Tagged: Alex Rodriguez
Thoughts at the All Star break
Now that the season is at it’s half way point this is a good time to voice my opinions on the season up to this point for the Yankees.
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Grandy needs to be Grander. At this point in the season Granderson is batting 30 points below his career average, and 9 points lower than last season. Curtis is on pace to hit 13 home runs this season which would be less than half of what he hit last season. Now I do understand that he was injured for a month of the season so let’s just hope he can pick it up and go on a tear in the second half.
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Brett Gardner = Most improved player in the Majors? Gardner’s average is 39 points higher than it was last season. He’s shown he has a little pop in his bat with 5 home runs. Including an inside the parker of course. Brett already has 25 stolen bases one shy of his last season total, but you can’t tell how improved he is just by the numbers. If you watch the way he hits this year compared to last year he goes the opposite way much more, and he hits the ball on the ground instead of upper cutting. This let’s him use his speed to his own advantage.
- Derek Jeter . . . Please come back! Jeter seems to be hitting a mid-season slump. Jete’s hitting SIXTY POINTS below what his average was at the end of last year, and he seems a bit lost at the plate. Hopefully the All Star break will turn things around for him. Remember Derek your an all star, now start hitting like one!
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Hopefully A-Rod won’t hit his usual mile stone slump. When Alex went for 500 it took him almost a month between #495 and #500. But it seems that A-Rod is a changed player since 2007 so hopefully this won’t happen again.
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Starters shining in the summer sun. Due to AJ’s resurrection, CC’s streak (Of 8 wins), Pettitte’s career season (and possibly last), Javy’s great pitching (But crappy run support), and Hughes’ hot start but cold summer.
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Red Sox slipping away. The AL east is turning into a two-team race between the Rays and Yanks. The Red Sox are now 5 games out of first. I know that they have more injuries than I can count on my fingers and toes, but five games is tough to overcome even without all of the injuries.
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Eight All Stars! Nice job Yankees on the 8 AS players (Even if Joe G had a bit to do with that) And Good Luck to Swisher in the Home Run Derby!
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May the second half be just as successful as the first half. LET’S GO YANKEES!
Countdown to 600 at 592
Yes with that swing Alex Rodriguez is now within eight home runs of the great and somewhat infamous 600 Home Run Club. This club is graced by the obvious Hank Aaron, Babe Ruth, Willie Mays, and the recently retired Ken Griffey Jr. but now this group is also graced occupied by almost the face of the steroid era Barry Bonds and it also includes Sammy Sosa. Both almost obviously were taking some kind of PED during their time. Now Alex Rodriguez will soon become a part of that group and hopefully evenutally become the all-time leader in homers passing Barry Bonds (Who is definitely my least favorite player ever!).
Well off of that subject! Now with Alex’s 9th homer of the season and a game with that homer and an RBI single hopefully he has finally broken out of this seemingly endless slump!!! That deserves a synchronized YAHOOOO!!! The Yankees may finally have both of their heavy hitters back to full force which will make the Yanks an even greater force in the AL east for the rest of the season.
Andy was his usual dandy self last night. He gave up 7 hits in 7 innings while walking two and only allowing two runs both of which were earned. Pettitte also struck out seven and this outing actually increased his ERA (By just .01) to 2.48 that just shows what a great year he’s had all season.
Six Yankees had RBI’s today (A-Rod had three). Every starter in the lineup for the Yankees got on base INCLUDING PETTITTE except poor Jorge, but Posada did do something he has not been known for in recent years and that is he threw out Justin Upton at second base for his sixth runner thrown out of the season. HIP HIP JORGE!
Yesterday I found it interesting that on the same day Alex Rodriguez hit his 592nd home run, which was his 2,600th hit and his 1,753rd RBI, Colin Curtis (The newest Yankee call-up) had his first hit which was a double in the eighth when he pinch hit for Pettitte and his first two RBI’s of his career. So Congratulations Colin! May there be many more where that came from (Maybe as many as A-Rod?)
PLAY OF THE GAME
It’s only appropriate that the play of this blow out would be Curtis’s first career hit. Once again Congratulations Colin!
Bench Burnett!
Last night the mighty Yankees (43-26) played the very lowly Diamondbacks (Last place in the weak NL West) with a record (27-43) almost mirroring the Yankees’. Going into this game at around 10 PM I thought it would be the easiest win for the Yanks all season. . . . I was wrong. Here is a brief review of what went down yesterday. . .
The first Home Run of many given up by A.J. Burnett
This was a solo blast by Justin Upton
The second Homer on the night a three-run bomb by Adam LaRoche
OH! and how could I forget Upton’s second homer of the game!? This time it was a 3-run blast into left field, after being hit with a pitch in his last at bat!
This game was basically like watching the Texas Chainsaw Massacre in slow-motion while being forced to eat my mother’s home-made cooking (sorry mom). It was a horrible game to watch. For the team on the other hand it wasn’t all that bad. Without Burnett in the game only three runs were given up and all of them scored on one swing from Justin Upton. The offense wasn’t awful as it was just last week against the Phillies. A-Rod had two very well hit balls including an RBI double, Gardner, hitting .324 on the season, went four for four including three infield singles with his 23rd stolen base and two runs scored, and Swisher and Posada both hit balls that would have been home runs in Yankee Stadium. Swisher’s went for a triple and Posada had to settle for a Sac Fly.
There was even some flashy defense today for the Yanks with two very nice plays by none other than Mark “Gold Glove” Teixeira and a Diving catch by Curtis “Gardner Should Actually be Playing Center” Granderson.
Granderson’s great grab in Center
Now to the Burnett dilemma. A.J. was very good through May with a 3.28 ERA, maybe not Cy Young but I would take a pitcher like that any day. Now after four starts in June his ERA has steadily risen to just shy of 5 with a 4.83. In June alone his ERA was a hefty 10.35 with 9 Home Runs allowed and leaving the game before the fifth twice.
With those numbers A.J. should be sitting here more often
Now with the news of the Yankees skipping Hughes’s next start I’m pretty worried about this week. With the Red Sox and Rays within half a game of the Yankees this is not the time to skip your ace in the rotation, Girardi!
So now all we can hope for is at least 2 straight wins to take this series and then at least 2 out of 3 in LA vs. good ol’ Joe Torre!
Blowout in the Bronx
After last night’s dramatics tonight was a nice change of events. Yankees scored 10 runs in total in their offensive breakout. But the biggest story of the night was Sergio Mitre’s best performance of the year. He went 6.1 innings giving up just 1 hit, yeah 1 HIT!!!
Michael Kay obviously jinxed the perfect game and no hitter when, after the 4th inning, he said “Mitre has a perfect game after 4”. Yeah people say that isn’t actually “jinxing it” but after today I think it’s a proven fact. JIm Thome then gave smashed a ground ball down the first base line which Mark Teixeira actually almost had. Then after an out in the seventh AJ Pierzynski lines a ball right at Mitre which hit him in the right fore arm right below the elbow, and at first he seemed fine but Gene Monahan and Joe Girardi weren’t taking any chances and automatically pulled him out of the game.
The offense was on fire! Every player in the lineup with 2 at-bats or more scored a run. It seems that even with Posada out of this lineup the Yanks can still produce.
Yankees have reached a high-point in the season at 33 games over .500 and now the Red Sox elimination number is down to 28 by the end of the day it could be 27 if the Jays beat Buchholz and the Sox tonight. Thats a very, very nice, low number with 33 games left in the season for both teams (34 counting today). Let’s say the Red Sox lose today just for kicks. So even if the Yankees just go at a .500 win % clip from this day on meaning they win 16 more games. That means that the Red Sox would have to lose just 10 the rest of the season which would be a .706 winning percentage which would be 130 points higher than their current percentage that would be unheard of. I am almost posite now that the Yankees have the division for the most part clinched. MMM smell that? That’s the smell of October baseball otherwise known as PLAYOFFS! Fellow Yankee fans get ready to be reintroduced to an old friend.
That’s right Yankees Playoffs are on the way!
PLAY OF THE GAME
Scott Podsendnik missed attempt on a sinking line drive by Robinson Cano put runners on second and third in the second inning and set the table for Jerry Hairston to score them both on his RBI double which started the scoring for the Yankees in the game.
Perfect Pettitte
Ok well maybe I exaggerated a little he wasn’t “perfect” but it seemed that way. Yes he gave up a run in the 5th and another in the 7th but the seventh was a quick, easy, and painless inning for the most part the 5th hurt a little more, but no pain no gain.
Today’s game was so much different than last night’s. For instance last night the pitching was. . . well to put it lightly the pitching sucked. Today the game was dominated by our pitching especially Andy. But then again some of our pitching had a hard time getting outs or at least one did . . . **cough**bruney**cough cough**
Jack Nicholson and I shared the same face when Bruney came into the game.
I guess I much rather Girardi bring Bruney in during blowouts like today than 1-0 games at the end of September. Cano made another play that made me want to hit the computer screen today when he dropped a cut-off throw which gave the Rangers an easy run by not making the throw home, but all is forgiven because for 1 the run probably would have scored anyways and 2 he went 2-4 with a run scored.
In fact every player with an at bat reached base at least once and the only player without a hit was Melky who reached on an error. 
That explains Derek Hollands frustrations for the night!
With the Sox winning AGAIN and the Yankees beating the Rangers the Yankees still have a 6 game lead and the Sox have a 2.5 game lead on Texas. Beating the Rangers makes me feel pretty bad because they are the main contenders with the Sox for the Wild Card and with us beating them we are actually HELPING the Red Sox, which is horrible, but the Yankees winning is amazing so I don’t care that much.
During the game two key players for the Yankees had injury scares:
A-Rod – Hit a foul ball off his toe in his at bat in the seventh and then dropped to the ground in pain, making Gene Monahan come racing out of the dug out, but after a brief chat it seemed that it was just a small scare.
Posada – Was it with a foul tip which was more like a foul line drive! His glove hand was hit with this foul ball and it was forced backwards causing him to wince in pain and walk around a little, giving Monahan some more exercise time. He jogged out of the dugout and looked at Posada’s hand. Looked like a typical catcher’s injury you get hit, rub some dirt on it, and its all fine again, but oddly enough Posada was forced to leave the game which forced Molina to get his jogging in as well running all the way from the bullpen to the dugout (That took a while)
Both of these players will be key in the Yankees play off run!!! I hope neither affects them in ANY way at all or else it could spell disaster for the Bombers. Happy Healings Posada and A-Rod!
PLAY OF THE GAME
Jorge Posada’s 2nd inning 3-run homer jump-started the offense in the game.
Close but not close enough
Yesterday was not great for Joba, he had a terrible inning and another so-so one in his 4 innings of work. Then Chad Gaudin gave up another 3 runs all earned in his 3.2 innings.
In the ninth inning the Yankees came within a run of tying the game! It was exciting until the last blown call by the umpire. The Rangers shortstop, Elvis Andrus, caught the liner hit by Melky then doubled off Ramiro Pena on a clear missed call by the second base umpire.
Joba has been absolutely terrible in his last two starts and hasn’t been on his best game in all of August. This is really worrying me because going down the stretch if we only have AJ and CC as pitchers that are dependable we are not in good shape! With Andy, Joba, and Gaudin/Mitre you never really know whats going to happen especially with the Gaudin and Mitre. The Red Sox are picking up steam as we are finishing out the season and I don’t want them to have momentum in their favor when the playoffs start, nobody does really! Hopefully all will be sorted out today when the Yanks play the Rangers again!
Godzilla Strikes Again!
Wow that was NOT what I expected at all! But the Yankees won and that’s all that matters to me and this is how it happened:
Yesterday, Matsui had his second multi-homer game in this series. This time they were just solo-shots but it’s still amazing. Those two were of five the others coming from Derek Jeter which came on the first pitch of the game, Robby Cano, and A-Rod with a man first.
Matsui connects with the first pitch in the second for his first homer.
Cano is congratulated after his solo homer.
A-Rod hits his 2-run homer.
Matsui’s second homer of the night in the 8th inning
Five Homers is the most homers Beckett has ever given up in one game in his career. In total he gave up 8 runs all earned. He’s only given up 8 runs twice this year and both times were against the Yankees.
CC had a great game he went 6.2 innings and gave up 3 earned, 8 K’s, no walks, and 8 hits. Not his best by any means but I’ll take it when we get 5 homers off Beckett. But our defense was pretty sloppy, or at least Cano was, he made 2 errors one on a terrible call on a pop up. He called off Teixeira then promptly missed it! That was pathetic and his terrible defense of late has destroyed his gold glove chances if he ever had any.
But other than those bad plays it was an AMAZING game the Yankees are now 7.5 games up in the Division. This series went nothing like I thought it would I thought we’d win the first 2 in complete blowout fashion, on that I was half correct. And I thought the last game would be a pitchers duel ’till the end. . . and I was wrong again. But winning is wayyy better than my predictions so THANK YOU Yankees for a great series.
PLAY OF THE GAME
Jeter’s lead off homer (21st of his career) put the momentum in the Yankees favor and it would stay there for the rest of the game.
Blowout in Beantown
The score says pretty much all you need to hear 20-11 Yankees win. If you interpret the score correctly it means that our pitching sucked but their’s was even worse. Although neither team put their best pitchers out there which is probably the true reason for the bloated score. I mean c’mon Joe wouldn’t have put Mitre into a game with the Sox unless it was a total massacre, he also wouldn’t have kept Bruney in the game after loading the bases then walking in a run. And I’m pretty sure Francona wouldn’t have put that Bowden guy into a close game either. But all excuses aside for both team WE won and WE crushed them.
Pettitte did not pitch well at all but he pitched well enough to pick up the W
Pettitte started for the Yankees and gave up 7 runs 5 earned in 5+ innings of work. I think he caught a bad break when that ball dropped between Hinske and Melky that should’ve been an error, no doubt in my mind, but instead they charged Pettitte with another ER and it was the final pitch he threw in the game.
I am very, VERY happy that Mr. Godzilla was able to return to the Yankees! Last night he was the guy who snapped Boston’s back. The Yankees sure have a way of hitting homers off of Red Sox rookies! Earlier this month A-rod hit a walk off homer off of Junichi Tazawa the Japanese imported pitcher. Then last night Matsui hits his first homer of the game vs. recently called up Michael Bowden. Hopefully this trend will continue into today’s game when Tazawa takes on AJ Burnett.
There were some interesting facts about this game other than it was a complete beatdown:
1. Last night’s game ws the highest combined scoring game in a Yankees/Red Sox matchup ever. With 31 runs scored.
2. It was the first triple hit by A-rod since May 31, 2006.
3. Every player on the Yankees with at least 2 AB’s had an RBI, a hit, and a run. That is amazing!
The ONLY bad thing happening yesterday is the Rangers lost which means the Sox keep their 1.5 game lead in the Wild Card. But beating the Rangers was the Rays who are now just 3 games behind the Sox in the Wild Card!
PLAY OF THE GAME
Matsui’s second homer of the game making the score 19-7
Yanks win last game of long road trip
Yesterday’s game was great. For one the Yankees won, Chad Gaudin did not pitch like himself in a good way, Teixeira had an amazing game getting all three of the Yankees RBI’s (two on a home run), and Jeter had his 5th multi-hit game in a row.
Chad Gaudin left a bit of a situation to the Bullpen but our savior Ace got out of the jam with a 1-2-3 DP almost identical to the one A-Rod hit into a couple nights ago. At the end of the game Rivera picked up his 36th save making the final score 3-2 in the Yankees favor.
The lead over the Sox is still at 7 with them beating the Jays 6-1. It seems like Ortiz is back on the rice and beans of late with his sudden surge of homers. Sadly the Red Sox seem to have found there groove and are just as hot as the Yankees lately but hopefully that will all change when the Yankees make themselves at home at Fenway.
Tonight the Sox have a chance to move a half game up in the Division since we are idle today. But even if they sweep the next series that would still leave the Yanks 3.5 games up which is AWESOME! All I can hope for is that we sweep the series at fenway putting us up 9.5 or 10.5 games. Sounds pretty good to me!
PLAY OF THE GAME
Teix’s 2-run blast in the 4th making the score 3-0 and putting up his 2nd and 3rd ribbies of the night. He was all the offense the Yankees needed for their 3-2 win.
Late inning dramatics save the series
Another day another win in the record books. But today we didn’t need back to back homers to win it we just needed a hero and he was none other than . . . . . . . . . . . (Drum roll please)
This guy! Yeah that’s right Robinson Cano. First he hit a homer in the 4th to put the Yanks ahead by 2 then he hit the game winning double in the bottom of the eleventh to score A-rod and win the game and the series for the Yankees. The Yankees also got help from the hot hitting Johnny Damon with a solo shot (His 22nd homer of the year) in the third to put the Yanks ahead for the second time of the game. Johnny is on pace to surpass his career high in homers which is 24 set in ’06 with the bombers. And Cano is two homers away from passing his mark of 19 in 2007. But the Red Sox won as well beating the Tigers 8-2 in their 3 game series. Which made me feel like this dude. . .
The is now obviously a two team race between the Sox and the Yankees. Seeing that my predictions were wrong and Boston ended up taking the first to games in their series vs. the Tigers I’m going to restrain myself from any more predictions until i feel comfortable about the division. Soooo it could be a while. Now what i want is for Big CC to come up big tomorrow against the M’s and newly acquired Ian Snell.
So for now and always-
Thoughts from a teenage Yankees fan 