Bronx, N.Y., May 1 — After the early rain today I was ready for a big night in the Bronx. The weather was warm if spotty, the Yankees are playing great ball, the incomparable Mr. Mussina was pitching and, as opposed to yesterday, I already had my Box 622 ticket and would not have to purchase another. The Yankees are hitting, they are catching the baseball and they are running the bases, and the pitching has been exceptional. And all this without the one and only Mariano Rivera, whom I had finally seen make his 2003 debut last night.

Those were the thoughts filling my head as I lay down this morning for a nice long catch-up nap. After a busy month at work I had taken the day, and I was looking forward to some days of tight playoff-like baseball against the cream of the West, the Seattle Mariners and the Oakland A’s.

“R-R-R-i-i-i-i-n-n-n-g-g-g!!” came suddenly crashing through my “We Are The Champions” reverie, and I made a stab at the phone on the bed-side stand, trying to come to my senses. “You mean you’re still home! I thought you were going to the ballgame tonight,” a familiar voice said, and I slowly focused on the clock radio as I strained to make sense of the words. It was 5:50 pm. The train I like to catch for night games had left the station 12 minutes earlier; the fallback later option would leave in 15, and in my current condition there was no way I would make it.

So I sat outside and read until game time, and joined the YES coverage just in time for Mussina’s first pitch to Ichiro. There are things one can see better on the small screen. I am sure I would have been impressed with Moose’s pitching had I watched from the tier boxes, but there really is nothing for watching great pitching like those camera views, close-ups, and stop-action shots one sees on the tube. I might not have experienced at home the sense of finality and frustration I would have gotten from witnessing Bret Boone in person as he took the inning’s 18th pitch for strike three (Moose struck out the side in the first, just as Andy had done the night before), but I had a better idea of the kind of stuff Mike had and how he was mixing it to keep the Mariners off stride.

Mussina was on tonight, as he has been often in this season’s early going, but Joel Pineiro looked ready for the challenge. He didn’t have the lights-out stuff Mike had, but he was throwing strikes, keeping the Yankee batters guessing, and benefited from four double plays. He gave up two walks and seven base hits, but he had the sense to never allow two Yankees on in the same inning until Nick Johnson walked after the Soriano homer leading off the sixth, and not to give up two base hits in the same frame until Matsui and Posada singled leading off the seventh. He threw only 90 pitches through seven and threw 18 out of 26 first-pitch strikes to the Yankee batters.

Moose was even better and he was perfect with five strike outs through three innings. He had notched all nine of his strike outs when he closed the sixth by whiffing Edgar, and the Yankee starters in the last three nights have struck out eight, eight and nine respectively. Unfortunately, strike outs often have a negative effect on pitch count, and although he achieved a very good 20-8 first-pitch strike ratio, his count reached 100 when he coaxed a ground out to Giambi at first from Olerud on the seventh inning’s first pitch.

I don’t think the author of the phrase “that’s the way the ball bounces” had baseball in mind when he first uttered it, but that’s the only way to explain that the Yankees were behind in this game, and that Moose gave up any runs at all. He was rolling along, having just made Cameron his seventh strike-out victim in the fifth when McLemore, Cirillo and Wislon all “hit it where they ain’t” for three ground singles and a 1-0 lead. On the one hand I was confident as none had hit the ball hard so I knew that Mike was still on. On the other I wondered if the Yankees would ever plate a run of their own.

My fear lasted one pitch, as Jorge deposited Piniero’s first pitch in the inning’s bottom half over the deepest wall in the park for his eighth homer and a 1-1 tie. Neither pitcher seemed to lose anything once they gave up a run and the pitcher’s duel was back on. But then Joel went to a 2-1 count on Alfonso leading off the sixth. Broadcaster Kenny Singleton made the point that in the modern game it is desirable to have a lead-off guy with some pop, because no pitcher worth his salt wants to start the inning by walking the speedy lead-off guy. Piniero came in with his next pitch, and Alfonso went out with it, and the game’s final score had been forged.

Pineiro survived the walk to Nick Johnson following Alfonso’s blast with help from a double play, and he got another one off Mondesi once Matsui and Posada had singled leading off the seventh. The Yankees tried to get something going, and some insurance runs, when they pounced on Jeff Nelson for back-to-back singles to lead off the eighth and Nick niftily bunted them over, but Arthur Rhodes came on and threw some unhittable pitches in striking out Giambi and Matsui around an intentional walk to Bernie.

Moose continued to deal, and retired seven straight until Ichiro excited thousands of his countrymen by singling with two outs in the eighth. But Jorge silenced them just as quickly as he threw Ichiro out trying to steal, as he had done to Winn after he had led off the sixth with a hit.

Kate Smith’s rendition of God Bless America is played during virtually every Yankee Stadium seventh inning, so even though I prefer tenor Ronan Tynan’s version myself, it is only fitting that we point out that Kate would have been celebrating her 96th birthday today. Judy Collins turns 64, and I grabbed the title for this column form the Joni Mitchell-penned song Both Sides Now that Judy had such a huge hit with about 35 years ago.

We have seen the Yankees from both sides now too. They have dominated on the road; they’re playing dynamite at home. The offense has been awesome, and even when a great game is thrown at us the power potential keeps us in every game. The defense is much improved over last year. And while the hitters have put up some impressive numbers, after a 16-0 start, the starting pitching has proven that they’re just not going away either. And if the starters are so great, how big is it that Mariano had a 1-2-3 ninth for his first serve?

I missed seeing Moose notch win no. 6 in person on a warm evening in the Bronx. Looking at the schedule, should he remain injury-free, he might get 35 or 36 starts this year. I know nobody wins them all, but I’m expecting a huge, and unprecedented, season from him. Twenty wins? Twenty-five? Thirty even?

The more the merrier, as long as I can see them. I don’t really care if my line of view is from the Stadium tier, or from the other side.

BTW,TYW

YANKEE BASEBALL!!!