Bronx, N.Y., October 17, 2003 — Yankee fans, delighted that Roger Clemens had outdueled Pedro Martinez on every level less than a week ago, had grown into a fit of fervor by the time the hard-throwing Yankee righty threw Thursday evening’s first pitch past Johnny Damon for a strike at 8:20. The crescendo of cheers grew as a foul strike and a bouncer to Jeter at short followed. But Todd Walker put a professional at bat on Clemens, and by the time he singled into right on the 10th pitch he saw, the crowd had already grown restive.
Even though Garciaparra followed by lining an 0-1 pitch to right center and Ramirez flied harmlessly to right on six pitches, the Rocket had been tested and pushed to 21 pitches. And Clemens did not come back from a shaky first in any better shape. By the time he had surrendered a single, home run, and double in a sloppy second, the Red Sox had already struck 22 of the 30 strikes he had thrown. You know as much as you need to about Clemens’s night when I tell you that the Yankees managed to hit their 22nd offering tossed up by Pedro Martinez when Bernie Williams fouled off a two-out pitch in the sixth.
Pedro Martinez was pushed in the first as well. The Yankees came out patient, with only Bernie Williams swinging at one of the first three pitches he saw. A badly outmatched Soriano even took a strike and a ball before swinging and missing twice, and Nick Johnson worked a five-pitch walk. But Pedro and home plate ump Tim McClelland were beginning to understand one another’s zones, and Martinez escaped a troubled 18-pitch first by getting ahead of Jeter and Matsui, and popping them both up. Five of his 10 first-inning strikes were called.
But part of Pedro’s high count in the first frame came from missing the zone eight times, and that wouldn’t happen to him again until the seventh. He didn’t appear to have more velocity than he had in Boston five days earlier, but his command and control were superb. In the next five innings he kept his count down by throwing only four, five, five, four, and four pitches out of the zone, striking out seven and coaxing another six high popups and fly balls that, despite the screeches of a few overzealous among the crowd, were easy outs as soon as they fell back to earth. In a reversal of general pitching form, the only balls the Yankees were hitting hard were the few they managed to propel along the ground, at least until Matsui doubled in the fourth, and Giambi homered to just right of dead center in the fifth.
By the time Jason hit that homer on Martinez’s first pitch of the fifth, the Yanks were already in a 4-0 hole, the fourth run coming on Kevin Millar’s no-doubt-about-it shot to left on Clemens’ first pitch of the fourth. The Yankees were able to close to within three on their DH’s bomb only because of the wonderful relief appearance they recieved from the wily Mike Mussina. The Moose came on with runners on the corners and no one out. Thirty-three pitches later his night was over, and three innings of potential Red Sox offense had passed quietly.
Martialing his expanded bullpen forces with Napoleanic dispatch, Yankee field boss Torre got the Yanks to the bottom of the seventh still down only 4-1. Martinez had only added 60 pitches to his count from the second through the sixth, and once he retired Posada on a liner to center, he had garnered 20 of the 27 outs needed on a mere 85 tosses. I think that Grady Little decided then and there that if Pedro thought he could carry the load he would let him. The fact that Little failed to let what transpired on the field shake that resolve is probably why the Red Sox lost the game. Giambi homered again for 4-2 and, although the 56,000-plus groaned in unison when Soriano struck out for the fourth consecutive time after Wilson and Garcia singled back to back, the tide had aready turned.
Little’s subsequent decision to stick with Martinez when the Yanks mounted yet another uprising in the eighth was the wrong move on several levels. First, although the diminutive righty had only thrown 99 pitches after seven, an excellent average of 14 tosses per, the seventh had cost him 21. Second, his control was slipping. He threw first-pitch strikes to 12 of 18 the first two times through the Yankee nine; that ratio dipped to six of 15 for the remainder.
But the most telling factor that signaled Martinez’s demise was that the gradually increasing ability of the Yankee batters to “see ball, hit ball” went off the scale in his last two frames. The Bombers hit three pitches Martinez threw in the first, three more in the second, and only two in the third. The Boston hurler continued to do well through the middle innings, but not as well, as the home team hit five pitches each in the fourth, fifth, and sixth. The dike of Martinez’s invulnerability was leaking, and somehow Little missed how badly it was breached in the seventh.
Martinez was a different pitcher in the seventh, and he was fooling the Yanks less and less. They hit 10 of his pitches in the that pivotal frame, doubling their hit total, and they struck another eight in the eighth before the Boston starter was finally removed, after allowing four more hits in a row.
Despite the fact that Boston retained the best of the play that they had seized midday through Wednesday’s Game Six, there was a very different feel in the ballpark on Thursday night. The temperature was higher, and the winds lower. The buzz I picked up the moment I arrived was more positive than the one I had felt the day before when, despite my finest efforts, I did not arrive at the ballpark until the Sox were in their four-run third-inning rally off Andy Pettitte.
I was delighted to be early for this Game Seven tilt. I hurried to the gate 2 entrance in the left-field corner and searched for my favorite security person. I had a plan. I became aware over a long season that she was related to a Yankee player. David Justice hit what was perhaps the biggest home run of the Yankee 2000 postseason. He took Arthur Rhodes’s outside fastball to right field’s upper deck, and took the Yankee fan nation for a “ride on the subway,” a feat that he had managed exactly three years before this game. I needed some ALCS magic, and I knew where to get it. Once I had been given the once-over, I asked for permission to touch her for luck, and rubbed her back gently for the mojo I was sure it would bring. I had been sure Thursday night would be different; now I was positive.
On my way up the escalators in the left-field corner, I discovered a ritual I had never caught before, as Coach Gary Tuck was putting Yankee catchers Jorge Posada and John Flaherty through their paces, first having them throw to one another at pitcher’s-mound-to-home-plate distance from a kneeling position. The escalators in the left field corner provide an excellent view of Monument Park and both the visiting and home team bullpen areas, and the latter was where these exercises were taking place. When they broke that rigorous throwing drill, they alternated reps of receiving hard throws from Tuck where the drill was to scamper to a throwing position from a catcher’s crouch, poised to throw as quickly as possible.
By the time I made it to my seat in the Tier behind the visiting dugout, the busy Mr. Posada was taking batting practice too. The buzz among the players, team officials and press on the field was palpable, and it was wafting up to the fans in heady doses. The driving wind of the night before was gone and the 61-degree temp with 12 mph winds promised a great night for baseball.
The growing crowd’s intensity level soared through the introductions of the lineups, and the National Anthem, rendered expertly and poignantly by the Harlem Boys Choir. The sense of expectation grew through the first-pitch ceremony (Yogi at 8:11), and Welcome to the Jungle, at 8:12. The Yanks took the field to the stirring strains of Baba O’Reilly and a huge roar from the Yankee fan throng.
Of couse, by the time the Yanks and their fans found themselves down, 4-1, in the seventh, much of the positive vibe had dissipated, but much of it had not too. For a man who doesn’t hesitate to find fault with the spoiled Yankee fan of today’s impatience with any failure whatsoever, I was very impressed with their resiliency, and with the thunderous crowd noise we all kept up all night.
Particularly poignant, I felt, was the class and love that was shown toward Clemens when he trudged quietly off the field after being removed with no one out in the fourth, already down, 4-1. I had been appalled to hear elements of the Yankee crowd actually boo Mariano Rivera briefly for throwing away a bunt (a la 2001) earlier this year. Their respect for the aging veteran this night reminded me that these were the same people who spent the entire eighth inning of Game Five of the 2001 World Series cheering the retiring Paul O’Neill loudly and fully, despite the fact that the Yanks were down, 2-0, and hadn’t mustered any offense all day.
And this crowd wasn’t only good because they cheered Clemens in possible defeat. They were quicker to notice and pounce on the weakening Martinez than his own manager was, and the roar of the throng during the game-tying rally in the 37-pitch home eighth was insistent and unflagging.
This is not to say that the credit for that rally rides totally on the excitement of the crowd, the diminishingly effective Martinez offerings and Grady Little’s seeming indifference to what was transpiring before him. That would be selling the game Yankee offense short.
One of the things I find fascinating in studying this game is that four of the five home runs struck during the contest came on a first pitch, and three of those on the first pitch of an inning. (Ortiz’s shot off Wells was his on first pitch, but he relieved Jeff Nelson with one out in the eighth.) But far more impressive, really, is the fact that the Jeter and Matsui doubles that formed the backbone of the Yankee three-run eighth-inning onslaught both came on 0-2 pitches. The Yanks did catch a bit of a break on Posada’s game-tying bloop into short center, but I say, turnabout fair play, as he had lined hard to center for an out his last time up the inning before. And kudos to the lumbering Yankee catcher for not hesitating to take second base once both Garciaparra and Walker raced after his ball in center.
And then there was Mo. Some read into the psyche of the greatest closer any of us will ever see, the “greatest to ever play the game” in the words I’ve borrowed from Bernard Malamud’s The Natural, just how deeply the loss in Arizona two years ago hurt him, by his teary and emotional reaction to the Yanks’ stunning win on Boone’s homer three innings later. But all we can say for sure is that the Yankees win in the playoffs because they win almost all of the close games. If they have a lead, are tied, or even are close late, they’re likely to win the game. He should have won the AL MVP back in 1996 when he was only a lowly setup man. He ascended to the role of closer a year later, a move that has directly resulted in three Yankee parades through downtown since.
As I’ve said, the Yankee fans were loud and ardent all night, but they were frustrated with some Yankee failures and foibles. Alfonso Soriano’s four strike outs and lack of discipline, for instance, had many bellowing for the Yanks to take more pitches, and a friend of mine two rows behind suggested while Aaron Boone was approaching the plate for his first at bat of the night that he should take more pitches too. Although I agree that Booney seems to be facing an 0-2 pitch every time I look up, I’m not sure that approach would work for him. But regardless, I responded by invoking an opinion and a hope that I developed when the Yanks traded Brandon Claussen for him in the first place. “Aaron Boone,” I said, “is about to become Scott Brosius.”
Don’t get me wrong. I talk sports a lot, and none more often than baseball. You can’t keep uttering fine phrases and offering impassioned opinions without scoring a hit from time to time. To me the connection is psychic. To me, it’s not entirely coincidental that the night the Yankee Fan Faithful treated the aging right-hander with some of the passion, the dignity and the respect they offered to their retiring right fielder two years ago, the third baseman once again rewarded them for their selflessness.
Of course, on the other hand, I am going to play the lottery!
BTW,TYW
YANKEE BASEBALL!!!