Monthly Archives: April 2012

New town, new team, new day.

Derek Jeter, SS
Nick Swisher, RF
Robinson Cano, 2B
Alex Rodriguez, DH
Mark Teixeira, 1B
Curtis Granderson, CF
Andruw Jones, LF
Rusell Martin, C
Eduardo Nunez, 3B
Ivan Nova, P

Get ’em, boys.

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

Meanwhile, over in Japan…our pal Mr. Ok Tokyo Jazz’s kids get ready to watch the Yankee game on-line.

“They are just starting to understand ‘home run’ means Daddy is happy and that ‘Joe Girardi’ is a curse word in our home,” says Jazz.

I’m proud to host a week of Yankee illustrations by talented Summer Anne Burton. If you are not following her work, be sure to bookmark her site: Every Hall of Famer.

“Large Figurative Sculpture” By William King (date unknown)

Dig this gallery of old New York over at our favorite hang, How To Be a Retronaut.

More basic goodness from David Lebovitz.

If George Steinbrenner were still alive… I just couldn’t resist starting this week’s column with a reference to the late “Boss.” Surely, he would not have been pleased by the Yankees’ season-opening performance in Tampa Bay. Three straight losses to start the season, lowlighted by poor pitching in the first two games and a nonexistent offense in the finale, would have been enough to ignite a Steinbrenner tantrum or two, at least in his prime years.

I won’t offer up any tantrums here. After all, it is only three games, and three games against one of the better teams in the American League. But then again, this series did not exactly produce a highlight reel of great moments in Joe Girardi’s managerial career. We’ve already heard plenty about his panic-stricken decision to intentionally walk the immortal Sean Rodriguez in the very first inning of game one, setting up Carlos Pena’s backbreaking grand slam. So there is no need to add charcoal to that fire.

Just as egregious was Girardi’s decision to start Eduardo Nunez in the second game while giving Derek Jeter a half-day off as the DH. Here we go with the issue of rest, yet again! It is beyond ridiculous that Jeter needed any kind of rest in the second game of the season. The counterargument that Jeter’s legs needed a break from the artificial turf of Tropicana Field doesn’t hold much water either, since most of the Rays’ infield is actually covered with dirt, like a traditional grass infield, and not the harder artificial surface. Whatever the rationale for the Jeter/Nunez move, the Yankees paid the price on Nunez’ first inning error, which led to two unearned runs against a shaky Hiroki Kuroda.

Later in the game, Girardi inexplicably allowed lefty specialist Clay Rapada to face the Rays’ best hitter, Evan Longoria, who responded with a ringing double that was nearly a home run. How could Girardi have allowed this matchup to take place? This is the same Rapada who allowed right-handed batters to hit .692 against him in 16 plate appearances last season!

In the third game, Girardi made another bad lineup decision. For some reason, he decided to play the defensively challenged Raul Ibanez in right field, a position that he has not played since 2005. Ibanez is bad enough in left field, but putting him in the unfamiliar territory of right field, and in a domed ballpark where it is often difficult to pick up the flight of the ball against the roof, is just begging for misadventure. Sure enough, Ibanez delivered with his first error of the season. If Nick Swisher absolutely needed a day off from right field–and to me it’s questionable that he needed a day off so early in the season–then Girardi should have played Andruw Jones in right field and simply foregone the platoon advantage.

Clearly, this was not a good weekend for Girardi, whose obsession with “rest” has become almost comical, and has overridden all other managerial tenets of common sense. I guess there’s little hope that Girardi will change this tendency; we can only hope that he starts to show a better feel for in-game managing, especially with regard to intentional walks and the decision to ever let Rapada face a right-handed batter the quality of Longoria.

Still, I’m not going to panic. Coming out of spring training, the Yankees were the consensus pick of the media to win the American League East. I believe they remain the favorites, even in a stacked division. CC Sabathia and Mariano Rivera will pitch better, Mark Teixeira will start to hit (though he still needs to stop the pull-the-ball tendencies), and the depth of the pitching staff will win out.

But check back with me again if the Yankees lose two out of three to the Orioles…

***

Prior to the tempest in Tampa Bay, the Yankees generated some controversy on the final day of spring training when they made room for newly acquired backup catcher Chris Stewart by demoting Francisco Cervelli to their Scranton/Wilkes Barre, affiliate, also known by its alternate nickname, the Empire State Yankees.

More than a few Yankee fans were outraged by the decision, but you can put me in the opposite camp on this issue. Despite his reputation as a superior defender, Cervelli has actually become a major liability behind the plate. He makes far too many errors, a total of 19 over the last two seasons combined. Even more alarmingly, he has thrown out a scant 14 per cent of opposing base stealers in each of the last two seasons. That’s such a paltry number that it’s reminiscent of the throwing troubles of Johnny Blanchard and Cliff Johnson, two former Yankee backup receivers of decades gone by.

At least Blanchard and “Heathcliff” could hit, and with enough power to make them game-changers in the late innings. Cervelli is a .260 hitter with no power; he has marginal offensive talents, and not nearly enough offensive potential to make up for his poor throwing and erratic decision-making.

In regards to Stewart, he’s reminiscent of Kevin Cash as a hitter, but at least he brings legitimate defensive chops to the position. He’s an excellent catcher with a strong arm, having thrown out nearly 40 per cent of basestealers in 2011. As long as the Yankees don’t ask him to play more than twice a week, he’ll be acceptable–at least until Austin Romine is able to return from his back problems. And perhaps in the interim, Cervelli can change his ways. At one time Cervelli was a good defensive catcher; it might not be too late for him to regain his fielding prowess playing every day at Triple-A…

***

Finally, I’m a little disappointed the Yankees received nothing for Justin Maxwell, other than the waiver price the Astros paid for in claiming him on Sunday. Maxwell’s value should have been at its apex after a great spring in which he impressed everyone with his game- breaking speed, versatile defensive ability, and live bat. I know that he’s 28 and not anyone’s idea of a top prospect, but he has the tools to be a very good fourth outfielder–and that should carry some value. It seems to me that the Yankees should have at least extracted a Grade-C prospect from the Astros or the Orioles, the two teams who expressed the most interest in Mad Max during the spring.

Maxwell couldn’t crack the Yankees’ bench, but he has enough talent to play regularly for the awful Astros. Houston is playing three unproven kids in its baby cradle outfield (J.D. Martinez, Jordan Schafer and Brian Bogusevic). Martinez is regarded as the Astros’ top prospect, but Schafer is a failed prospect out of the Braves’ system and Bogusevic is off to a slow start, so Maxwell figures to receive plenty of opportunity at Minute Maid Park.

Maxwell is a fun player to watch. I’ll be rooting for him to do well for the Astros, who could use all the help they can muster.

Bruce Markusen writes “Cooperstown Confidential” for The Hardball Times.

And I’m totally relaxed.

I liked this bit from Emilie Miller’s piece in the Times about growing up as the daughter of a famous baseball broadcaster:

To spend so much time in a space that fills night after night with tens of thousands of fans who love a team deeply, and to grow up surrounded by people who, at every pay level, love where they work, was beautiful. I still love sitting in the stands before the stadium opens; it feels like a cathedral, filled only with potential and the sound of flags whipping in the wind. Yet baseball is also the reason I will be forever fond of obnoxiously loud pop music and hot dogs.

When we did not go to the ballpark, Holly and I listened to games on the radio to help us sleep. During the off-season, my father would play cassettes of old games, which, he contends, acted like a sedative.

I never taped games but it sounds like a cherce idea. I used to listen to comedy albums as a sedative: Cosby, Carlin–especially “Occupation: Foole” and “Class Clown”–the 2000 Year Old Man albums, the Woody Allen double lp, “A Star is Bought” by Albert Brooks. They calmed me down and were good company.

[Photo Credit: Stable]

Phil Hughes pitched well. Jeremy Helickson pitched better–changed speeds beautifully and had control–to the tune of 3 hits over 8.2 innings. Nice way to celebrate his 25 birthday.

Rays 3, Yanks 0.

The Yankees hit the ball hard again but without any luck–right at fielders. Then bupkis the few times they had runners on base. Bum luck and it’s just one of those things, man. It won’t last.

Raul Ibanez made an error that led to a run, Hughes and Boone Logan gave up solo dingers. And that was that.

So, a lost weekend in Tampa to start the year. Drag.

At least the Knicks won an exciting game against the Bulls at the Garden. Forty-three for Melo, including two huge three pointers, one at the end of regulation, another near the end of overtime.

Yo, where’s the holiday candy at?

Happy Easter.

Yanks will win today, K? No matter what you think of Mr. Big Brain, K?

Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Mark Teixeira 1B
Nick Swisher DH
Raul Ibanez RF
Brett Gardner LF
Chris Stewart C

Phil Hughes gets the start.

Never mind the fretting: Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Photo Credit: Craig Robinson]

This here is how Yankee fans look (and presumably feel) after the first two games…

S’okay, they’s gunna win today.

There are two ways you can manage a game, I suppose. You can manage in a vacuum, simply making moves based on the game in front of you without considering the context of the standings or the number of games left in your season, or you can manage according to the calendar, knowing that games in April or May don’t carry the same importance as those in September or October.

Yankee manager Joe Girardi appears to have chosen the latter method, which is fine, except that he seems to be working from a calendar that says September instead of April. On Friday night he made one of the most curious managerial decisions of all time when he ordered his staff ace to issue an intentional walk in the first inning of a scoreless game (the first game), a move that produced a grand slam off the bat of Carlos Peña.

On Saturday night he confirmed his inability to read the calendar by choosing to give Derek Jeter a half-day off as DH. You know, because he must’ve been so exhausted after playing shortstop for one consecutive game without a single day off. How long did it take for that decision to bite Girardi in the ass? Not long.

Desmond Jennings, the first Tampa Bay hitter in the bottom of the first inning, grounded a ball out to shortstop where Eduardo Núñez was waiting. Núñez booted it, and Jennings reach base safely on the error. It could’ve been a meaningless play in a meaningless game in the first week of April, but it wasn’t. Hiroki Kuroda was on the mound for the Yanks, and he could’ve made the error forgettable by zipping through the next three hitters, but he didn’t. He took about ten minutes to strike out Carlos Peña, but Jennings stole second on strike three, then advanced to third on an Evan Longoria ground ball.

With two outs and a runner on third, Kuroda seemed to feel the moment a bit. He walked Matt Joyce and Ben Zobrist to load the bases, and for the second straight day a Yankee starter found himself facing a game-changing moment with two outs in the first inning. Just as Sabathia had the night before, Kuroda failed here. Scott laced a single up the middle, and the Rays had a 2-0 lead.

The Rays would add a run in the second on an RBI single from Peña, and another in the third courtesy of a large home run from Matt Joyce, and the Yanks were staring down a 4-0 deficit against lefty David Price. A tall order, to be sure, but after they scraped together two runs in the fourth on RBI singles from Andruw Jones and Eduardo Núñez, it looked like they might be able to make a game of it.

They wouldn’t.

By the time the game moved into the ninth inning, the Rays held a comfortable 8-2 lead. Curtis Granderson led off with a triple and came home on a sacrifice fly from pinch-hitter Raúl Ibáñez, but that was only important to those keeping score or playing fantasy baseball. When Russell Martin walked and pinch-hitter Eric Chávez singled, however, there was something close to hope. When Nick Swisher launched a no-doubter into the right field seats to cut the lead to 8-6, there was actual hope. When Robinson Canó followed that with a gritty seven-pitch walk to bring the tying run to the plate in the form of Alex Rodríguez, there was possibility.

Tampa Bay manager Joe Maddon had made one quirky defensive decision after another through the first two games, but finally he found himself in a position where there was only one move he could make. He brought in his closer, Fernando Rodney. As the stadium awoke to the drama and Michael Kay’s voice rose to a fever pitch, the Rodney-ARod confrontation lasted all of five seconds. A-Rod pounded a grounder just to the left of second base, the type of hit that rockets into center field against most American League defenses, but the Li’l Professor had his infield positioned perfectly, and second baseman Sean Rodríguez only had to take a couple steps to his left to field the ball easily and throw to first for the final out. Rays 8, Yankees 6.

Let’s get one thing straight here. It’s not time to panic. I mean, what are we, Red Sox fans? Even if the worst-case scenario plays out and the Yankees lose on Sunday to drop to 0-3, it will only serve to remind us of 1998, and that season worked out fine. Even so, it would be nice to get a win. No pressure, Mr. Hughes. No pressure at all.

[Photo Credit: Al Messerschmidt/Getty Images]

So much for easing into the season. Yesterday, Joe Girardi and Joe Maddon had their thinking caps on, the Yanks left the bases loaded three times and Mariano Rivera blew a save.

Tonight, Hiroki Kuroda makes his Yankee debut against the formidable David Price.

We’ll be here root-root-rooting away.

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Photo Credit: Associated Press]

[Photo Via: Daydreams]

Rumors of Opening Day have fluttered around town for what seems like weeks. I heard there’s an opener in Japan. Are you sure it counts? There’s a premiere in Miami. A game in Queens. They still have a team? Something must have happened, the Red Sox are already in last place.

Our season doesn’t start until the Yankees play. They’re the closer of openers. The Yankees played today, against the Rays in Tampa, and lost in a fashion that is only salvaged by the knowledge that there’s 161 more games to go.

For seven innings, specifically innings two through eight, today’s game had all the ingredients of a breezy, 6-1, opening-day jaunt for the Yanks. But they play nine at this level and their wound-way-too-tight manager botched the first and their savior gacked the ninth.

With two outs and two on in the very first inning of the very first game of the year Joe Girardi called for an intentional walk. None of Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Barry Bonds, or Jesus H Christ deserve an intentional walk in the very first inning of the very first game of the year.

Sean Rodriguez might deserve an intentional walk under some convoluted circumstances that I’m unable to fathom right now, say if the rest of the Rays were all dead and they would forfeit the game for being unable to send up another hitter after the walk. But, as you can probably guess, that wasn’t the case in the very first inning of the very first game of the year. 

Girardi’s colossal stupidity was greeted by Carlos Pena’s grand slam and the Rays had a four run lead in that same first inning of that same first game. Who could have seen that coming? (If haven’t read the game thread, here’s a hint: everybody.)

Alex Rodriguez shrugged off Girardi’s tight-assed, brain-dead move and had himself a nice day. He knocked a double to put some wind back in the Yanks’s sails and was part of two rallies that gave the Yanks the lead by the third inning. Trailing 4-3, Raul Ibanez cracked a two-out three-run job to stake the Yankees a 6-4 lead.

Neither starter was any good. Though Sabathia can thank Girardi for his final line looking so terrible, he still served up two gopher balls. And Shields was a hot mess and deserved a fate far worse than a no decision.

The Yanks handed Mariano a 6-5 lead and I gathered my boys around to watch the final frame. Mariano looked good for three pitches, setting up Desmond Jennings perfectly at 1-2, and then he missed high over the middle on the fourth pitch. It wasn’t the kind of high heat that gets whiffs and pop ups, it was a bail out for a guy down in the count. Jennings guided it right back up the middle for a hit.

What was the worst pitch of the inning, the bail out for Jennings or the next one to Zobrist? Mariano might have been counting on Zobrist taking a pitch, but whatever the reason, he threw a flat cutter and Zobrist tagged it for a triple in the right-center gap. The pitch didn’t have much action and Zobrist jumped on it.

Girardi must have been thrilled however, because he got to order two more intentional walks. During the second walk, my three-year old said, “Look Daddy, the wheels are off.” I was about to say, “No shit Henry,” when I looked down and saw he was holding one of those cars that has interchangeable parts. No wheels.

With five in the infield, Mariano struck out the terrifying Sean Rodriguez. He looked like he might also have a chance to get Carlos Pena. Pena sets up so far from the plate, Martin and Rivera went hard after the outside corner. After three almost identical pitches, maybe Pena was ready for one out there. He got the barrel on the fourth one and sent it back to the wall for the game winning hit. 7-6 Rays.

I missed the post-game press conference, but I’m sure Girardi has some regrets. I bet if he could do it over again, he’d just have Mo intentionally walk Sean Rodriguez with the bases loaded in the ninth to force in the winning run. When in doubt, go for symmetry.

The loss stings, but not so bad as it would in May, June, July, August or September. Not even a shadow of the wounds we’ve accrued in Octobers past. There are 161 games to go and probably about 157 of them will be better than this one.

Photo via vaguehowie

This is the 10th Opening Day we’ve covered here at Bronx Banter. We’re happy to have y’all back to enjoy another season.

Baseball is here.

Let’s Go Yank-ees!

Serious Eats does Passover.

[Photo Credit: Olga Massov]

Photo: Peter Adams Photography

The Yankees open up their 112th season against the division rival Tampa Rays. Although the two teams previously faced off on Opening Day in 2004, those games were played in the Tokyo Dome, so this afternoon’s contests marks the first time the Yankees will begin a season at Tropicana Field. Entering the game, the Yankees are 64-46-1 (.577) on the season’s first day, but when opening up on the road, the team is below .500 and has lost seven of the last 10.

On an individual note, C.C. Sabathia is making his fourth consecutive Opening Day start, the most since Mel Stottlemyre did the same from 1967 to 1970 (the record is six, which was accomplished by Lefty Gomez from 1932 to 1937). With his 16th Opening Day start, Derek Jeter moves past Bill Dickey for sole possession of second place on the Yankees’ all-time list. If the Captain starts the opener in each of the final two years left on his current deal, he’d tie Mickey Mantle for the franchise lead. However, Jeter’s run of starts is not consecutive because a strained thigh muscle kept him out of the 2001 opening game.

Listed below is an assortment of team and player Opening Day facts and figures to keep you busy until the start of this afternoon’s game.

Yankees Opening Day Record, 1901-2011

Source: Baseball-reference.com

Yankees Opening Day Starters, 1918-2011

Source: Baseball-reference.com

Select Individual Player Opening Day Records, 1918-2011

Note: ERA based on a minimum 10 innings pitched.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

Yankees Top Offensive Performers on Opening Day, 1918-2011

Note: Ranked by OPS; minimum 20 plate appearances.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

Yankees Top Pitching Performances on Opening Day, 1918-2011

Note: Ranked by Game Score.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

If I could rhyme I’d freestyle over this here Lord Sear groove: