Bronx, N.Y., April 30, 2008 — With the way the Yankee offense has been sputtering of late missing a few key performers, and the discouraging results gleaned so far from their two young starters, it was pretty difficult to approach any of the three games vs. the Tigers this week brimming over with confidence. The hope was that the team would be so happy to finally be home that the level of their play would rise dramatically.
Game One Tuesday night unfortunately met expectations, and the recovering Detroit lineup battered Phil Hughes for an early lead. Although Kenny Rogers seemed vulnerable, the home team failed to mount much of a counterattack. Things improved Wednesday off a quick two-run first-inning hometown rally with veteran stopper Andy Pettitte on the mound. But the offense disappeared and the few mistakes Pettitte made cleared fences and brought the visitors to victory from behind.
The improving Ian Kennedy gave the Yanks some hope in rainy Yankee Stadium Thursday, and once the Yanks blistered Detroit southpaw Nate Robertson for a 3-0 lead after 15 pitches, things were looking up. Although the Yankees have more often than not had trouble with lefties over the years, Roberston has not been one of them, and he took the mound this night with a 1-5 record vs. New York since Detroit got him from Florida back in 2003.
One long night stands out in particular, when the Yanks battered Roberston and the Tigers 10-3 on July 5, 2004. Nate couldn’t find the zone, and the Yanks made him pay. He walked three by the time he was removed in the second, and he threw 27 balls and 28 strikes, as the Yanks batted around for six runs and a 7-0 lead at his departure. He had similar trouble Thursday night, finding the zone with his first pitch to just one of the first nine Yankee batters. More than half his 27 first-inning pitches were balls, and it showed. Johnny Damon worked a leadoff walk, Derek Jeter singled a 2-0 fastball to left, and Bobby Abreu pounded a 3-1 offering to right for a quick 3-0 lead. But this lineup is not hitting anything like the 2004 one did, and the offense seemingly evaporated as quickly as it came. Shelley Duncan, in at first against a lefty, reached on an error, but Robertson shrugged it off and set down the next nine straight.
Kennedy was pitching well too. After a one-two-three first where he “trusted his stuff” to the tune of nine strikes out of 13 pitches, he worked around a one-out walk in the second. He popped Brandon Inge up to short to start the third, but shortstop Ramon Santiago blooped one to short left that became a double when Damon overran it. A fielder’s choice grounder got Ian within an out of escaping, but although Placido Polanco did not hit a 1-0 pitch hard, he placed it well for a double down the first base line; it was 3-1. A followup walk to ex-Yank Gary Sheffield was a big mistake, and Magglio Ordonez and Miguel Cabrera drilled back-to-back liners to the wall in right center. Ordonez tied it with his double, but Abreu could have, and probably should have, caught Cabrera’s drive. He shied away from the wall at the last minute, the carom eluded him, and Cabrera coasted in with an rbi triple. It was a rally that started hamrlessly and suddenly, but Detroit thunder stunned Kennedy and the Yanks, and the newly forged 4-3 Tigers lead stood for two innings.
After a nothing third inning, Hideki Matsui and Morgan Enberg singled in the fourth. The team failed to score, but it was a refreshing try after the seeming capitulation the team copped to after the first inning the night before. Fighting still, the Yanks tied it on a Jeter walk and Abreu and Duncan singles in the fifth. Kennedy was gone by then though; Joe Girardi lifted him with two down in the top half after another walk to Sheffield followed by a two-out single by Ordonez. Jonathan Albaladejo snuffed that rally, and impressively almost escaped even worse trouble in the sixth after a Carlos Guillen single and Jacque Jones double had two in scoring position with nobody out. Inge flew out to short left, and Granderson and Polanco struck out, but not before the pesky Santiago delivered both runs with a double to left. It was a blow to which the Yanks had no answer, and even less so when Kyle Farnsworth surrendered a two-run opposite-field home run to Cabrera in the seventh. The 8-4 score that forged became final two innings later.
The Yanks did drive Robertson out with a two-out Chad Moeller single in the sixth, to no avail as it tuned out, and Nate did garner the win. But things got raucous there for a bit when Damon and Jeter rolled back-to-back infield singles halfway to the mound to load the bases. But the last real Yankee chance was gone when Abreu lined out to Granderson in center. Still, the offense did some show life after they fell behind twice, and Kennedy seemed on his way to a decent start until the soft hits kept the third inning alive long enough for the loud ones. The two Sheffield walks were mistakes, and the second kept that frame alive.
The Scoreboard advised at the game’s start that the teams would be starting play under a temperature and a humidity percentage that both read 54, but not for long. After a random drop here and there got people looking skyward warily, the rains came for good in the second inning. And by the way, amateur (and professional) meteorologists out there, the word “showers” always evokes in me an intermittent sense. It may fall hard, but it will stop too. Can we just call it “rain” when it starts and never ceases?
The ballclub continues to feverisly promote the All Star Game, which will be played in this great old ballpark in about 10 weeks. Ron Blomberg was this day’s former Yankee called on to push the lever that indicates the number of regular-season Stadium home games remaining has been reduced, in this case from 70 to 69. It was a different and a difficult time in 1973 when Blomberg earned a piece of baseball immortality when he walked with the bases loaded in the first ever plate appearance in official play of the Designated Hitter.
The Yanks lost badly that day, but Blomberg had done something memorable, and fans appreciated it during days when the team was suffering through a string of fifth- and fourth-place finishes. It was a matter of pride. In this, the old Stadium’s 86th and final season, fans are not sounding very hopeful or proud of late. There was the sub-.500 April, injuries to key personnel, the persistent struggles of their young pitching. How is one to cope? It was humiliating and frustrating listening to Detroit fans celebrate their three wins with glee.
Thursday was the 69th birthday of the beautiful and luminous singer/songwriter Judy Collins, still going strong on the recording beat and in fine cabaret houses around the country. She had a huge hit years ago with Both Sides Now.
I have seen the Yankees from both sides, from those struggling years that featured Blomberg’s accomplishment and little else, and similar ones 20 years ago when young starters with unimpressive resumes were toeing the Stadium mound. And I’ve seen some of the glory days too, days of Mickey, Yogi, Whitey and Roger; later of Gator, Thurman, Sweet Lou and Reggie; later still with Donnie Baseball, The Warrior, Tino, Bernie, Jorge and Mo. The latter brought playoff baseball back to New York in 1995 after 14 years of absence since the 1981 World Series. And now this team struggles to keep it together so they can extend the team’s current playoff run to 14 years too.
Yes, I’ve looked at it from “both sides.” And you know what? Even with the 14-16 record, the injuries, the sputtering offense, and the questions about the pitching,
Rooting for this team is not that bad.
YANKEE BASEBALL!!!