Everything went according to the Yankees’ script tonight at The Stadium. Derek Jeter added to his postseason resume, CC Sabathia was dominant, the Twins were a plucky but not overly troublesome opponent, the bullpen was a well-oiled machine, and Alex Rodriguez got off the schneid.
I drove to New York today from Boston to make it in time for the game. I met up with my friend Lori, leaving my bags at her apartment, and then we headed to the Stadium. Found parking and walked, and just made it to our seats in time to see the first batter, Denard Span.
Who doubled. And even moved to third on a passed ball. But CC struck out the next two men, pesky Orlando Cabrera and the ever-dangerous Joe Mauer, then got Michael Cuddyer to fly out, stranding Span on third.
Sabathia struck out two more in the second, and each time he went to two strikes on any batter, the crowd rose to its feet, rooting for the strikeout and inaugurating the new Stadium to the postseason all at once. The 6pm start to the game and the windy fall weather made for a beautiful pink and purple sky, with clouds scudding across a silver backdrop. The wind was so intense that it blew whole packages of cotton candy from the concession stands out of the upper deck onto the fans below.
Jeter, meanwhile, had led the game off with a single on the first pitch. Do you think maybe someone lies awake at night just running positive visualizations of doing that? Off days drive Jeter crazy because that’s all he does, I think. He just thinks about what he WANTS to do. And he’d rather be doing it than thinking about it.
But Damon, Teixeira, and A-Rod went down easily, leaving Jeter on second. Matsui, Posada, and Cano went down just as easily in the second, but the sheer number of fouls balls each batter was hitting not only drove up the pitch count on lefty Brian Duensing, but gave me the impression that they were feeling him out, getting the feel for his pitches, such that the second time through the lineup they were probably going to resolve him into his component parts.
Which is pretty much what came to pass.
Read more details about the game over at Why I Like Baseball.
