Memories of Shea/Subway Series
Here are thoughts on either playing the Mets or playing at Shea Stadium from two Yankees on opposite ends of the experience spectrum: Joe Girardi and Joba Chamberlain.
Chamberlain has so far been little more than a spectator in the subway Series. He has pitched one inning against the Mets, and gave up a run in that inning. But he'll pitch tomorrow and won't start against the Mets this season.
But Chamberlain watched a Subway Series game in person before he even made his big league debut. He was pitching for Double-A Trenton at the time, and had a day game. Afterwards, he and Jason Jones came up to New York to watch a night game between the Yankees and Mets, and Sean Henn left tickets for them.
"My first time at game was in the Subway Series. It was Duque (Orlando Hernandez) against the Wanger (Chien-Ming Wang)."
Asked who won, Chamberlain said: "We did, Rod (Alex Rodriguez) hit a bomb."
Girardi was asked for a favorite memory of Shea, which is of course in its final season of use. He said he didn't have one. However, one of his least favorite memories was of a trip to Montreal and New York while a rookie. Girardi recalled facing pitchers such as Sid Fernandez and Doc Gooden, and not faring very well against them. "I got sent down shortly after. ... The rotations weren't too kind to me."
Today's lineup was heavily stacked due to how tough Oliver Perez has been on lefties. That's why Bobby Abreu, Robinson Cano and Jason Giambi are sitting today, and Jorge Posada is at first. Girardi made clear he still views Posada as a catcher but that he can play first if they need him to.
In other sports news, big game this afternoon between Spain and Germany in the Eurocopa finals. I'm a fan of Espana, so I'm pulling for them. Your two biggest soccer aficionados on the Yankees are Abreu and Mariano Rivera. Rivera said "Of course" he wants Spain to win. Abreu is pulling for Germany, though he originally wanted Holland to win.
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Comments (16)
Man, Tampa isn't going away, are they?
I expected Tampa to be vastly improved this year, but I also thought they'd fold eventually under all that youth. The longer they hang around, the more I realize that the strength of the team is really in the rotation, and those guys aren't all really kids anymore. They've got some studs who have learned how to pitch the hard way and have developed some big chips on their shoulders. We got a taste of their moxie in spring training, too. I still expect they'll crumble--or at least weaken--in the dog days, since they've never done it as a team, and they've got too many youngsters in the lineup. I'm guessing they fold by early September, but this is a team that's gonna be around for years to come, folks. My bet is that by next year, it ain't gonna be Yanks-Sox 24-7-365 anymore.
Besides, from what I understand their system is S-T-A-C-K-E-D.
Kat, I've got tomorrow's lede for you:
Oliver Twist finally came up with some doughnuts.
Bash away folks, bash away.
Well if you are always picking 1 or 2 in the draft, you should get some decent players.
If Tampa goes 40-48 the rest of the year they will have their first ever winning season
Which again brings the shame back to the Pittsburgh Pirates, who would be the only team to not put at least a .500 team since the leagues split from 2 to 3 divisions
Agreed, Sully, but you gotta be able to pick 'em, sign 'em and develop 'em. And not everyone does. Bucs are an excellent example.
The 'Roids in KC are another one, though they're looking like they're coming out of their long winter, thankfully. Always thought KC was a good baseball town and should have a competetive team. Kauffman screwed them for years. The Seligs haven't done Milwaukee any favors, for all the press Bud's family's gotten. But they're coming around now too, finally. And to think they wanted to contract the Twins. When you look at teams like Oakland and Minnesota, it really drive you nuts that teams in great baseball towns like the Pirates and Reds can't ever get their act together.
Brett Gardner has finally been promoted to the Bronx.
Hopefully, he really plays well enough that Girardi doesn't want him out of the lineup and decides to sit Melky and shifts Gardner to CF once Matsui comes back from the DL.
Then again, I'm still waiting for Jessica Simpson to give me a call once she dumps that no good Tony Romo.
I guess yesterday Girardi decided to play percentage baseball by sitting his lefty hitters vs. Perez .So they score 1-run on the Betemit HR .To me it was a waste of time.
Re: Rays
They haven't faced any adversity this season .Kasmir,Shields and Garza have pitched good baseball.I doubt they stay in it.
Their farm system is not stacked outside of Price not much to pick from.Longoria,Upton are the most recent successes.Shields is the only solid starter currently on the parent club that came up thru their system.They traded Young a good talent to the Twins for Garza and released Dukes because of abhorrent behavior.
Good teams are usually strong up the middle outside of Upton in CF the rest are extremely average players.
on the link there is a good post on the yankees pitching rotation
http://sportsnynj.blogspot.com/
Well folks, if you told me that the Yankees would go into a four game series against the Mets with Dan Giese, Sidney Ponson, D-Ras and Andy pitching for the Bombers against Petey, Johan, Pelfry and Ollie - I would have first gotten sick about the state of Yankee pitching, but if you told me I could get two wins in that series I would sign up for it in a heart beat - though I was quite shocked about when the wins came.
Viper, glad to hear Brett got the call (on the heels of another guy we all wanted up - Robertson) lets see if he can make the most of his opportunity. The one thing I would suggest is that you should be careful not to expect miracles from this kid - he's not Jay Bruce.
If Long is such a good hitting coach, why is this team terrible with runners in scoring position?! The offense has been week a lot this year. I guess its just bad luck, but its annoying when we can't string consecutive singles together like yesterday to pose even a minor threat.
al - how do you blame a coach for the failures of the player - he can tell Jeter what the scouting report on the pitcher is, they can work before the game on making sure he's not breaking his hips early or pulling off the ball - but when the metal hits the meat the failing is Jeter's not Long's.
good news for Oakland - bad news for us since I was hoping the Yankees would grab this kid up:
Michel Inoa, the 16-year-old Dominican phenom, has agreed to terms with the A's, according to a report in Baseball America, which cited industry sources.
Assistant general manager David Forst said he could not comment on the report, and agent Adam Katz was unavailable for comment Sunday night.
Inoa, who is 6-foot-7 and throws in the 90s, is not officially allowed to sign with a major-league team until Wednesday.
Chip,
Not expecting the world from Gardner. I fully understand his limitations.
My only point all along is that he'll be more productive than Melky Cabrera - which I don't think would be very hard to do.
I don't think they would have called him up unless he was going to play a lot so my guess is that Damon will now shift over to DH to stay off his legs and aching foot so he'll be relatively fresh when Matsui comes back (if he comes back).
Viper - I agree that the plan is likely for Damon to DH - tend to think Gardner will take LF (just because Melky has the better arm). I think it also means that the Yankees are going to showcase both of these guys in hopes of getting a pitcher back for one of them.
Also, if you read Buster Olney, it sounds like Matsui's injury could be a lot worse than the Yankees are letting on.