Bronx, N.Y., September 26, 2006 — The Yankees took the field vs. the Baltimore Orioles on a pleasant Tuesday night in the Bronx with a slew of questions to answer before beginning the postseason in one week’s time. How would their veteran left fielder handle his first game action in four months with a glove slipped past his injured but recovered left wrist? Would the former right fielder progress in his crash course in playing first base, and how would the two returnees hit?
Would number five starter Cory Lidle throw a good game after a bout with a bad finger, under the backdrop of a veteran front-line starter having had to skip a turn in the season’s last week with a balky back? With the peerlees Mariano Rivera off for the night under a regimen of every-other-day innings to build strength and nurse a sore elbow, how would Scott Proctor respond in a tight situation? And what effect would the mini-auditions have on a team in a race to hold onto a spot that would guarantee them homefield advantage throughout the playoffs?
And finally, would a fanbase that had snatched up 53,000 tickets in anticipation of a final-week playoff push come out to see their baseball heroes in full preparation mode? The resounding answer to all of the above? Not a series of resounding hallelujah’s perhaps, but, Just Enough!
Lidle started the night splendidly, retiring the first five visitors meekly on a meager 16 tosses, until Orioles catcher Ramon Hernandez homered to left on a 1-1 pitch. The Yankee righty then plunked the speedy Corey Patterson with a pitch, a seemingly costy mistake to a center fielder who has stolen 44 of 53 bags, but backup Yankee catcher Sal Fasano made a quick, hard peg and just nabbed Patterson stealing to close the top of the second. The Yankees responded with some center field speed of their own. After two one-out singles and a walk loaded the bases for New York, Johnny Damon stroked a four-hopper to second that had double dip written all over it. Damon beat the relay to first, however, and the game was knotted at one.
Lidle pitched around a Kevin Millar single and a Melvin Mora walk, and the veteran Hideki Matsui drifted to the fence and gamely hauled in Miguel Tejada’s home run bid starting the fourth. Once DH Jay Gibbons lashed a liner over the short porch in right for a 2-1 Baltimore lead, the Yankee righty closed the fourth with help from shortstop Derek Jeter, who made a running catch of a no-man’s-land pop to short center with his back to home plate. Warming to this tit-for-tat game the O’s had initiated, the Yanks responded quickly and loudly. Robbie Cano, DH’ing as he battles for a shot at the batting title, homered to left leading off the bottom half, and the game was tied 2-2.
The fifth inning began ominously, as Millar lofted the second of his four straight singles the other way to short left on a 3-2 pitch. I was planted in the same left side tier seat when Matsui lost much of his season and almost his career by diving for a similar ball four-plus months ago. I breathed a sigh of relief when the hard-charging star pulled up and gathered this ball on its first bounce. Hideki had scored the Yanks’ first run after singling in the second. He handled routine flies early before the Tejada drive sent him to the wall. And he made an eight-inning throw toward third that might have nailed an overzealous Tejada had it gone toward second. All in all, an acceptable night in left.
The crafty Lidle used his glove and arm to escape the fifth after the aforementioned Millar bingle. He fired a David Newhan comebacker to Jeter for a 1-6-3 twin killing, then leapt high to snag a Brian Roberts hopper for out number three. As the O’s took the field, the Yanks changed the game. Young Hayden Penn had left the mound after the Cano home run and a walk in the fourth, but veteran Rodrigo Lopez promptly whiffed three straight. But he showed no such dominance in the fifth. Jeter had doubled to left in the first, and had a base hit and rbi bid down third smothered by Melvin Mora to close the second. Going to left for the third time in a row, he pulled Lopez’s first toss to left for a single, and Bobby Abreu blasted a drive off the upper deck facade in right for a lead the Yanks would not relinquish. Cano would stroke a two-out single, but Lopez retired four in a row to hold the Yanks to that 4-2 lead through six.
September 26 has been a good day for Cory Lidle in his career. He has won twice, lost once, and had one no decision, allowing five runs on 13 hits in 24 innings coming into tonight. He didn’t quite live up to that promise this time out, but he pitched good enough for another win. He retired five Baltimore batters in the sixth and seventh until Patterson homered to right to close the gap to 4-3. After a third Millar single, Mike Myers was brought in to close the seventh. Lidle used all four of his pitches, changing speeds effectively, and he struck out five while coaxing a mix of grounders, infield popups and outfield flies. He pounded 19 of 27 first-pitch strikes, and his 58/27 strikes/balls ratio was spot-on. And the strike outs become more impressive because he walked just one, and used just four swings and misses by The O’s to get three of the K’s. Six hits over seven innings was good; that three cleared the fence was not.
Sheffield had a good day, with eight putouts, and he made a nice stop on a Nick Markakis bouncer down the line in the sixth. He lunged at and missed a Patterson single that started a rally in the ninth. Hardly an error, but with more reps, he would probably (and hopefully) get it. At the plate he bounced harmlessly to second twice around a fly to right, but with Alex Rodriguez at second after a single and steal with two down in the home seventh, Gary’s slashing single to left that provided what proved to be a necessary insurance run looked like vintage Shef.
Brian Bruney worked the eighth. It was a bit alarming that he threw nine of 18 off the plate and walked the right fielder, but Bruney pitched around the Tejada two-out single that moved Markakis to third. The best that can be said of Scott Proctor’s work in the ninth is that he did not back down. After striking out Hernandez for the first out, the Birds rallied for one run on three straight hits, two of them with two strikes on the batter. But Proctor had just one two-ball count and closed the game on a Roberts fly to left and a Mora liner to right center.
It was a gorgeous but slightly chilly night, and the crowd was in the mood for fun. They weren’t the most attentive bunch to ever attend a game, but they booed the Baltimore home runs (I hope) and not their own players, and cheered loudly in the ninth after spending much of the eighth inning doing the wave. Of the 53,420 paid, I would guess that perhaps 40,000 or so filled seats throughout the park’s expanse. The out of town scoreboard showed that the Tigers took an earlly lead over Toronto at a time when the Yanks were down. The Blue Jays fought back but lost in Detroit as the Yanks battled and vanquished the Orioles in the Bronx. The Yankees’ and Tigers’ records remain the same.
As far as results go, I would say that’s Just Enough.
BTW,TYW
YANKEE BASEBALL!!!