Bronx, N.Y., August 8, 2009 — It was only fitting that titular Yankee ace CC Sabathia got the ball in the Bronx Saturday in Game Three of four against the Red Sox. The Yanks had just beaten the Sox two straight in games that couldn’t have been more different. They won Thursday, and drove John Smoltz out of Boston, perhaps even out of baseball, but certainly from the America League, with a bombastic 13-7, four-hour lathering. A day later in a game approaching six hours, they beat Boston 2-0 in 15, in a game where if the phrase “playoff atmosphere” didn’t fit like a baseball glove, it was only because this was better than most playoff baseball.
But the four-game series, which you see more and more on the schedule since interleague play was instituted 13 seasons back, gives the loser of two straight the opportunity to level things off quickly. True, the first-game pounding had given the Yanks the assurance that first place would be theirs come Monday. But even after winning the second one, you just knew that this Yankee team, playing at the high level they have since getting Friday hero Alex Rodriguez back from hip surgery, would not be satisfied with splitting the four-gamer with the Sox, a team that had them in an 0-8, head-to-head hole coming in. Despite winning with overwhelming offense, then with precision pitching through two, Saturday would decide the series.
And Sabathia was ready. Pounding 96-mph heat with a killer mid-eighties curve and a floating dart of a change, he dominated a Boston lineup that just had to be due, one feared, for an offensive breakout after succumbing on four singles and no runs in 15 innings Friday night. CC was perfect until the much-put-upon DH David Ortiz drew an eight-pitch walk in the top of the fifth. Boston was without left fielder Jason Bay for a third straight game, but CC dominated a lineup that still contained Kevin Youkilis, newly acquired Cleveland banger Victor Martinez, 2008 AL MVP Dustin Pedroia, and veteran third sacker Mike Lowell who figured to be stronger now that he is being rested several days a week.
Unlike fellow Yankee newbie AJ Burnett, who mesmerised a similar Bosox lineup on one hit into the eighth the night before, Sabathia had a fairly early lead, even if it was by the most precarious of margins, 1-0. Young Boston righty Clay Buchholz, who less than a month ago seemed to be the odd starter out looking in on this Boston rotation, was in trouble in every inning Saturday afternoon, even though the first-inning trouble was caused when an out-of-position Youkilis dropped a routine fly ball in left field. But Clay escaped that bullet and got around a Robbie Cano single in the second by issuing a dp grounder. A similar sinking pill to Derek Jeter almost got him out of the third after a leadoff single and walk. But Mark Teixeira gave the Yanks a 1-0 lead with a two-out line single to right.
Buchholz blanked the home team despite allowing a hit and a walk in both the fourth and the fifth, but if he expected that limiting the damage against the home-standing Yankees might be a winning proposition, he hadn’t figured on this dominant an outing by Sabathia. Despite a middling post-All Star output, CC was very good winning in Chicago last Sunday, but it was a game where he gave up an early lead before taking over. Not so Saturday. Jacoby Ellsbury managed Boston’s first hit, a two-out single, in the sixth, but was left stranded on first when Pedroia fouled a third-pitch strike into Jose Molina’s glove.
The young Boston righty’s luck fizzled in the bottom half, when Cano put him in immediate trouble by lining a leadoff double to left center. Nick Swisher bunted Cano to third, and Manager Terry Francona had Buchholz walk Melky Cabrera to bring likely dp candidate Molina to the plate, but Jose lined a 1-0 sac fly to center. If 1-0 was a mountain the Boston offense had been unable to climb for 21 straight innings and counting, how would they respond to 2-0?
They tried, mounting their only real threat against CC in the top of the seventh. Martinez worked a seven-pitch walk leading off, and Youkilis singled him to second. But CC barely broke a sweat, striking out Ortiz for the first out, and coaxing a 4-6-3 dp from the lumbering Lowell as Derek Jeter avoided a late Youkilis slide and pegged to first to close the frame. Ramon Ramirez replaced Buchholz, issued a one-out walk and then ended his day by drilling A-Rod with his next pitch. Buchholz had buzzed Alex in the first in possible retaliation for the plunking of Pedroia Thursday night; home plate ump Jim Joyce thumbed Ramirez immediately. Boston’s latest callup Enrique Gonzalez allowed a Hideki Matsui single, and eagle-eye Swisher worked an eight-pitch, two-out rbi walk for a 3-0 lead.
Sabathia had broken the 110-pitch barrier subduing the Sox in the seventh, but Joe Girardi sent him out again to face lefty batters J.D. Drew and Casey Kotchman; the ace didn’t disappoint, walking off to tumultuous cheers following a liner to second and his ninth punch out. Phil Hughes struck out Nick Green to close the frame. Molina, having a good day with the bat (walk, sac fly, single, run) singled in the bottom half and Jeter looped an opposite-field home run inside the foul pole in right for a 5-0 lead. Yankee righthander David Roberston finished the Red Sox off in the ninth.
Boston didn’t go with a yawn though, and Mariano Rivera actually did get up in the pen once Ellsbury and Martinez sandwiched singles around a Pedroia liner to center. But Youkilis flied out and Robertson pounded a third strike past a stationary and obviously frustrated Ortiz to close it out.
In a way, though, that last Red Sox gasp paints an even more perfect scenario than we would have had without it. The two singles gave the visitors back-to-back games where four singles equaled their total offensive output, even if it took them 15 frames to get that many Friday. They reached Sabathia for two of those hits Saturday, one more than they got off Burnett Friday. But Burnett surrendered six walks, Sabathia just two.
On August 8, 1876, Thomas Edison filed the patent for his latest brainstorm invention, the mimeograph machine, allowing users to produce “perfect” copies of documents. One hundred years later, secretaries were feeding several layers through their typewriters, using an in-between sheet to produce “carbon copies.” And now, 30-plus years further along, we are all CC-ing e-mails and other forms of virtual communication to third (and fourth, etc.) parties.
One day after the Yanks shut out the Red Sox 2-0 on four singles where AJ Burnett led the way with 7.7 scoreless innings, the Bombers blanked Boston 5-0 with a 7.7-inning inning outing from yet another starter in a very specific way:
They CC’d ’em.
BTW,TYW
YANKEE BASEBALL!!!