Timeout. Six different Yankees had a zero in the hit column
of the box score Wednesday morning. This means two-thirds of the team, well
slightly less, ten players went to the plate.
But I’m not telling you some surprising mathematical
equation, you probably know two-thirds of your team not hitting the ball isn’t
good by any stretch of the imagination. The part where your imagination has to
stretch is the fact that this is the Yankees we’re talking about. The Bronx
Bombers.
A couple of weeks ago, while catching my friend up on the
game I’d been watching, I was interrupted after saying my favorite ball team
was using “Small ball,” to get a victory. Small ball is using walks and singles
and smart base running to score a few runs towards a win. Yankee ball is
sending three to four pitches back, back, back, ehh, you get the idea.
So why all of the sudden are the New York Yankees being
forced to try a different brand of baseball just to get a victory? That is a
fabulous question, the kind of question that would stump the smartest, most
intelligent sports fan in the world. No, that’s not me, I’m serious this
question would stump some of sports all-time wizards.
Two things are often heard by this Yankee fan. One being,
“How much did that championship cost you?” the other being myself replying to
such a question with, “That is a cheap comment by someone whose team loses all
the time.”
I usually follow up my defense with you still have to play
the game. You don’t win ball games in the bank, you win them at the ball park.
Pitch by pitch and batter by batter, you win the game by outplaying the
opponent. Sports’ most basic rule: Score more runs than the other team and you
win the game.
As simple as it sounds, hit the ball, score the runs, win
the game, suddenly I’m scratching my head like a 73 year old lady with an
iPhone 5. Why can’t the game’s best players just hit the ball?
And then there is the benching. Ten players took to the
plate on Tuesday with their sights set on the best pitcher in baseball. Two
players who did not were Alex Rodriguez and Nick Swisher. The two regularly
feared batters both hit .272 this season, respectable. Rodriguez is 3-24,
Swisher 4-26 in these playoffs, that’s .130 and .154 respectively, not
respectable.
It doesn’t stop there. Robinson Cano 3-36, he is an MVP
candidate. Also one who was considered more than once this season as an MVP is
Curtis Granderson. Yeah, he’s 3-29. Barring a ninth inning single that led to
squat on Tuesday, Cano hadn’t gotten a hit in his previous 29 at bats and this
second baseman has been in the top-20 in batting average in each of the last
seven seasons. Top-17 in home runs each of the last three seasons.
I actually thought pitching was the problem. With a good
guy, an old guy and another guy who said he doesn’t even like baseball being
our front men in the rotation, I thought we needed to re-tool. Then I looked at
the box scores.
This isn’t Yankee baseball. On the team’s page on Major
League Baseball’s website it reads, New York Yankees, Hero’s Remembered,
Legend’s Born. I’m suddenly left remembering a lot of hero’s but have yet to
see the birth of a legend. I would be okay with just seeing a regular guy take
the bat of his shoulder and hit the ball.
