NEW YORK –Honestly, Brett Gardner is never going to scare an opponent when he comes to the plate.
When a starting pitcher goes through the Yankee lineup, they probably feel as if they running the equivalent of a gauntlet.
For them, they see Gardner as a chance to get one of the few outs they can.
It is with this thinking that gets them in trouble.
He may have the gaudy talent and lifetime numbers as the other members of the lineup, but it is something he can use to his advantage as pitchers underestimate his ability.
On Sunday in the bottom of the second inning, White Sox starter Mark Buehrle gave up a two-run double to Robinson Cano, but got the next two men out. This brought Gardner to the plate in a lefty-lefty matchup that favorer the veteran Chicago left-hander.
Gardner though would hang in there; driving in a run on a ball that Paul Konerko could not range far enough for as the Yankees jumped on top 1-0.
Now it was the fourth inning. Buehrle escaped possible damage the third when with the bases loaded; Jorge Posada’s bullet line drive to left was caught by Juan Pierre to end the inning, keeping the score close.
This time, he could look at the three hitters coming up and his mind, feel as if he could take a breather. Marcus Thames, Brett Gardner and Ramiro Pena were certainly no “Murderers Row”.
With one out, Gardner came up.
This time, he would work the count to 3-2. Well known for his incredible speed, the last thing Buehrle wanted to do was walk him considering he is among the best at pounding the strike zone. Walking him would be like surrendering a double with his ability to steal bases.
Knowing this, Gardner saw a fastball in the middle of the plate, almost as if Buehrle was daring him to hit his way on base.
He did. With a good swing, he drove the ball out to right field and into the seats for the home run to give the Yankees a 2-0 lead. It was his first homer since late June when he hit one out of cavernous Citi Field.
It was simply a continuance of surprise performance in the early season for the Yankee outfielder. After starting the season as the everyday left fielder, a groin injury to Curtis Granderson has moved him back to centerfield for at least several weeks, assuring he will be in the everyday lineup.
After questions about whether can play and sustain his level of play of a season’s worth at bats, Gardner in the season’s first month is answering all questions. After his 2-for-4 performance in the Yankees 12-3 rocking chair victory, he upped his average to a hefty .342 (25-for73). Factor in his outstanding defense in the outfield, and to this point, Gardner has been an unmitigated success.
On a team filled with stars, he is showing that you do not need to have a future Hall of Fame player at every position. Each squad needs a group of gritty players that overachieve, produce, and in turn, spark the rest of the roster.
When Gardner came back to the bench after that homerun, you could see the rest of the team embracing him. For the little man, getting a hold of one is no small feat. At most, he’ll likely finish with two or three for the season, so he can brag about this one for a while.
Gardner in the nine-spot followed by Jeter makes the lineup circular and adds a different threat to the offense.
You try to come up with a player that he reminds you of and closest comparison is that of Brett Butler, who used to play centerfield for both the San Francisco Giants and Los Angeles Dodgers. Both players are of similar build (each are 5’10, Butler weighs 15 pounds more) and one (Butler) was a classic leadoff hitter during the his playing days of the 80’s and 90’s.
One would think he could not keep this up the entire season. But if he does, he would be another to add on the list of homegrown players to be developed by the Yankees.
We are seeing Robinson Cano mature into a superstar. Phil Hughes is finally showing all the promise that made him baseball top pitching prospect several years ago. Gardner is trying to put his name into that group.
Having such a productive player at a premium position at minimal cost only makes the team more dangerous and able to spend their resources elsewhere.
While the Yankees have privately had their eye on several high profile outfielders as free agents, perhaps they may have found a homegrown solution instead.
Don’t Stop Believing
I keep saying how much I marvel at the team’s ability even in defeat to give themselves a chance to win each time at the end.
Down by three runs last Tuesday in Baltimore, the Yankees had nothing going on. There was one out and no men on base.
Not the way you would draw up a rally.
However, I said to myself that if they could just get a man on base, they could still come back. The Orioles had a pitcher named Alfredo Simon (who would not be distinguishable even if wore a nametag that read, “Hello, my name is Alfredo Simon”) closing the game for the first time in his career.
Nick Swisher singled to center and then Nick Johnson drew a walk. Instantly, I thought the comeback could happen.
Derek Jeter struck out on a nasty slider for the second out, and Brett Gardner hit what was to be a routine grounder to shortstop to end the game.
Instead, Julio Lugo booted the ball, Gardner was safe and first and Swisher scored to make it 5-3.
Everyone in the building knew Gardner was going to steal second as he was the tying run at first and needed to get into scoring position. However, Mark Teixeira hacked at the first pitch, grounding an RBI single to right to make it 5-4.
Now it was inevitable. Alex Rodriguez would come up needing just a single to complete this improbable comeback. He swung at the first pitch and appeared to have a clean single up the up the middle.
Instead, Lugo played him towards the middle of the diamond, fielding the ball cleanly and throwing to second for the force to end the game.
The Yankees may have lost the game, but it continued to show the game is never over with his team. Just when you think you can call it a night, they always give you some hope they can pull a victory out.
You don’t believe?
Look at the team’s eight losses this season and you can only consider two of them “clean”, the 9-3 loss at Tampa and the 8-4 loss to the Angels (the game where Girardi lost his mind in the seventh inning). Outside of those games, in each other defeat, they have had the tying run or winning run at the plate with six outs remaining.
That is all you can ask from a team.
Back when, I always questioned the heart of this team, never able to battle back when hit with a
punch to the mouth.
Most times, they would fall. A few times, they would get back up, but usually not make the proverbial “ten count”.
Now, along with the Phillies, they display the toughest chins in the league. You had better knock them out and not give them even the slightest bit of chance late in any of these games or risk sealing your own fate.
The never ending story of Javy
With so much good stuff going around, it is very easy to see the negative.
In this case, the negative is now reaching extreme levels.
One of these weeks I will not have to write about Javier Vazquez, but he has to pitch well shut the mouths of those observing.
Let’s just say we are still waiting.
On Saturday, the crowd at Yankee Stadium came for blood. However, many of us were willing to give him a chance, albeit small.
It took only three batters in for the crowd to get on Vazquez’s ass as with two strikes, Andruw Jones turned around a fastball for a first inning homerun.
Boo.
Vazquez gave up another run in the second and the crowd sensed more failure to come. Jones would hit another homerun in the third and when .108 hitting Mark Kotsay hit a two-run blast in the fourth, there was no turning back for him.
It was over.
The crowd and I had seen enough. Whether all of these problems are in his head or he is simply not
tough enough to pitch here, something is wrong.
Is he concealing an injury? No one knows and it is as baffling a thing as we’ve seen here in years.
As Joe Girardi made the slow walk to the mound in the fourth inning, the crowd, made up mostly of families with younger children, spared him from an greater verbal beat down.
This is why the Yankees made the best decision possible in not starting him this Friday against the Red Sox at Fenway Park.
At first, my prevailing thought was that the current Boston lineup in no way resembles the squads of the past and thus, he could navigate through it.
Upon further review, this would be the worst thing for him.
The crowd, knowing he is mentally shot, would be on him from the beginning and only intensify when he is in trouble. Then, trying too hard, he would cave into the pressure, get embarrassed, the
Yankees would lose and his confidence would be officially lost, perhaps for the season.
He will start in Detroit on Tuesday in a much less pressurized situation. Maybe that can rescue him.
I doubt it seriously.
Time now for another edition of Yankee Random Thoughts
Phil Hughes is pitching so incredibly, you run out of superlatives to describe what has happened over the first month of the season.
After his seven-shutout innings on Sunday against the White Sox, Hughes lowered his ERA to a miniscule 1.44.
The ERA does not begin to tell the story. When you look at the rest of the numbers, they are even more remarkable.
10 hits allowed in 25 innings and even with the 12 walks, it equates to a 0.88 WHIP.
Wow!
The problem the Yankees are going to run into now is that if Vazquez continues his problems and the team is insistent on an innings cap for the young right-hander, how are they going to make this work?
Does anyone really want Vazquez anywhere near the mound for a Yankee playoff game on the road?
No!
So it will be incumbent on the Yankees to find days where they can skip him and give him additional days to where his innings do not reach past that magic number.
I’m still waiting for “Bad AJ” to make an appearance this season and so far It hasn’t happened.
This is meant as a compliment to AJ Burnett as he has cruised through the month of the season.
Once brittle (knock on wood), Burnett has come into this season with a mindset of finally reaching all of the potential everyone thinks exists in that right arm of his.
There is no reason he should not be a Cy Young candidate with his stuff. Injuries have played a role, but over the last two-plus seasons, he has made 72 starts (only two pitchers have made more starts) and is 15 games over .500 (34-19).
Even though he pitched the game of his life in Game 2 of the World Series, we still have our doubts about him on the road.
Sorry.
After Derek Jeter got the two-run triple on Friday night in the Yankees 6-4 win over the White Sox, a Chicago fan came up to me and that their reliever Matt Thornton, should not have been in the game to pitch in that spot.
On the White Sox postgame show, callers wondered why a right-hander wasn’t in the game instead.
My response: If your best relief pitcher cannot come into the game in the seventh inning with the game on the line, he's probably not that good.
It wasn’t as if those other stiffs were going to do any better anyway.
David Robertson is the one Yankee out of the bullpen who is not pitching well, giving credence to the idea that relievers are volatile from year to year.
Nick Johnson is still not hitting.
I still blame his daughter for getting him on a bad slump during the home opener when his at-bat music was Miley Cyrus’ “Party in the USA”.
There has been no party for Nick this season unless he’s drawing a walk.
Maybe a couple weeks away is what Curtis Granderson needs. He went into a terrible slump before his groin injury on Saturday.
After starting out well, his production dipped. Although it is a small sample size, Granderson had not shown success against lefty pitching (.161) as advertised in the spring.
Defensively he has been good. But there are still too many times I notice where he will not get a good initial read on the ball as it comes off the bat.
This is not to say I wanted to keep Austin Jackson (even though he leads MLB in hits and strikeouts), but the Yankees are betting on Granderson being a better player over the next three years than Jackson, so it will be interesting to see.
I refuse to believe Marcus Thames’ .588 (10-for-17) average against left-handed pitching exists.
The surprise of the season came Monday night when with the score tied 1-1, Randy Winn took Jeremy Guthrie deep into the Yankees bullpen for a three-run homer.
In the dugout, the players celebrated like children, happy for the veteran Winn
who was 1-for-14 this season before the big fly.
Winn had not homered since April 25 of last season, and was making a case for being another one of my whipping boys.
The blast was another in a list of happy moments this season.
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