CRUNCH TIME
I know we can't expect the anks to keep up the recent pace, but tonight was still a brutal loss for a number of reasons. Anytime Mussina pitches that well they need to win. Melky got 2 hits in the leadoff slot, which they have to cash in. And finally if the remainder of the season is to be about more than the wild card (they are still in excellent shape there, only four back of both Cleveland and Detroit and virtually even with the A's and Mariners), then this is the time to amke a move. The Sox have the Braves, the Padres and the Mariners, while the Yanks have the Rockies, the Giants and the O's. Both are on the road and the Yanks have historically been the better road team, so it is imperative that they make up a couple of games over this stretch. After tonight, they have lost a half game--from 8.5 to 9-but remain 8 back in the all-important loss column. If they can reduce that gap to 7, 6 in the loss column, then they only need to pichk up another game or two to put the remaing series decisvely in play. The key is to win each of these series, which means taking the next two. They definitely blew one tonight, with the ols situational hitting bugaboo returning. But if they really have their confidence back at the plate, they should be able to shake it off. This is the most important stretch of the season before the actual stretch drive. It's not now or never, but it is now or now or never.
posted by joe valente | 1:48 AM
3 Comments:
Agreed. Winning 11 of 12 will only have meaning if they continue to win series.
Who would have thought the 1B answer was Jorge Posada? No one, of course. Did anyone notice how close Posada came to being spiked on Jeter's high throw to first? Then our every day catcher would be Nieves (!). I foresee Posada playing 1B in the coming years. I am not convinced that the time is now, however.
Frankly, I don't know what Torre means by his comment that playing Cairo at first on a regular basis is "pushing the envelope". The guy has been playing great. Leave him in there. Cairo makes plays at first base that we haven't seen since Tino left. And although I don't get as angry with Torre as Joe V. often does, why would the manager question a lineup that had won 11 of 12? Aaargh! -- MUNSON
I'm hoping last night was just an aberration in relation to the recent hot streak, not a return to April and May. They just seemed really flat; maybe it was the travel or high altitude or whatever, but it seemed liked they were mostly taking weak hacks and getting themselves out early in counts. I'm hoping this is the classic flat, under-achiever game that they often pull at the start of a series before getting their acts together--like game 1 of that 4 game set against Chicago a few weeks back.
Myers sure earned his pay again.
Good to see they pulled the trigger on Phelps and brought Andy Phillips back up. Not that I expect great things from him, but he seems a little less like a liability than Phelps.
As for Torre on Cairo: that seems to me to be sowing the seeds for a big, unneccesary trade for power hitting 1b. They don't care about 1b defense--that's obvious. they care about HRs. As the recent streak demonstrates, they don't need a power hitting 1b. They need more guys like Cairo (not necessarily Cairo, but LIKE Cairo) in the lineup. But when Torre talks like that it means, in Cashman-Torre speak: "Cairo's done OK during our 12 of 13 streak, but we really prefer having a more impressive LOOKING lineup to actually winning games. We need Helton or Texeria, but we'll probably have to settle for an over-rated malcontent like Shea Hillenbrand, who won't contribute much, but who will make a lot of pundits say "Wow, look at that yankee lineup. Who can beat them now...?"
You know, like last year, when Torre said in August how melky had done OK filling in for Matsui, but...just imagine...imagine having Matsui and Sheffield back in the lineup?
The Tigers are still smarting from that murderer's row.
I think the last thing you want when you are on a hot streak at home is a day off before a road trip, particularly when going to such a different atmosphere (literally). Tonight's game is just huge: if they can play well and win, I think they shake last night off and have a good trip, winning 4 of 6 on the coast and 2 of 3 bacck in baltimore. If not, we might look at this spell as the one where they lost all hope of winning the division and started being strictly a wild card possibility.
Odd about Torre. He fetishizes experience, but he always assumes his role players, like Melky and Miguel, the M&M boys!, will play worse over time as everyday players rather than better. I know thewre is no love for Josh Phelps among the Yankee faithful, jere or elsewhere, but I do believe if Torre had put him in the line-up on opening day and left him there, instead of using him as spot relief for the Skankowicz, we'd have a 280 hitter with a 340 OBP, some pop, and an adequate glove at first right now. Im not taking anything anyway from cairo. I'm just saying he has benefitted from the rhythm of the quotidian, and Phelps never got that opportunity.
As for Posada at first, if you're not going to rest him, catch him. Pitchers with plus 5 era don't get to demand private catchers. God, Mussina is such a putz.
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