In the first inning this afternoon, the Yankees looked to be on the verge of getting to Jose Contreras early. Derek Jeter opened the game with yet another hit, and Johnny Damon reached when Jayson Nix made an error. But Mark Teixeira and Alex Rodriguez both struck out, and Hideki Matsui flew out to left. For now, Contreras escaped unscathed.
At that point, the Yanks had gone just 1 for 10 over their last 10 ABs with runners in scoring position. The one, of course, was Robinson Cano‘s walk-off home run last night, but my frustrating was mounting. I e-mailed Joe and Mike: “A hit would be nice now and then.” Mike replied: “Mitre’s throwing a perfect game. They’ll only need one run.” Little did we realize how close to the truth that would be.
An inning later, with Mitre’s perfect game still in tact, the Yankee offense broke through against the former Yankee hurler. Nick Swisher singled, and Robinson Cano doubled. Jerry Hairston, filling in for a slumping Melky Cabrera, lined a two-run double into right-center field. Jose Molina walked, and then Derek Jeter frustratingly gave away an out on a sac bunt. Johnny Damon made the point moot with a two-run double of his own, and the Yanks had a 4-0 lead. They never looked back.
In every other inning, the Yankees plated runs today. Thanks to a pair of White Sox errors, they tacked on another four runs in the fourth as they knocked Contreras out after 3.1 ugly innings.
Mitre, meanwhile, was dealing. Into the fifth he went with a perfect game when Jim Thome scorched a ball toward Mark Teixeira. The sure-handed Yankee first baseman couldn’t pick up the short hop, and the ball went into right field for a double. It would have been a tremendous play by Teixeira, and as it stood, it was the only hit Mitre would surrender.
In the sixth, the Yanks added a ninth run as Robbie Cano plated Mark Teixeira with a two-out hit. The Yanks would ad their tenth and final run on an A-Rod home run in the 8th. He was, of course, just padding those gaudy August stats and now finds himself batting .269 with a .400 OBP and 23 home runs with a bad hip.
In the seventh, Mitre ran into a spot of bad luck. He walked Brent Lillibridge, and then A.J. Pierzynski lined a ball off of Mitre’s arm. While the Yanks’ righty recovered to record the out, he was quickly pulled from the game with a forearm contusion. X-Rays were negative, but it put a bit of a damper on a great start. Mitre threw first-pitch strikes to 15 of 21 hitters, and his sinker delivered 11 ground ball outs. It was vintage Sergio Mitre if one can say “vintage” about Mitre.
Chad Gaudin took over for Mitre and picked up right where Sergio left off. He threw 2.2 innings and allowed no hits. He walked one White Sox hitter and struck out four as the Yanks coasted to their Major League-leading 81st win of the season. They are 33 games over .500 for the first time since the end of the 2006 season, and their Magic Number is down to 28. Joba will look for the series sweep tomorrow at 1:05 p.m.
Ozzie is entertaining http://yankees.lhblogs.com/200.....nt-1011104
Or a buffoon. Does he really think that’s going to motivate his overrated team to perform better? I doubt it.
Yea, I’d hate to play for him.
I doubt it, too, but since I’m a fan and not a White Sox fan, I can enjoy it with no discernable consequence.
Hey Rebecca, you weren’t @ the game last night, were you?
I was not. Why do you ask?
I like Ozzie. He must have done something right because he DID win a WS in 05′.
Unless that wasn’t Ozzie managing. But I’m pretty sure it was.
I’m not sure it was all Ozzie that kept his 1-5 SPs healthy for the whole year.
Looks like he ran into some fortune in 05
So now Ozzi is only responsible when his team loses? Come on, that’s not fair. He was the Manager of a WS champion, give him credit.
if your team gets 1-hit by Mitre/Gaudin you should be embarassed
agreed
One hit off Mitre and Gaudin is embarrassing. Ozzie is telling it like it is. Girardi would have said it was an off night and those guys are Cy Young.
you are truly amazing in your contrarianism. it’s impressive, in a way.
Cashman won this game. Mitre, Gaudin, and Hairston all had great days.
I never thought Mitre could go so long with a perfect game and that a one-hitter would be thrown when only Gaudin and Mitre pitched.
Too bad Mitre couldn’t go deeper but hopefully he’s OK as he’s had a nice last 2 starts.
Did he win last nights game because he gave CC 160+ and signed Cano?
When does he not get credit for a win by this logic?
i am convinced you are just a script someone wrote to disagree with every post.
Outstanding. Props to Mitre for a game well-pitched. (Gaudin, too.) And the defense was spot-on. As for the offense, it was good to see 9 of the 10 runs were achieved w/o a HR.
And the beat goes on…
It is good to see the team score runs in a variety of ways. But without actually having looked at any stats on the issue, the argument that teams that hit a lot of homeruns will struggle in the playoffs seems quite spurious to me.
Think back on all those great Yankees championship teams. They may not have had many “sluggers”, but it sure seemed like they hit a lot of big homeruns in those playoff runs.
Frankly, I think teams with a bunch of guys who can hit a homerun is better of than team with maybe high BA guys who can steal bases. This is because you just aren’t going to get that many baserunners and rallies against great pitchers. But even the great ones can leave one or two pitches up over the course of a game. And that might be enough to win.
Classic example was a win we had against Verlander. He was on fire all game, but then A-Rod jacked one out to right. Yankees win 2-1.
I can see this team beating some great pitchers in the playoffs on the strength of one or two swings from their powerful bats.
This makes sense to me. If you get the same reduction in the chance of a single as in the chance of a HR then the chance of three singles drops a lot more than the chance of one HR.
Good point. Its nice to have a team full of guys with power who can hit home runs. The only players on this team not slugging over .500 are Jeter, Cabrera, Swisher and Molina. Both Hinske and Hairston are slugging over .500 since joining the Yankees. This team should have 8 players with 20 or more home runs.
And both Jeter and Swisher have more than 20 HR’s (Jeter not yet but he’s on pace for over 20), so even they have power.
Interesting tidbits:
Gaudin only needed 1 more out to earn a save
The ChiSox had 3 times as many errors as hits
A-rod has told UZR to go shove it multiple times this series
We are now 7 wins behind last year’s total
You forget one…The Yankees are the bomb.
Complete this sentence:
You can’t……
….allow Jeter to bunt??
I didn’t like the Jeter bunt, but as fans there is nothing we can do about this disagreement in baseball strategy.
we can continue to compile evidence against the utility of such a move, in the hopes that players, managers and coaches will realize that that was absolutely not one of the few situations in which bunting is wise.
However, major league teams like the Yankees already compile such information so your hope of changing their strategic thinking is probably minimized to no change.
this is one of times i would not be surprised if Jeter did that on his own.
and checking LoHud, i was right:
“Derek Jeter said he elected to bunt for a base hit during the Yankees’ four-run rally in the second inning.”
Jeter said after the game he was trying to bunt for a hit. Nothing wrong with that.
well, yeah there is. Unless you’re super speedy and/or lay down a perfect bunt, you’re probably going to get thrown out. If you’re derek Jeter, hitting .450 in the last few weeks, have already gotten a hit off the pitcher, and he’s struggling, AND he couldn’t throw strikes to JOSE MOLINA, you’re probably going to get a pitch you can drive. Or he’ll walk you too. Either way, increased odds of good things happening.
Jeter has a career bunt hit percent of 33%. Compared to a BABIP of .360, there’s really not much difference.
It’s Derek “I banged more stars than you’ve seen in astronomy class” Jeter! If he wants to bunt for a hit, let him. I think he’s earned the right for fans to say, “geez, he must have saw something or thought he could get away with one there.”
At least he got the sacrifice, eliminating the chance of the double play. It would have been worse had he popped out. I didn’t like the idea of the bunt, but he still had 3 hits in the game.
I agree but it’s too late now to dampen all small-ball cravings the Captain has every now and then.
Haven’t posted in a while, but I just want to say how much I love having Hairston on this team.
I second that. The Yankees better bring him back next year. It seems like every time Hairston plays he contributes with a hit, walk, or RBI that leads to a run. He’s been hitting .314 since joining the team.
He is a Tybe-B so far, so if he walks, at least we get something.
Don’t have the updated stats but coming into today, Hairston’s OPS+ as a Yankee was 149 and that should only go up with another double and walk today.
I think Cash is pulling all the right triggers. Mitre was a decent backup type pitcher. Had really bad outings but really all we need are innings and with each start I think he will get better as he becomes further removed from TJ surgery. Gaudin was a good move, he has had good outings all around and been a good long man to go to. Hairston has been the best utility guy the Yanks have had in a very long time and he has been hitting when it counts. Hinske has had some big home runs and missed a walkoff against the Red Sox when JD Drew made that catch. Tex, CC, and AJ have had solid first seasons, probably some of the best seasons free agents have had as Yankees and the bullpen of the Yankees has been shut down when it matters hence the 14-0 end of 7 innings and tied and like untouchable after leading for 7 innings. Cash has made the right moves at the right times, hopefully leading to #27.
Great outing by Mitre. He should get some love for what he did. While the White Sox have been struggling they do have an O that is good at times. Beckman probably will win the AL ROY.
Jeter said he was bunting to try and move the runners over and he didn’t care about he himself driving in the runs. I like that attitude
Great win
this is what he specifically said
My admiration for Jeter exceeds my loathing for bunts.
Thanks for sharing the quote!
Ok..we’ve got about 33 games left in the regular season. How many wins do you think the Yanks end up with?
I think I predicted either 98 or 99 wins before the season started (I don’t remember and I didn’t write it down). But write now it really is looking like we’ll break a hundred. Still, I’ll go with the over of my two picks and say 99 wins, enough for the division, on the idea that the Yankees can’t possibly keep this up forever.
100 wins would be sweet. Only 19 of those 33 games would have to be won for it to happen.
Isn’t it great when the biggest issue right now is whther or not the hottest hitter on the team should have tried bunting for a hit with men on first and second or swing away during a ten to nothing win where our fifth starter dominated?
A-fucking-men
More good news: I think that the Red Sox are throwing Paul Byrd against Roy Halladay.
If Halladay shows up, that’s sort of like the battle between a hammer and a nail. Guess which pitcher is which.
I had heard Jon Lester…don’t remember where though
Red Sox site says Byrd vs Halladay. Not only that, but Wakefield was scratched from his next start.
Improbable but great start for Mitre. Hopefully it’s the beginning of a hot streak for him…
With the way the Yanks are playing, why not keep Jorge out of the lineup one more day? Bring him back to start the series in Baltimore.
Any idea which of the veterans get to rest tomorrow?
Mitre was outstanding against the White Sox today and I hope he recovers fast. The Sox really helped the pitching out, last night with so many swinging strikes and today with hitting for easy grounders.
I’m just glad to see amazing results from Mitre after so many Yankee fans decided to hate his guts like he was Cody Ransom or something. No one could be as bad as that leper…
I hope CC and Mitre share with Joba how easy it is to get these guys out. No nibbling!
[...] Confidence Poll « Mitre, Gaudin one-hit White Sox in 10-0 blowout Aug [...]
Ha, I think it was Ben (Mike?) that said he wished he never had to see Mitre throw another the pitch for the Yanks, reflecting completely my opinion at the the time. Now I can’t wait until his next start…
Also, how do people think Gaudin would be as a full-time fifth starter? Let’s say AP retires (unlikely), or there are significant injuries (more likely) and Gaudin has to throw every fifth day next year. Could pitch in the 4.75 range in the ALE? He did in Oakland (big ballpark, but still). If so, that’s an insanely good pick-up by Cash. At the very least, I think the guy would be a quality reliever. He could go fastball-slider and be a shutdown BP arm.
I like Gaudin’s versatility. He was a successful reliever and decent starter. I expect him to pitch out of the bullpen the remainder of the year and next year. The best thing about him this year is his high K-rate.
Let’s not fall in love because Mitre had 6 good innings. Take a deep breath there
The two comments you responded to were about Gaudin. Why are you bringing up Mitre?
he smelled some positivity and needed to snuff that out.
Like i said yesterday, i really like mitre. I really hope for him to do very well.
Take a look at his post game interview, he sounded pretty proud of his outing but bummed he couldn’t finish it.
http://web.yesnetwork.com/medi.....id=6355935
This was maybe the most improbable game I’ve seen from Yanks pitching this year. Seriously, a great play from Teix and take away the injury and Mitre would’ve been perfect through 6.1 with a chance to go the distance! Would’ve been one of the most incredible/unlikely pitching performances in baseball history. To think that our #5 backup team of Mitre/Gaudin can one-hit a team like the White Sox just boggles my mind. In a year where Mo worked a walk, Swish k’ed a guy, Arod hit a first pitch back homer, and we’ve seen 3 walkoffs in a row, add a 1-hitter from replacement-level pitchers to the list. You have to love the 2009 New York Yankees.
What’s Mitre’s story? Was he a top prospect or something, who early on came up with a bad arm? His limited major league record is pretty ugly, and he’s about 28, iirc.
What’s the basis of the Yanks’ seeming confidence (signing him and using him) that he can be a competitive starter in the majors? Anyone know?
He had a nice run in spurts with the Marlins. I even had him on my fantasy team a few years back. He definitely has some upside. At best he could be a nice fourth starter or fifth starter for a contender if he keeps his sinker down.
Thanks for giving me the sense of it. Just like to know what’s up with the team in all it’s detail–an interest I’m sure all us fans share.
I am no great Robinson Cano fan, far from it. But I have to tell you. That play Cano made Saturday, ranging far to his right and throwing with complete authority across his body to Teixiera for the out; long-time Yankee gold glove second baseman Bobby Richardson cannot make that play. Then or now.
That play was insane. Cano is amazing me with his range this year. Plays like that defy UZR. I don’t think any other second baseman in the league can make that play.