Lucky? He hit the hard grounder right at an infielder, the one thing you couldn’t do. Striking out would have been less damaging.”

Wow Pete, you are an idiot.

Baseball is a Hard Game.

ARod has about 1/2 second to recognize the pitch, swing and hit the ball hard. Which he did. Asking hime to guide it away from the infielders and other players is a bit too much.

DJ ran hard to third base as soon as he saw the liner wasn’t caught. If, instead he took off and got doubled off 2nd you would be taking him to taks for that.

Latroy Hwakins left a pitch up and “you can’t do that”. If he could throw the ball where he wanted to he wouldn’t be Latroy Hawkins.

My biggest beef was Jeter getting picked off 2nd. The 3rd base coach is supposed to help him out here. This is so out of character for Jeter that I am going to blame it on Bobby Meachum. He sucked as a player too and is a memory of the darkest days for Yankees fans.

This is the Yankees problem – they are a team of extremes. We have two types of players – young/inexperienced and post-prime veterans. When the vets can’t get it done, they have to rely on the young guys. But that puts pressure on the new guys to perform and they’re prone to mistakes. Its a bad situation all around. That’s why I can only hope that this year the Yanks will clean house and start fresh with a new team in the new stadium. Its time for this team to truly rebuild.

Jeter getting picked off of 2nd was bad. Jeter striking out while trying to bunt was bad, though, with a man on 2nd, having a guy who hits to the right side of the infield at will try to bunt was questionable. Jeter getting caught in the 4-2-5 DP was understandable—that ball was scorched to second. Jeter was thinking line drive. He got stuck in between.

Alex’s first error was bad. Alex’s second “error” was a very catchable ball for almost any 1st-baseman. Alex hitting the ball on the ground with the bases loaded was frustrating, but he did scorch that ball. He didn’t willfully try to hit it on the ground. He was maybe trying to hit to the right side, which you might question by saying just get it in the air. But really, I can’t blame Alex for that.

Betemit is scary at first base.

The offense put up 9 runs. Even with the 3 errors, you’re talking about 1 unearned run. Weak pitching was the (sad) story of this game. (What about maybe talking to Ohlendorf after the second home run in the 5th?) How a team with the largest payroll in baseball can’t go out and find a couple of decent (i.e., consistent) relievers is beyond me. I know starting pitching is hard to come by, and I’m fine with taking the time to develop some young guys. But if one of those young guys has a rough outing, you need to be able to rely on someone to come in and keep you in the game. And it’s been a long time since the Yankees have performed well in games that are close in the late innings or go into extras. I’ve been happy with Farnsworth lately. But the guy can’t go 2 innings or back-to-back days with any consistency. So he’s like half a reliever. Joba’s great, but he needs to be a starter. That leaves Rivera—and he can’t carry all of the burden out there.

I remember the Yankees having mediocre starting pitching and a strong pen. And I remember them having excellent starting pitching and a mediocre pen (with a good closer). But this is ridiculous. Shaky starting pitching and a hit-or-miss pen?

It’s difficult to invest 4 hours watching a game that you just know is going to be blown in the late innings.

I felt bad for Derek when he was picked off. I don’t think I have ever seen that look of embarrassment on his face before. I wonder what is wrong with him. Is he injured?

the goat list is missing one or more people: whomever decided Hawkins should be on the roster. obvious from ST on that they had several better candidates.