Mike Mussina has another important start tonight in Cleveland, but who am I kidding? Every start for him is going to be important down the stretch here. Let’s hope the Yanks go batty and bounce back from yesterday’s loss. With the A’s and the Sox streaking, it behooves the Bombers to win four of their next five. That’s a whole lot of B’s, baby. Am I right or am I right?
Let’s Go Yan-Kees.
1. You are right.
2. Alex, we get the message but someone should forward an urgent missive to Joe Torre, Brian Cashman and company. I think they've let a better-than-could-be-imagined July go to their collective heads. Old habits die hard in old, old men.
3. Alas, alliteration always allows alarmed alacrity.
Or something.
4. Small glimmer of hope - with lefty Cliff Lee pitching tonight, perhaps Andy Phillips will get the call at DH, and Giambi plays 1B, and Bernie plays CF, and Tino and Womack sit? After all, we know Tino can't hit lefties, and we know Womack can't hit lefties, and back in May, Joe T played Phillips against Zito, Kazmir, Ted Lilly - lefties all!
Or am I dreaming?
Moose sure could use the offense (6 Yankee runs in his last 3 starts) - and we sure need the win.
5. Tino at 1B, Phillips at the bench.
6. ... oh well.
7. ... and sadly the BoSox are facing a pitcher with an 8.something ERA.
8. Jorge, I take it all back - 3-0 Yanks and Moose struck out the side in the first!
If Matsui, Giambi, and Posada keep hitting like this . . . I'll just dream of what they could do with Phillips in there instead of Tino. Who just flew out on the first pitch, BTW.
9. When Moose is good, he is very, very good.
Looks bad for Rafael Palmeiro.
10. When Moose is bad, he's really mediocre. I hope he regains his composure and pitches 2 more innings. Otherwise, its going to be a frustrating game.
11. Someone PLEASE wake Torre up from his mid-innings nap...
12. I guess I spoke too soon . . . sigh. Meanwhile, Boston is up 7-4 on KC and the A's are in a 1-1 tie with Harden pitching. Double sigh.
How did Moose go from great to suck so fast?
13. Torre is aging as fast as Bernie. Didn't he see that Moose was through?
14. Ouch, Ouch and more Ouch. Someone wake up Torre...
Do you think that Berman just keeps talking during the commercials....man he has not stopped once during this game.
15. Boy they seem washed up tonight, that botched DP hurt big time ... got to brace myself for looking at a 4.5 game deficit tomorrow AM, sigh.
16. A while back I was chastised for claiming that Torre just didn't care anymore. Uh...was he asleep then during the 5th inning? At 4-3 I would've thought very hard about relieving Moose but at 4-5 don't you think it would've "kept the game in order" to take him out and hope the bleeding stops? And you couldn't say Sturtze wasn't ready...Moose threw something like 40 pitches in the inning. No, we wait until it's 4-6 and, maybe for ceremonial purposes, we bring Sturtze in. I guess Joe was awaiting confirmation from Steve Hirdt that, no, Moose officially couldn't be given a win with less than 5 full innings pitched. Aw shucks, this'll keep Moose out of the Hall. Dang!
17. Over at Was Watching, Steve Lombardi has a bad feeling about possible Yankees steroids test results coming out soon. Might be a little paranoid, but the vibe on the team is a little eerie. Ironically, it'll probably be someone we never suspected. Although I do think Steve is a little overwrought on this possibility. Quite possibly the long faces in the dugout stem from playing and managing badly against a mediocre team.
18. One of Torre's Terrible Tendencies (to keep the alliteration train rolling) is his difficulty yanking pitchers, particularly starters, with two outs (and JohnnyC is right, especially with a lead in the fifth--though that's more common, off the top of my head I remember Lou Piniella, whom so many of you have inexplicably requested as Joe's replacement--Lou is murder on a pitching staff--leaving Hideo Nomo, of all people, in too long in the fifth inning against the Yankees at the Stadium earlier this year).
19. Oops, posted to soon . . .
The thing is that with two outs, any given pitch could end the inning, and there's a natural impulse to be optimistic that your guy can get that last out so you don't have to bring a reliever into a sticky situation. I missed most of last night's game, so I can't say when I would have pulled Mussina, but I recognize that pulling a starter who had done well through four innings with two outs in the fifth is an extremely difficult call to make.
That said, Joe gets paid the big bucks to make that call correctly.
20. I'm not one to shy away from criticizing Joe this year, but I want to add another perspective to our discontent.
Mussina has got to win. Mussina has got to go deep into games. If we have any hope of the division, the wild card, or a playoff victory (if we're dreaming big), Mussina has to do his job as an ace.
Torre will go down swinging with Mussina, even if he's pissing away a lead. We have little choice in his starts, or Randy Johnson's starts. They have to fight through the tough innings and succeed or we have no shot at anything significant this year anyway. The onus is on our top pitchers at this point. It could be Jeffrey Maier managing and we still need Mussina and Johnson to shut down the opposition and go into at least the 7th.
So....to defend Joe tonight (for a change), I will say that without 7-8 innings and a 3ish ERA every time out from Mussina and Johnson we don't make the playoffs. Joe has got to stick with Mussina in hopes that he gets the big out and runs back to the dugout, or what does it even matter?
21. I'm not one to shy away from criticizing Joe this year, but I want to add another perspective to our discontent.
Mussina has got to win. Mussina has got to go deep into games. If we have any hope of the division, the wild card, or a playoff victory (if we're dreaming big), Mussina has to do his job as an ace.
Torre will go down swinging with Mussina, even if he's pissing away a lead. We have little choice in his starts, or Randy Johnson's starts. They have to fight through the tough innings and succeed or we have no shot at anything significant this year anyway. The onus is on our top pitchers at this point. It could be Jeffrey Maier managing and we still need Mussina and Johnson to shut down the opposition and go into at least the 7th.
So....to defend Joe tonight (for a change), I will say that without 7-8 innings and a 3ish ERA every time out from Mussina and Johnson we don't make the playoffs. Joe has got to stick with Mussina in hopes that he gets the big out and runs back to the dugout, or what does it even matter?
22. The whole paranoia about a Yankee steroid bust is freaking me out. Please stop. I prefer to live in complete denial until it actually happens.
The season is already bad enough as it is....
(Watch it be Womack, too. It would figure)
23. I don't know if this loss could've been avoided, but, for some reason, it was gutwrenching - more so than usual. I haven't felt this low since they were swept by KC.
Not that it matters in tonight's final analysis, but we cannot afford to give away outs, whether it be Jeter hacking wildly at first pitches, or Cano bunting with two strikes (or with any strikes, for that matter), or Tino/Bernie flailing away at 0-2 waste pitches.
24. Also, is it not time for Berman and his cloying, polyanna world view to peace out? With respect to the impending steroids epidemic, "Hopefully something good can come of this."
No. Nothing good will come of this. Now shush.
25. WTF?
Moose mugged in midwest.
I agree Cliff & Mikeplugh. If Moose & Unit can't go deep & win, then we might as well start making plans for October right now. In fact, I've got a niece's wedding for Oct. 22. And a convention in Indiannapolis for Oct. 13-15.
26. RBJ, at leat you have some decent October plans...I gotta be in Maine for a wedding the last weekend of the season. Think I'ma hear it from Sox fans then if the Yanks are out of the playoffs?