Friday, July 23, 2010

The Genius Maker #78

This was a pretty crazy game. There were so many things one could write about and so many pitch selection debates that I could write a blog so long nobody would want to read it.

Overall, I thought Posada called a good game. There were times I disagreed that worked, there were times I agreed that didn't work, but there were a lot of times I agreed and they did work. One such time was when Rich Ankiel was up in the 6th inning with 2 guys on and he had a 1-2 count on him. This was one of those times where a curve low was the absolute pitch to throw and they did and he struck out swinging. Same situation when Robertson was pitching in the 7th after relieving CC (who was left in at least one batter too long) and was facing the righty Aviles. Robertson's curve was not his best so he was throwing more fastballs and he had Aviles leaning out over the plate fouling off outside pitches. Going to the curve did not seem an option but busting a fastball in was and Posada called it, Robertson hit the target, Aviles was jammed and weakly popped up to Tex.

Now outside of Posada's good calling of a game, good blocking of pitches in the dirt and solid offensive day, he had an embarrassing night. The play that will stand out in everyone's mind will be the man on 3rd with one out and Posada blocked a swinging strike 3 in the dirt and checked the runner back to 3rd and instead of throwing the runner out at 1st, he tugged his throw into LF trying to get the runner at 3rd. Now it was an awful throw and turned into an awful play. In that situation, you probably don't want to take a chance and you should look the runner back and fire to 1st base to get the out making it 2 outs and a runner on 3rd with a 5-3 lead. However, I will say that if Posada makes an accurate throw, the runner would have been out, the throw had the guy. The 2nd embarrassing play that not too many people will think about was on a tremendous throw by Gardner that was on target with Posada blocking the plate; but for some reason Posada decided he didn't need to tag the runner and only held up the ball like he did! It was the strangest non tag I have ever seen and it was as if Posada forgot the rules? Fortunately, the ump called the runner out as the throw clearly beat the guy by a lot and the ump was shielded from the non tag; no ump would ever think a fielder would purposely not tag a guy so I could see the bad call. The 3rd embarrassing thing posada did was on another nicely blocked 3rd strike, instead of reaching out and tagging the runner who started toward first base, Jorge decided to throw him out, but instead of getting an angle he lobbed the ball over the runner and threw too high. Tex had to reach up and catch the ball and quick step back to the bag to get the out...Posada was lucky there. Posada also threw a little high and wide to 3rd base on a strike out throw out and while the runner should have been called out (ARod tagged him before he reached the base), the inaccurate throw gave the ump an opportunity to call him safe...Like I said...crazy game.

Some other crazy stuff...CC was called for a balk that nobody seemed to know what happened. I felt CC moved his front leg before he threw to 2nd base, but it was a bit ticky tack. i would much rather see pitchers called for not coming to a complete stop as this happens too much IMO.

Cano made a very nice catch over his shoulder, but what made the play interesting is that I don't think I have ever seen an infielder wave off everyone on a ball where his back was to the infield...call for the ball is one thing, wave people off on that is crazy.

Jeter did his usual slow movement toward a ball up the middle, but looked really bad when a play most SS's make standing up he had to dive for, but he missed it when the ball went off his right hand and then over his glove as both his hands were extended on a half dive. It looked a little pathetic.

Posednik got eaten up on a line drive by Tex that I think he should have caught but he played back on the ball and he turned a possible out into a double as it went right by him.

Dejesus made a fantastic catch on a long hard hit by Jeter, but when he hit the fence, he bent his wrist very bad and could not squeeze the ball any more and had to leave the game. Jeter ended up getting an inside the park HR out of it.

ARod hit is 599th HR and got up again in the 8th inning with the crowd going crazy looking for number 600. ARod hit a line drive double to RC...I hope he gets 600 quickly...or Maybe August 3rd when I am at the game.

ARod swing the bat better and so did Jeter. Jeter's 3 hits the other day were pretty weak, but he hit much better today; I hope he gets hot now.

The Yanks pulled away for a 10-4 win!

As I write this, Boston has just allowed 5 runs in the bottom of the 9th inning and Seattle has come back to tie the game. (they were down 6-1 in the 9th) :) Seattle is now up in the bottom of the 10th. UPDATE: Boston won in 13 innings :(

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