Bronx, N.Y., July 22, 2009 — Tell me if you’ve heard this one before. A promising Yankee team spends a long weekend on the West Coast and loses big time. Suddenly, a season filled with hope is on the brink of ruin. If you’re thinking I’m talking about a week and a half ago, and the three-game sweep by the Angels, think again. The Bombers went 1-4 to start the 1998 season in California, then came home and won 113 and lost 44 the rest of the way. Continue reading
Category Archives: Grandstand View
A Giant Step to First
Bronx, N.Y., July 20, 2009 — The Yankees kept their roll going Monday night with yet another victory in the Stadium, this one over the Orioles after having swept the Tigers over the weekend. It was the third straight (and perhaps last, for a while) beautiful day in the Bronx, and although they’ve had quality starts in all four games (and wins) since the All Star break, this made three playoff-quality outings by a starting pitcher in a row. CC Sabathia, Joba Chamberlain, and Andy Pettitte went exactly 21 innings among them, and in those frames they surrendered all of two runs. Continue reading
A Walk Too Far
Bronx, N.Y., July 19, 2009 — Forty-three ex-Yankee players took the field for the Old Timers Game in Yankee Stadium Sunday afternoon, and they were joined by the widows of four more. The stars played through three innings to a 5-2 win by the Clippers over the Bombers, and although routine fly balls fell for hits and grounders sneaked through the infield, there were a few flashes of the brilliance we’ve witnessed before. Present were most of the usual suspects, but I was thrilled to see reliable reliever Lindy McDaniel from my youth, and Charlie Hayes and Chad Curtis, who between them corralled the last outs of the 1996 and 1999 Championships. It was good, too, seeing Mike Mussina looking younger than all those around him, quite a change from the last few years, and the irascible Don Zimmer, whose presence on the Yankee bench was a comforting sight for so long. Continue reading
No-Out Lumber, Two-Out Thunder
Bronx, N.Y., July 18, 2009 — A little more than a month ago, Yankee Stadium was abuzz with a big crowd in anticipation of a classic pitcher’s duel as the Yanks hosted the crosstown Mets. But although 2009 free-agent signee A.J. Burnett fulfilled his half of the bargain for the Yankees, the Mets’ Johan Santana responded with his worst start in years. The hometeam pounded the Flushing southpaw and coasted to a 15-0 laugher. But Detroit’s Justin Verlander and New York’s CC Sabathia produced on the big stage Saturday afternoon. Continue reading
A Near Miss
Bronx, N.Y., July 6, 2009 — Well, the Yankees came oh so close to completing a four-game sweep over the Blue Jays Monday afternoon, even if young lefty Ricky Romero was every bit as good for the visitors as his notices claimed. Deftly mixing 95mph heat with mid-eighties sliders and changes of pace, he kept the Yanks off balance once he escaped a messy first with some help from third base ump Marty Foster. Continue reading
Three-Letter Relief
Bronx, N.Y., July 5, 2009 — If in today’s fifth inning you had bet me (or pretty much anyone else in Yankee Stadium) that the game would be complete 16 minutes short of four hours, I’d be in your debt now. The Yanks were in the middle of their second straight three-run inning, and the clock was heading toward three hours then. Joba Chamberlain, who had struggled with the usual pitch-count issues in the first and the third, came totally apart in the top of the fourth, and what had been a rollicking 4-0 Yankee lead became an 8-4 deficit when Aaron Hill blasted a two-run homer to right, the ninth hit off Chamberlain. Continue reading
Benevolent Birthday Bounce
Bronx, N.Y., July 4, 2009 — The Yankees beat the Blue Jays 6-5 in 12 innings Saturday. It was another come-from-behind win for the Bombers, as they trailed Doc Halladay 5-3 until Johnny Damon tied the game in the seventh with a two-run poke into the short porch in right. The comeback wins and homers we’re used to; spending four-plus hours in the Stadium on a gorgeous afternoon with not even a passing threat of rain? That was new, and welcome. Continue reading
Pitching to Contact
Bronx, N.Y., July 2, 2009 — The Yankees’ seven-game winning streak came to a close Thursday night, as Seattle doubled them uo 8-4 in yet another rain-delayed game in Yankee Stadium. CC Sabathia suffered through one of his more difficult games as a Yankee, and assaults by the Mariners in the second and fourth innings proved too much for him and his team to overcome. Continue reading
First and Last
Bronx, N.Y., June 30, 2009 — On June 30, 1859, the Frenchman Charles Blondin became the first man to cross Niagara Falls on a tightrope. One hundred and fifty years later to the day, the Yankees took a night-long walk on a tightrope that ultimately ended in an 8-5 victory over the Seattle Mariners. Continue reading
Nine the Hard Way
Bronx, N.Y., June 14, 2009 — Nine is a magical number in baseball, with nine players fielding positions on each team, nine innings of play. Three strikes make an out and three strike outs make an inning; three times three = nine. Three outs for nine innings makes 27. Three, nine, and 27 make a sort of trinity of baseball numbers. Continue reading