And I do seem to remember a lot of clutch home runs (e.g. Leyritz, Brosius, Posada) that made the championships possible.. but if by “little things” you mean fundamentals, I agree completely. I’m not saying home runs are the answer, but all of this bunting doesn’t seem to be helping anything.

we lost that game last night and many others this season because all we do is swing for the fences. I’m tired of it. We’re the Rangers of the mid 90′s now!

we won CHAMPIONSHIPS doing the little things!

We desperately need to get back to it.

They also don’t seem to adjust well during the game; a good hitting team might have trouble with a pitcher they haven’t seen initially, but they’ll start figuring him out on the second or third time through the lineup. Again I’d think the hitting coach would be the one directing those adjustments.

Re: little ball, I’d rather see hitters get up there and rip and miss than try to bunt for a single or a sacrifice. Asking (or allowing) guys to bunt is just going to decrease their confidence when the time comes to deliver a clutch hit. This team wins when they’re hitting home runs, not squeezing runners home.

..but i can’t imagine that jeter, a-rod, posada, melky (who’s playing for his major league life), cairo (who ALWAYS hustles!!), matsui, pettite, wang, clemens, rivera, proctor (i actually like proctor – he just needs to be used better), any of the triple a pitchers – i just don’t tink they’re walking around trying to pick up a paycheck.

This just seems like one of those whacky years when everything that could go wrong – has gone wrong. I think we’re also a little old, not to mention that we, for whatever reason, REFUSE to play small ball anymore (can somebody PLEASE explain this to me!).

I think what this team needs is a jolt – ala varitek vs. arod, although i still don’t know if that’s going to work. Something’s missing right now – and i can’t place a finger on it. How on earth could this team be this bad??!!
Very Puzzling!

Captain Hook really needs to SLOW down with pulling these pitchers too. I know it’s hard to trust a few of them, but how are they going to figure it out if you don’t let them. We have no choice at this point, do we?

The one thins this season has done to me so far is, it has me really looking forward to next year already and looking forward to the kids that are coming. (just wish we had some blue chip position players)

… with that said, i’m hoping we’re sellers this season rather than buyers (i think we’re too far gone – in the standings and mentally – for anything to make that big of a difference this year!)

..but i’d use damon, cano, farnsworth, myers, villone, abreu (eat whatever money we have to on that contract!)… and really look at adding some younger position players for the seasons to come.

..and sadly, i’d let joe go after this season and fuse some spunk back into this team by hiring Girardi as manager. Not throwing him under the bus or anything, almost ashamed to have even typed that last sentence, always been a joe supporter, but i think it’s time.

… and cashman? – i really hope they leave him right where he is – doing what he’s doing. He really needs a little more credit for his long term vision… (although, if we had grabbed Okajima i think we’d be having a totally diferent conversation right now!)

Makes sense :rolleyes

A better bullpen could certainly help your team than the one you’ve got. But looking on from up north, two things strike me. One is that your ‘pen is bad right now because a number of guys are underperforming from their career numbers. And another is that, compared to, say, the Red Sox ‘pen, they’re getting way more work.

And there’s a pattern her. There may be a lot of reasons your team lost the 2004 ALCS, but one of the keys, as far as we can tell, was that by the time you got there, all your good relievers were halfway burned out. That was October. This is late June — but while Rivera is, if anything, too well rested (even we know that he needs some regular work to be effective, viz. the Dice-K comeback earlier this season), Proctor is clearly running on fumes. And why? Because earlier in the season, when even veteran starters got in a jam, trailing by a run or two in the fourth or fifth inning, in came Torre with the hook, and all too often for the same, already overworked, guys from the ‘pen. I have no idea what Proctor was cursing about, but in his position, I’d certainly have a few choice words of my own.