Baseball blog

[NB: Here's the complete set of live posts I blogged during this afternoon's Red Sox-Yankees game. Scroll down to the previous post, LIVE BLOGGING EVENT, for some background.]

PREGAME:

Jason Bay's hamstring is still acting up, so Kevin Youkilis is again playing out of position in left field, with backup Casey Kotchman filling in at 1st. Kotchman is a journeyman, an adept fielder without much power. The Sox acquired him last week from the Braves for Adam LaRoche, whom they had acquired a couple of weeks earlier from the Pirates. The Red Sox said they felt compelled to trade LaRoche because, after acquiring Victor Martinez from the Indians, they had nowhere for LaRoche to play. But the curious thing is, they traded LaRoche for another first baseman, meaning they would presumably have the same problem playing Kotchman that they would have had with LaRoche.

And now, one injury later, Kotchman is forced to play seriously intense games while LaRoche--a far more dangerous hitter--is toiling with the Braves. I don't understand this at all.

1ST INNING:

Bottom of the 1st. Boston's pitcher is Clay Buchholz, a youngster who came to fame in 2007 when he threw a September no-hitter against the Orioles. I watched that game with my mom. Since then he's been a disaster in the big leagues. The Red Sox refuse to trade him because he has great stuff and he's been lights out in the minors. But for whatever reason, he can't get major leaguers out with any consistency. My dad called a few games ago to complain about Buchholz's delivery: it looks like he falls off the mound to his left on his follow through, which tends to leave his pitches out over the plate against right handed hitters.

Second batter of the game and Youkilis drops an easy fly ball in left field. Did I mention he's playing out of position?

A look at Buchholz's stats against right and left handed hitters backs up Dad's theory. Ordinarily, a right-handed pitcher will perform better against right-handed hitters and worse against lefties. Granted, the sample size is small, but Buchholz has performed far worse against righties: in roughly the same number of innings, he's allowed 4 more baserunners, 3 more home runs, and 7 more earned runs against righties.

0-0 after 1.

2ND INNING:

Ortiz gets booed again by the Yankees fans, presumably on account of the steroid accusations. Joe Buck speculates that the fans are booing "more out of a sense of gamesmanship than disgust". I'm not sure how many Yankee fans know what gamesmanship means.

Another perfect inning for C.C. Sabathia.

3RD INNING:

Kotchman strikes out. Sabathia, who looked horrible in April after signing a huge contract in the offseason, has been phenomenal ever since. The Red Sox haven't scored a run in 18 straight innings.

Boston shortstop Nick Green played for the Yankees in 2006. Interestingly enough, he scored the winning run against the Sox in the 5th game of that brutal August series I just wrote about when Keith Foulke uncorked a wild pitch in the 8th inning, permitting Green to score from 3rd.
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Yanks have 2 men on with nobody out in the bottom of the 3rd, with good old Jeter at the plate. I foresee bad things.
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Wrong. Jeter grounds weakly into a double play, third-to-second-to-first. Of course Buchholz then walks Damon on 4 pitches. Yowzers. Teixeira drives in Cabrera on a sharp single to right. Yankees 1, Sox 0.

4TH INNING:

[NB: I'll probably go back and paste all these things into a single post, so people don't have to read them in reverse. One interesting thing about blogging is: if you have any sort of serial narrative going on, the reader has to read from bottom to top. Doesn't everything else in the English language read top left to bottom right?]

Sabathia has a perfect game through 4 innings. Joe Buck and Tim McCarver have been boring, but not as dumb as I had hoped.

Back in 2007, I blogged game one of the World Series between the Red Sox and the Rockies. It didn't go well, but at least I got some choice quotes from McCarver and Ken Rosenthal.

Long inning for Buchholz. No damage yet, but 2 on with 2 out. Joe Buck points out, astutely, that all the hits off Buchholz today have been by left-handed batters. This doesn't exactly jive with my analysis from back in the first inning, but I'm sticking to my guns.

Cabrera, a rightie, strikes out to end the inning.

TOP OF THE 5TH:

Tim McCarver inveighs against the well-known tradition that announcers don't mention a no-hitter (or a perfect game) while it's in progress. He's right, of course, that superstition is stupid. But it's surprising to hear from a former ballplayer (and a catcher, no less). I love silly baseball superstitions and I wouldn't dare talk about a perfect game while it's in progress. Unless the pitcher is a Yankee.

Sabathia walks Ortiz, who's hitting .047 in his last 5 games, on a borderline inside curveball. No more perfect game. Sabathia quickly retires Lowell and Drew. The no-hitter is intact.

BONUS: here's some funny analysis of a classic Tim McCarver quote, also from the 2007 playoffs.

BOTTOM OF THE 5TH:

Youkilis misplays another fly ball, although this was a more difficult play than the other one. Just like in the 1st inning, Damon finds himself on 2nd with one out. The Yankee fans are really laying it on good old Youk.

I think this is the inning where Buchholz falls apart.

Teixeira walks, A-Rod grounds out but moves the runners over to 2nd and 3rd. Fortunately Matsui grounds out to the pitcher; crisis averted.

6TH INNING:

Ellsbury, Boston's center fielder, singles to center with 2 outs, breaking up the no-hitter. I remember a game back in 2001, when the Yankees were in Boston and Mike Mussina took a perfect game into the 9th inning. Finally, with 2 outs and 2 strikes, Carl Everett singled cleanly to left field. The Red Sox were still losing, but the fans cheered like they had just won the pennant. It was thrilling and surreal, even on TV. Yankees first baseman Clay Bellinger said afterwards, "it felt like we lost the game."

Back to 2009. Pedroia strikes out on 3 pitches to end the inning. Sabathia has thrown 92 pitches through 6 innings; the Sox' only hope is that he tires himself out before the 9th.
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Bottom 6. Leadoff double for Cano. Buchholz has allowed 10 baserunners in 5+ innings. He's been really lucky so far, but it can't last forever.

Swisher sacrifices Cano to third, then Buchholz intentionally walks Cabrera to set up the double play. Molina, New York's slow-footed catcher, is up to bat.

Molina promptly flies out deep to center field, scoring Cano easily. Jeter flies out to right. 2-0 Yanks.

7TH INNING:

It's hard to tell how this live blogging is going. It certainly doesn't help that no one is actually reading this in real time. If anything, the game goes a lot faster when you're constantly trying to think of interesting things to say.

Meanwhile, Martinez walks and Youkilis singles, both with nobody out. Ortiz, former Boston folk hero, recent steroid casualty, steps in looking nothing like the clutch hitter he was two long years ago...

...And promptly strikes out on a shitty call by the home plate ump. Mike Lowell, perhaps the slowest runner in the American League, then grounds into a double play. Still 2-0 Yankees.
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Ramon Ramirez relieves Buchholz to start the 7th. You could say Buchholz pitched bravely, but mostly he got lucky. Still one of his best performances since the no-hitter in 2007.

With a man on first and one out, Ramirez hits A-Rod with the first pitch. The umpire immediately ejects Ramirez from the game, and the Red Sox are understandably furious.

A couple of batters later, the new pitcher, Gonzalez , gives up a two out, bases loaded walk to plate another run. 3-0 Yanks.

8TH INNING:

Sabathia strikes out Kotchman for the 3rd time, then gets lifted for a relief pitcher. Final line on Sabathia: 7 2/3 innings, 0 runs, 2 hits, 2 walks, 9 strikeouts. Not a bad day's work.

Phil Hughes comes on and strikes out poor Nick Green on 4 pitches. The Red Sox haven't scored in 23 innings, and they're about to lose their 5th game in a row.
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Bottom 8. Two run homer for Jeter. 5-0 Yanks. I can't believe the announcers haven't compared this bloodbath to the 2006 series yet.

9TH INNING:

Well this sucks. I'm supposed to see a friend's band tonight at 8:00. The only suspense is whether David Robertson can shut down the Red Sox fast enough for me to make the show.

He cannot. Not that the Red Sox come back to win, but they manage to hang around long enough to make me late. A moral victory, I suppose.