[Photo Credit: Kathy Kmonicek/Associated Press]

Remember the Yanks had a 1-0 lead on the Tigers back in 2006. And that didn’t turn out so hot, did it?

Big game today. Maybe the pivotal game of the series. Gunna need another miracle out of Freddy. Plus, how about a Sunday delivery from the Score Truck?

Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Mark Teixeira 1B
Nick Swisher RF
Jorge Posada DH
Russell Martin C
Brett Gardner LF

Never mind the sunshine (the what?!?!):

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Photo Credit: Stay Gold]

Photo: AP

When the Yankees played the Tigers in the 2006 ALDS, Jim Leyland referred to the power-laden Bronx Bombers as Murders’ Row and Robbie Cano. In game one of the 2011 ALDS, Cano demonstrated what many have known for some time. The Yankees’ second baseman is no longer a supporting member of the lineup. He has become the heart and soul.

Joe Girardi’s decision to elevate Cano to the three-hole came just before the start of the playoffs, but it only took one game for the move to pay immediate dividends. In his third at bat of the game (and second of the evening), the Yankees’ second baseman broke a 1-1 tie in the fifth by driving a Doug Fister fastball off the very top of the wall for an RBI double. The play, which was reviewed but upheld, was reminiscent of Todd Zeile’s two-base hit in game one of the 2000 World Series, but unlike Timo Perez, Curtis Granderson never stopped running.  Of course, if Jeffrey Maier had been in the stands, Cano would have been circling the bases too.

One inning later, after Brett Gardner singled home two runs, Cano struck again, this time belting a grand slam deep into the right field second deck off reliever Al Alburquerque. The bases clearing homer was Cano’s sixth of the year, but only the eleventh in Yankees’ postseason history. The second baseman further added his name to the record book by driving in another run with a double in the eighth inning, giving him a franchise high six RBIs in one postseason game.

Most RBIs by a Yankee in One Postseason Game

Source: Baseball-reference.com

The reason Cano had a chance to break the game open was because Ivan Nova kept the Tigers off the scoreboard until the ninth inning. Although he was technically making a relief appearance, Nova became the defacto third Yankees’ rookie to start a postseason series opener and showed little signs of being overwhelmed by the experience. The Yankees have seen a sharper Nova, but he still limited the Tigers to only two hits until taking a hard hit grounder off his backside in the ninth. Detroit wound up scoring two runs in the final frame, but it did little to detract from Nova’s strong outing.

Before the Yankees broke out with the bats, Nova also got some help from his defense. With runners on first and second in the top of the fifth, Jhonny Peralta lined a single to center, but Alex Avila was gunned down by a great relay from Jeter, who, as often seems to be the case during the postseason, found himself in the perfect position to handle Curtis Granderson’s throw from centerfield. Jeter’s toss to Russell Martin allowed the Yankees’ catcher to apply a swipe tag and turned aside the one real threat the Tigers had during the game.

Youngest Yankees’ Pitchers to Start a Post Season Opener

Note: Underline indicates rookie.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

After all the rain, and all the runs, the Yankees still needed Mariano Rivera to slam the door on the Tigers’ rally in the ninth. Summoning the great closer might have been overkill, but it was also an appropriate way to end another Yankees’ postseason victory. With three dynamite cutters, Rivera struck out Betemit and sent the crowd home happy one day after they departed the Stadium soaking wet. I guess good things do come to those who wait. It also doesn’t hurt to have Robinson Cano.

Game One continues…

Never mind the forecast:

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Photo Credit: Hellanne]

Open Game Thread for today’s Division Series games.

[Photo Credit: It’s a Long Season]

Swing.

[Photo Credit: The Kitchn]