I think you have to give Twins’ starter Brian Duensing some credit – he didn’t do too badly for a rookie tossed into the lion’s den. I mean, yes, he did get eaten by the lions, but he put up a respectable fight, as did the presumably exhausted Twins. The postseason, as we all know, doesn’t often go exactly according to plan, but events last night unfolded more or less the way the Yankees drew them up, and they eased into a 7-2 win.

Things started off a little disconcertingly, as Denard Span opened the first inning with a double off CC Sabathia (you can’t keep a good Span down). Sabathia got out of that inning, striking out Joe Mauer in the process – despite a passed ball – but couldn’t wiggle out of a jam in the third without some damage. There was a single, a double play, a single, a double, another single, and then another miscommunication with Jorge Posada, before Sabathia struck out Jason Kubel for the third out, leaving the Twins up 2-0. (After the game Posada said the first incident was his mistake, and the second was Sabathia’s, but that doesn’t explain Jorge’s rather casual approach to tracking down the second passed ball, which resulted in Joe Mauer scoring the Twins’ second run).

So things were a mite tense when, in the bottom of the third, Derek Jeter came to the plate, and dispersed the gathering unease with a two-run homer to tie the game. It was not a very Jeterish hit – how often does he blast one to left field? – but on the other hand, given the timing and circumstances, it was a very Jeterish hit. One inning later, Nick Swisher doubled in Robinson Cano, and the Yankees took the lead for good; they added to it in the fifth with Alex Rodriguez’s two-out RBI single (yep), followed by a big two-run Hideki Matsui blast. Just for good measure, A-Rod added a second two-out RBI single in the seventh, and let’s all hope this marks the beginning of the end of that particular subplot.

Sabathia left after six and two thirds innings with eight strikeouts and nary a walk, and though he did have two runners on base when he left, Phil Hughes took care of that by striking out our old pal Orlando Cabrera after a long, tough at-bat that somehow felt very personal. Funny how that happens once in a while, in a big spot in a big game, if an at-bat goes long enough. (Paul O’Neill used to be the master of that kind of plate appearance, but then, Paul O’Neill took everything personally).

Anyway, with the luxury of a five-run lead and an off-day tomorrow, Girardi rotated through he best relievers, getting everyone a little work. Hughes, Phil Coke, and prodigal reliever Joba Chamberlain each took care of one out in the eighth, and Mariano Rivera pitched the ninth. He allowed two baserunners, but the tension was out of the game by that point, and eventually nature took its course.

I imagine both teams will sleep very well tonight, though for different reasons.

Finally, Jay-Z was in the house tonight, sitting next to Kate Hudson. I thought it was fitting since, if the Yanks go anywhere this postseason, “Empire State of Mind” is already shaping up to be the anthem – it’s Jeter’s at-bat song, a current hit, and a popular pick for Yankee montages. It’s far from Jay-Z’s best, but I kinda like it despite myself.

I’m a sucker for songs about New York, always have been. If was picking one for this series, though, I’d probably go with this one.

Finally, I need your help with a very important issue: the Chip Caray/TBS Drinking Game. Thoughts, suggestions? Let get this thing hammered out by Friday.

With one 4-2 win this afternoon, the Yankees clinched their division, wrapped up home field advantage, swept the Red Sox at home, and did their part for the struggling champagne industry. Good thing it stopped raining.

Andy Pettitte was on on the mound today and had one of those now-familiar starts wherein he doesn’t seem to have particularly good stuff or control, but still pitches resourcefully enough to keep things in hand. With the Sox putting together a double, two walks and a single in the first (including a comebacker off Pettitte’s leg), and loading the bases with no one out in the third, it’s impressive that Boston only scored one run in each of those innings. Pettitte righted himself and bore down after that, throwing very well in his last few innings, and leaving after six innings with the Yankees trailing the Sox 2-1.

Meanwhile, I don’t know how Paul Byrd does it – repeatedly over the last few years he’s completely baffled the Yankees’ hitters, despite the undeniable fact that he’s Paul Byrd. On a typical day Paul Byrd couldn’t baffle my labrador retriever. But he did it again this afternoon, shutting out the Yanks for five and two thirds, except for one Melky Cabrera laser shot into the right field stands. But in the sixth, Teixeira and A-Rod managed two-out singles off him, and when Terry Francona brought in Takashi Saito, the Yankees broke through: Hideki Matsui knocked in both runners with a little dunker into right field to make it 3-2. Later in the game, Teixeira’s homer provided a little bit more insurance.

In other encouraging news, Brian Bruney looked great today, locking down five outs in the seventh and eighth. This really hasn’t been Bruney’s year, and I can’t say I have much confidence when he trots out to the mound, to put it diplomatically – but when he’s right, Bruney can be very very good, and if he somehow does get things figured out in time for the playoffs, well, that’d be a hell of a bullpen.

Mariano pitched the ninth, and things did not go entirely smoothly, but eventually he fielded a little grounder to the mound and threw to Teixeira for the much-anticipated last out. Everyone started high-fiving, and hugging — and I can report that in addition to his other good qualities Andy Pettitte seems to be a really excellent hugger, warm and confident and full-bodied, not one of those stiff back-patter types — and breaking out the Division Champion hats and shirts, and then spraying booze all over each other.

I’m always a sucker for a champagne celebration, and this one was fun to watch, but not quite all-out – because the Yankees want to keep the focus on their playoff goals, and maybe also because winning the division has been nearly a foregone conclusion for weeks now. I think every single player interviewed followed the script: this is great, BUT… we’ve got a great team, BUT… well, we’re really happy we met the first of our goals.

And that makes sense – for the Yankees, it’s not really an honor just to be nominated. Everyone expects more from them, so why go nuts? But personally, particularly after last year reminded me just how much it sucks when neither the Yankees or Mets get to the postseason, I’m happy just to have October baseball in New York – yes, even if that only means watching the Yankees get swept by the Tigers in the ALDS. I was entertained all the way through the season this year, and maybe that’s not all I ask, but it’s all I need.

Sometimes you can tell right away that you’re going to like a movie. I had that experience Friday night when I saw Fat City at the Film Forum with Alex (who posted his thoughts here and a few more here). It starts with an atmospheric Kris Kristofferson song – “Help Me Make It Through the Night,” which I downloaded about 30 seconds after getting home – and on-location establishing shots of dingy Stockton, California, then finds its central figure, played by a rough around the edges Stacy Keach, waking up in a bare flophouse room in his underwear. There follows a long, entirely visual sequence in which he grabs a cigarette, checks for matches, searches for them in his pants pocket, coat pocket, and on the end table, gets dressed and goes outside, looks around blinking in the sunlight for a few seconds, throws his unsmoked cigarette down and goes back to his room. I’m not sure if that scene would play as funny on every viewing, but that night in that particular theater it did, and by the end of the sequence I was sold.

I went in with pretty high hopes, too, because the movie was directed by John Huston, but as it turns out a lot of the Huston movies I’d seen and loved don’t have much in common with Fat City – the stylized awesomeness of Maltese Falcon or the fun camp of Key Largo or even Treasure of the Sierra Madre, although the underlying worldview of that last one is probably not all that different. Fat City is in the gritty*, naturalistic vein of a lot of 70s cinema, with a loose plot but a very specific setting and characters. Stacy Keach plays Billy Tully, a 29-year-old itinerant semi-ex-boxer on his way from low to lower, and a ridiculously young Jeff Bridges is Ernie Munger, just starting out in the ring and headed nowhere that great.

While hardly a cheery flick, it was not so slit-your-wrists grim as I’d been expecting from a movie that’s usually summed up as “70s boxing flick about losers and drunks,” and lot of that is thanks to Nicholas Colasanto (aka Raging Bull’s Tommy “He ain’t pretty no more” Como) as the boxers’ small-time manager, and Art Aragon as his assistant and foil. It’s all in the delivery with those two, and they’re pitch-perfect, often very funny and 100% believable – Aragon was a professional boxer in the ’40s and ’50s, and I was actually surprised to learn that Colasanto never was.

Fat City is not a movie with a particularly high opinion of women, but then, as Alex pointed out afterwards, it’s not a movie with a particularly high opinion of anyone. Susan Tyrrell was nominated for an Oscar for her performance as Tully’s dumb, shrill, alcoholic pseudo-love interest, and although she’s completely convincing in the role the character is so irritating as to be almost unwatchable. On the other hand it’s hard to argue that Tully, who finds a way to make bad luck worse four times out of five, really deserves much more.

What I liked most about Fat City was its subtlety – so few movies trust their audience to that extent. I kept waiting for something melodramatic to happen: Tully hits the woman, or her ex gets out of jail and tries to kill him, or a boxer is killed in the ring, or the characters scream at each other about their feelings… well, non-spoiler alert, nothing like that happens. There’s plenty going on in a given scene, but Huston never feels obligated to spell it out for anyone.

Finally, I realized in writing this that I actually have no idea why it’s called Fat City. But put in on your Netflix queue, and then when you watch it, lemme know what you think… or better yet see it at the Film Forum where it’s playing through October 1st. This is one of those movies that might get lost on TV and benefits from a big screen, dark room and into-it crowd.

—

*Ugh, not only was that word already overused when talking about movies, but now I can’t hear it without thinking of David Eckstein. New Year’s resolution: I will stop using the word “gritty.” Right after this post.

It’s hard to write about Joba Chamberlain these days without sounding like a disappointed parent – “oh honey, you have so much potential, if you could just apply yourself…!” Today’s start was not pretty, not progress, and not encouraging – 3 innings, 6 hits, 7 earned runs, 3 walks, yipes –  and when the dust settled the Yankees lost 7-1. Chamberlain wasn’t really any better than that line would suggest, and yet, per Peter Abraham and his post-game audio, he remains remarkably tone-deaf when talking to the media. “My delivery was great,” he says. Oh was it now?

Sergio Mitre relieved Joba and threw five innings of scoreless one-hit ball, with five Ks and just one walk, so I guess his delivery must have been super-ultra-great. Meanwhile, the Yankee hitters couldn’t get anything going against an impressive Ian Snell or a potpourri of Seattle relievers, save for a brief flash of life in the sixth which was quickly snuffed out.

I was going to write something along the lines of, “I can’t believe the Yankees have a five-game division lead on September 20th, with a virtual lock on a playoff spot, and some fans are panicking!” But, come on – of course I can believe it. That said, for those of you so inclined, now would probably be a good time to start making voodoo sacrifices to ensure Andy Pettitte’s quick and full recovery.

Due to a relatively small number of tough big losses and the vagaries of human perception, the Angels have become a larger-than-life antagonist in my mind – I always expect the worst when they play the Yankees, and I have a fatalistic, forget-it-Jake-it’s-Anaheim view of facing them in the postseason, home field advantage or no. It’s not really justified, but when Howie freaking Kendrick is hitting .465 against New York you can hardly blame me.

Things didn’t go too badly for the Yankees tonight, though, and while it was touch and go at times they won 5-3. First of all, and most importantly, Joba Chamberlain was looking better tonight – not great, but much improved. He gave up one run on a solo shot by Vlad Guerrero, but that’s just going to happen sometimes; he left with four innings pitched, 67 pitches of which 41 were strikes, 2 Ks and mercifully no walks.

It was a nail-biter all the way through: the Yankees tied it at one in the third on Nick Swisher’s home run (looks like those lopsided home/away power splits are correcting themselves); the Angels regained a one-run lead with a double, bunt and ground out against Alfredo Aceves in the fifth; in the bottom of that inning, the Yankees went ahead 3-2 when Mark Teixeira tripled home Swisher and Johnny Damon. In the eighth, though, the Angels loaded the bases against Phil Hughes with nobody out, and while he wiggled out of it with only one run scoring, the game was tied at three. (Hughes later was awarded the win because, again, wins are stupid).

New York forced a little luck in the bottom of the eighth: Mark Teixeira doubled and Girardi put Brett Gardner in to pinch run for him, an unusually aggressive move for this year’s Yanks. I’m not really sure how I feel about this – I do not like watching Teixeira walk off the field early – but it paid off when Gardner stole third, and Angels catcher Mike Napoli’s throw got away from Chone Figgins, trickling into the outfield and giving the Yanks the go-ahead run. Then Alex Rodriguez, who had walked and stole third when Gardner came home, scored on Robinson Cano’s single – and for all the talk of Cano’s lousy numbers with runners in scoring position, he’s come through a number of times in the last few weeks. Anyway, after that Mariano Rivera came in and successfully navigated the ninth inning for his 40th save of the season. It was a heavily managed game on both sides, and therefore a little playoff-ish, although for my part if I never see the Angels in October again it will be too soon.

Finally, I was going to go into a whole rant about Derek Jeter’s bunting, in situations where he is much too good a hitter to be bunting – he’s been on a real tear recently and he did it again tonight. But I feel like on this blog, there’s really no need. I imagine most Banter readers have already expressed similar feelings directly to their televisions and with more pungent language than I like to use here.

Tomorrow: the Blue Jays come to town, and ace Roy Hallady takes on… ah yes… Sergio Mitre. I see.

I generally try not to make assumptions about a team’s mental state, because who knows what players are actually thinking during any given game? But I couldn’t help wondering this weekend, with a playoff spot all but sewn up and the Jeter hype finally over, if the Yankees hadn’t lost focus a bit. It would certainly be understandable.

The fourth inning of today’s game, when Johnny Damon forgot how many outs there were and nearly threw a live ball into the stands, allowing a run to score, did nothing to undermine this theory. But after that little wake-up call – and after Alex Rodriguez and Joe Girardi were both ejected for arguing balls and strikes – the Yankees got their act together, and they went on to win 13-3.  Correlation is not causation but hey, the human mind loves to impose a narrative.

CC Sabathia started off a little shaky this afternoon, and he couldn’t hold the 1-0 lead provided by Alex Rodriguez’s first inning double. But after allowing three runs in the first four innings, he settled in and kept the O’s off the board through seven. In the bottom of the fourth, Melky Cabrera’s two-run single (he whacked a slider into center with a neat little piece of 0-2 hitting) tied the game at three. The promising inning ended when Alex Rodriguez struck out looking on a pitch that, while close, was pretty clearly a bit outside on the replay. And once A-Rod got the chance to duck into the video room and confirm his suspicions, just before the bottom of the fifth, he started hectoring home plate ump Marty Foster about it from the dugout. So Foster tossed him. And then Joe Girardi hulked out.

At first I thought Girardi was just trying to get tossed to “fire up” the team, which we’ve seen him do before; sometimes it seems like he’s just going through the argumentative motions, waiting to get run. But today he looked genuinely furious – he was yelling just inches from Foster’s face, and I think it’s pretty hard to fake that scary bulging-vein thing. He was thrown out, of course, so Tony Pena and Eric Hinske took over in the dugout and at third, respectively.

The Yankees loaded the bases in the bottom of the sixth, took the lead when Jeter and Damon scored on a Hideki Matsui single, and that was it for O’s starter Jeremy Guthrie. Ex-Yank Sean Henn – who per Tyler Kepner’s nice Bats post, has no idea how he even ended up on the Orioles – got Baltimore out of the inning, but subsequent relievers did not fare as well. After Phil Hughes did his thing in the eighth, the Yankee offense unloaded: Damon walked, Teixeira singled, Matsui homered – nice day for him – and things went on in that vein until New York led 13-3. This was not enough of a lead for Brian Bruney to refrain from walking two batters in the ninth, but it was enough for that not to matter.

After the game both Joe Girardi and Alex Rodriguez explained their outbursts by talking about how important this game was, which… it wasn’t, really. But there are still two weeks of baseball left to be played, and a 2007-Mets-style death spiral is not yet technically impossible, so I guess you would have to keep telling yourself that.

I’m a bit out of the loop, since I just got back from a week in England – I apologize in advance. No cell phone or laptop, away from the internet, I completely missed all the baseball news… well, okay, I borrowed my friend’s computer a time or two during the Red Sox series, but just for a minute. So I’m still catching up on everything that happened while I was gone (did someone mention a timely bunt Tuesday night?). Ask me anything about England’s recent cricket victory over Australia, though!

The Yankees, as is their wont these days, bounced back from last night’s loss with a 9-2 win over the Texas Rangers. New York scored three in the second, then blew the game open with five more in the seventh, and every starter had at least one hit except Melky Cabrera (even he had a lovely bunt). The Yanks also got some reassuringly solid pitching after their recent rough-ish patch; Andy Pettitte went seven innings and allowed just two earned runs, with seven strikeouts and three walks.

Rangers starter Derek Holland actually pitched pretty well for someone who was charged with six earned runs, but he paid for just about all of his mistakes. The Yanks’ big blows were Jorge Posada’s three-run homer in the second, Jerry Hairston Jr.’s solo shot in the fourth, and the seventh-inning onslaught that began with a poor defensive play and a Robinson Cano double, and ended some time later with a Mark Teixeira single off of Jason Jennings. Brian Bruney’s eighth inning outing was good enough under the circumstances, and Phil Coke tied the bow around the night.

I found myself thinking today, reading about Oliver Perez’s season-ending trip to the DL, that I need to start writing more about the Mets, because their season has been so fascinating (in a horrific way, but still), while the Yankees right now are extremely pleasant to watch but just don’t give you a ton of juicy material. Don’t worry – as soon as the thought flickered across my brain I spat three times and knocked on all the wood in my apartment.

—

Side Note: I had always previously assumed that cricket was at least somewhat related to baseball – since, after all, it involves a pitcher and a batter and fielders – and that I would therefore be able to follow it a little bit, even just vaguely. This turns out not to be the case at all. For example, this is what the scoreboard looked like at last Thursday’s club game at Lords:

The six in “308 for 6” refers to six wickets, in case you were wondering – I sure was. It took three or four different British friends and acquaintances explaining the rules to me before I began to get the idea, and I’m still fuzzy on a number of details. Also, the big England vs Australia game was a “test match”, which usually last five days, although this one only went four; can you imagine watching five straight days, nearly eight hours per day, of one Red Sox-Yankees game? Some of my favorite Banter commenters would have to be hospitalized.

Hey there hi there ho there . . . I’m baaaaaack!

Today’s news is powered by the one and only Roy Orbison:

• Mr. October buys some portions of the old Stadium:

Jackson has purchased the letters that spelled “YANKEE STADIUM” on the upper ring of the old ballpark and the concrete from the blacked out part of center field, where his third Game 6 World Series homer in 1977 landed.

“I might build a Stadium at home [Carmel], light it up and make it with 100-foot fences so that when I am 75 I can hit a home run at Yankee Stadium,” Jackson said.

(more…)

Aside from the obvious reasons, long rain delays bug me because they put too much pressure on the game when it finally comes. If it’s an ugly one it’s hard to not think, “I waited around that whole time for this?” For a few innings it looked like tonight was going to be One of Those Games, but instead it turned into a more or less textbook win: seven innings from CC Sabathia, a few big hits from Mark Teixeira and Jorge Posada, and a save(!) from Phil Hughes led to a 6-3 Yankees win.

Sabathia wasn’t looking sharp in the first few innings — after hours of Nintendo during the rain delay — and Oakland A’s starter Vin Mazzaro was, leading to a 3-zip Oakland lead. But Sabathia recovered after relatively little carnage, and once the Yankee hitters had gotten a decent look at Mazzaro, they started to do some damage.

In the fourth, Mark Teixeira took a rare swing on a 3-0 count and hit a no-nonsense home run into the second deck. A few batters later Posada doubled home Alex Rodriguez, who’s looking downright spry on the basepaths these days, and then scored himself on an Eric Hinske single. The next inning was a variation on the theme, as Teixeira got himself a double and another RBI, and Johnny Damon scored on a Posada single to make it 6-3.

Craig Breslow relieved Mazzaro and, with apologies to my fellow Yankee fans, I was very psyched to see him pitch 1.2 scoreless innings (he was a year ahead of me at college). I didn’t have to feel conflicted about rooting for him, either, as the Yankees already had all the runs they’d need: Sabathia had found his rhythm by then, and he turned the lead straight over to Phil Hughes, who continues to pitch first and ask questions later.

A couple of stray thoughts:

-Could Mark Teixeira’s transition to New York have gone any smoother? He did have an awful first month, but he got going before people really lost patience; even in New York there’s a bit of a grace period. Ever since then he’s been somewhere between solid and excellent, and wowed the Giambi-battered crowd with his defense. And there hasn’t been so much as a whiff of a mini-controversy, not even something small and silly that, taken out of context, makes for a good misleading headline. I complain about the guy being a dull interview, and he usually is – by design, I’m sure, like Jeter – but he’s really handled everything remarkably well. It already feels like he’s been here forever.

-Finally, I kind of love that Nomar Garciaparra got booed. Sure, it’s silly – he hasn’t played for the Sox in five years, and has been too injury-riddled for most of that time to make a big impact anyway. But this wasn’t vicious, angry booing, it was more ritualistic. Of course you boo Nomar Garciaparra. It’s tradition! Heck, his feelings would probably be hurt if no one bothered.

Maybe I should be wondering where the usually stellar Yankee offense has been the last few days, but I think instead I’ll just enjoy the relief that comes whenever the new Stadium hosts tight, low-scoring games. The Yankees beat the Orioles 2-1 tonight, thanks to an old-school performance from Andy Pettitte and some pretty defense and, okay, yes, two home runs to right.

It feels like it’s been a long time since I’ve been able to write that Andy Pettitte pitched really well – not “didn’t have his best stuff but kept them in the game” or “made a few big mistakes but was able to limit the damage,” but was just plain good. He was tonight, though, pitching into the eighth inning with six strikeouts and two walks; he allowed six hits but also induced two double plays. Run-wise he allowed a first-inning home run to Nick Markakis and that was all.

Meanwhile Orioles rookie David Hernandez, after a tiring and rocky beginning, soon got into a groove of his own. The Yankees scored in the second on an Eric “All or Nothing” Hinske solo shot that tied the game (Hinske’s fourth of the season for New York, out of five total hits), but he was the last Yank to cross home plate for quite a while.

So it was a good thing that the Yankees helped themselves on defense tonight, making a few really excellent/lucky plays. Robinson Cano apparently deked out poor Cesar Izturis not once but twice, and also saved the day when a grounder bounced off the heel of Mark Teixeira’s glove, snatching it out of midair and tossing to Pettitte just ahead of the runner (“the old 3-4-1…”).

The most impressive fielding came in the eighth, though, after Pettitte left the game in Phil Coke’s hands with two runners on and one out. First Nick Markakis hit a shrill liner to Teixeira, who fired it back to Molina, who managed to tag out the runner at the plate – a lightning-fast play all around. I wasn’t expecting it and I doubt the runner, poor Cesar Izturis, was either (it was just not his game). Then Brian Roberts tried to score on a wild pitch, but Molina, moving faster than a Molina is built to move, got the ball back to Phil Coke in time for him to awkwardly lunge and tag out Brian Roberts, who missed the plate – saving the run and ending the inning.

With one out in the bottom of the ninth, Hideki Matsui, who has been largely overshadowed this season, apparently decided he wanted a little more attention and whacked a 2-2 Jim Johnson fastball into the right field bleachers. This was no New Stadium cheapie either, but a big no-doubt blast. Cue the helmet-tossing and the jumping around and the grinning and the whipped-cream pie.

The Red Sox lost tonight, and so the Yankees are now clutching their very own piece of first place. Tomorrow Sergio Mitre will try to defend it… and I was going to make a couple cracks about that because, well, you know. But Cliff seems to think that he might not actually be so bad, and Cliff is usually right, so I’ll hold off on the Mitre-mocking.

—

When Worlds Collide: the most recent headline on my FiveThirtyEight.com RSS feed reads: “Teixeira Says Culture Wars Ending, GOP Needs New Playbook.” I don’t know what initially confused me more, the idea that Mark Teixeiria of all people would suddenly start talking political strategy, or that FiveThirtyEight would quote him as an authority. Of course it turns out the post is actually referring to a demographics expert named Ruy Teixeira, but that was sure a baffling ten seconds.

It was a tight game tonight, and A.J. Burnett was a bit nervous-making. Wild pitches left and right (and then left again), seven hits in 6.1 innings, four walks and just two strikeouts. But Burnett was stubborn, too, and he controlled the damage: the Yankees won, 4-2. At a few points he was stalking around the mound and muttering to himself; “I got upset a couple times, but just tried to stay within myself and make the next pitch,” he said after the game. Ah, that’s a golden oldie, stay within himself. Joe Torre used that one all the time, and while I don’t think it actually means anything (staying within yourself is just what you do while you’re taking it one day at a time and giving 110 or even 120%), it invokes fond memories.

In the postgame scrum, a reporter asked Burnett how he settled himself during games. “Anything that can calm me down,” he said. “I’m joking out there with myself, I mean if y’all could read my mind out there y’all would crack up.” Am I the only one imagining Nuke LaLoosh’s inner monologue from Bull Durham right now? Anyway, as I’ve seen a number of Yankees fans say this season, Burnett’s been a lot more likable than I expected. He always used to annoy me. Partly it was his squinty, short-tempered demeanor on the mound – like with my old favorite Paul O’Neill and his temper tantrums, that stuff’s a lot less charming when the player in question isn’t on your team. Plus there were some very questionable hair choices over the years. But hey, so far this season, he’s been downright endearing.

Anyway, Burnett’s outing (dare I call it “gritty”?) and another pretty solid night for the Yankee bullpen – including a 1.1-inning save courtesy of Mo – were enough, barely, to back up the Yankees’ four runs. Anthony Swarzak started for Minnesota tonight, and the Yankees got to him early, scoring three runs in the second on a RBI groundout from Nick Swisher and a two-run Brett Gardner single. Swarzak, who sounds like a creature from Land of the Lost, made a good recovery but his pitch count puffed up fast. He was out of the game in the fifth, though  not before giving up what turned out to be the game-winning run – which came when Alex Rodriguez knocked in Derek Jeter. (Ain’t that the way it’s supposed to be?).

I’ve always liked the Twins, and now that they have a player named Span, of course I have to pull for them even more. My guy Denard has a very fine .377 OBP, though admittedly he is not exactly slugging up a storm. And I think it will take a few more series before I stop doing a double-take every time Ken Singleton says “Span is smelling like a rose” (thanks Kenny!) or David Cone remarks that “Span’s just caught flat-footed”.

The Yanks have won 12 of their last 14. Excelsior.

Man, I wish I’d been there in person for this one.

“I just wanna do my job and let someone else talk about myself,” said Mariano Rivera after his 500th career save and first-ever RBI. Happy to oblige.

The Yankees won 4-2 tonight, and though they probably should have scored more – given that the Mets handed them nine walks and an error in the last four innings alone – it ended on a high note, so I won’t be complaining, or even bothering to question the questionable moves from Joe Girardi tonight (I’m sure a few  commenters will be happy to pick up my slack).

The Mets were patching things together pretty well for a while there, considering three of their four best hitters are out of the picture, and that the roles of John Maine and Ollie Perez are being played by Tim Redding and tonight’s starter, Livan Hernandez, the oldest 34-year-old in the game. Hernandez was not half bad tonight, in fact, and I enjoy watching his smoke and mirrors, but it wasn’t enough – at the moment the Mets’ lineup is too depleted, and their defense too sloppy. Meanwhile the Yankees seem to be getting their act together, though only time will tell. The end result was a three-game sweep, and to add insult to injury, tonight’s insurance run came courtesy of the fearsome plate discipline of Mariano Rivera, in his third career at-bad.

The Yankees scored three in the first inning, thanks in large part to yet more defensive blundering from the Mets. Derek Jeter doubled, and Nick Swisher hit into a fielder’s choice, but the fielder chose poorly. Mark Teixeira doubled, and eventually Jorge Posada got him home with a sacrifice fly. That was all the Yankees could muster, dispite numerous opportunities, until Mo’s appearance in the ninth.

Chien-Ming Wang, abetted by some nifty fielding, gave up two runs in the second but kept his cool and held on into the sixth. Phils Coke and Hughes were excellent again in relief, but Brian Bruney was not, prompting Rivera to make another 8th inning appearance. You know, every year since 2006 or so, Torre and Girardi have claimed they aren’t going to do that, and they always do anyway – not that I blame them for changing their minds. How could you resist? If I were a manager (god forbid) and I had Mariano Rivera at my disposal, I imagine my hand would start twitching towards the bullpen phone sometime around the third inning most nights.

In the top of the ninth, the Yankees tried to use Francisco Cervelli as a pinch-hitting decoy, but it was clear that Rivera was never coming out of a 3-2 game in the ninth inning. Mo limbered up and rolled his shoulders as he walked to the plate with – of course – the bases loaded, facing Francisco Rodriguez with two outs. If you have to have a pitcher up in that spot, I guess at least you want to have a guy who doesn’t rattle.

I think Mariano Rivera’s at-bats may be the most thoroughly entertained I have ever seen a Yankee dugout. Anyway, thecoaches presumably told Mo not to swing again, but he had no intention of following that advice this time, either. He took one very healthy hack on a 2-2 count and fouled the pitch back – but other than that he laid off, working the count full and then, remarkably, walking.

Be nice to your Mets fan friends tomorrow, gang. They’ve been through enough already.

Rivera closed out the game afterwards with a minimum of fuss for his 500th save, and while I think most everyone reading the Banter would agree that the save is a deeply flawed statistic, this is really just another opportunity to reflect on how freakishly awesome Mariano has been, is now, and hopefully will continue to be – for at least a  while longer. You can’t really overhype Mo, and that’s saying something.

Hey, the Yankees stopped sucking for a few innings! It was probably because I wasn’t watching. I caught up thanks to the miracle of Tivo, though, and much to my pleasant surprise, saw the Yankees beat the Braves 8-4, behind a solid Joba Chamberlain start and some timely (well, a week or two late, but you know what I mean) second-half hitting.

Despite some hard-hit balls, the Yankees had settled into their comfortable routine of doing nothing against National League pitching – in fact, two Braves pitchers were teaming up for a perfect game through five. Then suddenly, in the sixth inning, the Yanks got some of those run thingies we’ve been hearing so much about. The first one came when… wait, this can’t be right. Francisco Cervelli hit a home run?

Cervelli’s solo shot, his first in the bigs, tied the game at 1-1. Rookies usually try to act all cool and nonchalant in this scenario, but Cervelli was obviously pumped. His homer came immediately after Brett Gardner got picked off first base on a truly lousy call, and Joe Girardi got thrown out for arguing. I don’t necessarily buy that this move “fired up the team,” but hey, can’t hurt to try, right?  Jeter and Damon followed with singles, Teixeira was sorta-intentionally walked, and A-Rod struck… whoops, sorry, force of habit. A-Rod hit a two-run single: 3-1 Yanks.

The game stayed close for a few innings, but New York clung to the lead. After Joba lost it a bit in the 7th, Phil Coke, a shaky Brian Bruney, and one Mariano Rivera kept things under control (with Mo striking out all four batters he faced, and lining out to center field, awesomely, amid much fanfare). And the Yankee hitters pursued an exciting new strategy which involved tacking on additional runs in order to give their team a cushion. Yeah, it’s different, but I think they may be on to something.

“Everybody is happy,” said Cervelli after the game, “everybody wants to play baseball. So things happen.”

As a side note, one of my favorite things about interleague play (though not so much this year, thus far) is watching the facial expressions of NL batters who haven’t previously faced Mariano Rivera. Ah. Believe the hype, fellas, even now.

Despite the sarcastic tone of this post, I should say that I don’t think the Yankees are in such a dire position just yet. After all they’re still tied for the Wild Card, it’s still only June, they’re due for a few wins against the Red Sox, and we’ve already seen this year that they’re capable of going on a big run.

They probably shouldn’t wait any longer to do it, though.

If there was any fairness in the world, the Yankees would have to throw that win back. Or perhaps baseball should institute a rule whereby, when it’s called for, the umpires could just declare the game a loss for both teams. Pending such an innovation, though, tonight’s score will have to stand: Yankees 8, Mets 7, on a walk-off error.

Yep, that was one fugly baseball game. At the beginning of the night, back when we were young, Joba Chamberlain took the mound for the Yanks. He looked pretty decent the first couple of innings… and then imploded, at least as much as you can implode without giving up more than two runs. His control fled like a teenager in a slasher flick and he walked two batters, hit one, walked another, hit another, and threw more than 40 pitches just in the third. At the end of his abbreviated night he’d tossed 100 pitches in just four innings, while allowing five walks. Yeesh.

If I try to give you a detailed blow-by-blow on all the offense, I’ll be here all night, so here’s the Cliffs Notes: the Yankees went up 1-0, then the Mets took a 2-1 lead, then the Yankees came back and made it 3-2, then Brett Tomko came in — yes, that Livan Hernandez-Brett Tomko marquee matchup New Yorkers have been waiting for! — and the Mets torched him for four earned runs, including a patented Gary Sheffield blast. The Yankees clawed their way back when Jeter hit a New Stadium Special solo shot to right, and Matsui followed the next inning with a big three-run homer to make it 7-6. The Mets came right back in the seventh: 7-7, tie game.

With two outs in the eighth, Girardi brought in Mariano Rivera. Obvious  question: why couldn’t he have done this last night, when I was driving my mom up the NJ Turnpike and cursing extensively at the radio while trying to explain to her about high-leverage situations? Of course, tonight Girardi followed my advice and it didn’t work at all. Ah well. Beltran walked, Wright doubled, and the Mets took a one-run lead, again, some more.

However hapless the Yanks were tonight, though, in the end, the Mets were… uh, haplesser. In the bottom of the ninth Derek Jeter singled off of K-Rod, a nice piece of hitting, and stole second; Teixeira was intentionally walked once the count went to 3-0. The Yankees were down to their final out, though, and naturally it all came down to A-Rod – and he hit a soft little routine pop-up behind second. Game over, you had to assume, as Luis Castillo settled under it… but then Castillo… dropped it. Just like that, for no visible reason. It bounced and fell out of his glove. Huh.

It was exactly what you always hope will happen on the last out of a loss but of course it never, ever does.  Teixeira and Jeter were running hard from the start, and so they both scored, and voila: walk-off E-4.  The Yankees didn’t win this one so much as the Mets lost it, but hey, it all comes out the same in the standings.

Be sure to catch the SNY pregame show tomorrow, when Louis Castillo will be torn apart by an angry mob… that is, if the team hasn’t already sacrificed him on an altar to appease the baseball gods. (I hear the new Stadium has an amazingly luxe visitors’ altar).

Man, it’s gorgeous out there today. I’ve gotta say, once it gets hot and sunny out, I can’t summon any real sense of urgency for day games. Not that I enjoy watching any less… but I get pretty laid-back about it.

Today’s game was appropriate, then, as the Yankees beat the Rays 4-3 with one of the least exciting three-run eighth inning comebacks you’ll ever see. It was still a nice win (and the Yanks’ 20th come-from-behinder of the season), it’s just that a few walks, an error, and a couple of dinky shoulda-been DP balls is hardly the stuff of legend. For an inning there it was like playing the old Devil Rays of a few years ago. Still, whatever works, and the Yanks, for now, have regained their .5-game division lead.

For the first five innings, the game was mostly a Matt Garza-Joba Chamberlain pitching duel. They both allowed a single run in the third – Joba on a B.J. Upton RBI double, Garza on a Nick Swisher homer – but that was it. Then in the sixth Joba, who’d been cruising along pretty efficiently, lost his fastball control and got himself into a mess. With the bases loaded, Gabe Gross hit a single up the middle and the Rays took a 3-1 lead. Chamberlain recovered to K Dioner Navarro, though, and that combined with Alfredo Aceves’s impressive six outs meant New York’s deficit never got too daunting.

The Yankees launched their passive-resistance-style comeback in the eighth. Damon and Teixeira singled, A-Rod walked, and then Cano walked – and if I were a manager and my reliever managed to walk Robinson Cano with the bases loaded, I’d be out of the dugout so fast the cameras would only pick up a Superman-like blur. Anyway, then Posada reached, and the game was tied, thanks to a painful error on a likely DP ball by Willy Aybar at third. Matsui hit another likely DP but beat the throw to first (yeah, you heard me) and got away with a force out. And with that, the offensive fireworks were complete. The Yanks’ one-run lead was all they needed, since Mariano Rivera returned to his customary awesomeness and made short work of the Rays, including final out Evan Longoria.

Meanwhile, I’m really liking David Cone as an announcer these days. He seems to enjoy himself, he throws around obscure player slang, and he always seems to be just moments away from forgetting where he is and telling some great, wildly inappropriate story about his playing days that will traumatize young children and gpossibly get him canned. Fun.

So it rained before the game, and it’s raining now, but the heavens closed tonight just long enough for the Yankees to play a listless nine innings and lose, 4-2, to the Rangers.

During the game I was thinking that Phil Hughes may be back in the rotation sooner rather than later, because it sure seemed like something was off with Andy Pettitte. After the game he said he was fine, but his first couple innings tonight were a festival of walks and singles – both his stuff and his location were giving him trouble. It’s a testament to either Pettitte’s luck or his guile that he  limited the damage to four runs and then got himself through five innings, given how rough he looked in the early going. Could just be an off-night, or maybe his back still hurts and he’s  being macho about it, which (note: complete speculation) would be my guess.

Meanwhile Scott Feldman, going for the Rangers, was not exactly dominating but did do a good job of preventing the Yankees from stringing anything together. Alex Rodriguez singled in Nick Swisher in the first, and then in the seventh, Jorge Posada knocked a line drive over the right field wall, and that was it for New York.

Despite all their come-from-behind wins this year,  I never thought they’d pull one of those off tonight – the game just didn’t have that feel. Low-energy, and a bit of a comedown after the last two doozies, but hey, they were certainly due for one of these. My personal favorite moment of the game was Paul O’Neill’s extended shocked silence at the revelation that Randy Choate is currently closing for the Rays.

So, I’m off to sleep. Over the last few weeks I’ve been having really odd, vivid dreams, which I only mention because a lot of them have been baseball-related. There was one the week before last in which Jeter and A-Rod were kidnapped and for some reason I had to find them when the police couldn’t. Then I had one of those classics where you show up to class and discover there’s a huge exam you’re totally unprepared for, and all the questions were about the ’94 strike. Oddest of all, a few nights ago I dreamed I was… making out with Johan Santana at an Enrique Iglesias concert. (Please note that my admiration for Johan Santana is considerable, but platonic, and that I can’t stand Enrique Iglesias.) The subconscious is a strange place.

Anyone else have any weird baseball dreams you’d care to share?

… and also in the first-seven-innings role. Someone must’ve told him it was Alex’s birthday.

Great game tonight – drama, frustration, release, a major league fielding record, awe mixed with uncontrollable giggles at the expense of a large man bellyflopping acrobatically, clips from When Animals Attack… this one had it all. The Yanks won 5-2 and they did it with style.

–

Photo courtesy of ESPN.com

–

Five runs was enough for New York, but it could’ve been more, given that the Indians loaded the bases on walks not once but twice, and handed out 11 free passes all told. Joba pitched very, very well – was in fact perfect until Victor Martinez launched a homer with two outs in the fourth – but the game stayed tied, 1-1, into the seventh.

Chamberlain was briefly in trouble in the fifth, with two on and nobody out, when Kelly Shoppach (who apparently likes to play with black cats under ladders in his spare time) came up and bunted. The ball shot up in the air and Joba, in a move that managed to be both staggeringly awkward and remarkably graceful at the same time, launched into a huge bellyflop of a leap for it, with some very serious hang time. He made the catch just as gravity reasserted itself. Video here. Joba’s teammates were cracking up after the play (Pettitte, in the dugout, looked like he couldn’t even breath), but leave it to ol’ redass Jorge Posada to run up to the prone Joba, screaming for him to get up and get the second out at second base – which much to his credit, Chamberlain actually had enough breath left in him to do.

In the seventh inning, with the bases full of walked Yankees for the second time, Nick Swisher came up and whacked a two-run double that missed grand slamdom by just a foot or two. 3-1 Yanks. Then the Indians did something I’ll never understand: walked Teixeira to load the bases so that they could pitch to Alex Rodriguez. Wha? I mean, yeah, right handed pitcher, whatever, and I know how hot Teixeira is right now, and A-Rod’s not 100% still, and you want to set up the DP… but, no. Steroids or not, clutch or not, how do you intentionally walk anyone to pitch to Alex Rodriguez? Anyway, Rodriguez validated my feelings on the matter with a two-run single.

Mariano Rivera came in for the save – Joba went eight innings, 106 pitches, big velocity, a beauty – and ended the game with a nifty grab, twirl and throw, a play that might actually have been better  than Joba’s, though it was not nearly as funny.

So: who would ever have thought that the Yankees of all people would set a Major League record for consecutive errorless games? This was their 18th. Yes, yes, I know errors are not a very meaningful measure of fielding skill, and this isn’t exactly one of the sport’s more hallowed records, but still. Even in their late-90s heyday defense wasn’t really the Yanks’ thing… and I don’t think it is this year, either, though lord knows Teixeira helps. But hey, Mr. Fielding Controversy himself, Derek Jeter, is looking awfully good these days. I intend to enjoy it while it lasts.

Finally, what is up with the animals in Cleveland? Who’s been screening Hitchcock for the seagulls? I don’t think New York pigeons know what fear is, but you almost never see them settle en masse on a playing field like that. I think I’ve only ever seen birds that brazen in Atlantic City, where the seagulls are absolutely HUGE – bigger than many dog breeds, no exaggeration – and always look at you like they’re just biding their time til they can get you outnumbered and pick the flesh from your bones.

I vaguely remember writing something like this during the midge game in ’07, but we need NYC animal life to come out and support the local nine the same way those gnats gave Cleveland a boost.  I mean, let’s see how calm opposing relievers are when cockroaches swarm the mound and the outfield is full of rats. At the very least someone ought to start some false bed bug rumors and induce psychosomatic itchiness.

Anyway, Yanks are in first place by a hair and coming home. Good night Cleveland, there will be no encore!

The Yankees left the bases loaded in the first inning of tonight’s game against the Indians – Posada, finally back, struck out – but it didn’t turn into One of Those Games. Although Pettitte left in the sixth with the vague yet ominous-sounding “back stiffness,” both he and the Yanks’ heart attack of a bullpen were solid, and New York won 3-1.

The Yankees took the lead in the second when Derek Jeter singled in Nick Swisher, and Mark Texeira’s bases-loaded groundout knocked in Brett Gardner. One inning later, Swisher hit a sac fly, Cano scored, and the Yankees had their three runs, which was enough. Cliff Lee looked pretty good tonight, but not 2008 good. Meanwhile Pettitte pitched well up ’til his untimely departure, and Aceves and Rivera took things from there. Nice clean win, even though the dreaded midges showed up for a while in the early going (shudder). And with all due respect to Francisco Cervelli it was great to see Jorge back, especially since he went 2 for 3 with a walk and a double.

The Red Sox lost to Toronto tonight, which means the Yankees are alone in first place for the first time since… wow, 2006? We were all so young then.

–

I don’t know a lot about Cleveland, really… never been there, don’t know anyone from there. When I think “Cleveland”, I think:

-Swarms of gnats
-Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
-LeBron James
-Drew Carey

That’s about it, really, plus “Look Out Cleveland,” by The Band, which is an excellent song. But I actually picked the Indians to win their division, and I’ve always kind of liked them (awful racist logo aside), and so I’m rooting for them to play better. As soon as the Yankees leave town.

Finally, in other good news, the Mets have acquired RHP Lance Broadway. Not that I know a damn thing about Lance Broadway — and a quick glance at his stats has not exactly left my jaw on the floor — but, needless to say, that man was born to pitch in New York City. You don’t mess with destiny.

Today’s news is powered by . . . The Gas Face . . .:

• Hughes (in)corporation:

For now, Hughes is scheduled to pitch Monday at Texas. But if he is back in the minors instead, he will take lessons with him.

“Just be aggressive,” Hughes said. “Sometimes, because of the stage you’re on, you try to do too much or you’re afraid to make a mistake. That’s not the way I pitch. That’s not my plan going in. Really, there’s no difference at this level. You’ve still got to go off your strengths.”

For Hughes on Wednesday, that was a lively 94-mile-an-hour fastball he used to strike out Adam Jones and Nick Markakis in the first inning. Seven of his strikeouts came against those two hitters — both batting well over .300— or Aubrey Huff.

“He can be successful at this level with the stuff that he’s got,” Girardi said. “It’s attacking the strike zone and wiggling your way out of some innings like other pitchers are able to do.”

• Scenes from a looser clubhouse:

Togetherness was what Girardi made a point of in spring training when he arranged that surprise “Day at the Pool Parlor.” Say this for Girardi, he recognized what guys like Damon are only now willing to talk openly about: The Yankee clubhouse was a joyless place in the latter years of the Joe Torre regime. Part of it was the personnel – how could anyone find any fun being around Kevin Brown? – but a big part of it was the generation gap that existed between Torre and his players. Aside from his small coterie of veterans from the championship years, Torre kept his distance from his players and when each new high profile free agent came over from another organization, like Jason Giambi, Hideki Matsui or Damon, they were never able to blend in with the championship core as it gradually diminished. It was apparently the consummate “25 players, 25 taxi cabs” team.

“Rarely in the last three years I’ve been here would there be four-five guys hanging out playing video games in the hotel room,” Brian Bruney said. “Now, guys are having fun and they want to hang out together. The shaving cream, the music, people need to realize you can do those things and still win. You can’t win with just All-Stars all around. We’ve done that the past three years and we haven’t done anything.”

“The rules here are much more family oriented now,” said Damon,”and that’s why you have free agents wanting to come to New York instead of a low-key place.”

Funny, I thought it was the money. But there is no question that CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett, for all the moolah it took to get them to come here, have had a major influence in changing both the personality of the team and the atmosphere in the clubhouse. Same with Nick Swisher, who was grateful to escape Ozzie Guillen’s dog house in Chicago and get traded to the Yankees.

• Tyler Kepner doesn’t know what to make of Melky Cabrera:

I’ll admit it: I’ve seen his whole career and I don’t know what to make of Melky Cabrera. I see him on a roll like this, and I think he’s a legitimate major league outfielder. He homered on Wednesday and went 2 for 4, raising his average to .321 and helping the Yankees to their eighth victory in a row, 11-4 over Baltimore. And he’s a reliable defender.

But it’s weird. Do you know he’s gone 43 plate appearances since his last walk? That’s kind of startling, since he’s hitting in front of the third- or fourth-string catcher. But what does it really matter? The Yankees are winning and his on-base percentage is .374.

History says this won’t last. Remember, Cabrera was hot at the start of last season, too. Through the games of last May 4, Cabrera was batting .291 with six homers. . . .

“He’s a different player is the way I see it,” Manager Joe Girardi said. “He’s consistent from both sides of the plate, he’s having good at-bats all the time, he’s not trying to do too much, he’s hitting a lot of line drives, some of his line drives have gone out of the ballpark. He’s been aggressive. We’re very pleased with what we’re getting from him.”

• Wang to make one more start in minors:

Wang has thrown 13 scoreless innings over his previous two starts in the Minors, though the Yankees have been looking to see more consistency from his sinker. He showed flashes of regaining that command in a bullpen session on Tuesday at Yankee Stadium.

“We want to see what we saw in the bullpen,” Yankees manager Joe Girardi said. “We want to see him take that into the game. That will tell us a lot.”. . .

“We all know that he wants to be here, and we want him to,” Girardi said. “But he understood where we’re coming from. We want to see that stuff he had in the bullpen in the game.”

[My take: Will Chamberlain taking a liner off his knee last night change the plan for CMW?]

(more…)

Alternate post titles:

*Catchers? We Don’t Need No Stinking Catchers!

*Carsten Charles in Charge (I was proud of myself for a second there, but yeah, it’s been done).

This afternoon I told Alex that the way things were going, A-Rod return or no A-Rod return, for tonight’s recap I could probably cut and paste one from earlier this week, and just replace “Rays” with “Orioles”. He wrote back: “Dude, CC is gunna toss a gem and Alex is gunna hit a homer.”

Well… yep. That’s the Twitter version (or this is I guess), and the Yankees snapped their five game skid with a fast and clean 4-0 win over the Orioles, thanks to a complete game four-hit shutout courtesy of C.C. Sabathia.

On the first pitch of Rodriguez’s first big-league at-bat of the season, the prodigal 3B knocked a nice parabola of a home run into the left field stands and gave Sabathia a three-run cushion before he even got to the mound, and the way C.C. was throwing tonight that was plenty. Rodriguez took a second to enjoy the moment, not that I can blame him, and the dugout went nuts, which made me think that however much his teammates might dislike him, they seem to like winning more. The first “A-Bomb! From A-Rod” (TM John Sterling) of the ’09 season gave the Yankees their first lead since last Saturday. Yeesh. If the team was trying to set up A-Rod’s big dramatic redemption, they could hardly have come up with better storyboards.

Sabathia was pitching to Francisco Cervelli tonight, because this year “Yankee catcher” is a job title connoting about as much longevity as “Spinal Tap drummer.” They’d never worked together before except for a couple of spring training bullpen sessions, but they sure seemed in synch, at least after a bumpy first inning (which Cervelli helped cut short with a caught stealing). After that Sabathia got scarily efficient, with an eventual total of 8 Ks and one walk with 113 pitches over the nine innings. He looks sloppy on the mound  – the crooked brim and baggy uniform, not buttoned all the way – but when he’s on, his pitching is precise. After that first inning he breezed through until the ninth, when he gave everyone heart palpitations with two leadoff hits before snagging three all-business swinging strikeouts in a row to end the game.

The Yankees had a mini-rally in the fourth, but didn’t score after Nick Swisher got picked off third – in fact Swisher got back to the bag in time, but was called out because third base coach Rob Thomson had shoved him in the right direction. I have to admit I had no idea that was against the rules, not that I’d ever really thought about it before. Good thing I’m not a third base coach.

Later in that inning, Cervelli snagged his first hit, and in the seventh he walked and scored the Yankees’ fourth run when Damon doubled him home.  I like Cervelli but if you walk him to lead off an inning, like Bob McCrory did, you should probably be fined or something. Still, I’m pulling for the kid, mainly because I don’t know who Kevin Cash is and don’t care to find out. The only thing I want to watch Cash do is star in a Monument Valley western with Cody Ransom.

Anyway, Cervelli, who somehow managed to make it through the game without spontaneously combusting, was pumped when the Orioles’ last batter struck out, as were his teammates. The Yankees lined up to enthusiastically hug Sabathia, which I imagine is what most fans watching at home wanted to do to him, too, after this past week.