Bronx, N.Y., June 4, 2004 — Fans of the Yankees from the last few seasons have been looking forward to Friday night’s game vs. the Texas Rangers all season, and they know why. There is the fact that ex-Manager Buck Showalter is at the Texas helm, but so was he last year. And lefthander Kenny Rogers, who as a Yankee was routinely hammered early and often in the 1996 playoffs, was starting.
But it has been eight years and he’s been beaten by New York since. And besides, it wasn’t clear until about a week ago that he would be getting the ball. And of course, the Rangers are looking more like a playoff team than they have in five years, they are hitting the ball very well, and they took the Yanks in two out of three in Texas two weekends ago.
But the reason everyone wanted to see the Rangers became clear several times Friday evening. In for his first visit since his trade to Texas for Alex Rodriguez, power-hitting second baseman Alfonso Soriano was greeted warmly during pregame introductions, but this kind of treatment has been afforded before. And he got a standing ovation when he batted with one down in the first inning, but that too has precedent. But only former first sacker and playoff hero Tino Martinez has received the kinds of cheers Soriano got for homering against his ex-mates, as happened once the Texas second baseman took a trademark first-pitch swing and drove a ball over the right field wall for a 3-0 Rangers lead in the third. As the crowd slowly quieted, one out later Mark Teixeira lifted a fly to almost the same location, though not as deep, but Yankee fans still seemed happy with their team suddenly in a 4-0 hole.
Was it because they were confident that the Yankee bats would revive and stage a blistering comeback as they have been doing all year? Or were they certain that Rogers would unravel immediately and let the Bombers back in the game? The vibe in the cool night air told me that it was a little of both, along with residual delight that Soriano had succeeded in his return to the Bronx.
The seeds for a Rogers demise had already been sewn. He walked two in the first two innings, and had survived warning track blasts to center and left by Bernie Williams and Hideki Matsui; it took him 42 pitches to get to the third. The uprising began quietly with a Jeter infield single to start the frame, but Williams homered loudly to left, and the bases-loaded jam that followed, although it produced no more runs, extended Kenny to 73 tosses just to get to the fourth inning.
On a tear of late, light-hitting Enrique Wilson homered to left on an 0-2 pitch leading off the fourth. Two outs later, A-Rod threatened rain clouds with a majestic bomb to left, and Sheffield gave the Yanks an immediate lead by lining one over the wall in the same direction two pitches later. Hideki Matsui doubled the lead on the second pitch of the fifth inning on a no-doubt-about it shot halfway up the right field bleachers, and the Stadium was rocking.
Fifty pitches, five home runs. It can only be the first week of June in Yankee land. On June 1, 1935, the home-standing Yanks blasted six singleton jacks in subduing the Red Sox, 7-2. And on June 5, 1977, it was six taters again, this time in Chicago, as they edged the White Sox, 8-6. This 2004 game’s 7-6 final coincides with a couple of June 4 games as well, as that is the score the Yankees beat the Braves by in Atlanta on this day four years ago. And on this day in 1988, the Yanks and Orioles played the longest game ever in Memorial Stadium, as the Birds beat the Yanks by that same count in 14 innings and 5.5 hours.
But let that last losing tally be a slap in the face, because this ballgame was not over, far from it. After all the fireworks of two third-inning Rangers homers (and almost a third, as Laynce Nix just barely missed the right field foul pole before bouncing to Clark to end it), and six Yankee scores on five homers in the innings that followed, the Rangers mounted the quietest of rallies in the sixth. Whereas Rogers was in trouble all night with huge pitch counts, Kevin Brown stayed in the game by keeping his down, except for the 30 it took him to finally emerge from the four-run third. He threw but seven and eight, respectively, to negotiate the first and the fifth, and with 15 and 14 in the second and fourth, he started the top of the sixth with plenty in the tank, having thrown just 74.
It all started very innocently, as Brad Fullmer fouled off two to fall behind 0-2. But Brown missed on four straight, and after Texeiria took a called third strike, Nix doubled into the left field corner, and the tying runs were in scoring position. On the fifth offering to Eric Young, Brown fell to 3-2. It’s funny that a short passed ball can have such a big effect. When the ball rolled perhaps 10-12 feet to Posada’s left, Fullmer raced home, Nix moved to third, and Torre was forced to bring the infield in. Ironically, Young’s 3-2 hot shot toward A-Rod the pitch before would have been a 5-3, and no runs would have scored. But with one run across and the infield drawn in, the ball glanced off Alex’s glove and the game was tied. Brown escaped further damage and Posada won a bit of redemption on an inning-closing 3-2, strike-out, throw-’em-out double dip to Wilson, but about 2,000 feet worth of Yankee home run balls had been blunted by a ball that rolled 10 feet.
It was Wilson who took the throw to close the Texas fifth because he had slid to short with Cairo in at second once Jeter felt some tightness after legging out the infield hit that started the Yanks on their way. And Wilson had already homered, and turned in a beaut at short, catching Michael Young’s leadoff grounder up the middle in the fifth and wheeling and firing to Clark. With the game now tied at six, the home team went back to the trick they knew best, as Sheffield lined another dinger to left with two down in the sixth.
Paul Quantrill replaced Brown for the seventh, and looked good, but with two down the Rangers came knocking at the door again. Blalock legged out an infield roller down third. First base ump Fletcher hesitated in making the call, but although Hank may have been out, this ump had stood his ground when Showalter argued on the foul home run call on Nix in the third, so I’ll give him this one. Returning hero Soriano followed by swinging and missing on Paul’s first toss. He fouled a pitch, then two more after taking one outside, and finally he stroked a single to right. Still he was cheered. Designated hitter Fullmer picked up where Sori left off, battling Quantrill too, a fight he seemed to have won as he bounced one hard up the middle on the at bat’s eighth pitch, but once again Wilson streaked across behind the second base bag, stretched to grab the ball and then used every inch of the 6’10” target Tony Clark presented at first in pegging Brad out.
Tom Gordon has pitched virtually every day for a week and was apparently not available, and although lefties Felix Heredia and Gabe White had warmed, Quantrill toed the runbber against lefties Texeiria and Nix in the eighth. Paul came back strongly, coaxing a weak fly to left and then striking out Nix and Young to get the game to Mo. Rivera saved the contest without incident and the ballgame was over.
There was a huge crowd of 49,000-plus for this Friday night contest, and they certainly got their money’s worth. And if that were not enough, the ice cube trays doled out to the first 18,000 fans 21 or older are very cool, as they make Yankee (interlocking NY) logo-shaped ice cubes. It may take days, or even weeks, to get enough together to throw a decent-sized party, but if the correct kind of crowd shows up, they could be a real hit, perhaps a 400-foot one like those that dotted the park this night. We’ll be looking for an excuse to use ours real soon. As for fellow Box 622 fan Jed Morash, he has no need to find a reason to celebrate. Jed and his wife invited the newest Yankee fan into the fold just a few days ago. Perhaps someday Jed will regale young Jackson Aguila Morash with the tale of how he and grandpa (on Mom’s side) saw the Yankees hit six home runs in the Bronx just a few nights after he was born. I like to think so.
BTW,TYW
YANKEE BASEBALL!!!