SB Nation - Mark Teixeira

Gold Gloves vs. UZR: The Laziest Article I've Ever Written (AL Edition)

SFiercex4 — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:20:29 -0000

More photos » by Ted S. Warren - AP

During a pitching change in the sixth inning against the San Diego Padres in a baseball game Tuesday, June 23, 2009, center fielder Franklin Gutierrez (center) ponders aloud "You think I'll get a Gold Glove this year?" Left fielder Wladimir Balentien assures him while right fielder Ichiro Suzuki (kneeling right) snickers. "Gold Gloves?" he thinks as he stares off into the diamond. "I have a million of those." (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren)

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So, today we got to see the American League Gold Glove awards as voted on by coaches and managers. The following is the list of players who won for the American League

Player	Team	Position
Mark Buehrle	CHA	P
Joe Mauer	MIN	C
Mark Teixeira	NYA	1B
Placido Polanco	DET	2B
Evan Longoria	TBR	3B
Derek Jeter	NYA	SS
Adam Jones	BAL	OF
Torii Hunter	LAA	OF
Ichiro Suzuki	SEA	OF

If you are reading this site, I do not think you need to be told that the Gold Glove awards reward players for their name, good looks, reputation, lack of errors, and degree of difficulty, whether real or fabricated by a player's skill. What it does not generally reward is actual defense, though that occasionally gets thrown into the mix as well.

In what will undoubtedly appear as a lazy article (after all, it's so easy to pick on these things, why even bother?), I am going to pit the Gold Glove awards with UZR to see how much agreement there may be. Of course, so as to not raise the ire of one MGL, I will not be quoting single-season UZR totals. Rather, I'll do something simple: a 3-year pseudo-Marcels projection of defensive worth based on both UZR and the Fans Scouting Report. I'll take the single-season UZR leader (yes, I know, but this allows me to not have to do too many projections) and the 2009 GG winner and run a weighted Marcels, weighting UZR at 75% and the Fans at 25%. I'll then regress each total by 75 games of average defense for infielders and 100 games of average for outfielders.

For outfielders, I'll look at the players with the best UZR + positional adjustments, so as to account for the fact that you can pick any three outfielders. For catchers, I'll use the defensive estimates done by devil_fingers in this post, and TotalZone data available at B-Ref courtesy of Sean Smith. Catcher defense is regressed 125 games; I do not have a basis for this, but I figured it should be regressed the most because we know the least about it. I won't be looking at the pitchers, though it is worth mentioning that Buerhle also won the Fielding Bible Award for pitchers this season, so that probably goes down as an agreement. Finally, because the 2009 FSR is still in the voting format, 2009 data will only include UZR. Sorry.

Let's find out how the voters did against the numbers (why do we always have to fight?).

First off, here are the players the Gold Glove voters selected.

Player	Position	Defense
Joe Mauer	C	+7
Mark Teixiera	1B	+2
Placido Polanco	2B	+9
Evan Longoria	3B	+15
Derek Jeter	SS	+0
Adam Jones	OF	+2
Torii Hunter	OF	-2
Ichiro Suzuki	OF	+9

As you can see, the list is not all that bad. Among the players listed here, the Fans Scouting Report agreed a whole lot more than UZR did with the GG voters. Teixeira has come out as around the second best first baseman in baseball over the last few years, behind only Albert Pujols, but UZR has had him with two seasons of below average play and one very strong 2008 campaign; overall, he ended up at around +2 runs. Torii Hunter ends up as the only player in the negative side; here the Fans and UZR disagree heavily, with UZR rating Hunter as solidly below average while the Fans have still have him as one of the best center fielders in the game.

I was rather surprised to see Derek Jeter rate as an even shortstop under this methodology. The Fans have him as slightly above average (+2 and +1 runs in 2007 and 2008 respectively), while UZR has him over the three-year span as a -4 run defender per 150 games. it is worth noting that in the 2009 FSR, Jeter ranks in the middle of the pack as well at shortstop, around the likes of Juan Castro, Tyler Greene, and Miguel Tejada.

Ichiro was an interesting case as well. Each of the three years, UZR rated him well, even with his move to center field in 2007. The Fans, however, were off the charts in favor of Ichiro, labeling him likely the best defender in baseball. The Fans had Ichiro at +27 and +22 runs in 2007 and 2008 respectively. Taking the conglomerate, Ichiro ended up at +9 runs, still the second best total listed here.

There were still places where UZR, the Fans, and even the GG voters agreed. Everyone came to terms on how ridiculous Evan Longoria is at third base, and no one should be surprised there. Similarly, Placido Polanco received reviews from the Fans that were very similar to his UZR numbers, at least in 2008. And Adam Jones received high marks in '08, in concordance with his solid UZR. Jones however was hurt in that his second season in 2009 weighed in more than half of his rating and he happened to receive poor marks from UZR; the Fans still rank him very highly among center fielders, and his numbers would have looked better had I used this season's FSR data.

The Numbers Tally

In comparison, let's take a look at the leaders in terms of UZR or catcher defense this season. Note that in the case of third base, Longoria was the UZR leader and the award recipient, so I went to the second-ranked player for the comparison. Also, in the case of second base, the leader was Ben Zobrist, but I felt with such little data at our disposal in terms of his second base play, his skewed 2009 UZR would have a significant hold on his projection, so I went with the next available player, Dustin Pedroia. Finally, I added four outfielders, three of them center fielders, for comparison. Only one corner outfielder, Carl Crawford, would have approached the amount needed when combining both UZR and positional adjustment.

Player	Team	Position	Defense
Gerald Laird	DET	C	+7
Kevin Youkilis	BOS	1B	+3
Dustin Pedroia	BOS	2B	+8
Chone Figgins	LAA	3B	+9
Cesar Izturis	BAL	SS	+7
Franklin Gutierrez	SEA	OF	+21
B.J. Upton	TBR	OF	+8
Rajai Davis	OAK	OF	+7
Carl Crawford	TBR	OF	+10

As mentioned, the GG voters nabbed two of the UZR leaders (at third base and at second base, if you don't count Zobrist). It would appear as if they did a very good job in that department, as this methodology shows Longoria as absolutely dominant defensively and Polanco a very defensible choice given the difference between him and Pedroia. Mauer and "One Man, Five Tools" Laird came out fairly even in the projection, so there should be no quibble in handing the award to the future AL MVP. Likewise, the Youkilis vs. Teixeira debate came fairly even, so deeming Teixeira the winner is certainly a decent choice.

The shortstop position was a very interesting find. I was quite surprised to see that Cesar Izturis came out on top this season, though he carries a very good reputation. I was also quite happy to see strong agreement between the Fans and UZR on Izturis' year-to-year performances. Overall, he would have been a solid choice. I recognize also that I left Elvis Andrus out of the picture for similar reasons to the Zobrist argument. He did end ever-so-slightly behind Izturis on the leaderboard, so I do have that to back me up. With the type of regression Andrus probably would have received for not having played a whole lot, I imagine Izturis would still have come out on top.

It is perhaps in the outfield where the voters missed the mark. Two of the three winners of the Fielding Bible awards, center fielder Franklin Gutierrez and left fielder Carl Crawford, came up missing in the final awards, while a player that, according to this projection, actually hurt the team's defense when compared to the average was awarded (another) Gold Glove. The decision to take Hunter in this case seems very poor when in comparison to the options available. Gutierrez's exclusion was expected but still heinous in light of how good he was this year and how good he has been the past three seasons.

Any of the above choices, between Crawford, Upton, Davis, and Gutierrez, would have been much better than Hunter in this case. Replacing either Jones or Ichiro would be more questionable, and admittedly I did not factor in positional adjustments into these, so Ichiro's numbers as a center fielder and right fielder are counting the same, as are Gutierrez's.

Conclusion

The voters actually did a decent job overall, minus the one giant oversight of Gutierrez and the awarding of yet another Gold Glove that Derek Jeter likely did not earn. Compared to recent results over the last few years though, this year's ballot was a nice change of pace, even though it included a lot of the "old guard" in terms of defense. I hope that in a few years, we can expect to see less of Jeter and Hunter and more of Gutierrez, Andrus, and Crawford on these ballots, reflecting a changing of the guard in defense, a changing of the system and how it is run, or maybe even a more open view on defensive metrics, at least in the context of rewarding good defense.

Expect the National League version tomorrow, or later still, depending on how infuriating it looks. I'm a pessimist.

AL Gold Glove Awards Announced

Eli Greenspan — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 20:53:17 -0000

More photos » by Kathy Willens - AP

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The American League winners who graced us with their highlight-reel plays all season long were unveiled Tuesday, but mostly featured a cast of familiar faces:

C Joe Mauer, Twins - second straight year

1B Mark Teixeira, Yankees - third Gold Glove, first since 2006

2B Placido Polanco, Tigers - second Gold Glove, 2007 and 2009

3B Evan Longoria, Rays - first Gold Glove

SS Derek Jeter, Yankees - who said he can't field? Fourth Gold Glove, first since 2006.

OF - Torii Hunter, Angels - ninth straight Gold Glove

OF - Adam Jones, Orioles - first Gold Glove

OF - Ichiro, Mariners - ninth straight Gold Glove

P - Mark Buehrle, White Sox - first Gold Glove

What do you guys think? Did they miss any players that should be awarded for strong defensive play in 2009?

Yankees 'boring' this winter? Never

Ed Valentine — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 13:53:46 -0000

The euphoria over winning a 27th World Series title has already begun to fade, just a little. The focus is turning to 2010, and trying to win No. 28.

What will GM Brian Cashman do this winter? We know what most of the questions are. Hideki Matsui? Johnny Damon? Andy Pettitte? The makeup of the starting rotation?

I have been a Yankee fan for the entirety of the Steinbrenner era, and the one thing I can say is the off-season is never dull around the Bronx Bombers.

Yet, word seeping out is that might just be the case this year.

Here is Joel Sherman.

The Yankees found $181 million lying around last offseason, and made a late, victorious bid to corral Mark Teixeira, so never say never when it comes to the Yankees and spending.

But the initial read as the winter bazaar opens is that the Yankees do not intend to make a play for the three biggest free agents: Jason Bay, Matt Holliday and John Lackey. After signing the three biggest free agents last offseason (Teixeira, CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett), the Yankees just might be boring this winter.

This is not about need, because corner outfield and starting pitcher are priorities to fortify what is now a champion. But based on conversations with multiple Yankees officials, I sense that financially and philosophically the Yankees will not big-game hunt in free agency.

Bob Klapisch agrees.

The Yankees will look remarkably similar in 2010, which is bad news for the rest of the industry. The free-agent crop is thin, and it’s unlikely that any team will dramatically remake itself during the off-season — and that includes the Bombers, who figure to stay away from the likes of John Lackey and Matt Holliday.
The Yankees had $75 million coming off the books after ’08, which allowed them to re-direct that cash toward CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett and Mark Teixeira. There’ll be no similar windfall this winter, and Cashman would have a hard time justifying another payroll surge to the Steinbrenner family.

Others, though, are not buying that the Yankees won't be buying this winter. I can't blame them. We have heard it before.

Among them is Mike Lupica.

No one except the bookkeepers knows the real finances for the Yankees, how much they are propped up by YES, how much they make - or lose - just on the baseball operation, how much debt they incurred building the Eighth Wonder of the World. There are people in baseball who seriously wonder how long this team is actually going to stay in the Steinbrenner family.

We just know this: They sell winning and are willing to pay for it. There's nothing baseball can do to stop it, because all that the Players Association really has left is that they never gave in on a salary cap.

We'll hear now that the Yankees have got to get younger and can't keep both Damon and Matsui, and how they really aren't all that interested in Jason Bay or Matt Holliday. That's what we'll hear. But we'll see about all that. This is the one about how money can't buy happiness, but it certainly will finance an exhaustive search.

Here is an outside opinion, from John Shea of the San Francisco Chronicle.

Reports out of New York, one from longtime New York Post columnist Joel Sherman, suggest the Yankees might restrict their spending this offseason and won't hotly pursue elite free agents, maybe even try to pull that modest payroll under $200 million.

With all due respect to Sherman, who probably has more sources inside the Yankees than Hal Steinbrenner, we observers who think outside the Bronx are a little skeptical and offer two words of warning:

Just wait.

The Yankees can't help themselves.

Whether they buy or not, the Yankees won't be boring this winter. They never are.

Belated Words on the 27th World Championship Victory...

CrazyYankeeChick — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 00:17:43 -0000

I wrote this when I finally got out of bed circa 2:30 in the afternoon.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.

My fellow crazies and I were out celebrating the World Series Championship of the New York Yankees up until about 7am. None of us wanted the night to end.

Ball game over. World Series over. Baseball season over.

Listening to asinine hating anti-fans drop the "who's won more in this century" over.

Having to hear people say they "can't wait til the Yankees choke" over.

First year at new stadium over.

Nine years without a ring over.

Ball game over. The Yankees win.

What a night. The hours and day(s) leading up to last night were saturated with critics attacking Girardi for pitching AJ Burnett in Game 5 because it meant not only would Andy Pettitte have to go on short rest for Game 6, but CC Sabathia would have to pitch his 2nd short-rested game in a row, should a Game 7 be needed.

Funny, though, how these naysayers were oddly silent up until the point AJ started getting shelled. THEN it was a fatal flaw. THEN Girardi was a moron. And all I heard about for all of Monday night through 8pm last night was how that move will change the face of the series, and there's no way Andy will be able to go on 3 days rest, and Girardi should be fired, etc.

The consensus was that if the Yankees win the World Series, it was be in spite of Girardi, not because of him. I really couldn't disagree more on this one. And this is coming from someone who spend many a game banging her head against the computer, screaming to no one in particular that Girardi is an idiot for not using [fill in name of bullpen reliever who wouldn't have let up runs, in my estimation].

My dad even said, "Kris, I could have won a championship with that team. Look at them."

True. But how much different are they from any other one of their teams in the last 5 years? What about when they got Randy Johnson? And Carl Pavano? A-Rod? Those were big name guys, and they never brought us to a title.

Something was different this year. There was no Torre doing ungodly things to his pitching staff's arms. There a case study in "Eff you, critics" performance from A-Rod. A relatively steadfast batting order that wasn't seemingly determined by picking names out of a batting helmet. Patience at the plate (cough...Cano...cough).

I don't think it's easy to manage a club no matter how good they are. And the fact that Girardi took this team through the World Series is not something that should be trivialized. He didn't always do thing we agreed with, but his strategy of a quilted motley crew of relievers to support precarious starter situations, worked out beautifully.

The Yankees were able to ride a 3-man rotation through the entire playoffs, all 3 of them going on short rest at some point (some faring better than others). And it worked out. It %&#@E worked out. The New York Yankees are Kings of the World once again.

And my God, it feels good.

The Phillies were good, and put up a good fight, so much so that there was even talk of Chase Utley getting World Series MVP even if the Phils didn't win. (Of course, you can't really make that argument when a guy on the winning team somehow manages to knock in 6 ribbies in one game to tie the World Series record. Thank you, Hideki.)

Ryan Howard was abysmal all series, save one long ball he knocked off Petitte last night to bring the score to 7-3. It was too little too late though, and the Phils weren't able to overcome that kind of damage in a rocking stadium filled to the rafters with fans salivating for, in the words of Cole Hamels, "it all to be over with."

Pedro Martinez was no one where near as sharp as he was when he dueled with AJ Burnett in Game 2. (And of course, now the scapegoat blame gets applied to Charlie Manuel for not taking Pedro out when Hideki came to the plate with bases loaded in the 3rd, with the lead only 4-1.)

The Phils scored on a sac fly by Shane Victorino, who I was half hoping would enter the game with a bloody batting glove and give the Fox announcers something to distract themselves away from hating on the Yankees for 2 seconds.

But the Yankees were doing what they do best, which was knocking the ball all over the park. Even the foul balls were long shots, even the outs were well hit liners. This is to be expected, perhaps, when Pedro is throwing 87 mph fastballs.

When Hideki's 2-strike, 2-out, single put the score at 4-1, I was a little more relaxed, but I never stopped compulsively flicking at my hat brim and pacing and grinding my teeth, until he hit a 2-run double in the bottom of the 5th to make it 7-1, following Mark Teixeira's base hit that had scored Jeter.

A 6-run lead isn't any guarantee, but it was comfortable. And that was when we all started to let it prematurely sink in. The Yankees were going to be World Champions soon.

I think this implosion from good old Petey should be indicative of how short rest or normal rest, an erratic pitcher in his 30s isn't going to always be lights out. I don't think AJ was knocked around on Monday because he wasn't well rested. I think he was beat up because he's AJ Burnett, and that's what he does. He surprises us with either Good AJ or Bad AJ, and let's be honest, we all knew this when we bought him, so let's not act so surprised when he gets chased early.

Pedro gave a mirror image performance of that, but it was a little more untimely than AJ's crap outing. If I were a Phillies fan, I'd point fingers directly at the decision to pitch Pedro in Yankee Stadium for Game 2, when they should have pitched him at home.

And more significantly, the decision to pitch Pedro in Yankee Stadium for an elimination game!! I guess they didn't have much choice in the matter, but if Cliff Lee had pitched instead of Joe Blanton on Sunday, they wouldn't have been in that situation in the first place.

(Eh, whatever. Like I care about what the Phillies do with the pitchers.The Yankees just won the World Series. I got all day today to read every last word written about the game, and then all day tomorrow to get lost in the masses of people tumbling into the Canyon of Heroes.)

With 2 outs in the top of the 9th, the bar packed wall to wall, the stadium deafening with every pitch Mariano Rivera threw that made the title that much closer...it started to feel like New Year's Eve. Well, if the year lasted 9 years.

All of us expectantly waiting for the ball to drop, so to speak. All of us exploding in raucous, bleary eyed, delirious, euphoric celebration when it did.

"New York, New York" blared through the streets. Then "We are the Champions." "Empire State of Mind." The text message congratulations. The shots. The dancing. The screaming. The hugging. It was heaven. It still is.

I've kept my mouth shut about retaliating against all the shit-talkers that tried their damnedest to curse the Yankees, who tried to rain on our playoff parade. I've limited my jabs to half-kidding trash talking towards our opponents.

But I wrote in Game 5 postmortem:

If someone makes a point to go out of his or her way to poke the bear, unprovoked, then there's the exception to the rule. Because if the Yankees should end up winning the World Series this year, I will make a pit stop before riding off into the sunset, to dole out heaps of karma three-fold.

Instead of just letting us enjoy the fact our team was playing in the World Series, and that we were really happy and excited about it, NYC was teeming with assholes that wanted us to be as miserable as them. They were unrelenting in their banal insults, their pathetic and predictable Yankee shots.

Maybe we couldn't be bothered, or maybe a part of us was secretly scared that if we responded in kind, that we'd be putting ourselves in grave danger should the Yankees happen to choke it away.

Whatever the reason, it's immaterial now. BECAUSE WE WON.

Everyone out there with your "I can't wait to see them blow it the ALDS" and the "I can't wait til they choke against the Angels" or "I can't wait to see Pettitte get lit up on short rest" etc etc etc... HOPE YOU ENJOY THE NEXT FEW DAYS OF SEEING NOTHING BUT YANKEE COVERAGE.

And I hope your commute to work is significantly screwed up because of the ticker tape parade.

And until the 2010 World Series, the Yankees are the World Champions. So every time you see a fan walking down the street with a Yankee hat on, and your knee jerk reaction is to say something negative, just remember: The Yankees won. And you're out of material.

The Yankees did it. They won their 27th championship, the most of any team in any sport. In the first year in their new stadium, they christened their home with champagne and victory...just as they did to their last stadium, when they won the World Series in its inaugural season in 1923.

Congratulations, Yankees. Thank for you bringing the trophy back to where it belongs.

Thank you for everything that you've given your fans this season.

Thank you for #27.

-CYC

Offseason Day 1 Quick Hits

Eli Greenspan — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:06:44 -0000

More photos » by Jeff Roberson - AP

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Let's take a look at some of the headlines making their way around the wire on this Thursday morning:

It appears as if the Nationals will remove the interim tag on manager Jim Riggleman and name him their permanent manager. The Nationals did contact Don Mattingly about an interview, but he respectively declined. Riggleman is very experienced and did get more than expected from the Nationals after taking over, going 33-42 to close out the season.
The Kansas City Star is reporting that the Royals likely will decline Coco Crisp's option, but have interest in negotiating a low-base salary for the 2010 season. Crisp, who has surgery on both shoulders this past season, is no guarantee to come back as strong as he was in previous years.
Joe Strauss of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch is reporting that the Cardinals and Scott Boras have discussed a the framework of a deal, reportedly in the neighborhood of 6 years, worth 96 million dollars. Seems like the first offer of many in what is expected to be a very long negotiating process. Boras has not been afraid to compare his client to Mark Teixeira, who signed an 8 year, 180 million dollar deal a year ago. I think more reasonable contracts to compare Holliday to are Vernon Wells' (7 year, 126) or Alfonso Soriano's (8 year, 134).
With Tim Wakefield's 4 million dollar option and Victor Martinez's 7 million dollar option, the Red Sox have to decided what to do with shortstop Alex Gonzalez's 6 million dollar option. Gonzalez hit .284 after joining the Red Sox, and was pretty sound defensively. The Red Sox could decline the option and hope to sign him at a reduced rate, similar to what the Giants did with Freddy Sanchez. They could always look to the Brewers and shortstop J.J. Hardy, who is also expected to draw interest from the Twins.

Thursday Rockpile: Yankees championship hints that death, taxes may also be possible

Rox Girl — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:09:25 -0000

More photos » by Kathy Willens - AP

Charlie Weis was a key midseason acquisition for the Yankees on their quest to their 27th championship. To cover their bases, the Yankees also got some much needed help by signing Jeff Gordon, Serena and Venus Williams, trading for David Beckham, purchasing the rights to Jonathan Franzen and Lang Lang.

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It's so great to see long suffering franchises like the one in New York finally break through and win a championship after many years of loyal, patient, support from their understanding fans. Yes, the one thing that the Yankees World Series win tells us is that the one sure way out of a rut for a franchise is a slow rebuild involving years of patiently developing stars at remote farm outposts as far flung as Seattle, Dallas, and in the case of C.C. Sabathia, that tiny backwater known as Cleveland. By carefully using one's meager television base to develop a trickle of revenue that will allow the team's scouts to purchase the Extra Innings packages necessary to observe the team's various farm clubs and looking for those unwanted scrap heap free agents that prove to be diamonds in the rough like Mark Teixeira and AJ Burnett. Yes, this is a big victory for the little guy, and the Pirates would do well to emulate this model if they ever want to get above .500.

I know many prominent baseball observers thought that we may never see another Yankees championship after their last one so long ago all the way back in Y2K, I'm sure I heard Bob Costas say it, or maybe I knew this woman who said she knew somebody who heard Bob Costas say it, and Joe Buck and Tim McCarver were clearly laughing that the Yankees even managed to get to the Series until the very end, when it finally became clear that this could actually happen, that this ragtag bunch of misfits and castoffs could maybe actually pull this thing off, but this resilient little franchise proved all those doubters wrong.

Congratulations New York, I and the rest of the world raise our fingers in salute to you in that manner of your most charming taxi drivers. May your next championship drought be only five times so long.

The Season May End Tonight: World Series Game 5 Preview, Yankees vs. Phillies, Monday 11/2, 6:57 CT

Al — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 19:00:49 -0000

More photos » by Joseph Kaczmarek - AP

Look carefully... you may not see a major league baseball game again after tonight, until 2010.

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Grudgingly, I give the Yankees credit. Every time they've needed to come up with a big hit in a key situation in this series -- in fact, in the entire postseason -- they've done so. George Steinbrenner & Sons have bought themselves a championship this year, if they win tonight, by buying CC Sabathia and Mark Teixeira, two of the most important components of this Yankee team.

Still, they have to get past Cliff Lee tonight first -- and Lee has been the best pitcher in the 2009 postseason, winning three of his four starts, throwing two complete games, and allowing only two earned runs in 33.1 innings. I think we'll have at least one more game after today, game six in New York on Wednesday, because I think the Phillies will win tonight. And after that, who knows? Both Andy Pettitte and CC Sabathia would have to pitch on short rest in games six and seven -- unless Joe Girardi wants to give Chad Gaudin a start, something I'd think would be about on par with Joe having both his arms sawed off.

Coming back from a 3-1 deficit in the World Series has been accomplished five times: 1925, 1958, 1968, 1979, and 1985. There have been 36 seven-game World Series that ended up four games to three, so based on history, there's about a one-in-seven shot for the Phillies to pull off the comeback.

I hope they do -- not only because I've been rooting for them, but because there hasn't been a seven-game series in seven years and I'd like to see one.

Yankees at Phillies, 6:57 pm CDT. Yankees lead series 3-1. TV: Fox. Announcers: Joe Buck and Tim McCarver.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com game preview

SB Nation game preview

Please visit our SB Nation Phillies site The Good Phight and Yankees site Pinstripe Alley.

Discuss amongst yourselves.

Anatomy of an at-bat

Travis G — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 11:15:12 -0000

More photos » by Julie Jacobson - AP

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We will hopefully look back at Mark Teixeira's fourth inning solo homer as the turning point of the World Series. Up to that point, the Yankees had scored one run in 12 innings, and it looked like their lineup would be dominated for a second straight night.

Then Tex stepped to the plate and drilled a 1-0 changeup (as if he was looking for it) into the rightfield bullpen to tie the game. Let's look back and see how it came to be.

First off, Pedro fell in love with his changeup. He threw it (44 times) more than any other pitch (fastball 34, curveball 13, slider 11, cutter 5), including five of his first six pitches. Tex obviously knew how attached Pedro was to his changeup, so that was one reason to look for it. Now let's look at his first AB -

pitch #1: changeup, called strike, low and away

#2: cutter, ball, high and away

#3: curve, swinging strike, in the dirt, middle of the plate

#4: curve, ball, in the dirt, away

#5: FB, pop out, high and away

So he started Tex with a changeup for a called strike, yet retired him on a 91 MPH fastball, all the while staying away from him...

Now for his 2nd AB -

#1: changeup, ball, inside

#2: changeup, HR, away

The key here is that Pedro fell behind. On 1-0, Tex could take an all-or-nothing swing: all means a homer, nothing mean a strike (no big deal). Pedro tried to establish the inside part of the plate but missed. Most batters look for a fastball on 1-0, but Pedro was smart enough (though in this case he was too smart) to not throw a fastball there, but to throw something that looked like a fastball (in other words, a changeup). Tex realized that, and combined with Pedro's changeup obsession (he'd thrown 24 to that point, by my count), being ahead in the count, and the fact that he'd stayed away from him his entire first AB and missed with his only inside pitch, it was a perfect time to guess outside changeup: that's what Tex did and he got the biggest hit of the World Series so far.

(You could make a valid argument that Hideki Matsui's homer was bigger (and it was according to WPA), but I contend Tex's was more important, for the Yankee offense had looked inept to that point, and it kind of 'broke the ice' and allowed the batters to relax.)

Burnett Roulette: Yankees 3, Phillies 1

WholeCamels — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 03:53:26 -0000

More photos » by Julie Jacobson - AP

12 days ago: New York Yankees' A.J. Burnett reacts after striking out Philadelphia Phillies' Ryan Howard with two men on base during the third inning of Game 2 of the Major League Baseball World Series Thursday, Oct. 29, 2009, in New York. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

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Two games so far, decided by two dominant pitching performances.

A.J. Burnett, the Yankees' erratic free agent acquisition, pitched the game of his life tonight, going seven strong innings, allowing just four hits, striking out nine and walking only two. He allowed just one run, on a smash RBI single off the glove of Alex Rodriguez, scoring Raul Ibanez from second base in the top of the second inning. The Phillies did a decent job making Burnett throw pitches in the early going, but as the game progressed, he became virtually unhittable. Burnett benefited from a wide plate, and the Phillies hitters failed to adjust -- in the later innings, Burnett dropped curveball after curveball on the outside corner, but the Phillies left-handed hitters failed to change their approach.

We got about all we could have hoped for from Pedro Martinez. The veteran righty went six-plus innings, striking out eight and allowing three runs, two on solo home runs from Mark Teixeira and Hideki Matsui, and a third run on a single by Jorge Posada off Chan Ho Park, scoring the inherited baserunner Brett Gardner. Good, but not quite good enough.

The game was not without controversy, with a pair of double-plays-that-weren't in consecutive half innings; in the bottom of the seventh, with runners on first and second, Johnny Damon lined a ball to Ryan Howard, who snagged the short-hop and threw to second. The ball was called a catch, and the throw to second resulted in a force of Melky Cabrera. In the top of the eighth, with runners on first and second, Chase Utley hit a ground ball to second base and, after forcing Shane Victorino at second, the relay throw failed to get Utley on time at first base. He was called out anyway. Even Steven?

Mariano Rivera pitched the 8th and 9th innings and looked mortal, surrendering a walk to Jimmy Rollins and a single to Victorino in the previously discussed 8th inning, and a two out double to Raul Ibanez in the 9th. But... too little, too late.

There was really no beating A.J. Burnett tonight. "Good A.J." showed up. "Good A.J." is one of the best pitchers in baseball, even if he looks like some kind of Boo Radley / extra from the classic The Hills Have Eyes hybrid ghoul.

They still split in New York. They've got Cole Hamels, who's pitched well at home this season, on Saturday night.

Agh, disappointment.

Yanks take Game 2, take Pedro deep in 3-1 victory

CrazyYankeeChick — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 03:33:57 -0000

Ahh, much better.

The Yankees beat the Phillies in a much-needed, if technically not "must-win" Game 2, with A.J. Burnett outdueling old friend Pedro Martinez.

The Phillies took an early 1-0 lead in the 2nd with an RBI single from Matt Stairs, but the Yanks answered in the 4th with a solo shot from Mark Teixeira. Two innings later, Hideki Matsui went yard to give the Yanks a 2-1 lead, and then they collectively abandoned the longball game in favor of the small ball one.

If we had lost that game, I would have undoubtedly been arrested, and they would have needed dental records to identify the first base ump's mangled body.

Something tells me this game is just a microcosm of how the rest of the series is going to go. Nip and tuck. Working the pitchers. No easy outs, no easy runs. I don't know if my heart can take it.

Admittedly, no one can say we teed off on the long-winded stepchild of the Yankees. He kept our bats frozen through 3 innings, save a single from Hideki. And I wouldn't dare publicly subscribe to this at the time, but the thought did cross my mind that if Pedro holds us scoreless and to one hit, I may have to walk into a pit of wild boars to take me out of my misery.

Fortunately, Tex saved me from this fate when he led off the bottom of the 4th with shot to right center. 'Bout time. I was like 8 minutes away from exploding into a "the Phillies have weighted the ball!" outburst. (Seriously, though. It felt like the whole bar had been possessed by Sterling, every shot looked like it was going to carry, inducing us all to jump to our feet in excitement only to see it caught no where near the warning track.)

With the score tied 1-1, everyone was breathing slightly easier. Slightly. A.J. continued to deal, and unlike his usual Good A.J. persona, he wasn't even throwing the occasional wildness. Over 7 unbelievably solid innings, he used 108 pitches to let up just 4 hits, walk 2, and strike out 9. NINE. Thank you a thousand times over, A.J.

The offense did little to help him out, though it never seemed as through Pedro was baffling them, per se. If anything, they might have been a little overeager to knock him around and hence were getting whiffed on giant cuts.

In the bottom of the 7th, the Yanks added another run to their lead, and it really should have been a couple more runs, but a horrendous call ended the inning. With runners on 1st and 2nd, Jorge Posada singled to score Brett Gardner (although his ribbie was regrettably not off Pedro, but I'll take it.)

Jeter made the first out of the inning when he did what every hot batter does with 2 strikes, runners on, in a playoff game where you only lead by 2: bunted. Naturally. Johnny Damon came up and hit a line drive to first which Ryan Howard sells as a catch despite its definite hop, umps buy it, Posada out at 2nd, Damon out with the catch.

Technically, it should have been a 4-1 game, with runners on 1st and 2nd and still 1 out, since Howard never even stepped on first. Eh, it's moot.

Mariano Rivera comes in for 6 outs and throws wayyy too many pitches en route to his 38th postseason save (39). Things started to get a little too close for comfort when he put on Shane Victorino and Jimmy Rollins, with Chase Utley to deal with on only 1 out. Superman induces a double play, inning over.

The 9th went on without much of a hitch beyond Raul Ibanez's double. Mo struck out Matt Stairs to end the game. (Btw, I never noticed how much of a fat middle-aged Guiness-drinking, Mets-rooting blob Stairs looks like--that's the type of guy who bats cleanup in his bar softball league, not for a pro one.)

The series is tied at 1 game apiece, with a "travel" day tomorrow, then 3 games in Philly commence on Halloween. Great win tonight, Yanks. And special nod of gratitude for Jose Molina (yup, first time that sentiment has ever been uttered ever), for picking off Jason Werth in the 3rd. Maybe that was the weird kick in the pants the boys needed to start it up.

It's still our series. Here's to taking Philly by the jugular this weekend.

And what better time for bloodshed then October 31?

-CYC