Bronx, N.Y., June 29, 2007 — There he was, situated behind home plate just as I remembered him, exchanging lineups before the Friday night game pitting the Yankees and the visiting Oakland A’s. And Bob Geren was wearing no. 53 still, just as he had backing up catching luminaries such as Don Slaught and Matt Nokes for the Yankees from 1988-1991.
The first-year field boss for Oakland now, Bob had perhaps his best offensive day as a Yank 16 years and two days ago, when he smacked a three-run home run in an 8-0 win over the Boston Red Sox in Fenway Park on June 27, 1991. No, it was not against Roger Clemens, but the Yanks had bested that hard-throwing Texas righty two days before. Heady stuff. But those Yankees went 71-91, good for fifth place in the seven-team AL East. Coming off 11 straight playoff appearances, today’s Yankee team answers to a much higher standard.
And the quick 2-0 lead the home team built in the first held promise of a nice explosion like the one Geren contributed to, and a rare laugher for a team that limps into town coming off a 1-7 road trip. Geren’s 1991 team smacked three home runs with their eight runs. This day’s group of players would have to get by on a lot less offense. Melky Cabrera got it started with a beautiful bunt base hit that died on the infield grass 25 feet from the plate. Derek Jeter popped up a bunt and Hideki Matsui forced Cabrera, but it was enough to get the inning to Alex Rodriguez and he took it from there.
Oakland starter Joe Kennedy got two quick strike calls after a ball, but Alex hung in. He fouled off three of the next five as the count went full, then stroked a double to the left field wall as Matsui scored without a throw. With Wil Nieves catching Mussina again, Jorge Posada DH’d. He followed with a sharp single past shortstop, and Alex scored for the quick 2-0 bulge. Try as they did, the struggling Yankee offense was never able to add to that lead.
Which brings us to the masterful outing by veteran Yankee righty Mike Mussina, who although he once again scared no one with his fastball, mixed his vast assortment of pitches to perfection. Mike walked Shannon Stewart leading off the game, and then no one else. He survived that first by striking out the next two as the A’s left fielder stole second. Moose closed it out when left fielder Matsui ran down Jack Cust’s long drive to left.
Mussina was stretched to 19 first-inning tosses following the six-pitch walk and the back-to-back K’s. He would throw no more than 14 in an inning thereafter, and he hit a bunch of bats to close three different frames on a measly nine tosses apiece. He popped three guys up, got one more strike out for three, and split his other 15 outs between infield grounders and flies to his outfielders. Wasting no time between pitches and missing the zone just 30 times all night, Mike had his fielders’ utmost attention, and it showed. The Yankee defense was in rare form, and Jeter, Matsui, Robbie Cano and Bobby Abreu kept the A’s off the board through six with their electric play.
Jeter got it started by nailing fellow shortstop Bobby Crosby on his patented stab in the hole, wheel, leap and toss to first to start the top of the third. A dandy play and a pitcher-saver under any circumstances, the significance of this one grew as the next two A’s followed with singles. Abreu came a long way to catch a pop in short right for out no. two and Moose was off the hook when Nick Swisher lifted a fly to center.
It got even better, if that’s possible, in the fourth. Cano’s take-no-prisoners approach at the plate and his middling batting average have fans frustrated after so much promise the last few years, but his defense at second has steadily improved. Robbie played Jack Cust, on with one down after a leadoff single and an infield popup, like a puppet once Mark Ellis smacked one right at him. Reacting to the liner, Robbie had Cust doubling back to first when he pulled his glove back, took the ball on a bounce and fired to Jeter for a fancy 4-6-3. Abreu leaped at the wall for a Crosby liner in the fifth, and Matsui’s hard charge on a Mark Kotsay sinking liner one frame later had Hideki firing to second to force Stewart, on first with one of three singles.
The defense was sharp all night, a good thing, because despite the first-inning burst, the offense misfired the rest of the game. The Yanks almost added right away, but after one-out, second-inning singles from Cano and Wil Nieves, Ellis pulled a little mitt magic of his own, stopping Jeter’s rbi bid into the second base hole and pegging him out at first. If anyone had the right to feel more deserted by the stumbling “O” than the game Mussina, it was Rodriguez, who doubled twice, walked, then singled off the left field wall when the carom went straight to Stewart. Abreu bounced into a twin killing after Alex’s third-inning double, and Miguel Cairo and Cano went down meekly in the home eighth following the booming one-base hit. Two strike outs doomed the two-walk fifth, both of them on called third strikes. Home plate ump Larry Young punched five Yankees out on called strike three; they swung and missed for a K just once.
It was Yankee defense to the rescue yet again in the top of the seventh, as Oakland threatened to drive Mussina from the mound. Eric Chavez’s hard hopper in front of first baseman Andy Phillips was on him in an instant; it was by Phillips before he could flag it down, and Chavez had a leadoff double. Chavez stopped at third as Ellis singled to right, but the A’s were set up with two on, two down, and nobody out. But Mark Johnson’s hopper up the middle bounded off Mussina, and then at Cano. The alert second sacker fired to second and the Yanks got two quick outs on the 1-4-6-3 as Chavez crossed. Moose retired Johnson on a fly to center, but the A’s had closed it to 2-1.
Despite a low count (84 pitches), Joe Torre replaced Mussina in the eighth. Moose’s first-pitch strike ratio was good at 17-9; Kennedy’s was 8-19, another reason one would think the Yanks could have reached him for more than two runs. The Yankee righty coaxed just five swinging strikes all night, three of them on the back-to-back K’s in the first.
Kyle Farnsworth came on for the eighth with no room for error. He snagged Jason Kendall’s comebacker for an out, then Stewart singled hard up the middle. With Cairo holding Stewart at first, Kotsay’s bouncer snuck through the right side for another single. But Kyle came back to get Swisher swinging; he was one out away. But Torre signaled for the underutilized Mariano Rivera, with Farnsworth fuming at what he saw as a snub. Get over it, Kyle, would say the Baseball Genie, you were replaced by the best closer ever. Rivera struck out Cust, then notched two more K’s in the ninth as the Yanks won this one in 2:34.
Aside from Geren’s return, June 29 has been a pretty explosive day in the Bronx. Don Mattingly and Dave Winfield both hit grand slams among eight home runs as the Yanks outpointed Toronto 15-14 on this day in 1987, and they prevailed over Cleveland 11-10 exactly 10 years later in support of a struggling David Cone. And on June 29, 2000, the day thay acquired David Justice from the Indians, the Bombers’ 8-0 win over the Tigers matched the score Geren had contributed to in the win over Boston 16 years ago.
Friday evening can be a great stress-free time to see a ballgame, but it has been anything but fun for Yankee fans in 2007. Coming into this game, their home Friday record was 1-5; the team was 3-9 overall. And New York has been as unpleasant a place the last few days as the rest of the Eastern seaboard. But this one began under puffy clouds in 72-degree temps, and the home team was up from the get-go. As Mussina and his defense were frustrating abortive Oakland rallies in the fourth through the sixth, the sky across the outfield was like a painting, with the sun dappling strings of clouds with a salmon color that blended to pink as the rays receded from view. In the eighth, the one-day-from-full moon teased left field fans as it peaked out through clouds over the right field facade.
It was easy to forget the blunted rallies and the stumbling offense as the superb and dominant Rivera put on the finishing touches of Mike Mussina’s artistic effort. A 2-1 win felt just about right.
BTW,TYW
YANKEE BASEBALL!!!