Derek Jeter – Page 5 – Keefe To The City

Jul 8, 2014

Sorry, Soriano

Alfonso Soriano became the first scapegoat for the 2014 Yankees, but he gave me a lot of memories during his time with the Yankees.

I was sitting in a hotel room in New Jersey for a junior hockey tournament when one of my teammates came barging into the room yelling, “WE GOT A-ROD!” in a tone comparable to Axl Rose asking “DO YOU KNOW WHERE THE EFF YOU ARE?!”

Alex Rodriguez: a Yankee. The idea seemed surreal and knowing that he had recently been traded and then untraded to the Red Sox, I didn’t really believe it. But once it was confirmed I started thinking about where he would play and where he would hit and if the Yankees would ever lose another game, but I wasn’t thinking of the most important question: who did the Yankees give up?

***

Don Mattingly was my favorite player when I first started attending Yankees games at the age of four in 1991 and it was his player T-shirt I wore over and over and over until the NY on the front started to break apart and fade and the dark blue of the shirt started to look more like New York Rangers blue than New York Yankees blue from the washing machine. I was only nine when Mattingly played his last game in 1995, but I wasn’t without a favorite player for long because the following April on Opening Day 1996, Derek Jeter started at shortstop … and has ever since.

Jeter has been a staple of my baseball life for nearly my entire life as well as for many other 20-something-year-olds in the tri-state area. It’s Jeter’s number 2 I wanted to wear and his swing I tried to emulate and his at-bats I had to watch and his line in the box score I checked when I missed those at-bats. No one has ever come close to Mattingly and Jeter for me, but in 2001, someone became a close second to those two.

***

Last Wednesday, I sat in Section 203 at Yankee Stadium and watched the Yankees slowly and miserably lose to David Price and the Rays and for some reason I paid extra close attention to Alfonso Soriano in right field. At the time I didn’t know it would be the last time I would ever see him play for the Yankees. It’s been nearly 11 years since I first thought I would never see him play for the Yankees again sitting in that hotel room in New Jersey.

Even getting the best player in baseball and destroying everything the Red Sox had spent their entire offseason working for, I was devastated to see Soriano get traded to the Rangers. After Jeter, he had become” the guy” even if he was coming off of a 20-strikeout performance between the ALCS and World Series. But when you’re acquiring the reigning AL MVP at 28 years old and locked up for at least four more years, you’re more apt to get over a trade of that magnitude and more willing to forget how much fun it was watching Soriano play.

I have wondered too much over the last 10-plus years what things would have been like if the Red Sox had successfully traded for Alex Rodriguez and if Alfonso Soriano had stayed with the Yankees all of this time instead of going to Texas, Washington and Chicago. Would 2004 have ended differently? Would Soriano have stayed at second base? Would Robinson Cano ever have been a Yankee? Would A-Rod still be getting paid by a Major League Baseball team? Would A-Rod have become a professional wrestler or a contestant on The Apprentice or a star of Celebrity Rehab? Would we ever have found out about A-Rod’s love for high stakes poker and for strippers and prostitutes? (I think if the Yankees had a crystal ball in February 2004, they probably wouldn’t have made the trade.)

I started to think about all of this on Sunday when I found out that Soriano had been designated for assignment. At .221/.244/.367 he was nowhere near the .256/.325/.525 player he was during the second half of last season, but in a limited and platoon role, his numbers were understandable for a guy who averaged 144 games per season over his 13-year career as an everyday player. With the Yankees struggling to score runs and coming off another embarrassing one-run effort on Saturday, a game in which Soriano went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts and had his third straight two-strikeout game, he became the first scapegoat for the 2014 Yankees. Someone had to pay the price for the Yankees scoring two runs or less seemingly every day and since Brian McCann and Carlos Beltran contractually couldn’t pay the price and because the .212/.289/.376-hitting Kelly Johnson, who has one home run since May 3, is apparently a distant relative of Brian Cashman, Soriano was the one who had to go.

Soriano was supposed to be the Yankees’ designated hitter this season. He was supposed to play in the outfield only to give others a day off. But because of the old, brittle signing of Carlos Beltran and having the softest player in all of baseball in Mark Teixeira, Soriano lost out on being the full-time DH and was relegated to infrequent at-bats as part of an outfield rotation with Ichiro. The Yankees put Soriano, a career everyday player, in a position to fail and when he did, they let him go.

He became the first Yankee to fall on a team whose $180 million first baseman has missed games for being tired from standing on the bases, whose $85 million catcher isn’t hitting and just keeps telling the media how horrible he is, whose $45 million right fielder can’t play right field, whose $153 million center fielder is proving his 2012 power was an anomaly and who is playing at a level less than the left fielder who only got and whose $700,000-per-start “ace” hasn’t pitched since May 10 and might never pitch again. Soriano wasn’t the problem with the 2014 Yankees, but with the Yankees only owing him about $2.5 million for the rest of the season, he was the easiest choice for Brian Cashman to show he finally means business after watching the nearly half-billion dollars he spent this offseason play .500 baseball for 86 games.

Even Jeter, who never seems fazed by any roster move, was surprised by Soriano being designated for assignment. And Jeter was right to be with the time and chances given to others who offer much less in an everyday role.

“Soriano is like family to me,” Jeter said. “I have played with him a long time, when he first came up and when he came back. Sori has had a tremendous career here in New York and it was difficult for him this year. Not playing every day, it’s hard to be productive. I feel for him and I am going to miss him but I will be in touch with him. He is like a brother to me. He should be proud of what he was able to do.”

I’ll remember Alfonso Soriano for his magical 2002 season when he led the league in hits, runs and stolen bases, when it felt like he would lead off every game with a home run. I’ll remember him for hitting .400 against the 116-win Mariners in the 2001 ALCS and the way he tried to single-handedly carry a mediocre Yankees team to the playoffs in 2013, hitting 17 home runs and 50 RBIs in 58 games. I’ll remember his high socks, his long swing and the way he stared at most likely all of his 412 home runs until they reached their destination. And I’ll always remember feeling like Mikey McDermott sitting on a full house with three stacks of high society on the line following Soriano’s solo home run against Curt Schilling in the ninth inning of Game 7 of the 2001 World Series to give the Yankees a 1-0 lead before it all came crashing down a few minutes later when the Diamondbacks showed aces full like Teddy KGB.

Soriano won’t have a plaque in Monument Park and there won’t be a day for him at Yankee Stadium. Eventually his legacy will likely become the answer to the question “Who was Alex Rodriguez traded to the Yankees for?” that the YES broadcasters ask during a Yankees-Rangers game in 2029. But for me and for the generation of Yankees fans my age, he’ll always be the scrawny kid that came up wearing number 58, switched to 53 then to 33 and settled on 12, swung the biggest bat in the league, started all the handshakes and long tossed with Jeter down the first-base line before every game.

Blogs • Email Exchanges • Yankees

Jun 27, 2014

The Yankees-Red Sox Rivalry Is Missing Its Summer Significance

The Yankees and Red Sox haven’t played in over two months, but they are this weekend in the Bronx and that means another email exchange with Mike Hurley.

A Yankees-Red Sox series at the end of June used to feel like a summer playoff series. But here we are on June 27 and the Yankees are 40-37 and three games out of first place and the Red Sox are 36-43 and eight games out of first place. Sure, we have Masahiro Tanaka against Jon Lester on national TV on Saturday at the Stadium, but we also have Vidal Nuno against Brandon Workman on Friday night.

With the Yankees and Red Sox both battling to make up ground on the Blue Jays and get back to the top of the AL East, I emailed Mike Hurley of CBS Boston because that’s what I do whenever the Yankees and Red Sox play each other.

Keefe: The last time we talked was April 22. That was 65 days ago. But there’s nothing like Major League Baseball scheduling two Yankees-Red Sox series in the freezing cold before April 22 and then not having the two teams play for more than nine weeks. Why is it so hard for baseball to get their scheduling right? But I guess if we’re going to sit here and trade emails about what’s wrong with the way Major League Baseball operates, the problems with their scheduling would likely be item No. 297 on the list and that might even be high.

Since we last talked, the AL East has been filled with mediocrity between the Yankees, Red Sox, Blue Jays and Orioles (we won’t mention the Rays because they are already counting down the days until Game 162 and a six-month vacation). The Yankees won that three-game series that started in Boston on April 22, but since then they have gone 27-28. The Red Sox have gone 26-30. There’s nothing quite like the Yankees and Red Sox both playing under-.500 baseball for two months and being featured on Sunday Night Baseball this weekend!

When the Red Sox won the division and then the American League and then the World Series last year after the one-year Bobby Valentine era, I was infuriated. The Dodgers had let them off the hook from their financial crisis that would have ruined them for at least six or seven years and then every player they picked up in the offseason performed exactly how a Red Sox fan would have hoped in an ideal world. What the Red Sox experienced last season and in the postseason would be like you correctly picking every NFL game against the spread for the first five weeks of the season. That’s how insane their success was. And what infuriates me more is that this year we are seeing what the Red Sox should have been in 2013. The 2013 Red Sox should have been the 2014 Red Sox! They are the same team! Doesn’t anyone notice this? Or is it just Mugatu and me?

Hurley: You’re not taking crazy pills. Well, you might be taking crazy pills, but you’re right about this.

You look at the 2014 Red Sox and ask yourself what are the differences from the 2013 Red Sox?

Jarrod Saltalamacchia is now A.J. Pierzysnki. A downgrade, but Saltalmacchia was not Saltalmaggio.

Will Middlebrooks is now Xander Bogaerts. That’s a minor upgrade or a wash.

Jacoby Ellsbury is now Jackie Bradley Jr. Huge downgrade.

Shane Victorino is now The Ghost of Shane Victorino. He’s currently on the disabled list due to having a sore body. I feel like he spent the offseason the Mike Hurley diet, aka eating Burger King for lunch and Wendy’s for dinner. He was on the road to recovery this year at the same time that Louis C.K. and Robert Kelly introduced the idea of a “bang-bang” on Louie, and then boom, Victorino took a step back in his rehab. Coincidence? I don’t think so.

You also see guys like Daniel Nava go from .303/.385/.445 to .227/.317/.313. Mike Carp’s .885 OPS from 2013 is now .603 in 2014. Jonny Gomes, the guy want to go to war with, is crushing it with a .232 batting average and .693 OPS.

Even David Ortiz is doing poorly. You wouldn’t know it just by looking at his 18 homers and 49 RBIs, but he’s hitting just .256 with an .841 OPS. Just once since his Minnesota days has he posted an OPS lower than that. For some perspective, Brock Holt has three more doubles than Ortiz in 95 fewer at-bats. Brock Holt.

And Dustin Pedroia has a .715 OPS. His worst-ever OPS in a full season was .787 last year. His second-worst OPS was .797 … in 2012. Dustin’s trending the wrong way.

All of that is to say yes, it’s mostly the same team. The difference is last year, you saw everyone performing at their highest possible level. This year it’s the complete opposite.

Keefe: Thank you for agreeing with me. That is the first time ever. I will be recording the date and time. But you agreeing me only makes me sadder that the 2013 Red Sox should have won 72 games and been a laughingstock for the second straight year and Ben Cherington wouldn’t be viewed in the same light as Theo Epstein in Boston and John Henry and his hated ownership group would have probably sold the team. If I didn’t have a degree in journalism, maybe I would have enough money to fund a start-up to build a time machine and go back in time to August 2012 and tell the MLB front office not to allow the Red Sox-Dodgers trade. That way Josh Beckett would still be fat, lazy and on the disabled list playing golf in Boston, Adrian Gonzalez would be striking out against position player pitchers in extra innings and getting his empty calorie stat, Carl Crawford would be writing blogs about how unfairly he is treated despite getting $142 million to play baseball at a below-average rate and Nick Punto … well , who effing cares about what Nick Punto would be doing.

Your point about Dustin Pedroia is interesting because if you told me right now the Yankees could have any position player from any team right now, I would pick Mike Trout first because he’s Mike Trout then I would pick Troy Tulowitzki because the Yankees don’t know who their 2015 shortstop is going to be and then I would pick Dustin Pedroia. He is everything that baseball and baseball players should be about, he’s impossible to get out (though if he’s hitting .265/.338/.377 someone is gettimg him out) and he’s best friends with Derek Jeter (or at least I like to pretend they are best friends every since the 2009 World Baseball Classic). I hate Dustin Pedroia, but I don’t. It’s the Tom Brady conundrum all over again.

But back to your point that he’s trending downward … that’s eye opening because he’s only 30. He has a team-friendly contract, so it’s not like the Red Sox will be screwed if he turns into Jason Bay, but are Dustin Pedroia’s best days really truly behind him? Is he going to become Kevin Youkilis 2012-13 and end up playing in Japan at some point? Please tell me this is going to happen.

Hurley: I do not believe his best days are behind him. Honestly, he’s kind of a psycho, so the more people start talking about how bad his numbers are, and the more people start publicly asking questions like that, the more likely it is that his psycho genes kick in and inspire him to go on some sort of tear, hit .480 with a 1.080 OPS in the month of July, and then tell him to start swearing at the media for ever questioning him.

At the very least, he’s a Gold Glove second baseman. I’m not entirely too concerned that he’s in full decline. He is a guy who tore a ligament in his thumb on opening day in the Bronx last year but still played all season and won the World Series, so if I were to be concerned about anything, it’s that his style of play lends itself to getting hurt more often. Banged-up wrists, busted fingers and the like make it hard to hit, and I think that’s something he’s always going to be dealing with, based on the way he plays the game.

If you could take any position player from the Red Sox though, please take Xander Bogaerts. I feel bad for the kid. His swing looks like that of a young Manny Ramirez, and he’s going to mash in this league. And you could solve your shortsop problem, too. Granted, Bogaerts isn’t an elite defensive shortstop, but he’d be replacing Old Man Jeter, who is essentially playing shortstop at the level of a trash can with a Rawlings duct-taped to its side. Bogaerts would look exceptional by comparison.

Keefe: I will pretend like you didn’t just say those things about Derek Jeter, who turned 40 yesterday. 40! Forty! F-O-R-T-Y! Is this real life? He was the Opening Day shortstop for the Yankees when we were in fourth grade! I was in Miss Ryan’s class playing freeze tag in Mr. Fonicello’s gym class. You were somewhere in Massachusetts probably visiting the nurse after pulling your hamstring in gym class. But Derek Jeter is 40, we graduated high school 10 years ago and your first child is on the way. Now I’m going to put on some 90s alternative rock and cry.

I’m still not convinced that Derek Jeter won’t be the Yankees shortstop next season, but then again, I’m still waiting for Don Mattingly to start at first base and hit third in the Yankees lineup and it’s been 19 years since his last played. The baseball season always feels long, and it is, but when you think that there’s only half a season and three months of Derek Jeter left, it’s devastating. But I’m also aware that I’m more upset and distraught about this than he is, and I shouldn’t be since I got to watch him play for nearly two decades and the Yankees won’t have a shortshop slugging .327 next season (let’s hope) and he is going to go live his life and spend the $265,159,364 he has made in his career and travel the world and have children with super models half his age. I think he will be fine once he has played his last game.

On the flip side, David Ortiz, who will be 39 years old this November and is still crying about official scorer’s and will soon be crying about his contract, has ho-hummed his way to 18 home runs in 77 games this year. Sure, he’s hitting just .256, but Ortiz having 18 home runs before the end of June after hitting .997 in the World Series last year at the age of 38? Is Ortiz on the Barry Bonds workout regimen and diet? Actually, I already know he is. I’m just looking for you to agree with me about something else.

Hurley: I don’t know. Do you look at David Ortiz and go, “Yeah, there’s a guy who’s unnaturally muscular”? I think he’s just a huge dude who’s an exceptional hitter. I’m not naive enough to think he’s not taking something, I just don’t think that something is the same kind of something that leads Melky Cabrera to become a webmaster or Manny Ramirez to start growing C cups.

Ortiz is just an exceptional power hitter. I don’t like most of the things about him — he may have outdone himself with the hissy fit he threw at the official scorer — but he’s really been something to watch. He’s a big dude with a lot of power, and naturally people are going to assume he’s cheating when he succeeds into his late 30s. But I don’t think he’s on the Ryan Braun workout regimen.

I know this is your website and all, but can we talk about John Lackey? Please? The guy signed a contract that specifically said, “If you miss significant time due to your right elbow, we will tack on one more year that major league minimum salary.” He signed on the dotted line. And now that he doesn’t suck at pitching, he’s running to Ken Rosenthal — Ken Rosenthal!! — to not-so-slyly leak out the news that he’ll retire before ever playing for $500,000. This is the same guy who happily collected $15.25 million in 2012 to lightly jog in the morning and then double-fist Bud Lights at night. Now that his contract is coming around, he’s ready to stomp his feet, take his ball and go home. Baseball players never cease to amaze me.

Keefe: Is there time to talk about John Lackey? Is that a serious question? There is ALWAYS time talk about John Lackey! ALWAYS!

John Lackey is the worst, and if Josh Beckett didn’t exist, Lackey would be the easy choice for my annual All-Animosity Team. He is pure scum on top of scum and I’m not sure how he has a single fan. He signed a five-year, $82.5 million A.J. Burnett deal before 2010 and in the first two years he went 26-23 with a 5.26 ERA. Then he missed the entire 2012 season. Last year he went 10-13 with a 3.52 on a division-winning and World Series-winning team and now he’s 8-5 with a 3.45. It doesn’t surprise me one bit that he is upset that he would only make $500,000 next year, but it’s a little ironic that he didn’t think he should only be making $500,000 when he had a 1.619 WHIP in 2011.

You’re right about baseball players and they never cease to amaze me either. The other day the Mets’ Josh Thole was on with Mike Francesa, and I didn’t listen to it, but after I saw someone tweet that Thole sounds like the nicest guy in the world. And after reading that I thought, yeah maybe he is, but chances are he isn’t because he’s a baseball player. Give me an NHL player any day.

And since I was able to seamlessly throw the NHL into the mix, how depressed are you that there isn’t hockey to watch every night right now?

Hurley: It sucks hockey ended. People around here are talking about Bruins draft prospects for No. 25. Oh my God. Is there anything less exciting than talking about who the hockey team is going to draft with the 25th pick? Holy smokes. It’s just that, and then Jarome Iginla speculation. That’s hockey life here in Boston. What a thrill.

How depressed are you knowing that the Rangers’ making the Cup Final is a complete random fluke, like the Devils two years ago, and they’ll probably stink for a while and waste more years of the game’s best goalie?

Keefe: Speculating about the 25th overall draft pick is impressive because that not only means you are worried about which 18-year-old kid the Bruins are going to draft, who likely will never have an impact on the franchise, but it also means you have to speculate about the 24 picks before the Bruins’ pick to figure out who is going to be available. And if you’re taking time to do that, go outside, it’s June. Or find a hobby. Or go meet some actual people and interact with other humans. Do something.

The Rangers’ run to the Cup was a product of a lot of luck and bounces (that ran out in the Final) and having the path to the Cup cleared for them by the Canadiens. It was reminiscent of the Giants’ runs in 2011 when they beat the Packers and then the 49ers beat the Saints, preventing the Giants from having to play in New Orleans, which would have resulted in a 63-17 loss. Then the Saints would have played the Patriots in the Super Bowl, and if that happens, maybe the Patriots aren’t Super Bowl-less for what will now be a decade this year. But yes, I’m upset that this one Final appearance might be all Henrik Lundqvist gets because he has Dan Girardi preventing scoring opportunities for more than one-third of every Rangers game.

Now that you have made me sad, when I was getting happy about the Red Sox’ awful season, the decline of Dustin Pedroia, David Ortiz being a bad person and John Lackey being scum, it’s time to end this email exchange. The next time we talk will be in August when the Yankees go to Fenway for a three-game weekend series. Maybe then we can finally have our fistfight on Lansdowne Street?

Hurley: As you’ve already mentioned, we’re getting older, and as I get older, my rage cools considerably. Let’s just have 100 beers and call it even.

Blogs • Yankees

Jun 25, 2014

The Biggest Win of the Season Became the Worst Loss

I thought the Yankees were going to have their biggest win of the season on Tuesday night in Toronto, but instead it turned out to be their worst loss.

This is going to be the biggest win of the season. That’s what I thought when Derek Jeter and Jacoby Ellsbury scored in the seventh inning to tie Tuesday night’s game in Toronto at 6. That thought didn’t last long.

In the fifth inning on Tuesday night against the Blue Jays, Derek Jeter made an uncharacteristic brain fart (his first of two in the inning) that kept the inning alive and loaded the bases for the Blue Jays, who already led 3-0. And David Phelps bailed out his shortstop by giving up a first-pitch drive off the right-field wall to Colby Rasmus. Two runs initially scored and with Rasmus trying to advance to second, Jeter caught him in a rundown as Edwin Encarnacion danced off third, trying to decide if he should break for home, as Jeter tried to get Rasmus out while also keeping an eye on Encarnacion. Jeter held on to the ball and ran Rasmus safely back to first and Encarnacion raced home. 6-0 Blue Jays.

Jeter came away from the play with a confused look on his face like someone who got off an elevator on the wrong floor, but tried to play it cool as though he meant to get off that floor. And I came away from the play with the look of frustration like someone who was watching their baseball team aimlessly navigate through another wasted game. In the dugout, Joe Girardi had a different look. It was a look that suggested he might go through the clubhouse after the game and individually fight every player on his team. And he would want to individually fight each Yankee because as Mark Teixeira reminded us all after the Yankees’ two-inning loss to the Blue Jays on Monday, baseball is an individual game.

Friday night looked like it was going to be the biggest win of the year. The 2014 Yankees, a team with less fight in them than Brian Boyle, had come back against the Orioles and erased a two-run, ninth-inning deficit, winning on a three-run, walkoff home run from Carlos Beltran. After suggesting that Yankee Stadium no longer has a home-field advantage over the first two-plus months of the season, the walkoff win was the Yankees’ fourth in a row and fifth consecutive home win. But momentum is the next day’s starting pitcher and unfortunately for the Yankees, that was Vidal Nuno, who hates momentum more than Brett Gardner hates trying to steal a base early in a count. The Yankees’ four-game winning streak that had brought them back to a tie in the loss column with the first-place Blue Jays became a two-game losing streak over the weekend and extended to three games on Monday after Chase Whitley tried to one-up Nuno by giving up seven runs on 10 hits in the first two innings in Toronto. And after that Monday loss is when we heard from self-appointed de facto captain Mark Teixeira.

“Baseball is an individual game in a team atmosphere. Individually, we’ve just got to figure out a way to get the jobs done. Everyone has to step up a little bit and hopefully, collectively, if everyone does a little bit better we’ll score more runs.”

I really, really, really hope Teixeira was including himself both times he said “everyone” and wasn’t talking about everyone other than him. But I have a feeling that because he’s hitting .241/.335/.467 and leading the Yankees in home runs (13) and RBIs (36) he thinks he has done his job this season, even if leading the Yankees in those two categories in 2014 holds as much clout as having the most buddies on AIM. If playing in 56 of your team’s 76 games (74 percent) and hitting 36 points below your career average, 13 points below your career on-base percentage and 56 points below your career slugging percentage is doing a job you’re paid $23.5 million per season to do then I’m sorry for suggesting otherwise. And maybe I should be sorry because there seem to be a lot of people that think Teixeira has done his job this season hasn’t been part of the problem for a team that ranks 20^th in runs scored in the league (one place above the Mets).

In Teixeira’s first game since speaking out about the team scoring four runs during their three-game losing streak, he must have forgotten his own words.

“Baseball is an individual game in a team atmosphere.”

In the first inning with runners on first and second and one out, Teixeira hit a 1-2 changeup into a 4-6-3 double play.

“Individually, we’ve just got to figure out a way to get the jobs done.”

In the fourth inning, Teixeira led off the inning by grounding out to short on a 3-2 fastball.

“Everyone has to step up a little bit.”

In the sixth inning, with one out following Jeter’s solo home run to make it 6-1, Teixeira grounded out to short again, this time on a 2-2 fastball.

“Hopefully, collectively, if everyone does a little bit better …”

In the seventh inning, with two outs, runners on second and third and three runs already in to make it 6-4, Teixeira hit a 1-1 fastball to Jose Reyes at short, who made his second throwing error of the game that allowed Jeter and Jacoby Ellsbury to score to tie the game.

“… we’ll score more runs.”

In the ninth inning, with two outs and Gardner at third as the go-ahead run, Teixeira struck out on three pitches.

The three-pitch strikeout was Teixeira’s last at-bat because if you haven’t seen the disastrous bottom of the ninth, Joe Girardi brought in Adam Warren, who I wouldn’t trust to tell me what day of the week it is, with Shawn Kelley and David Robertson hanging out in the bullpen (Ladies and gentlemen, set bullpen roles!). In three Warren pitches, the Blue Jays won after a leadoff double and Yangervis Solarte throwing error. Ballgame over. Yankees lose. Again.

A day after awkwardly trying to step up and be a leader for a team he has been in and out of the lineup for by calling out the offense, Teixeira responded by going 0-for-5 with a strikeout and left three men on, including the potential go-ahead run in the ninth.

Given the score through five innings, the three miserable losses on Saturday, Sunday and Monday and the most importantly the standings and opponent, Tuesday was going to the biggest win of the season. It was going to be a six-run comeback on the road against a first-place team that would have ended a three-game losing streak. Instead, it was the worst loss of the season.

The Yankees have now lost 34 games and Tuesday’s was the worst. Sure, there was Opening Day in Houston and the following night in Houston. And there was May 10 in Milwaukee and also May 11 in Milwaukee. There was the first game of the Subway Series and the second game of the Subway Series. There was Adam Dunn’s walk-off home run off against David Robertson on May 23 and Robertson’s meltdown against the Twins on June 1. There was the blown 4-0 lead against the A’s on June 4 and pretty much any Nuno or CC Sabathia start. But Tuesday night against the Blue Jays was the worst. I can only hope it remains the worst for the rest of the season.

Blogs • Email Exchanges • Yankees

May 30, 2014

The Hostility for Phil Hughes

In his eighth season in the majors, Phil Hughes is finally realizing his potential as a starting pitcher. The problem is he is doing it with the Twins after failing to do so with the Yankees.

The Yankees are finally back home after what felt like a month-long road trip and the Twins are in the Bronx to begin what is a seven-game homestand. And even with Robinson Cano returning to the Bronx again on Monday and Felix Hernandez starting for the Mariners in that same game, the attention in the Bronx over the next week will be on Phil Hughes, who will start Sunday against the Yankees.

Since 60 percent of the Yankees’ Opening Day rotation is on the disabled list and the organization looking for starting pitching depth, a lot will be made about why they didn’t re-sign Hughes in the offseason. But two months of solid starts from Hughes doesn’t change the fact that he wouldn’t have had that same success in New York this season. He had seven seasons to show he could have that kind of success in New York.

With the Yankees and Twins meeting for the first time in 2014, Jesse Lund of Twinkie Town joined me to talk about the Twins’ postseason problems with the Yankees, how Phil Hughes has managed to realize his potential in Minnesota and what’s it like to watch Justin Morneau return to his former self for another team.

Keefe: From 2002 to 2010, the Twins made the playoffs in six of the nine seasons. In four of those years (2003, 2004, 2009 and 2010) they played the Yankees in the ALDS and lost all four series, going just 2-12.

From 2002 to 2011, the Yankees made the playoffs in nine of the 10 seasons. The only four times the Yankees made it out of the ALDS were the series against the Twins as they would lose to the Angels (2002 and 2005), Tigers (2006 and 2011) and Indians (2007). It wasn’t until the Yankees series win over the Orioles in the 2012 ALDS that they were able to advance to the ALCS having beaten a team other than the Twins. The Twins have been good to the Yankees.

The last time the teams met in the playoffs, the Twins had home-field advantage and a lead late in Game 1, but a Mark Teixeira home run carried the Yankees to a win and they didn’t look back from there, sweeping the Twins in three games.

Before that, the teams met in 2009 and the Twins took an early lead in Game 1 in that series before a Yankees’ comeback and rally and the Twins had a two-run lead in the ninth inning of Game 2 with Joe Nathan on the mound and he couldn’t close it out and then in extra innings the Twins couldn’t score with the bases loaded as the Yankees went on to win on a Teixeira walk-off home run. In Game 3, the Yankees hit back-to-back solo home runs off Carl Pavano and some bad baserunning did the Twins in in what was just a three-game series.

Going back to 2003 and 2004 when the Twins had Johan Santana and late leads against the Yankees, they weren’t able to hold those then either.

For as much as the Yankees made the Twins their whipping team from 2003-2010 in four postseason series, the Twins were a bounce or two or a Phil Cuzzi correct call or a Joe Nathan save away from changing those series and course of baseball history. After what has happened with the Twins over the last few years and recognizing how hard it is to sustain success in the majors and reach the postseason, do you ever think about what could have been if just a couple things had gone the other way in those series?

Lund: For me, it’s over. They’re painful times to relive, because as you said, a bounce here or there and things go in a different direction. But it’s happened and I try to move on. I can’t promise that the rest of Twins Territory feels the same way, because our own community has raged against the organization (and Ron Gardenhire in particular) every October, but it’s easier for those wounds to feel fresh when it’s the same opponent pressing their heel into your chest. And you know what? Being a good team and continuing to take those losses year in and year out, it gets old.

In the grand scheme of life you always look back, but the best you can do is get yourself ready for what’s coming next. The Twins are rebuilding, and in the next two or three years they’ll have chances at toppling someone else in the playoffs. But I can guarantee you one thing — when it’s the Yankees, it’ll be sweet as hell. A lot of Twins fans will be waiting for that day.

Keefe: I had a party the day after Phil Hughes’ final start with the Yankees last season because I knew it would be the last time he would pitch for the Yankees. After an up-and-down start to his rushed career in 2007, which saw him blow a hamstring during a no-hitter in his second career start, he saved the Yankees’ ALDS hopes out of the bullpen in Game 3 that October. Then in 2008, his season was destroyed by injuries and he started 2009 in Triple-A before being recalled and eventually moved to the bullpen where he became a dominant setup man for Mariano. In 2010, he won 18 games, but faded at the end of the season and after shutting out the Twins in Game 3 of the ALDS, he was embarrassed by the Rangers in two ALCS starts. In 2011, he suffered from a tired arm early on but rebounded to win 16 games. And then in 2013, he was the worst regular starting pitcher in the majors, pitching to a 5.19 ERA and losing 14 games for an 85-win team. The Yankees didn’t deserve to make the playoffs last year, but if anyone other than Hughes had been in the rotation for his starts, they likely would have.

I thought Hughes needed to go to the National League to achieve success as a starter in the majors and believed that eventually some team would put him in the bullpen where he was so good in 2009. But so far with the Twins through two months, Hughes has become the pitcher we saw glimpses of in New York and maybe he just needed to get out of the spotlight to realize his potential.

Lund: I always expected he’d be a target, and sure enough the front office admitted as much early in the off-season. The market rate was around $8 million per year, and as long as the Twins didn’t go over that I wouldn’t have had any issues with them signing Hughes. In the end they went for three years at $8 million per, which is a year longer than I’d have hoped for, but one of the things we talked about at Twinkie Town over the winter was that the club would need to overpay in free agency to get any of the free agent targets they really wanted. Whether that meant the Twins had to go three years to make it happen or not, that’s the way I was looking at it. It’s been a terrible three-year span for this organization. Who was going to voluntarily come to Minnesota unless they met a special asking price?

There were certain things that led me to believe that Hughes could be more successful in Minnesota. Target Field plays bigger than Yankee Stadium, which is always going to help a fly ball pitcher. The pressure on professional athletes isn’t the same, either, which can make it easier for a guy to play within himself. Everyone reacts differently to pressure, and having lived in Minneapolis and Boston and New York City it’s only reinforced the stereotype that the overzealous sports fans get more attention on the east coast than they do in the Midwest. I’m not sure that there are proportionally more crazy sports fans in one area compared to the other, but it’s safe to say that sports feel more important to more people in New York and Boston. And that carries over to radio and television and newspapers and fans on the street and certainly at the ballpark. Which is just a long way of saying that a change of scenery seemed like a good idea for Hughes.

Now, did anyone think he’d be as good as he’s been this year? Hell no.

Keefe: Joe Mauer has been one of the Top 5 hardest outs against the Yankees with Dustin Pedroia, Miguel Cabrera, Delmon Young and Evan Longoria being the other four. He has been to the Twins what Derke Jeter has been to Yankees fans for so long and I’m happy he didn’t leave through free agency or get traded instead of getting paid by the Twins.

Now on the other side of 30, Mauer is still an offensive threat and one of the better average hitters in the game, even if he hasn’t taken off yet this season. He might never replicate his 2009 MVP season, but he can still be the face of the franchise and a middle-of-the-order presence for seemingly as long as he’s healthy.

What’s it like to have Mauer now be the first baseman for the Twins after having been that familiar face behind the plate for so long?

Lund: I think we all knew that Mauer would need to change positions sooner or later. It would have been better to have had that change come under different circumstances, but mitigating risk of additional concussions was going to be on the front of everyone’s mind after the performance hiatus of Justin Morneau. At least Mauer told the Twins of his decision early in the off-season, so that the front office had plenty of time to build the team around him.

Not that they succeeded. But that’s a story we’ve banged on endless times in the last few months.

It’s worth wondering if there are some lingering post-concussion things with Mauer. He’s striking out more this season, and while teams are shifting him to left field and just daring him to pull the ball there’s more to it than that. At catcher he was one of the best hitters in the game, and at first base his career numbers would make him one of the eight or 10 best-hitting first basemen in baseball, but if we’re going to see that potential then he’s going to have to turn something around pretty soon. The sooner, the better, because this offense desperately needs him.

Keefe: It still feels weird to me to see Justin Morneau on a team other than Twins, even though he’s now with his second team since his days as a Twin ended. He was the face of the Twins, at least from an outsider’s perspective, along with Mauer, and if it hadn’t been for injuries in 2010 and 2011, maybe the Twins would have experienced a different fate.

What has it been like seeing one of the staples of the organization for so long play for another team and also succeed and return to form with another team? Do you think he will ever give Derek Jeter the 2006 MVP he stole from him?

Lund: First, you’re probably right that Morneau didn’t deserve the MVP in 2006. But Grady Sizemore, Joe Mauer and even Johan Santana deserved it before Jeter. Man, those debates were intense in 2006! Both before and after the awards were handed out. But the Twins had a young core that was the absolute balls.

And yeah, it feels bizarre to see Justin Morneau wearing another uniform. Honestly it was painful seeing him dealt away last August for essentially nothing. Alex Presley was our center fielder for the rest of the season before he was claimed off waivers by Houston this spring, and Duke Welker was swapped back to Pittsburgh for Kris Johnson, who is a lefty stuck in Triple-A who doesn’t have much of a future with the Major League club anyway. It wasn’t that the Twins were undersold, either – Morneau’s value had fallen that far.

A vocal minority at Twinkie Town, including myself, still wanted the Twins to bring him back, to see him split first base and designated hitter duties with Mauer. Of course, that didn’t happen. But I’m happy to see that he’s reviving his career, because he was a special hitter. By 2010 he had as many holes in his swing as Mauer — none — and it was so much fun watching the trajectories of both players continue to rise. Without the injuries, it’s safe to say that the Twins would have given Morneau another contract.

Four years later things have changed quite a bit, and I don’t think anyone could have predicted just much Justin would produce this year. And it’s not just playing at Coors Field, either — Morneau is hitting at home and on the road.

Keefe: The Twins won 66 games the last two years and 63 games in 2011. Before that, they had one season (2007) in which they finished under .500 since 2000. The Twins had a good run from 2001-10 before everything seemed to fall apart for them, mainly the starting pitching, and now while they aren’t having a great season so far, they seem to be back on track.

What were your expectations for the Twins coming into the season and have they changed for better or worse after watching them for two months? When will the Twins get back to where they were before 2011?

Lund: My expectations were that this team could win 70 games this season, and I don’t think that’s changed. The starting pitching needs to be better, starting with Ricky Nolasco, but calling up future ace Alex Meyer and fireballer Trevor May will help those of us looking towards the future – at least, once the Twins are bold enough to bring them both up. As for the offense, it’s good to have Josh Willingham and Oswaldo Arcia – a potential middle-of-the-order hitter in the future – back in the lineup. But I’m not sure there’s a lot of help to be had for the lineup unless a number of guys start contributing as we know they’re capable of contributing. There’s no denying that 2014 will still be a rough season for Twins fans, but it should be better than the last three summers. Which is a plus.

This organization went into a tailspin not just because of poor decisions at the Major League level (free agents and trades were almost universally awful following Terry Ryan’s departure after the 2007 season), but also because the Twins whiffed on half a dozen drafts in a row in the early to late 2000s. They netted no good starting pitchers and no offensive contributors better than replacement level between 2003 and 2008. Except Matt Garza. Who they traded.

Luckily, the Twins have done exceptionally well with their international signings in recent years, and their drafts since 2009 have been yielding significantly better results. The front office still needs to make some good, shrewd, difficult decisions over the next off-season or two, but if they can consistently make better decisions then this team can partner legitimate Major League talent with a fantastic farm system that is going to start producing some real studs. The aforementioned Meyer and Arcia, Eddie Rosario, Jose Berrios, Kohl Stewart, Jorge Polanco, and of course Byron Buxton and Miguel Sano … the good days are coming.

But the front office needs to do their part to make sure there’s talent around those guys when they arrive.

Blogs • Yankees

May 14, 2014

Subway Series 2014 Diary: Yankee Stadium

The Yankees lost the first two games of the 2014 Subway Series and have now lost six straight to the Mets, so let’s look at what went wrong in the Bronx.

The Rangers overcame a 3-1 series deficit to beat the Penguins and advance to the Eastern Conference finals and the Yankees lost two games in a row at home to the Mets and have now lost six in a row to the Mets going back to last year. Is it 2014? Is this real life?

Two years ago I did a Subway Series Diary for the Yankee Stadium portion of the rivalry to recap what I watched over the three-game series and I said:

I feel weird calling this a diary since I have never had a diary before. I remember in elementary school when we were forced to have a “journal” in one of those black-and-white Mead notebooks.

Well, here we go again.

MONDAY
With the Mets losing eight of their last nine and looking ripe for their annual free fall, I didn’t think there was a chance the 2014 Subway Series could go the way the 2013 Subway Series went. But when Monday started off with Mark Teixeira not being in the lineup due to “fatigue” and “tired legs” and the $23.5 million-per-year and $138,888-per game first baseman said, “I was on the bases a lot this week. Just a little tired. I’ll be fine,” doubt started to creep in. When the Mets took a 1-0 first inning lead and held that lead into the second and the Yankees loaded the bases with no one out only for Kelly Johnson and Brian Roberts to fail to drive a run in, the doubt grew larger. Then Brett Gardner saved Johnson and Roberts by hitting a grand slam to give the Yankees a 4-1 lead and I was relieved that order had been restored in the Subway Series. I thought “The Mets are the Mets” and started to think about winning three of four in the series, if not sweeping the series. And then the seventh inning started.

Alfredo Aceves’ second tour with the Yankees is going about as well as Javier Vazquez’s second tour with the Yankees went. Sure, Alfredo Aceves 2.0 is averaging 9.3 K/9 and 2.8 BB/9, but he’s ruined the last two games he pitched in (he blew Saturday’s game in Milwaukee and Monday’s game) and he’s only pitched in four games (he did pitch 5 1/3 scoreless innings against Tampa Bay on May 4 and maybe that’s the sign the Yankees need to put him in the rotation). But Aceves wasn’t the only wrong button that Joe Girardi pushed with a 7-5 lead and nine outs to go in the game. Here are the lines for the bullpen:

Alfredo Aceves: 0.2 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 2 K

Matt Thornton: 0.2 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 0 K

Preston Claiborne: 1.2 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 3K

Everyone loves to praise Girardi for how he uses his relievers and how he manages their workloads (he did a great job giving Mariano Rivera extended rest in his final season last year, so he could throw pitches to WFAN’s Craig Carton this week at Yankee Stadium), but Girardi’s biggest bullpen problem this season hasn’t necessarily been managing workloads as much as it has been determining who should pitch when. It’s not completely his fault since the entire league has dictated the idea of set bullpen roles, so that someone like David Robertson can no longer be the escape artist he once was when it comes to escaping jams for others. Because Robertson is the closer, he can now only escape his own jams. And that’s why Robertson was standing in the bullpen on Monday night ready to enter the game, but because it wasn’t the ninth inning and because the Yankees weren’t winning or the game wasn’t tied, he stayed in the bullpen watching the 2014 version of The Goof Troop light the game on fire like my great grandmother burning her trash in the backyard as if it were no big deal. If there are going to be set bullpen roles (and there are), then David Robertson pitches the ninth, Dellin Betances pitches the eighth and Girardi can mix and match the other innings and outs with his binder. That is the only acceptable pecking order after six weeks.

Even after watching the bullpen punch out early and after giving up nine runs, the Yankees had a chance to tie the game in the ninth with Derek Jeter on first with one out for pinch hitter … Mark Teixeira!

“All year long, they looked to him to light the fire, and all year long, he answered the demands, until he was physically unable to start tonight — with two bad legs.”

That’s how Vin Scully started his famous call of Kirk Gibson’s 1988 World Series home run and I thought Michael Kay might start to rattle something similar off, not because Kay likes to overdo it with drama more than any other baseball play-by-play man (which he does), but because it was nearly a miracle that hours after taking a seat on the bench due to tired legs, Mark Teixeira was hitting in the ninth.

And Teixeira got the job done with a single to right to put the tying run on base and the winning run at the plate in Brian McCann. But then McCann hit into the predictable game-ending double play and the Subway Series picked up right where it left off last May.

TUESDAY
For someone fighting for their job, Vidal Nuno basically did the equivalent of showing up to work an hour late wearing shorts and a T-shirt, streaming Netflix in your cube, taking a two-hour lunch, scrolling through Facebook pictures for the remainder of the post-lunch day and then accidentally forwarding an email containing a pornographic link to a company-wide list at 4:02 p.m. before leaving for the day. Nuno was given a golden opportunity to make a case that he could be a reliable starter in the rotation and replace Ivan Nova this year and also to throw his name in the mix for a spot in the rotation next year when Hiroki Kuroda leaves or if Nova still isn’t health. But Nuno has followed up every promising start with an A.J. Burnett-like egg and if it weren’t for CC Sabathia also landing on the disabled list, Nuno would probably be getting his seat back in the bullpen. Here is how Nuno has done over the last three weeks since joining the rotation:

April 20 at TB: 5 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 6 K

April 26 vs. LAA: 4.1 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 4 K

May 2 vs. TB: 4.2 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 3 BB, 2 K

May 7 at LAA: 6.1 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 3 K

May 13 vs. NYM: 3.1 IP, 4 H, 7 R, 5 ER, 4 BB, 1 K

Sean Henn would have been proud of Nuno’s performance on Tuesday night, letting the Mets hang a 4-spot before the Yankees could even bat for the first time and then continuing to let the Mets add on to their lead with the offense trying to erase the deficit. The problem isn’t just Nuno, it’s that the Yankees needed two starters to replace Nova and Michael Pineda and Nuno and David Phelps have proven to be coin flips in their short stints in the rotation. And now the problem is even bigger with Yankees asking Chase Whitley to take CC Sabathia’s spot in the rotation on Thursday. The last time someone named Chase started a game for the Yankees, I was sitting at Fenway Park wondering if I wanted to watch baseball ever again.

After watching Aceves blow Saturday’s game and then Monday’s game, there he was again on Tuesday being called upon to stop the bleeding and give the offense a chance to get back in the game and there he was again ruining a game. Aceves gave up four earned runs in 1 2/3 innings before handing off the ball to Matt Daley, who actually did his job this time after taking part in the April 19 disaster in Tampa Bay.

Standing between a four-game losing streak and a seven-game Subway Series losing streak is Masahiro Tanaka and I’m happy he’s standing there. Right now, Tanaka’s not only the one Yankees’ starter who can be trusted, he’s the only Yankees’ starter who can win.

Tag: Derek Jeter

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Subway Series 2014 Diary: Yankee Stadium