Bronx, N.Y., May 15, 2011 – The Yankees put up a semblance of a fight in the Sunday night ESPN game vs. the Red Sox, taking their first two leads of the three-game Boston sweep. It had to concern fans going in that, with Sox ace John Lester throwing and aging Freddy Garcia toeing the rubber for the home team, this contest on paper was the one of the three the Yankees were least likely to win.
But the Yanks and Garcia defied those odds early, with Freddy throwing free and easy, showing enough confidence in his off-speed array of pitches that he managed to float seven first-pitch strikes to the first nine batters. Not everything was going well, as for the second time in the three-game battle catcher Russell Martin had a swinging third strike by Kevin Youkilis get past him for a passed ball. As was the case Friday, the Sox third baseman would score, on Sunday the first Boston run, equalling the tally the Yanks had managed in the first when Derek Jeter, on via a hit by pitch, scored from second base on a Mark Teixeira single to center. Garcia was quickly in big trouble that frame, with a single and walk loading the bases with no one out. Youkilis would score on a fly to deep center, but when David Ortiz tried to score from third on a one-out hopper to A-Rod, Alex pegged him out, and the tie stood.
Signs continued to be good, as Andruw Jones drillled a home run leading off the home second to regain the lead, and two outs later, Curtis Granderson went yard for two more and a 4-1 Yankee edge. Garcia had thrown 30 pitches and Lester 50 to this point. But it fell apart in top of the third. With two on and one out, Freddy went ahead of Youkilis 1-2, then missed with two straight. After a foul, Kevin homered to right for the tie and the Yankee dominance on the night was over.
Garcia was OK thereafter, although he did allow an Ortiz homer for a 5-4 Boston lead in the fifth, but the Yankee offense quickly withdrew into the cocoon where it’s been largely hiding over the last two weeks. They would not collect another hit until the fifth, nor a run until the seventh, when Carl Crawford booted Alex Rodriguez’s double in left field allowing Granderson to score the fifth, and last, Yankee tally. The Sox had scored yet again in that span, when A-Rod missed Youkilis’s grounder with Dustin Pedroia running from second against David Roberston. Joba Chamberlain came on for the eighth but allowed yet another home run, this one by light-hitting catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia.
The Jorge Posada episode was hopefully drained of all drama, with Jorge issuing an early apology to his manager, and the Yankee veteran of 17 seasons being honored in the Bleacher Creature roll call in the first inning. Posada did not start, but he appeared to lots of cheers as a pinch hitter in the eighth, drawing a walk but dying on first.
May 15 is one more big day in Yankee history, as on this day in 1941 Joe DiMaggio managed a scratch single against Ed Smith of the White Sox. The story of the day was that with a homer Chicago’s Taffy Wright extended his steak of games with rbi’s to eight, but the focus would morph into a DiMag hit watch for the next two months as the great Yankee Clipper slashed his way to his still unequaled 56-game hitting streak.
Way back on May 15, 1618, astronomer Johannes Kepler discovered his third law of planetary motion, often referred to as the law of harmonics, as Kepler was trying to construct a theory of what he referred to as the “music of the spheres,” trying to conceive of and prove a planetary vision where all objects drifted in harmony under God’s plan, a new cosmological view made necessary now that the theories of Copernicus and Kepler’s own had destroyed the Christocentric view that the earth, and man, were the center of the universe. Likewise, the Yankees have been trying to develop a harmonic team, one that can combine the better-than-hoped-for starting pitching with the initially disappointing bullpen — an expected strength — and a power lineup viewed by most as the team most likely to lead the league in offense.
Weeks ago, when the Yanks built up a lead in the East, they were routinely taking three- and four-run early leads, then failing to score thereafter, but riding very good starts to victory on those nights when the pen did its job. But on this home stand, and for most of the team’s week-ago-concluded road trip, the Bombers have consistently been unable to amass those fourth and fifth runs. Sunday night they handed Garcia an early 4-1 lead, but this time it was the starter who couldn’t hold the opposition at bay. When the starts are good, the offense sputters, or it scores just enough, but then the pen gives the store away.
The Yanks head to first-place Tampa Monday for two, then Baltimore for two more, only to return to the Bronx Friday with three vs. the crosstown NL Mets. The team continues to struggle to array its strengths in “harmony,” pitching well early and late in games with an offense that manages multiple runs despite so many struggling players dotting the lineup. The team needs to return to the days where early offense, as the with the four runs Sunday night, is the rule again, and the starting pitchers hold the opponent. With those pillars in place, the bullpen – and solid defense – can bring home strings of wins. All played – in “harmony” – to the
Music of the Bases