All-Star mayhem in The Bronx

I just couldn’t pass up the chance to chronicle the final game that will matter in Yankee Stadium’s history. New York’s starting rotation is so poor that there’s no way they can make a deep run in the postseason this year, leaving the All-Star game as the last highlight (I hope).
Anyway, fresh off my trip to upstate New York (and several brain cells lighter), let’s get back into the blogosphere.
Pregame – This is all going to be lumped together, mostly because I can’t stand pregame pomp and circumstance. Just a few notes:
-- Alex Rodriguez needs to get a clutch hit in a big game before he can wear those white cleats and be taken seriously. Only the game’s great players can wear those and not look like pretentious assholes morons.
-- Frank Robinson looks like he could grab a bat and pinch-hit in this game. Tony Gwynn looks like he could grab Frank Robinson and try to eat him.
-- Seeing Wade Boggs in a Yankees’ hat reminds me what a selfish bastard he was his whole time in Boston, a man more obsessed with hitting singles and winning batting titles than hitting for power and helping the Red Sox win games with his production.
-- Nice try, New York, attempting to replicate Ted Williams’ magical ride into Fenway Park during the 1999 All-Star game by wheeling in an ailing George Steinbrenner from center field. Not one current or former player went up to Steinbrenner’s cart to greet him, far from the group embrace that Williams received in 1999, and it’s probably a good thing – Dave Winfield might have tried to strangle his former Boss.
-- Did the Yankees’ players get booed like this in Boston in 1999? Leave it to The Bronx to put the ‘ass’ in ‘class’.
-- I can’t stand Joe Buck’s smarmy nature, but Tim McCarver is worse. Let the Derek Jeter taint waxing begin.
8:48 – McCarver doesn’t take long to make a fool of himself. He claims that Cliff Lee struck out the game’s first batter, Hanley Ramirez, with a cut fastball in on the hands. Lee’s pitch was right down the middle. Stay hot, Tim.
8:56 – Ben Sheets is filthy. Those two curveballs he threw to Josh Hamilton were borderline unfair. How good would this guy be if he could stay off my All-DL Team (more to come in a future column)?
8:59 – Was there any doubt that A-Rod would pop up with a runner in scoring position? Not in New England – inning over.
9:11 – Manny Ramirez just earned himself two weeks on the DL after swinging over the top of another disgusting Sheets curveball. No doubt some sort of back strain will be invented by Boston’s Village Idiot if This Manager does something that Manny doesn’t feel Manny agrees with.
9:24 – It doesn’t seem like Yogi Berra wants to be in the booth with Buck and McCarver very much. Always knew that Yogi was a much wiser man than he let on.
9:26 – Doesn’t FOX have a sound technician on this broadcast? Berra’s old voice is much lower than Buck’s squealing, and they keep drowning the old guy out. I’d love to hear more of what he’s saying, like that crack he just made about Sarah Jessica Parker not looking too bad. Classic stuff.
9:38 – As if Roy Halladay wasn’t dirty enough already, now Mariano Rivera is going to teach him the cutter? That clip from battling practice on Tuesday that FOX just showed should be frightening to the rest of American League. Halladay is tough enough to hit without the best closer in the history of baseball teaching him his famous out pitch.
9:40 – I don’t care that Albert Pujols was safe at second – Ichiro has an absolute cannon. Pujols should have know better than to try to stretch a single into a double with Ichiro less than 250 feet from the bag.
9:49 – Never knew that a fat tub like Carlos Zambrano could move that quickly. I guess Milton Bradley didn’t know anything about it either, because he just got picked off first base with a two-step lead.
9:54 – Ervin Santana’s 97-mph fastball wasn’t all that impressive to Matt Holliday. He just crushed a ball into the right field bleachers that could have broken someone’s hand. 1-0, NL.
10:01 – Here’s how brilliant Billy Beane is. My parents can’t understand how Danny Haren has been traded twice if he started the All-Star game for the AL last season and is back in the game with the NL this year. They don’t understand that Beane dealt Mark Mulder to St. Louis for Haren and watched Mulder’s shoulder explode. They also don’t see the glut of prospects that Beane stole from the Arizona Diamondbacks, including current Oakland A’s Dana Eveland, Carlos Gonzalez and Greg Smith. The lesson here is to never make a trade with Billy Beane and expect to get the better end of the deal, no matter how good the player he’s sending you looks.
10:10 – There’s no way that Jeter was going to be called out on strikes when Haren’s 2-2 fastball hit the outside corner. It was only justice that Jeter grounded back to the box on the next pitch, stranding two men instead of singling in the tying run from second. Still 1-0, NL.
10:15 – McCarver puts his foot in his mouth yet again, proclaiming Justin Duchscherer’s hanging curveball to Ramirez the worst pitch of the night. All Ramirez did was line a single to left field – Holliday crushed Santana’s fastball down the dick into the bleachers for the game’s lone run in the top of the fifth. Perhaps that might have been worse.
10:31 – Hamilton really is the total package. He just stole second on a play that wouldn’t have been close even if Los Angeles Dodgers’ catcher Russell Martin had made a good throw. I think I already saw Hamilton on television today – I was watching ‘The Natural’ on Bravo.
10:41 – Where’s Ronan Tynan to sing ‘God Bless America’ during the seventh inning stretch? Major League Baseball has Josh Groban performing instead. Guess we only get Tynan’s 5-minute version of the song in the postseason when New York wants to freeze an opposing starting pitcher in the 42-degree chill of an October night in the Northeast. Besides, the NL is bringing in a reliever.
10:49 – Thrilled that This Manager spared Jason Varitek the indignity of looking foolish against Edinson Volquez and his electric array of stuff. Let Dioner Navarro look stupid hacking at that change-up. Varitek can stay on the bench and admire a guy who looks like someone he used to catch – Volquez is Pedro Martinez 2.0.
10:51 – Sure enough, that tailing fastball at 95-mph caught Volquez standing and watching. He had absolutely no chance.
10:53 – J.D. Drew just went deep against Volquez?! A two-run homer to tie the game at 2-2 after seven?! I haven’t had any beers tonight…this must really be happening! And Drew was cheered as he rounded the bases. Wow. Memo to Major League pitchers – do not throw Drew belt-high fastballs. They’re the only pitches he can hit.
10:57 – Dilemma time for This Manager: When to use Rivera? He’s only throwing one inning, and it’s a 2-2 game into the eighth. Jonathan Papelbon is in now, likely for only one inning. Do you pray for the AL to score in the eighth and have Rivera close in the ninth? Do you go to Rivera in the ninth and use him in the 10^th to close, a two-inning appearance? Do you gamble that it goes into the 10^th and hold him out through the ninth, risking a walk-off homer and leaving Rivera in the bullpen? Yikes. No way This Manager can get this one right.
10:59 – And the Yankee fans again show their idiocy, chanting ‘Mariano’ and ‘Overrated’ at Papelbon. If he fails, Rivera’s role in this game will be meaningless. They should STFU and pray that Papelbon can throw a scoreless inning.
11:02 – This is karma…one of the Yankees’ old farmhands, Navarro, throws the ball into center field, allowing Miguel Tejada to steal second and race to third on the error. Tejada, who reached on a broken-bat single, scores easily on a sacrifice fly to center by San Diego’s Adrian Gonzalez, and the NL takes a 3-2 lead. Now Rivera is at the mercy of the AL offense and the NL bullpen if he wants to throw a relevant inning.
11:19 – And yet again, This Manager is bailed out by his players. Tampa Bay’s young star, Evan Longoria, bangs a hanging slider from the Mets’ Billy Wagner into left for a ground-rule double that scores Cleveland’s Grady Sizemore from second. Wagner allowed Sizemore to steal second on the previous pitch, a stupid move that permitted the tying run to advance into scoring position. Now Rivera can throw the ninth and get the win if the AL can score in the bottom of the inning, saving This Manager from an awful postgame grilling.
11:23 – This Manager refuses to get it right!!! The AL offense threw him a life raft to get Rivera in the game, and now K-Rod comes in!? I hope someone from the AL’s sorry offense hits a walk-off homer in the bottom of the ninth and Rivera is left sitting. Then maybe This Manager will be nationally exposed for the fraud that he is.
11:27 – Brad Mills must have finally located his TASER and informed This Manager that Rivera was still out in the bullpen. The move is finally made with one out in the ninth, and Rivera will be forced to hold Washington’s Cristian Guzman at first to keep it a tie game. The real drama will come if this game goes into extra innings.
11:32 – Navarro atones for his earlier mistake, completing a strike ‘em out, throw ‘em out double play to end the ninth. If only the fat slob had done the same thing in the eighth, that would have been a save for Rivera. Something tells me that Papelbon will take all the blame, but it’s far from just his fault.
11:35 – Anybody else remember Ryan Dempster as a closer? I don’t like the NL’s chances here.
11:40 – Is this really Dempster? A filthy slider to strike out Texas’ Ian Kinsler and 96-mph heat to fan Navarro? Yikes.
11:42 – There’s the Drew we all know and love…getting ahead 3-1 and striking out with the bat on his shoulder. That’s about right. On to the 10^th. Someone find Bud Selig and handcuff him to a lamppost somewhere outside the stadium so that he can’t declare the game a tie.
11:48 – Rivera is still the gold standard of closers, even at 38 years old. That cutter is lethal, sawing off Pittsburgh’s Nate McClouth on a pitch inside before darting over the backside of the plate on the next pitch for a called third strike.
11:51 – Back-to-back singles by Los Angeles’ Russell Martin and Tejada have runners at first and third with one out and Rivera on the verge of giving up the go-ahead run. This is right out of a dream that I had last night, just after the one where the All-Star game got rained out this year.
11:53 – Damn it! Florida’s Dan Uggla grounds into a double play, unlikely for a guy who swings and misses so much. Uggla could have just struck out like he frequently does and kept the potential winning run at third, but no…Rivera is spared the embarrassment and still has a shot at a win.
11:57 – Is Uggla being paid off by the Yankees? I know Florida has no money, but no amount of cash should be enough to get an alleged All-Star to make two straight errors on ground balls by Texas’ Michael Young and Chicago’s Carlos Quentin and gift Rivera and the AL a chance to win it. Now Colorado’s Aaron Cook has no choice but to walk Detroit’s Carlos Guillen and load the bases.
11:59 – Even if Sizemore gets a hit here, is there any chance Rivera isn’t the game’s MVP? Why let the fact that Sizemore scored the tying run and (potentially) drove in the winning run get in the way of the story? This is obviously a rhetorical question – I hate that this will happen.
12:01 – Uggla makes up for it a little bit by fielding Sizemore’s grounder and throwing to the plate for the inning’s first out. Longoria is up. See Sizemore’s scenario above and replace his name with Longoria’s, but change ‘scored the tying run’ to ‘drove in the tying run’.
12:05 – Longoria bounces harmlessly to Guzman at third, creating another force at the plate, and Justin Morneau’s slow roller to short turns into a great play by Tejada. 3-3 into the 11^th, and Rivera is out of the decision and the MVP talk. Now I’m actually rooting for Drew to come up with some sort of walk-off hit, steal the MVP and allow Boston’s new baseball dynasty to be booed off the field.
12:08 – FOX is showing Selig in his luxury box, plotting to ruin another All-Star game. Quick note, Bud – this is New York, not Milwaukee. Call this one a tie and there will be a riot. That’s not an exaggeration.
12:16 – Kansas City’s Joakim Soria retires the NL in the 11^th and Kinsler singles to open the bottom of the inning. Drew is on deck with Navarro up. Please let Drew get to the plate with a chance to do damage. Please let it happen…
12:18 – This Manager gets it all wrong again. He abandons the bunt and Cook pitches out, hanging Kinsler out to dry while trying to steal second. Of course Navarro walks on five pitches and Drew singles to center. Had the bunt still been on, Drew’s hit would have scored Kinsler from second and ended the game.
12:22 – Young singles to center, and Navarro gets hosed at the plate by McLouth to save the game. Had This Manager saved a bench player to run for Navarro like he said he was going to do before the game, this one would be over. Instead of Guillen scoring easily, Navarro was a dead duck and this game will go on.
12:25 – Quentin grounds to third and we’re on to the 12^th tied at 3-3. Selig just broke into a cold sweat.
12:28 – Now the NL puts the first two men on in the 12^th thanks to a leadoff walk by St. Louis’ Ryan Ludwick and a drag bunt by McClouth. Martin’s sacrifice puts a pair of runners in scoring position with one out, fine fundamental baseball that This Manager never mastered during his four-year stint in Philadelphia. No wonder why he was fired so quickly, and why his AL team couldn’t execute in the 11^th.
12:30 – Tejada draws a walk to load the bases and it’s Uggla’s chance to prove he belongs in this game after grounding into a double play in his previous at-bat and making two errors in the field.
12:32 – So much for that. Uggla swings at a pitch over his head, takes a fastball down the dick and gets his knees buckled by Soria’s disgusting curveball. Two outs and here comes Baltimore’s George Sherrill to try to finish the inning.
12:36 – Sherrill strikes out Gonzalez on three straight pitches, bailing out This Manager once again. Unbelievable. The AL will no doubt score here and allow This Manager to keep Tampa Bay’s Scott Kazmir, his final pitcher in the bullpen, out of the game like he promised he would. Then again, he also said he wouldn’t play Guillen…oops.
12:39 – Right on cue, Guillen doubles to left to lead off the 12^th. Unreal. Sizemore grounds to second (Uggla kicks the ball before recovering and throwing to first), moving Guillen to third, and Longoria is back in position to win the game’s MVP (see above at 12:01).
12:42 – Longoria hasn’t seen a two-seamer like that in the minors. Cook just dropped a pitch right on Longoria’s ankles for a swinging third strike and Morneau is being walked so that Cook can face Kinsler. We’re dangerously close to a 13^th inning and Selig is ready to start drinking some of those Miller products that built his park in Milwaukee.
12:45 – Kinsler grounds out to third and we head to the 13^th still tied at 3-3. Someone tranquilize Selig right now before he can do something damaging like flip a coin for home field advantage in the World Series.
12:52 – Kazmir is the lone AL pitcher left, and he threw 104 pitches on Sunday. The NL has Chicago’s Carlos Marmol, Philadelphia’s Brad Lidge and Arizona’s Brandon Webb (108 pitches on Sunday) left in the bullpen. Which manager organized his staff better here?
1:00 – There’s a hat trick that Uggla didn’t want and a record he didn’t want to set…his third error of the game after making just six during the regular season. You’ve got to wonder as a Marlins’ fan what this will do to him defensively for the rest of the season – this is, if there are any Marlins’ fans out there.
1:05 – Marmol strikes out Quentin to end the 13^th as the game soldiers on. I think Selig has awakened from his injection and is about to field a call from Tampa manager Joe Maddon when This Manager, Maddon’s division rival (or so the Rays think), puts in the Tampa ace against the wishes of his organization. That next series between the Red Sox and Rays should be fun.
1:10 – Sherrill gives up a couple of deep flys in the 14^th, but it’s a 1-2-3 inning and we’re even closer to Kazmir coming into this game. Selig’s phone is ringing and Maddon is screaming so loudly on the other end that Selig must be shaking off the effects of that shot by now.
1:12 – Here comes Webb to pitch the 14th, a sure sign that NL manager Clint Hurdle wants Lidge to close the game for the NL if it takes a lead in the top of one of these innings. This game officially just entered dangerous territory and will boil over when Kazmir starts the next inning, two pitchers on borrowed time squaring off in a game that is supposed to mean something but, in reality, still is a joke the way Selig and his cronies still allow the fans to pick the starters and every team to be represented regardless of a worthy candidate. But I digress...
1:26 – Kazmir easily works his way through the 15^th, but he’s clearly on borrowed time. This can’t last much longer thanks to This Manager’s brilliant usage of some of his staff – Lee (20 pitches), Joe Saunders (12), Halladay (9), Santana (20), Duchscherer (22), starters all, threw less pitches in this game than closers like Rivera (26), Soria (30) and Sherrill (25). Well done.
1:32 – Hurdle brings Lidge into the game, a bit of a surprise, and he allows the AL to put the winning run into scoring position on Morneau’s single and Navarro’s one-out hit. No way Drew can deliver this time, can he?
1:36 – Here comes the Lidge meltdown in a pressure spot. He walks Drew to load the bases. Somewhere Pujols, he of the 2004 bomb off Lidge in the NLCS, is smiling.
1:37 – Young flies to medium depth right field, allowing Morneau to tag and barely slide in safely with the winning run. Another year, another win for the AL, and yet another bail out for This Manager by his players.
1:46 – The Apocalypse has arrived!!!! Drew wins the MVP!!!!! Bury the old Yankees’ dynasty. Bury it where it stands in a hole at West 161 St. This is the ghost of Ted Williams coming back to haunt New York. Add one more chapter to the reverse of The Curse and close the book on the old dump in The Bronx.