The LoHud Yankees Blog

YANKEES
Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Lance Berkman 1B
Nick Swisher RF
Jorge Posada C
Marcus Thames DH
Brett Gardner LF

RANGERS
Elvis Andrus SS
Michael Young 3B
Josh Hamilton CF
Vladimir Guerrero DH
Nelson Cruz RF
Ian Kinsler 2B
David Murphy LF
Bengie Molina C
Mitch Moreland 1B

Just got back from lunch, and there’s some very light rain falling off and on here in Texas. The forecast calls for a cloudy afternoon, with roughly a 40-percent chance of rain around game time.

It’s actually a little worse tomorrow, with a 60 percent chance of rain most of the day.

The Dallas Morning News noted that it’s been a very dry month around here, so maybe that’ll hold up and the games will go on as scheduled. Remember that in the postseason, games are not official after five innings. If a game gets delayed, it will not be canceled or cut short. It will be resumed at some point.

Look at that picture. That’s Phil Hughes, and he looks like he means business.

“I didn’t want my season to end on that last start,” he said.

Game 2 would have been a bad way to end a good year. You expect some up-and-down moments from a 24-year-old starter, and so far the postseason has given both extremes from Hughes. Outstanding in the division series. No so good in the ALCS.

Joe Girardi said the extra rest might have played a role in Hughes’ command problems during that Game 2 start here in Texas, but Hughes kind of shrugged it off. In his mind, it seems, he should be able to make a pitch no matter how many days have passed. Hughes also shrugged off his workload. He’s thrown far more innings this year than at any other point in his career, but Hughes said he’s noticed no “wear or fatigue.” Hughes also shrugged off the enormity of the postseason.

Not to oversimplify it, but it always comes down to making pitches.

“I had just as much if not more adrenaline in my first start against Minnesota, and that certainly wasn’t the problem (against Texas),” Hughes said. “It was just being very predictable, and throwing a lot of fastballs, and hitters counts that were mistakes. (That) is what it boils down to. Have to do a better job of that, and I’m confident that I will.”

Associated Press photo

To be perfectly honest, I’ve more or less stopped asking questions about Robinson Cano. I still write about him all the time, but there’s not much for anyone to say. He’s clearly one of the top players in the league, a legitimate MVP candidate and the Yankees only consistent offensive weapon this postseason.

He’s the Yankees best hitter, but no one needs to say it to make it true.

“He had a few more home runs this year, but it’s really nothing new,” Derek Jeter said. “He’s just getting more attention now.”

Cano’s power numbers didn’t take a huge turn this season. He actually has fewer hits and a lower batting average than last year. His walks are up, but so are his strikeouts.

Truth is, Cano’s been very good since he got to the big leagues, but his real breakout year was last year. That’s when his production climbed significantly and that’s the year that prompted Joe Girardi to move him into the No. 5 hole. Cano’s production in fifth spot is what’s made the rest of the world pay attention.

Cano is better this year, there’s no doubt, but Jeter is right. He’s been good for a long time. This is simply the first year that everything has spoken for itself, and he’s been impossible to ignore in the ALCS.

“He’s hitting everything,” Rangers manager Ron Washington said. “He’s hitting breaking balls. Balls down and away. Hitting balls up. He’s just a tremendous hitter.”

He’s the kind of hitter who speaks for himself.

—

Speaking of Cano speaking for himself, here’s a short clip from yesterday’s workout, with Cano talking about his old friend Melky Cabrera. “I wish we could have him here next year,” he said.

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Associated Press photo

Last night, Joe Girardi specifically said there was one pitcher he would avoid using out of the bullpen. Andy Pettitte was off the table.

That seemed true until the late innings when Petttitte was told to get to the bullpen and be ready.

“Well, they told me to go down there,” Pettitte said. “I was hoping not (to be needed).”

The Yankees are going to have a second lefty in the bullpen again tomorrow night. For Game 6, CC Sabathia will be in the bullpen. One day of rest, so he clearly won’t be available for any sort of long relief, but he’ll be down there and ready to go.

“Our plan is he’s available tomorrow,” Girardi said. “Let’s see how he feels tomorrow, but our plan is that he will be available for us.”

• Also like Game 5, the Yankees will have both Mariano Rivera and Kerry Wood available for six outs if necessary. If Rivera gets six outs tomorrow, though, it’s unlikely he’d be available for six outs in Game 7. “I doubt it,” Girardi said.

• Lance Berkman will be available. “I don’t think he’ll be limited tomorrow,” Girardi said. “I’m sure he’s sore. You don’t fall that hard and not be sore, but I don’t expect it to affect his play tomorrow. He’ll be in there, unless something happens overnight.”

• Girardi on the track at Yankee Stadium: “If we feel it’s something we need to address, we’ll address it.”

• Alex Rodriguez said he never had any idea that guy who ran on the field on Monday was after him. He didn’t find out until he read it in the paper. “I saw he was very upset,” Rodriguez said. “It’s always a little scary, but our guys took care of it.”

• Mark Teixeira on having to watch a playoff game from the bench: “Really, really weird. I’ve watched games before during the regular season, but watching a playoff game from the dugout was something hopefully I’ll never have to do again.”

• The Yankees didn’t have much luck with Colby Lewis the first time they saw him (hardly anything new this season). But they get a second crack tomorrow. “The one thing I noticed was he threw a lot of strikes,” Curtis Granderson said. “He didn’t get behind at all throughout the course of the game. I assume to see a lot of the same, that he’s going to come right at guys. He’s going to throw an even mix of his fastball and his offspeed pitches, which is going to be a hard thing to try to offset. He’s going to stick with his plan, and hopefully we can stick to our plan.”

• Nelson Cruz is expected to be in the Rangers lineup tomorrow. Pulling him from last night’s game, Ron Washington said, was a precaution.

• The ceremonial first pitch for Game 6 will be thrown by Rangers Hall of Famer Tom Grieve, who works as a team broadcaster.

• Derek Jeter on workout day during the ALCS: “It’s always loose. These are the days that for us as players, we just want to get them over with. We’d much rather be playing than have today off.”

Associated Press photos of Jeter and Posada. I have no idea what’s going on with Posada, but it cracks me up.

Chasing a foul ball last night, Lance Berkman tried to stop quickly in the dirt-covered foul territory behind first base at Yankee Stadium. His feet went out from under him, he slammed to the ground and didn’t get up immediately. Mark Teixeira, who had been injured the night before, said he was holding his breath in the dugout, stunned but not surprised.

“That warning track around our stadium is very dangerous,” Teixeira said. “It’s hard. It’s basically concrete with sand on top. It needs to be fixed.”

Berkman said afterward that he was wearing plastic spikes at the time. That’s what Berkman usually wears in the field, but after his first play on that surface, he retreated into the clubhouse to change into metal spikes.

After the game, I was making small talk when one Yankee said to imagine running from grass onto a sheet of ice. The track at Yankee Stadium is that sort of surface change, he said.

Teixeira said he believed the Yankees had brought up the issue in the past.

“I think we have, but I don’t think it’s an easy thing to (fix),” he said. “You can’t do it during the season. Maybe this offseason we’ll be able to fix it and won’t have any problems.

“… I’ve dove a few times and I always come up with scraps on my arms and my knees. Ask any of the outfielders, where they’re running toward balls in the outfield. It’s not a safe surface.”

Associated Press photo

I remember this place.

As if we never left, the whole crew is back in Arlington where the Yankees are going through a standard workout at Rangers Ballpark. I honestly believed I was going to write on the plane and have plenty to post as soon as I landed. Instead, I predictably slept while flying across something like a quarter of the country.

With the late notice of the playoffs, it’s pretty much impossible to find a direct flight out of any New York airport without paying several thousand dollars, so most of the writers had to connect. I ate French toast in Charlotte, then fell back asleep. My usual travel friend Sweeny Murti apparently missed a connection and is stranded somewhere in America. One writer — let’s just say he brings the news daily — drove all the way to Philly to get a direct flight.

One small bit of news from the ballpark:

The Yankees have completed their trade for Kerry Wood, sending RHP Andrew Shive and 2B Matt Cusick to Cleveland. Neither is considered a premier prospect.

Joe Girardi and Phil Hughes will speak to the media in about a half hour, then the clubhouse will open. Sam and I will have some updates after we get the chance to ask some questions.

Nothing like booking a flight nine hours before it takes off!

It’s time to head back to Texas. The Yankees are already there, and their situation has changed. Two games in a row is significantly less daunting than three in a row, and the Yankees have finally played a good baseball game after three bad ones in a row.

“There was determination that we were going to go out and play our game today,” Joe Girardi said. “I saw it during (batting practice). The mood during BP was very businesslike, and we knew what we had to do. The guys went out and did it.”

What I found funny — and predictable – is that Derek Jeter said he noticed nothing different about batting practice. There’s a lot to be said for veteran players who have been there and done that and aren’t changed by the pressure of a must-win game. The Yankees have a lot of them, and the rest of the team seems to lean on those veterans.

“If we didn’t get the win we’d be packing to go home,” Nick Swisher said. “We knew what we were up against, (and) we know we’ve got a lot work to accomplish. We’re really, really excited for that. In this locker room, we never feel like we’re out of anything, regardless of what we’re up against. I think that’s a true testament to the leaders we have on this team, the way these guys handle themselves in tough situations and good situations. It’s nice to feed off of those guys.”

The Yankees are working out this afternoon in Arlington. Sam and I are flying through the morning, and we’ll have updates when we get to Texas. See you then.

Associated Press photo of Mariano Rivera and Joe Girardi

The Yankees aren’t out of this American League Championship Series just yet. Today they played a complete game, their first truly complete game of the series: Starting pitching. A few timely hits. A few extra-base hits. Aggressive base running. Dominant relief pitching.  Today, the Yankees played like a team actually capable of winning a World Series.

Next up, Phil Hughes gets a second chance in Texas.

“Same as CC,” Jorge Posada said. “Loation is important, and execute the pitches that we are going to call. Obviously we are going to go through a nice game plan and hopefully we can execute that. We haven’t been able to until today.”

Of all the things that went right today, it was CC Sabathia who stood front and center. It was a start that reminded me of Andy Pettitte: Huge pitches at key moments in a game that Yankees literally had to win.

“I just felt like I wanted to keep them in it and give us a chance to win,” Sabathia said. “The first two starts of the postseason, I just felt like I wasn’t able to do that. We ended up winning the games, but you know, tonight I just felt like I made some pitches when I needed to.”

The two best examples: The Josh Hamilton double play in the fifth inning, and the Mitch Moreland strikeout to end the sixth. Both came with two runners on base, when a big hit would have let the Rangers right back in the game.

“I think it starts with your starting pitcher,” Joe Girardi said. “Putting up zeros and getting a couple of runs early. I think that’s momentum. Because when you look at both of these clubs, there’s a lot of talent out there. And if you don’t make your pitches, or you don’t hit the pitches you should, no matter what kind of momentum you have, you’re probably not going to win the game.” 

• What did Lance Berkman hurt the most on that tumble in foul territory? “My pride,” he said. “No, it felt like I got lit up in football. I initially thought I’d hit my head. I was looking up at the ball and the next thing I knew I was flat on my back looking up at the sky.”

• Berkman was wearing plastic spikes when he fell, then switched to his metal spikes. Yankee Stadium’s foul territory is notoriously slick — one player said it was like running from grass to ice — and Berkman wasn’t expecting it. He said he stood through most of the game, and sitting for a four-hour flight won’t be pretty. “They may have to carry me off the plane,” he said.

• Sabathia said one of the biggest adjustments since Game 1 was hit ability to stay tall over the rubber. He said Posada came to the mound more than once to let him know he was starting to fall. That helped him keep his mechanics together.

• Posada on his base running that led to a run: “I pretty much thought that Francoeur is going to go home and try to take advantage and try to get to third base, even if they were coming towards me. Get that run to score. And the ball gets away, and you know, I don’t see anybody back there, because obviously he was backing up home plate. As soon as the ball hit, I was like, oh, God, and I got lucky and he threw it away.”

• Posada took some grief from the dugout for his running. “I don’t know if there was ‘guys’ (giving a hard time),” he said. “I know Derek was all over me.” Girardi said there were some, “giggles on the bench when they saw Jorge running and running.”

• Robinson Cano on the reaction to seeing Posada run like that: “We always make fun of him.”

• Cano hit his fourth home run of the series, twice as many as his teammates combined. Fans have been chanting MVP when he comes to the plate, and Cano has been listening. “Oh, you can’t avoid the fans,” Cano said. “They are really loud and like I said, just focus on the game and we can’t afford to lose the game. Just go out there and give what I got and try to win the game.

• Kerry Wood said he almost never tries to pick off twice in a row at second base. For whatever reason, he did it tonight and even he was surprised to catch Elvis Andrus napping. “When his (Andrus) game is flowing, he thinks he’s invincible,” Ron Washington said. “So you know, right there we got three, four, five coming. You want to be very careful. Sometimes our game does that to us, but we are not going to stop playing it.”

• Phil Hughes threw in the bullpen during the game, but it was just a regular side session to prepare for Wednesday. Chad Moeller said he was laughing at the idea of a full stadium thinking Hughes was on his way into the game.

• Cano and Nick Swisher went back-to-back in the third inning. It was the 12th time Yankees hitters hit back-to-back home runs in the postseason, including one back-to-back-to-back. The last time was the 2000 ALCS when Bernie Williams and Tino Martinez did it.

• Sabathia is the sixth pitcher to ever allow 11 or more hits and allow no more than two runs in a playoff game.

• Cano snapped Mark Teixeira’s streak of 22 straight Yankees playoffs games as the No. 3 hitter. That was the third longest such streak in team history behind Babe Ruth’s 20 straight from 1922 to 1932. That sort of streak means a little less these days.

Associated Press photos of Sabathia, Berkman and Cano

The Yankees aren’t out of it just yet. The offense showed signs of life in a 7-2 Game 5 win that kept the Yankees alive and pushed the American League Championship Series back to Texas for Friday’s Game 6. CC Sabathia allowed 11 hits, but he made his best pitches with runners on base. The Yankees finally hit the ball hard — three home runs doubled their series total — and the bullpen gave three shutout innings.

Associated Press photo