NEW YORK – With each swing and miss, each strikeout, soft groundball out and pop up, Red Sox hitters were coming up to the plate and heading back to bench - most of them looking as if they did not much of a chance.
Inning by inning went by and this familiar refrain continued. You could see the resignation on some Boston players that this would not be their day.
This is what CC Sabathia can do to an opposing team’s lineup.
He has been everything the Yankees could have ever hoped. The numbers he had put up over the last two seasons were gaudy, but no one knew how they would translate to pitching in pinstripes with all of fans and media scrutinizing every pitch he threw.
What you have seen in previous years is that some pitchers were afraid of this light and pitched worse because of it. The pressure became too much and when it would all be on the line, they would fall short of expectations.
So far, Sabathia has been anything but. He is a man who goes about his business as if no one else is around him. He steps on the mound and he is in office, punching his time clock and going to work. His task? To take the opposition down and eventually make them surrender.
It started out a little slow for him in April and part of May. Suddenly, he found his gear. Unlike the last three months when he pitched for Milwaukee, he was not going to put it numbers reminiscent of Bob Gibson in his prime. However, anything slightly above that would be just good enough.
When he gets the ball on his day to pitch, you feel comfortable with him. You feel as if the game is secure in his hands. You feel as if you are going to win because he is one starting that day. He possesses that ability and this season has gone out and showed why he is the pitcher that was given $161 million.
33 times, he has taken the ball. Sabathia has not missed a start this season. After his overpowering seven inning, one hit performance Saturday against the Red Sox, he has now thrown 227 1/3 innings, currently 26 less than last season when the Brewers, desperate for a playoff berth, pitched him on short rest (three days) four consecutive times. He is an innings eater and bullpen saver. Don’t worry about loosening men up in the sixth because he will take the ball all the way through eight (even nine) if needed.
Sabathia is a true ace. He has been a leader since the moment he arrived on the team and brought the pitching staff together. He comes across as genuine, adored by teammates.
If Zach Greinke weren’t pitching the best season from a starter since Pedro Martinez in 1999, Sabathia would be the leading candidate for the CY Young award. At 19-7 with a 3.21 ERA, those numbers are reminiscent of his award-winning season in 2007.
Unfortunately, for him the season did not end the way he wanted.
Sabathia struggled in his Division Series Game 1 start against the Yankees and was on the ropes before his Indians team bailed him out. In the League Championship Series, he was battered in Fenway Park in an opening loss to the Red Sox. Again, his team bailed him out and wound up winning the next three games and he was given a chance to pitch his team into the World Series at Jacobs (now Progressive) Field in Game 5. Again, he struggled and lost the game to Boston’s Josh Beckett, who pitched them back to Fenway and never allowed the Indians back in the series.
The League Championship, fairly or unfairly, will always rest in the hands of Sabathia, who had the opportunity in his hands and let it slip away.
Last year he clearly ran out of physical strength in his Game 2 start in Philadelphia as the Phillies pounded him and he was removed after four innings. These failures have given him the label as a playoff failure.
Now, on a team that has carried him as much as he has carried them this season, they eyes of the Yankee world will fixate on him as he takes the ball in Game 1 of the Division Series and beyond. It is on him to make amends for those prior performances and show that those were non-reflective of the pitcher that he is.
Over his last 11 starts this year, Sabathia is 9-0 with a 2.04 ERA. He has been on fire and has rendered most opponents lineups useless. If you have a good left-handed hitter, you are better off giving him the day off.
He has not been a pitcher who has feasted on bad hitting teams. Four times he has faced the Red Sox and three times he was won (it would have been four had the bullpen held a late inning lead). Pitching in Fenway Park or at Yankee Stadium has not mattered. There has been no such thing as “enemy territory” for him.
While he has aced all of the quizzes and homework assignments in the regular season, this has all been a buildup for this eventual final exam.
The true referendum on him is going to be made at that point; it will be on him to deliver.
If he fails again in the playoffs, he will have wiped away the goodwill he has gained this season.
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