The Red Sox have a new ace this postseason, one who’s baffled the Yankee bats to the point of frustration while showing a touch of class lacking in his more famous teammate. With tension still in the air at Fenway Park after a wild Saturday afternoon and a washed out Sunday, Tim Wakefield knuckled down to subdue the Yanks for the second time in this series. Boston is now even at two games apiece.

In a rematch of the ALCS opener, the score was much closer but the result the same. Mike Mussina dueled Wakefield admirably, looking sharper than he had in the postseason and striking out 10. But as before, Moose had trouble keeping the ball in the park, and he gave up solo homers to Todd Walker and Trot Nixon. His control helped him to keep the game close, but a one-out walk to Kevin Millar in the seventh sealed his fate. The Sox loaded the bases against Mussina, and then called in catcher Jason Varitek from the bullpen to pinch hit for Doug Mirabelli, Wakefield’s regular catcher. Lefty Felix Heredia was ready in the bullpen to face the lefty Varitek, but manager Joe Torre decided to trust his starter, and though Varitek hit a grounder to Derek Jeter, he beat the throw to first, and the Sox had their third run of the night.

The Yanks had their opportunities against Wakefield. Last time out, he’d held them to two meager singles before leading off the seventh with a pair of walks and then exiting. This time he allowed the first two runners of the ballgame, Alfonso Soriano and Jeter, to get on base. But Jason Giambi’s liner was speared by Millar, who easily doubled Jeter off of first, and the Yanks ended up failing to score. In the third, a hit by pitch, a steal and a passed ball got David Dellucci all the way to third base, but again, the Yankee run died there.

The Yanks finally put one over on Wakefield in the fifth, but even then, they were left wanting. Dellucci and Soriano stroked one-out singles, and then Jeter lined one down the third base line which hit the bag and then ricocheted. One run scored, but had the ball not struck the base, it’s likely both runs could have crossed the plate. Giambi then narrowly missed a three-run homer, his ball down the rightfield line curving foul by a few feet. Big G eventually flew out to weak-armed Johnny Damon in short center, not deep enough to score Sori. In retrospect, the Yanks might as well have chanced things; Damon’s throw to Mirabelli was well up the line, and it’s possible Sori might have passed him by then. Bernie Williams kept the inning alive with a walk, but Jorge Posada struck out with the bases loaded.

Wakefield left in the seventh after issuing a leadoff walk to Giambi. Failing to get the 3-2 call, he glared in frustration at either home plate ump Derryl Cousins or manager Grady Little. But the classy knuckleballer apologized profusely during the postgame press conference for losing control of his emotions at a critical time, lending an air of civility to a series which had otherwised lacked it. A very classy gesture.

Afte Wakefield was gone, the Yanks added a run in the ninth on a one-out pinch-homer by Ruben Sierra to cut the lead to 3-2. But it stayed that way as Scott Williamson struck out the other three Yanks, bringing their total to 12 on the night.

All in all, it was another dismal showing by the Yankee offense, as Giambi, Posada, Matsui, Johnson, and Boone were a combined 0-for-18 with one walk. The Yanks are hitting only .192 with a .589 OPS this series and have scored just 3.5 runs per game. Sori is a meager 1-for-15 with 6 Ks, Boone is 0-for-9 and looks completely lost, and Giambi’s only 2-for13, both singles. The Yanks aren’t walking much either, only 11 walks in 125 ABs, compared to 29 Ks.

With Wakefield having baffled them twice, the seed of having the knuckler start again has been planted. Given the lack of wear a knuckleballer shows compared to a normal starter, the option has to be tempting for Grady Little, especially with Fragile Diva Martinez showing signs of physical and mental breakdown. The Yanks have to be shuddering at the thought, as they’ve gotten only seven hits and three runs in 13 innings off of the knuckler.

With a day game looming in a couple of hours (David Wells and Derek Lowe), I’ll save the rest of what I have to say for the next writeup.

• • •

Alex Belth of Bronx Banter has a worthwhile piece examining some of the bloggers’ responses to Game Three. He notes that with their antics on Saturday, the Sox shed some of their undedog appeal, but he also turns the mirror on himself:

…I allow my narcissism, my own sense of grandiosity, to get in the way of my enjoyment of the game. Meaning that if the Yankees win, I feel good, validated, or like a winner, and if they lose, I feel like a loser. The world is black-and-white, and I’m either a somebody or a nobody. As if I have anything to do with how they do. I know this is a simplification, but it’s something that is very real for me.

For instance, how many times do fans believe that if they wear their lucky hat, or sit in a certain position on the couch, it will actually effect the outcome of a game? All the time. Superstitions are the birthright of every sports fan—we all know how superstitious the players are, right? All we want to do is identify with them. But even though our little routines are innocent enough, that doesn’t mask the fact that they dellude us into thinking we can actually have an impact on a game. Perhaps it’s just a way for us to feel closer to the action, but it also skews our sense of reality too.

It’s this personalization which is unhealthy, and I think that is at the core of what bothers Edward [Bambino’s Curse‘s Cossette] so much. Sure, it doesn’t help that his team displayed qualities that he rejected, but I think his dependency on the team’s fate to feel good about himself is what is wearing him down.

I’m projecting, of course. What I should say is that I’m allowing my dependency on the Yankees’ fate to wear me down.

I can identify with that on some level… hell, those are my cap superstitions Alex is talking about. But while I’m capable of a good mini-tantrum during or after these ballgames, I apparently have an easier time of letting go than he does, though as he points out, writing in a blog like this is a big part of that.

Look, I know as a Yank fan I’ve been lucky to have such a great team playing in front of me for the past several years, to the point where I expect nothing less than a run at a championship. But if this team falls short (as I’ve been predicting for most of this season, only to glimpse the promised land on Saturday), you know what? I’ll probably spend a day or two cursing a blue streak, then I’ll go right back to watching whoever’s still playing, climb on some other bandwagon as I take joy in the release of the pressure, and then look forward to all of the hot-stove banter on what my team can do to get back to their rightful spot at the top of the heap next season. The sun will still come up, my friends will still be there, and life will continue.

Rain in Boston made the Fenway Park field unplayable, postponing Sunday night’s ALCS Game Four and leaving the two teams, their organizations, and their fans another 24 hours to fan the flames and doctor the spin from Saturday’s imbroglio (wasn’t he traded for Lou Brock?). The game will be played Monday evening, with Game Five pushed back to Tuesday afternoon and then, if necessary, Games Six and Seven going on as scheduled in da Bronx. The travel day has been eliminated.

Both managers decided to use the postponement to realign their rotations. The Yanks will now start Mike Mussina against Boston’s Tim Wakefield, a rematch of Game One in which the Sox got the upper hand. Game Five, to be played Tuesday at 4:18 PM, will pit Wells against either Derek Lowe or John Burkett.

Overall, this would seem to benefit the Red Sox more, since they can skip over Burkett to pitch Lowe at Fenway, where he’s been much more effective (3.21 ERA there vs. 6.11 on the road). On the other hand, Lowe looked the other night as though the postseason innings were taking a bit of a toll on his shoulder, so Boston manager Grady Little left himself an out. The Yanks will get the benefit of Moose on his normal four days’ rest, compared to the seven he had before Game One, a factor which may have contributed to his lack of command.

Meanwhile, four of the principals in Saturday’s drama — Pedro Martinez, Manny Ramirez, Don Zimmer, and Karim Garcia — were fined by Major League Baseball disciplinarian Bob Watson. According to the Boston Globe, Martinez’s wallet will be lightened by $50,000, Ramirez’s by $25,000, Garcia’s by $10,000, and Zimmer’s by $5,000.

Watson also announced that the ninth-inning bullpen incident involving Garcia, Jeff Nelson, and a Sox groundskeeper was still under review. Boston police said no arrests were planned relating to the incident, but that a summons still might be issued. Garcia was scratched from Sunday’s lineup due to the injuries he sustained on his left hand, but will be available later in the series. Zimmer issued a brief, tearful apology for his role in the matter, the only one of the four principals to do so.

When I wrote at the outset of the Yankees-Red Sox ALCS matchup that this series would bring out the worst in everyone, I envisioned mouthy owners, rabid media, and dangerously rowdy fans. I never pictured things devolving to the point of affecting the game on the field. But Saturday’s Game Three at Fenway Park devolved from a marquee pitching matchup for the ages — Roger Clemens vs. Pedro Martinez — into an ugly theater of the absurd which featured a beanball, a hard slide, taunting, bench clearing, violence which spilled to include 72-year old coaches and groundskeepers, and enough “fuck yous” to give a prudish lipreader a heart attack.

For a Yankee fan, this had to be the most satisfying non-clinching victory of the Joe Torre era. Not only did the Yanks beat Pedro Martinez in a playoff game, they caused the diva ace of the Red Sox to implode and humliate himself in front of his home crowd. Martinez’s and fellow diva Manny Ramirez’s stereotypically hotheaded actions put machismo ahead of winning the baseball game, while the notoriously hot Clemens overcame a rocky start and corraled his emotions long enough to coolly dispatch the Boston side.

The game began as though it would be a rerun of the two aces’ 1999 ALCS matchup at Fenway, when Clemens was shelled en route to a 13-1 Sox win (a pyrrhic one at that, as it was their only victory of the series). Thanks to some slack defense, Clemens was touched for two runs in the first, and had it not been for a strikeout-throwout DP to end the inning, the hole he dug might have been worse. As it was, spotting Martinez and the Sox a two-run lead was enough to whip the Boston crowd into a frenzy.

But Clemens settled into a groove thereafter, and the Yanks refused to roll over. Jorge Posada led off the second with a double to left-center, and two outs later, Karim Garcia punched an RBI single to put the Yanks on the board. They evened the score in the third as Derek Jeter launched a curve ball that didn’t curve for a home run over the Green Monster. Martinez was relying on his changeup and breaking stuff, steering clear of a meager fastball that couldn’t break 90 MPH — clearly, he was missing his best stuff.

But Pedro showed his fastball in the fourth inning, an inning that may yet rank with the tenth inning of a certain World Series game for infamy in Red Sox lore. Posada worked a leadoff walk from Martinez, and Nick Johnson followed with a single. Hideki Matsui then laced Martinez’s first pitch for a ground-rule double to left, scoring Posada to take a 3-2 lead and putting runners on second and third. Then Garcia came to bat. For showing the temerity to drive in a run off of The Exalted Pedro, Garcia drew a first-pitch fastball behind the head which hit him between the numbers as he ducked. This inexcusable salvo — throwing at the head is aggressive, but throwing behind the head is an Act of War — drew heated exchanges between the batter and the pitcher, ratcheting the tension up several notches.

The bases now loaded, Alfonso Soriano stepped in. With a chance to put Pedro away, the free-swinging Sori slapped a grounder to Nomar Garciaparra, and while the Sox turned the DP, Garcia’s hard-and-late slide into second baseman Todd Walker cranked the tension even more. The two tussled briefly, while Johnson scored to make it 4-2. At this point, Posada and Martinez began screaming and gesturing to each other, with the Sox pitcher pointing to his head as if to say, “I’ll hit you, too.” The Yankee dugout, particularly Clemens, looked ready to explode.

Martinez escaped the inning via an Enrique Wilson popup (the rotund futilityman, who has owned Pedro in the past, was hitless on the day), but tensions continued into the bottom half of the inning when Clemens took the mound. Both benches had been warned by the umpires about retaliation. But the Rocket, with his own colorful past when it comes to headhunting (see Piazza, Mike), engaged in another kind of head game. On the first three pitches, as Baseball Tonight‘s Harold Reynolds pointed out later, Ramirez was so psyched out by the merest threat of a high hard one that he was bailing out each time.

Clemens’ fourth pitch to Ramirez, a high fastball nowhere near anybody’s head, enraged Little Man Ramirez so much that the moody slugger charged the mound, bat in hand, exchanging four-letter pleasantries with Clemens. In postgame interviews, Clemens emphasized that his pitch was over the plate: “”If I wanted it near him,” Clemens said in his characteristically Texan drawl, “he’d know it.”

Both benches emptied, and then the game’s most surreal moment transpired. Feisty Yankee bench coach Don Zimmer — a man who knows a few things about beanballs — charged at Martinez and appeared to lunge at him. Pedro showed his true color — yellow — by throwing the 72-year-old to the ground, an image that will dog Puny Pedro for the rest of his career. Not that Zimmer was in the right, or that the entire region of New England hasn’t wanted to do just that to “Popeye” since the Sox collapse in 1978, but this was ridiculous, and miles removed from the Clemens-Piazza feud of 2000. Then you had two men in what would have been a fair fight; here you had a senior citizen and a junior punk — pure tabloid dynamite.

Even more ridiculous was that nobody was ejected after this melee. Martinez, Ramirez, and Zimmer should have all taken powders at this point, but crew chief Tim McClelland decided to separate the game from the sideshow, concluding that all parties should stay. This kept the atmosphere at a rolling boil, a situation that would carry ramifications later.

For his part, when the action resumed, Clemens showed amazing restraint. He threw one more pitch to Ramirez, waaaay outside, and Mental Midget Manny swung feebly before taking his seat. From there, the ballgame settled into a tense groove. Surprisingly, Martinez found his rhythm and a few miles an hour on his fastball, and retired the Yanks 1-2-3 in the fifth, sixth and seventh innings. Clemens got into trouble in the sixth via a Johnny Damon single and a Walker walk with none out. But he K’ed Nomar on three pitches, and facing Manny again, got the Sox slugger to ground into an inning-ending double play.

Clemens pounded his glove as he came off the Fenway field for what would be the last time, frustrating the Sox faithful who’d shouted, “Get Roger!” The mental image it conjured up was of Bugs Bunny jamming a carrot in Elmer Fudd’s rifle as the fwustwated hunter swore he’d get that waskally wabbit. The poise which the Rocket showed in front of that loaded crowd spoke volumes; as the New York Times‘ Jack Curry put it, “His final appearance at Fenway was crazy, but Clemens was the better pitcher, the better man.”

That said, there was still the small matter of winning the ballgame, which was the Yanks’ main interest. Torre brought on Felix Heredia to start the seventh, but when Heredia walked David Ortiz, he got the hook in favor of Jose Conteras. The Cuban gave up a single to Kevin Millar, and then yielded a run when Trot Nixon grounded into a double play, cutting the lead to 4-3. Bill Mueller then drew a walk from Contreras, but Jason Varitek popped up to end the inning.

In the eighth, Torre went to his ace in the hole, Mariano Rivera. For the Yanks, the atmosphere felt like a clinching opportunity; a loss after what had transpired would have been devastating, as if somehow justifying the Sox shenanigans. Fortunately Rivera was as cool a customer as Clemens, and the Yankee closer Mo’ed ‘em down 1-2-3 in both innings to preserve the win.

But not before one more sideshow took place. At the beginning of the 9th, a scuffle ensued in the Yankee bullpen. According to reports, an overly partisan Boston groundskeeper got into a mixer with reliever Jeff Nelson and rightfielder Garcia, who climbed the wall to come to his teammate’s aid. The groundskeeper ended up being taken to the hospital with “cleat marks on his arms and back,” according to the Times, while Garcia left the game with a cut on his knuckle. Executives for both teams blew hard, while the Boston Police Department launched an investigation into why Sox fans are so wicked retarded… oops, I mean, into the fight which occurred.

The postgame interviews contained some great soundbites and quotes:

• Boston manager Grady Little: “”Everyone knew it was going to be quite a battle, it was going to be very emotional, a lot of intensity. But I think we’ve upgraded it from a battle to a war.”

• Joe Torre: “There’s no question in my mind that Pedro hit him on purpose. He was probably frustrated with the fact that we hit some balls hard… I didn’t care for that.”

• Pedro Martinez: “I’m not going to talk about any of that. What are you doing in my locker?”

• Trot Nixon: “A whole lot of testosterone flying around out there.”

• Derek Jeter: “All I saw was the bald head go down. I wasn’t sure if it was Zimm or Boomer [David Wells]. Hey, Zimm is intense. That’s the only way you can stay in this game all these years.”

• Scott Sauerbeck: “That guy [Zimmer] has a pair on him. Was what he did idiotic? Yes. Could he have hurt Petey? No.”

• Roger Clemens: “Sometimes when you’re getting knocked around the ballpark, you get your ticket punched… These guys have done it to me, and if you don’t have electric stuff or you’re not on, and guys are leaning out hitting balls they shouldn’t be hitting, you might have to stand somebody up. But just ’cause you’re getting hit around you don’t whip one behind somebody’s neck… I wasn’t a part of all that. I went in there and was trying to strike Manny out, and the bottom line is that he started mouthing me and the ball wasn’t even near him. And he would know if if I’m in it. There would be no mistake about it.”

• Clemens, again, “Pick your two most favorite superheroes and I’ll put Rivera up against both of them.”

Online, a couple of Boston bloggers felt shamed the day’s events. Ed Kubosiak from Out of Left Field wrtes: “I’m embarrassed to be a Red Sox fan this morning. Hell, make that embarrassed to be a baseball fan. I found it nearly impossible to cheer for the Sox yesterday after Pedro’s head-hunting pitch that hit Karim Garcia in the back, and his finger pointing, both at the Yankee dugout and at his own head, seeming to indicate he would throw at somebody else’s noggin if he had to.”

Similarly, Edward Cossette of Bambino’s Curse writes, “I went to bed last night feeling embarrassed to be a Red Sox fan. I awoke this morning and felt no different.” Cossette runs down some of the Boston media coverage, noting Boston Herald writer Tony Massarotti‘s observation, “Interestingly, following the game, not a single Red Sox player defended Martinez’ pitch to Garcia. Not one.”

With the dust on an ugly day now at least somewhat settled, the Yanks hold a 2-1 edge to the series and send David Wells to the mound to face John Burkett. Wells pitched the Yanks to their biggest victory of the regular season over the Sox in the Bronx, and he also beat Boston once in its home park. Burkett has a history of futility against the Yanks: 0-6, 8.49 ERA in the regular season, though he did beat them for a complete game victory in the ’96 ALDS for the Texas Rangers, and he shut them out for 5.2 innings back in July. The advantage would appear to be with the Pinstripes here, as they have a chance to go for the jugular in this bloodthirsty series.

Whatever sympathy the Sox and their 85-year championship drought may have evoked nationwide probably evaporated in yesterday’s melees. As Washington Post‘s Thomas Boswell put it, “If ‘Reverse the Curse’ were on a nationwide recall ballot after Saturday’s Game 3 of the American League Championship Series, then the Red Sox would probably lose millions of ‘swing votes’ after a disgraceful performance that left the Boston organization with a self-inflicted black eye in addition to a 4-3 loss.”

Saturday’s ballgame may turn out to be the defining moment of this Yankee team, the one which turned their desire for a pennant into a steely resolve to crush their Boston rivals into a gooey paste. If so, the city of Boston is going to wish Pedro and Manny had just taken their licking instead of putting the “ass” in “class.”

Thursday was the 100th anniversary of one of the titans of baseball, former Dodger owner Walter O’Malley. The popular perception of O’Malley as the robber baron who stole baseball from Brooklyn still endures, a topic that L.A. Times columnist Bill Plaschke investigates. Plaschke begins by noting that O’Malley’s fingerprints are all over the game today:

This fall’s baseball playoffs have stretched marvelously from coast to coast, from a grimy subway to a golden gate, from clam chowder to key lime pie, a national pastime renewed.

Walter O’Malley had something to do with that.

This fall’s baseball teams feature rosters that stretch from continent to continent, different languages, many colors, diversity in their clubhouses far greater than on our streets.

Walter O’Malley had something to do with that too.

This fall, baseball is enjoying a resurgence of old-fashioned teams playing in old-fashioned ballparks, winning with old-fashioned smarts.

Today being his 100th birthday, wouldn’t Walter O’Malley be proud.

Plaschke then wonders aloud why O’Malley isn’t in the Baseball Hall of Fame, while fellow owners such as the notoriously racist Tom Yawkey and the gimmicky Bill Veeck are. The answer isn’t difficult; even 45 years after moving the Dodgers, O’Malley carries “the stigma of having moved a team from the myopic neighborhood that is New York.”

But as I’ve written before, the simple explanation that O’Malley bolted town is a distortion. O’Malley tried in vain to get a replacement stadium built in Brooklyn (a domed Buckminster Fuller-designed number, even), but he ran into heavier hitters, particularly Robert Moses, the master architect of New York City, who wouldn’t give him the time of day. O’Malley didn’t hold a gun to the city’s head and say, “Build me a new ballpark or I’m gone,” he sought a ballpark built with private money but which required the city’s intervention to parcel all of the land into one package he could purchase. It’s a complex tale best told in Neil J. Sullivan’s The Dodgers Move West and also in Michael Shapiro’s recent The Last Good Season.

On the occasion of his centennial, Plaschke notes that the O’Malley family has created an official website, walteromalley.com, which contains a wealth of historical information about one of the most powerful executives in the game’s history. This isn’t just a one-page puff piece, either — we’re talking something in the scope of a presidential library; 600 web pages in all. In addition to photos and multimedia clips, O’Malley’s correspondances with the power brokers of New York City, particularly Moses, and Los Angeles, are on display for all the world to see. Also here are extensive features on the creation of Dodgertown in Vero Beach, Florida, the building of Dodger Stadium in L.A., the team’s history during his reign, bios of the Hall of Famers who starred for the Dodgers during O’Malley’s tenure and the owner’s legacy of expanding baseball orders. It’s too much to take in during one sitting, particuarly during the postseason, but this is a site that’s worth mining during the cold winter months. This is an essential piece of Dodger history, and of baseball history in general.

Consider this for a minute. How many owners besides O’Malley can you think of whose actions came under such scrutiny? Perhaps Charles Comiskey during the Black Sox scandal, but Comiskey was doing his best to cover up as much as possible, hoping not to lose his players or expose his own skinflint nature. Perhaps other scandal-mongering owners such as George Steinbrenner and Marge Schott, who were disciplined by commissioners for various infractions and indiscretions. But how many other owners can you think of whose affairs look better when dragged out into the harsh light of day?

The O’Malley family isn’t arguing that Walter belongs in the Hall, but Plaschke builds a solid case for the man which rests primarily on his legacy in speeding up the game’s integration (O’Malley was a co-owner when Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier, and continued Branch Rickey’s work long after the old master was forced out), in building Dodger Stadium, his jewel, “a clean ballpark at a fair price,” and in his grand vision of the game as a global entity.

It remains to be seen whether O’Malley will ever gain admission to Cooperstown. With the players now firmly in control of the Veteran’s Committee and reviewing non-playing candidates only every four years, he’ll have to wait quite a bit longer. Still, the O’Malley website speaks volumes as to the man’s qualifications.

• • •

Speaking of Dodger owners, the franchise has a new bidder in Frank McCourt, a Boston real-estate developer. With Tampa Bay Buccaneers owner Malcolm Glazer’s bid to purchase the team, currently owned by News Corp. hitting the skids due to the complexities of satisfying two very different groups of owners, the Dodgers have sought other suitors. The McCourt bid is said to be in the vicinity of $330 million and is apparently moving very quickly because News Corp. wants to wash its hands of the club. According to the L.A. Times:

Although it is unclear how much News Corp. is willing to concede in its efforts to rid itself of the franchise it purchased for $311 million in 1998, it appears McCourt represents the only immediate option for the media giant to end its ownership of the Dodgers.

McCourt’s attempts to purchase the Boston Red Sox in 2001 and the Angels this year probably would help accelerate the approval process of his Dodger bid, executives said, because baseball officials conducted background checks at that time.

John Wiebe’s Dodger Blog has a look at some of the positives and negatives surrounding McCourt’s bid, and some relevant links to articles.

Nobody on the Yankees would publicly admit it, but Thursday night’s ballgame was a must-win for them. After dropping the opener of the ALCS to the Red Sox on Wednesday, a Game Two loss would send the Bronx Bombers back to Beantown down 2-0 and staring down the barrel at Pedro Martinez in Fenway Park. It doesn’t get much worse than that.

Just as it did last week, the task of rescuing the Yankee season from the brink of disaster fell to Andy Pettitte. The situtation couldn’t have been in better hands; the last ten times Dandy Andy had pitched after a Yankee loss, he’d garnered a victory, with three of those stops coming against Boston.

But the Red Sox came out looking as though they might stop Pettitte dead in his tracks on this night. Gabe Kapler, playing centerfield for the injured Johnny Damon, led off the ballgame with an infield single, but he was erased on a strikeout-throwout double-play. Two singles and a walk to the Sox big three hitters (Nomar Garciaparra, Manny Ramirez, and David Ortiz) followed to load the bases, with Ortiz coming back from an 0-2 count to draw the base on balls. Pettitte squeaked free by getting Kevin Millar to pop up, but his 22-pitch count gave cause for concern.

The second inning started off even worse for the lefty. A Jason Varitek double and a Trot Nixon single put runners on the corners, and then #9 hiter Damian Jackson squirted a single up the middle to score the first run of the ballgame, still with nobody out. Blood was in the water. But Kapler grounded Pettitte’s first pitch to Derek Jeter, who stepped on second and then fired to first to complete the critical double-play. After falling behind Bill Mueller, Pettitte then induced ground out to end the inning. The Yanks were trailing, and their starter had already thrown 39 pitches, but the situation could have been much, much worse.

Jorge Posada began the Yankee second against Derek Lowe by working a walk. Then in a matchup which pitted the game’s most extreme groundball pitcher with its most extreme groundball hitter, Lowe got Hideki Matsui to hit — guess what? — a grounder to second. But after getting the forceout, Nomar was unable to complete the DP. Nick Johnson stepped in next, still in the midst of a 1-for-33 slump. On the second pitch, Lowe threw Johnson a cutter that didn’t cut. Nick the Stick cranked the Loweball over the rightfield wall, a towering shot that put the Yanks up 2-1, their first lead in the series.

Pettitte kept the momentum going the Yankee way by slicing through Boston’s big three on ten pitches, and then the Yanks struck again in the bottom of the third. With one out, Jeter reached on an infield single, and then Jason Giambi went the other way with a single to left. Bernie Williams immediately followed with a single to score Jeter. Then Jorge Posada stroked a low liner to Jackson, but the Sox second baseman, thinking double-play all the way, failed even to make the catch. The ball squirted through the infield, then Jackson threw poorly to eliminate even the forceout. The bases now loaded, Hideki Matsui again hit a ground ball, with Millar forcing out Giambi at home. Johnson grounded out to end the inning, but the Yanks now led 3-1.

Both pitchers continued to slop through, stranding baserunners here and there. Matsui finally gained some redemption in the fifth, singling home Williams from second after the Yankee centerfielder had doubled. Bernie appears to be locked in at the plate, his ailing knee well enough to allow him to resume his trademark ass-out crouch at the plate. He’s hitting .381 with a .985 OPS this October, a welcome boost after a subpar season.

Now holding a 4-1 lead, Pettitte got two quick outs in the sixth. But Varitek smacked a frozen rope that carried all the way to the leftfield net, his fourth homer of the postseason. 4-2 Yankees. Andy got the first two outs in the seventh as well before Mueller singled. His starter having thrown 118 pitches and the big boys coming up again, Joe Torre took a leap of faith and handed the ball to Jose Contreras, the new symbol of this classic rivalry. Recall that the Yanks won a bidding war with the Sox over Conteras, which led to Boston president Larry Lucchino’s sour-grapes remark about the Yanks as “the Evil Empire.” The Empire struck back, as Nomar popped up Contreras’ first pitch to Johnson at first base, ending the inning.

Again, the Yanks wheeled out their lengthy display of forced patriotism in the seventh, and again Ronan Tynan’s pipes brought more Yankee magic and more pain to the opposing starter. Giambi stroked a two-out single, and Williams drew a walk, bringing the curtain down on Lowe’s night. Posada greeted reliever Scott Sauerbeck with a bases-clearing double, and a passed ball took him to third, but the Yanks failed to capitalize. Still, that’s now six runs in four seventh innings at Yankee Stadium, which comes out to a 13.50 ERA. God bless that Irish tenor.

With the score 4-2, Torre had prepared Mariano Rivera to pitch the final two innings. But with the lead now doubled and his setup man having thrown exactly one pitch, Torre let Contreras work the eighth. The Cuban righty set the Sox down 1-2-3, setting the stage for the Yankee closer to come on in the ninth and nail down the win, which he did. The series is now split, 1-1.

So again, the two teams hit the road with their chins up, the Sox for stealing a game in the Bronx, the Yanks for carrying some momentum into foreign territory. Saturday’s matchup is one for the ages, pitting Pedro against Roger Clemens, who makes what will certainly be his final start in the ballpark where he won 101 games. That’s nine Cy Young Awards on the mantle for these two. October was made for this matchup.

A couple of lineup changes may play a part in Game Three. Damon should return to action for the Sox, replacing Kapler, who had a miserable night against Pettitte. After singling for his first postseason hit, he was on the bad end of the two early DPs, then struck out twice to run his line to 1-for-17 in October. Damon had a hot Divisional Series against Oakland before that grisly Game Five collision — .316 with a .988 OPS. On the other side of the diamond, the Yankee lineup against Martinez will likely include futilityman Enrique Wilson either at second for Soriano or third for Aaron Boone. Wilson was 7-for-8 with four doubles against the Boston ace this season, and is 10-for-20 lifetime with a 1.224 OPS, proving that even a blind chicken finds a kernal of corn once in awhile.

So much for the theory about the Yankees being well-rested compared to the haggard Red Sox entering the American League Championship Series. Yankee starter Mike Mussina looked more rusted than rested from seven days off, and the Yank bats were baffled by Sox starter Tim Wakefield’s knuckler as Boston took the first game of this highly anticipated series, 5-2.

Just as last week against the Minnesota Twins, the game-time temperature was unseasonably warm — 67 degrees. But there was no mistaking this for anything but an October affair, not with the bombastic pregame ceremonies which included Mr. October himself, Reggie Jackson, throwing out the first pitch, a very confused bald eagle and an ear-splitting F-14 flyover. Not with 56,281 feverish fans who cheered and booed every pitch. The crowds are louder, the grass is greener, the lights are brighter on October nights in the Yankee Stadium.

A surprisingly large contingent of those 56,281 fans were wearing Boston colors. Once upon a time, doing so in da Bronx was an invitation for trouble (“Hey pal, I’m gonna show you a new way to wear that hat!”), but the sucesss of the Torre dynasty and its record attendance levels have brought in a more civil — and occasionally bipartisan — clientele. My brother and I, sittting in seats 19 and 18 in our row (hehehe), had to endure the barbs of four female Boston fans directly behind us, otherwise clueless twentysomethings who kept calling Nomar and Manny “big boy,” as in “Come on, big boy, let’s do it!” Everytime one of those Boston stars came to bat, I thought I’d stumbled upon some Beantown version of the Spice Channel.

Wakefield was virtually unhittable, allowing only two second-inning singles through the first six innings and retiring 14 straight batters as his knuckler danced. Since his last start, the Boston pitcher reportedly had gone back to basics for the mechanics on his money pitch, making sure to lock his wrist during delivery. The results paid off big time. The Yanks took impatient at-bats against Wakefield, with Derek Jeter’s evening typify things. In three trips to the plate against the knuckleballer, Jeter saw exactly four pitches, producing two infield popups and a soft liner to third.

In conrast to Wakefield, Mussina continually courted disaster. After a sharp 1-2-3 first inning, he began missing high in the strike zone, throwing 14 balls in a 17-pitch span (pitching from the stretch move I call “the goddamn drinking bird”) and walking David Ortiz and Trot Nixon in the second. He wriggled free, but not before expending 24 pitches in doing so. By the end of the third, he’d thrown 53 pitches.

He found real trouble in the fourth. It began innocently enough, with a Manny Ramirez chopper to the first-base side of the mound. With his follow-through carrying him the other way, Moose could only swat the ball with his glove towards Nick Johnson at first, feebly at that. Next up was David Ortiz, 0-for-21 lifetime against Mussina. Moose got ahead 0-2, but Ortiz waited him out until the count was full. Up to that point, Mussina had gone to two strikes on eight of the thirteen batters he’d faced without recording a single strikeout. He couldn’t finish Ortiz off either. The big lefty slugger creamed a low-and-away fastball into the rightfield upper deck for a two-run homer.

Mussina continued to have trouble keeping the ball in the park during the fifth. Todd Walker led off with a shot that appeared to hit the rightfield foul pole. The rightfield umpire initially called the ball foul, but he was overruled by home plate ump Tim McClelland. Replays showed that the ball actually struck the glove of some wannabe Jeffery Maier, and apparently Fox made a big deal of the replay. But it looked pretty clearly as though the ball would have hit the pole anyway, making it a fair ball and thus a home run. Three batters later, Manny got into the act with his own shot to right, stretching the lead to 4-0.

Moose didn’t even make it out of the sixth. Singles by Kevin Millar and Doug Mirabelli put two men aboard, and with two outs, Joe Torre called for lefty Felix Heredia to face Walker, who struggles with southpaws (a .655 OPS). Heredia got Walker to end the inning, but the Yankee bullpen faltered in the top of the seventh. With one out, Jeff Nelson came on in relief, and though he got Nomar Garciaparra to ground out meekly to catcher, the results thereafter weren’t pretty. Manny singled, then Nellie hit Ortiz in the foot. A Millar single drove in Ramirez, by which time Torre had seen enough to call upon Gabe White. Trot Nixon greeted White with another single, but the lefty escaped the inning on a fielder’s choice.

As it did with Minnesota pitcher Brad Radke, the seventh inning stretch, with Ronan Tynan and the looooooong version of “God Bless America,” appeared to rattle Wakefield. He came into the inning on a roll, having retired 14 straight and given the Yankee crowd almost nothing to cheer about since the opening ceremonies. But he walked Jason Giambi to lead off the seventh, then walked Bernie Williams as well. Sox manager Grady Little gave Wakefield a quick hook, bringing in lefty Alan Embree.

Jorge Posada smoked Embree’s second pitch into the right centerfield gap for an RBI double, with Williams holding at third as the Yankee crowd erupted. At this point the ignorance of the Sox fans behind me revealed itself. These gals had already become the butt of jokes in our section. The four of them had disappeared during the sixth inning on a beer run, but they’d left behind nearly full beers, into which a pair of ten-year-olds, at the distinct lack of discouragement by their guardian, had put peanut shells and nasty loogies. No matter; the gals came back double-fisting Bud Lights. After Posada’s hit, the loudest of the women shouted out, “C’mon guys, all we need is one more run!” before her friend turned to her and reminded her that the Sox were in the field. Oops. So then the same woman shouted, “Let’s go Wakefield!” despite the fact that the knuckler’s night had just ended. Hmmmm, you ever watch baseball?

I hadn’t engaged these women (not ladies) in any sort of taunting, but by this point I’d been nurturing a couple of good’n’filthy comeback lines — certainly no worse than theirs — waiting for the right moment. I turned around and prepared to deliver my bon mots, but as I did so, I caught the eye of the one directly behind me, an angelic blue-eyed blonde who hadn’t uttered a peep all evening. We made eye contact and she smiled, at which I thought to myself that whatever vile spew I was about to unleash, she had done absolutely nothing to deserve hearing it. Looking at her, I exhaled and shook my head, deciding to just put a sock in it for the evening.

Hideki Matsui faced Embree with none out and two runners in scoring position. He got ahead in the count 2-0, but on the next pitch, he lofted a fly ball to left field — deep enough to score the run, but a bringdown nonetheless. The Yanks could do nothing to bring Posada home after that.

That was it for the scoring. White held down the Sox before giving way to Jose Contreras, who impressed by striking out the side in the ninth except for a Ramirez single, his fourth hit on the night. The Yanks mounted no challenge to either Mike Timlin or Scott Williamson, and just like that, Boston had overcome all predictions about their fatigue to jump out to a 1-0 lead in the ALCS.

I’ve spent the last few days hyping my TiVo for how it improves the playoff-watching experience. Monday was the dark side of that. Because of a dinner commitment, we had planned to start the deciding game of the A’s-Red Sox series late. As we were leaving dinner, our host — who had a definite rooting agenda, and who had gotten up to check the score — playfully hinted that something had just happened. Grrrrr.

Reconstructing by the time-slider on the recording, my pal had to have just seen Jason Varitek’s game-tying home run to lead off the sixth inning. Up to that point, A’s starter Barry Zito had cruised. Perfect through the first three innings, he allowed only two hits and a walk over the next two, with one of those hits being erased stretching for an extra base. Meanwhile the A’s had scratched out a run off of Pedro Martinez in the fourth on a Scott Hatteberg walk and a Jose Guillen double. But Guillen was thrown out trying for third to end the inning, the second time in as many days he’d made a critical out at third.

Had Varitek’s homer been the only damage in the sixth, the A’s would have still counted themselves lucky. But it got worse. Two of the next three batters reached base, and Zito was left to face Manny Ramirez, who had yet to drive in a run all series. I braced myself, muttering to my girlfriend that this seemed like the right time for him to crush one — it fit the storyline. I’ve been right about lots of things this week, but few of them have pissed me off as much as seeing Ramirez smoke that ball over the leftfield wall. That is, unless it was the sight of that airhead standing and admiring his handiwork, then pointing to the Red Sox dugout. Ramirez deserved a fastball in his earhole for his showboating.

My girlfriend and I had started watching the game on a 90-minute delay, and by the middle of the eighth we’d cut the margin in half. At that point, I decided to make a beer run while unwittingly wearing my Yankees cap. The game must have just ended, and a tall man in a sweater preparing t to take his two dogs for a walk saw my cap and called out, “Yanks-Sox in the Championship Series!” Trying to ignore him, I avoided eye contact, so he said it again, by which time I was shaking my head and rolling my eyes. I threw a mini-tantrum when I came into the apartment, much to the dismay of my gal, who already suspected the result because our awkward efforts to add time to the recording beyond its three-hour slot resulted in a brief snippet of live TV. The rest of the game was a fait accompli, any sense of the fever pitch the accursed teams’ fan bases must have felt as the A’s loaded the bases in the ninth against Derek Lowe completely dissipated into an angry fatigue. Ah, shitfuck.

Those moves A’s manager Ken Macha made in the 9th were beyond questionable. Pinch-running using the guy who can’t find home plate with a roadmap, the guy whose whimpering cost you the tying run in Game Three (Eric Byrnes), is a bad omen. Pinch-hitting for the guy who hit your only home run in the series (Jermaine Dye) is a bad omen. Wasting an out with a sacrifice bunt is irresponsible. Pinch-hitting a guy with a .317 career On Base Percentage (Terrence Long) for a guy with a .354 career OBP (Frank Menechino) with two outs and the bases loaded is aggressively stupid.

Still, the A’s really lost this series on Saturday night, their baserunning gaffes entering the lore of the damned: Merkle’s boner, Snodgrass’s muff, Owen’s dropped third strike, Pesky holding the ball, Buckner letting one through the legs, Byrnes and Miguel Tejada whining midplay as they failed to touch home plate. Everything in the series which happened after that fateful inning only served to give it more weight, becoming part of Oakland’s elimination-game futility. Ladies and gentlemen, the Chokeland A’s.

So now the AL’s best rivalry will determine its league champion. While that sounds great on paper, I’ve got mixed emotions about the matchup. Those emotions have less to do with the 26 titles the Yanks have won since a certain Ruth fella got sold, the prospect (gasp) that the Yanks might finally find themselves on the short end of the stick in a rivarly they have historically dominated, or even how the two teams currently stack up.

No, my emotions are mixed because this series will bring out the worst in everybody. From the owners to the media to the fans, this will make the California recall election seem like Romper Room. Sox prez Larry Lucchino and Yank owner George Steinbrenner will continue their history of trading barbs, the tabloid mentality of the various papers in both cities will blow every noseblow out of proportion, and the two fan bases loathing each other in close enough proximity might spill some real blood. Both ballparks will sound like the annual Tourette’s Syndrome Convention, with the opposing teams superstars implicated in all manners of sexual congress (“Hey Nomar, your wife does it soccer-style!”). Any parent brazen enough to take their kid to one of these games had better teach them the concept of earmuffs beforehand.

The Sox are an interesting mix. On the one hand is an old guard of fragile diva superstars who need no last names: Pedro, Nomar, and Manny. They bear the Red Sox frustrated history of late-season collapses and playoff failures, and they’ve developed hostile relationships with the press. On the other hand is a new breed of dirt dogs such as Kevin Millar, Johnny Damon, and Bill Mueller, guys who’d run through a wall and then delight in telling reporters about it. Workaday mainstays Jason Varitek and Trot Nixon have more in common with the latter, and it’s this infectious swagger which has brought a new attitude to the Red Sox. “Cowboy up!” is their rallying cry. “…[A]s if any of those Olde Towners had even been near a rodeo in their lives,” writes one loyal reader.

While the dirt dogs of the Red Sox cowboy up with their trash talk, the Yanks won’t say boo to a caterpillar. Derek Jeter will tell us that he’s going to put his pants on one leg at a time, Bernie Williams will say that the Yanks just have to play their game, and Joe Torre will remind us that it’s the starting pitchzzzzzzzzz. The guys in pinstripes won’t give the Sox a shred of bulletin-board material to rally around.

Realistically, one has to like the Yankees’ chances. Well-rested by clinching on Sunday, they’ll be facing a team who criss-crossed the country in the previous 48 hours. The Yankee rotation appears to be firing on all cylinders, while the Sox one is a bit patchy, and Pedro Martinez won’t be available until Game Three. The Yankee bullpen is well-rested, the Sox one dinged up, though whether Byung-Hyun Kim’s missing the series is a bad thing for Boston is a debatable topic. Sox manager Grady Little won’t have such an easy time shuttling Derek Lowe and Tim Wakefield down to the bullpen as he did in the first round. The heart of the Yankee lineup is en fuego, while that of the Sox got exactly enough big hits — one from Manny, one from David Ortiz — to survivve their series, and they’ll be missing their leadoff man, Johnny Damon, for at least the first game.

That said, these two teams played 19 times this season, and while the Yanks hold a bare 10-9 edge, they were outscored 109-94 — almost a run per game. Though the Yanks (101-61) finished six games ahead of the Sox (95-67) in the AL East, their Pythagorean records are much closer, with the Yanks about two games ahead. Their run differentials are almost the same, 159 for the Yanks, 154 for the Sox, which is a shorthand way of saying that the Yanks’ edge pitching matches up about evenly with the Sox edge in hitting. This is basically an even matchup, a toe-to-toe slugfest of a heavyweight championship battle in the making. Bring it on.

I’ll be at Yankee Stadium for Game One Wednesday night, finding creative ways to tell the world about Manny Ramirez and those barnyard animals, hoping the Yanks can wipe the smiles off of those grungy Sox faces. Cowboy up yours, Boston.

Another day, another ten hours on the couch watching some thrilling baseball. Okay, I didn’t spend the entire period from 1:00 to 11:00 PM EDT on Sunday deepening the ass groove in front of my boob tube. The magic of TiVo afforded me a couple of hours away from the set doing the kinds of things normal human beings do to keep functioning, things like buying groceries, exercising, and interacting with other humans. Fortunately my gal has gone rabid for baseball this fall. “I’m addicted,” she tells me, worrying that between Monday night’s A’s-Sox finale and Wednesday’s AL Championship Series opener, she might be without a ballgame. It’s with great pride that I assured her that Tuesday’s NLCS opener would fill the void.

For drama, Sunday’s trio couldn’t quite top Saturday’s quartet of ballgames, but only because the Yankees made it look easy in dispatching the Twins. Behind a six-run fourth inning and some stellar pitching by David Wells, they rolled over young Johan Santana and kept the decibels in the Metrodome to a minimum. With eight runs in all, the Yanks equalled their total over the first three games, and every player in the lineup got a hit, including Nick Johnson, who broke an 0-for-26 slump with a two-run double which sounded the death knell for Minny. Jason Giambi started off the fateful rally Bernie Williams continued his hot hitting, Jorge Posada came to life, and Derek Jeter capped things off with a ninth-inning home run to leftfield that made up for Shannon Stewart robbing him of one to end the sixth.

So once again, the Yanks bucked the first-game-as-series-indicator trend. Coming into the ALDS, I noted that 22 out of 32 teams that won the first game of the best-of-five took the series, and that the Yanks had bucked the trend each of the past three years. It turns out I should have dug even deeper, as they also bucked the trend in 1995, 1996, and 1997, not always for the best (they lost in ’95, 97 and ’02 after striking first). So we’re at 23 out of 35 right now, not including tonight’s A’s-Red Sox matchup, and the Yanks have been the minority seven out of those 12 times.

The victory does a bit to wash away the bitter taste of falling to the Anaheim Angels last year, particularly with regards to the Yanks’ starting pitching. This year their fearsome foursome went 3-1 with a 1.88 ERA in 28.2 innings over four games; the same quartet went 0-1 with an 10.38 ERA in 17.1 innings the last time around. Redemption, thy name is Mussina, Pettitte, Clemens and Wells.

About Stewart, the most telling stat for the Twins in this series is that despite their leadoff man hitting .400 AVG/.471 OBP/.533 SLG/1.004 OPS, he didn’t score a single run the entire series. As a team the Twins hit only .198/.248/.282/.531 as a team, and if you remove their electric leadoff man, that drops to .172/.218/.250/.468. With runners in scoring position the Twins were just 2-for-22 the entire series. You can’t win that way.

Overall, manager Ron Gardenhire did an excellent job in getting his troops to put an ugly first half (44-49) behind them and win the AL Central. But he’s got a couple of puzzling tendencies when it comes to his lineups, namely batting light-hitting Luis Rivas and his .308 OBP second , and playing Jacque Jones against lefties, against whom he managed only a .703 OPS in the regular season. Rivas went 0-for-13 in the series, while Jones was just 2-for-16, including 0-for-8 against lefties. One of the Twins’ best assets is their outfield depth; they had Dustan Mohr (.801 OPS vs. lefties), Lew Ford (.906 vs. lefties in 37 AB) and Michael Ryan (1.158 vs. lefties in 16 AB) as other options. With the Twins struggling to score runs, one would have expected Gardy to shuffle the deck and try something new against the Yankee southpaws. But Gardenhire made some comment at the outset of the series that he was going with his best overall lineup, and that’s one reason he finds himself bounced out of the postseason.

I have a soft spot for the Twins that’s almost unequalled among AL teams besides the Yanks. Start with their two unlikely World Series wins, which thrilled me back in the day. Add to that Gardenhire’s special spot in this site’s lore, the contraction debacle, a knowledgeable fan base with a strong presence online, and the fact that my girlfriend’s got family in Minnesota who are fairly attached to the team, and it’s tough to root too hard for Goliath to slay David. So I’ll just say congrats to the Twins and their fans on another excellent season.

Much happier congratulations are also in order to the Chicago Cubs and their fans, as the Cubs won Game Five of their NL Divisional Series against the Atlanta Braves, 5-1. For the second time in the series, Kerry Wood dominated the Atlanta bats, and the Cubs got timely hits from their Pirates treasure chest of Kenny Lofton and Aramis Ramirez (who I keep calling Alanis, but that’s another story) as well as Moises Alou and Alex Gonzalez. As the Fox announcers continually pointed out, the victory gave the Cubs their first postseason series victory in 95 years. That and a bag of ice still won’t get you drunk, but I’m guessing it’s good enough for the legions of Cubs fans who essentially blew the Braves faithful out of their own ballpark. After Robert Fick’s egregious tomahawk chop on Cub first baseman Eric Karros in Game Four, the wind seemed to come out of the sails of the Braves and their fans, nearly all of whom were embarrassed by the incident and by Fick’s less than fickle response. The NLCS now shapes up as the Battle of the Alex Gonzalez Shortstops, with the Cubs’ Alexander Scott Gonzalez (30 years old, hitting .228/.295/.409/.704) going against the Florida Marlins’ Just Alex Gonzalez Please (26 years old, hitting .256/.313/.443/.756). I’m pulling for the Marlins here based on Jack McKeon, but I’d be surpised if the Cubs’ pitching and Dusty Baker’s ass-backwards tactics don’t carry the day.

As for the A’s-Red Sox game on Sunday, I don’t have the time or the stomach to pick it apart. I’m still angry about Oakland’s baserunning gaffes in Game Three, and will have zero sympathy for them if they extend their string of elimination-game futility to 0 and 9. That’s the kind of baggage one expects of the Red Sox, but with the exception of Byung-Hyun Kim (and his itchy middle finger), these Sox seem comparatively free of same. Tonight’s matchup is the kind of marquee special you expect for a Game Five. Boston offers up Pedro Martinez on full rest, though he threw 130 pitches last Wednesday and was less than stellar. The A’s counter with Barry Zito on three days rest, something he’s never done before.

But even if the A’s get through, their rotation is a mess. Mark Mulder’s already on the shelf with a stress fracture in his femur, and Tim Hudson left yesterday’s ballgame after one inning with a strained oblique muscle. For the next round, that doesn’t even add up to “Zito and Lilly and pray things get silly,” as the former presumably wouldn’t be available until Saturday’s Game Three and the latter could only open the series by starting on three days rest. Add John Halama and pray for more drama? Or throw in Steve Sparks and watch out for sharks? There’s a good chance it won’t even matter. And here’s a kick in the ribs: the emerging story about Hudson’s injury via the San Francisco Chronicle is that it may have been caused by a bar fight with a Sox fan the night before. If so, that’s more brainy ball from the A’s in the Eric Byrnes/Miguel Tejada tradition. Don’t even get me started about Tejada trying to take first base yesterday after ball three, or Erubiel Durazo’s slide into first base…

Considering these two francises’ respective psychic burdens, it’s tempting to call upon the great Red Smith line: “I don’t see how either of these teams team can possibly win.” But there’s no mistaking the fact that the Sox have the momentum here, even in Oakland. Even if Pedro’s not able to pitch deep into the ballgame, their bullpen has built up some confidence in this series, showing exceptional mettle via a 1.26 ERA in 14.1 innings. I’d less rather the Yanks face the Sox for all of the negative energy it will produce in the fans of both sides, but if the AL’s best rivalry is going to determine its league champion, so be it.

And yes, I’m trying to jinx them.

What a day of watching baseball Saturday was! The Yankees took a 2-1 lead in their series behind the Rocket, the Marlins knocked out the Giants on a play at the plate, the Braves forced a Game Five by retiring potential tying run Sammy Sosa on a long fly ball, and the Red Sox stayed alive on a walk-off homer in the 11th inning. I spent the better part of eight hours in front of the tube (praise TiVo!), from the beginning of the Yanks game through the inexcusable braincramps of the Oakland A’s, before heading out to a birthday party, where we monitored the Sox-A’s game via cell phone updates.

First, the Yanks game. After walking the first batter, Clemens settled into a vintage performance, dominating the Twins for seven innings, working out of a couple of jams and allowing only a solo homer to A.J. Pierzynski. Meanwhile the Yankees scraped together some runs against Kyle Lohse. Hideki Matsui hit a towering two-run homer in the second with Bernie Williams aboard, and the hot-hitting Williams, who’s had much to atone for with his fielding, added an RBI single in the third. The Yanks threatened a few other times, but the Twins bullpen — including the Kenny “The Gambler” Rogers — kept the game close. But with two spotless innings, Mo Rivera again nailed down the 3-1 win.

It’s been a low-scoring series thus far, with the Yanks outscoring the Twins 8-5. The Yanks are hitting .253 AVG/.330 OBP/.323 SLG/.654 OPS, which looks positively Ruthian compared to the Twins’ .179/.245/.284/.529 line. The biggest difference between the two teams has been hitting with men in scoring position. In 30 opportunities, the Yanks are at .200/.265/.300/.565 which is anemic except up agains the Twins’ .067/.158/.067/.225 in 15 chances.

Today’s 4 PM matchup pits Game One starter Johan Santana, who stifled the Yanks for four innings before leaving with leg cramps, against David Wells, who has a long history against the Twins, including his perfect game back in 1998. The only current Twin who appeared in that game is Latroy Hawkins. This season, Boomer went 2-0 with one run allowed in 18 innings against the Twins this season. In the Metrodome on April 21, he backed a 15-run outburst with a 1-run complete game. Its tough to read too much into that, as he faced only four Twins who are likely to be in Sunday’s lineup (Guzman, Hunter, LeCroy and Rivas).

Onto the other games. The Marlins-Giants battle was going on simultaneously with the Yanks, so most of what I caught were cut-ins and snippets between innings. The Giants scored first, but the Fish took a 5-1 lead by the fourth, knocking out Giants starter Jerome Williams. Dontrelle Willis crused through five innings, but the Giants rallied to tie the game in the sixth, chasing the rookie sensation. The Marlins retook the lead in the seventh as Ivan Rodriguez collided with Giants catcher Yorvit Torrealba in a play at the plate, knocking the ball loose to score the go-ahead run. The loose ball enabled Derek Lee to score as well, 7-5 Fish. But the Giants mounted a rally in the ninth against Ugueth Urbina, starting in the most unlikely way — a leadoff double by pinch-hitter Neifi Perez, he of the .632 OPS. J.T. Snow singled him in. With two outs and a man on second, Jeffrey Hammonds singled to shallow leftfield, where Jeff Conine fielded the ball and fired home. Rodriguez held onto the ball as Snow, son of a former NFL star, collided. Out! Ballgame and series to the Marlins, who pigpiled at home plate in celebration while the Giants simply looked stunned.

So much for my half-assed prediction that they would go all the way, but at least the pundits fo the baseball universe have something to ponder beyond the eterntal pitch/don’t pitch to Barry Bonds. To quote the late Brooklyn Dodger manager Charlie Dressen, “The Giants is dead.”

In Chicago, the Braves stared down elminiation. Russ Ortiz, who nearly pitched the World Series-winning game for Dusty Baker last October, faced Baker from across the diamond. Ortiz wobbled through five innings, allowing only one run while the Braves rolled against Matt Clement and his ridiculously pubic-looking beard on the strength of a Chipper Jones 2-run homer. With a 5-1 lead, Ortiz gave up a homer to the not-so-undead Eric Karros and was soon given the hook. The game became a battle of the bullpens, as eleven relievers were used. Jones slugged another 2-run shot in the eighth, and Karros countered with a solo shot to keep the score at 6-3. John Smoltz came on to close things out and the visibly pained closer struggled, yielding a run on back-to-back doubles to lead off the inning. He got the next two batters, forcing a confrontation for the ages: tying run at the plate in the form of Sammy Sosa. Taking an eternity between pitches, Smoltz fell behind Sosa, who worked the count to 3-2. On the seventh pitch of the at-bat, Sosa connected, driving a ball deep to centerfield. With the potential for bedlam in Wrigley Field if it went out, the Braves held their collective breath. But Andruw Jones snagged the ball at the warning track, breathing life back into Atlanta’s chances. Game Five is tonight, with Kerry Wood facing Mike Hampton, who goes on short rest.

In the nightcap, Derek Lowe and Ted Lilly deadlocked to a 1-1 tie through seven, abetted by two brainlocks on the part of the A’s. Trailing 1-0 in the sixth inning, with one out, Eric Bynes on third and a man on first, Miguel Tejada slapped one back to Lowe, who wildly threw home. Byrnes tumbled as he collided with Jason Varitek as the ball skipped by the Sox catcher. Byrnes came up wincing and limping. He pushed Varitek out of the way as the catcher chased the ball to the backstop, and Varitek came back with the ball to tag him out for missing the plate. Incredible! I swore a blue streak that had children a block away crying, phrases which will give me plenty to atone for on Yom Kippur. But hurt or not, Byrnes’ play was pitiful. There isn’t a man on the Yankees roster who wouldn’t have crawled back on bloody stumps over broken glass to touch home on that play, and I’d say the same thing about the Sox roster with the exception a certain leftfielder. For all of their sabermetric blueprints, one has to wonder if the A’s teach simple fundamentals like how to slide into home plate (somewhere Jeremy Giambi is shaking his head) and principles such as “You have to touch home for the run to count,” and “There’s no crying in baseball, especially when the ball’s in play.”

The answer to all those questions is apparently a resounding “No!” as things went from dumb to dumberer for the A’s two batters later. With the bases loaded and two outs, Ramon Hernandez slapped a ball past Nomar Garciaparra. Moving to cover third, third baseman Bill Mueller collided with Tejada as coach Ron Washington waved him home behind Erubiel Durazo, who scored. As Manny Ramirez’s throw home beat Tejada, the A’s shortstop stopped short, holding up his arms and complaining about obstruction. The umps called his whiny ass out. A’s manager Ken Macha stormed out of the dugout to argue, and the men in blue held a lengthy conference, but the play stood. While the obstruction call was probably the right one, Tejada’s mid-play appeal brought to mind Chuck Knoblauch’s whining about interference in the ’98 ALDS as the ball squirted away. A better thing to do would have been for Tejada to retake third, then mount his complaint that he should be awarded home.

The A’s ended up losin on an eleventh-inning pinch-homer by Trot Nixon off of Rich Harden, none of which I saw. But I can’t shake the collective incompetence they showed on those two plays. Had either of them happened to the Sox, they would have assumed Buckneresque proportions in the team’s horrible lore, and they may well do so for the A’s if they blow this series. The tide may well have turned in the Sox favor.

Which reminds me: it’s 1 PM, and there’s a ballgame calling for me, Tim Hudson facing John Burkett. Here comes another tough day at the office. I can barely see over my smile.

Steven Goldman’s special installment of The Pinstriped Bible has some excellent analysis regarding these Yankees in the ALDS. He points out how fickle the media has been, questioning their questioning of this Yankee club’s shortcomings: “Here we are in October, and some still don’t know the team they have been watching since February.”

Goldman dispels a couple of myths about this Yankee team: that they’re not patient at the plate (they led the majors in walks by a wide margin, and drew more than all of Torre’s other Yankee teams save the ’99 model), and that they’re a bottom-feeding team (any team that wins 100 is). He also explores the Yanks’ frighteningly bad defense:

The Torre/Cashman Yankees take a lot of chances with their defense to improve their offense…T he only problem with this formulation is that if you’re going to be matched up against a team that is not running a walks and power offense… but puts the ball in play, you’re going to have unusual pressure put on the defense. All of the shortcomings, additionally magnified by the pressure of the postseason, come oozing out. This is what killed the Yankees in the 2002 playoffs and it is hurting them now. The key is to out-hit the mistakes, and the Yankees have not.

Spot on. Goldman goes on to point out that in the long run, the exposure of the Yanks’ defensive woes is a good thing: “The question that this ALDS is forcing the Yankees to evaluate is where they have crossed the line from good hit/some field to good hit/no field. This is a good thing, especially if it means they will spend the offseason confronting the 2004 disposition of Bernie Williams.” Good stuff.

Also on the Yankee tip, but from a different angle, is Replacement Level Yankee Weblog‘s Larry Mahnken, who’s feeling a bit jaded these days. Comparing the hopes of this Yankee team to seeing his first World Series champ in ’96:

Now, it’s not the same. It’s hardly even fun. Sure, if they win the World Series, I’ll be happy, I’ll float for weeks. But if they lose… they’re not supposed to lose, just like they weren’t supposed to win in 1996. Thursday night’s game, as good a game as has been pitched by any Yankee in this postseason run, was not an exhilirating experience for me–not until the bottom of the seventh. I sat there watching, expecting the worst, waiting for the defense to blow the game. The win was relief, not joy.

After a while, winning does get boring. Oh, poor Yankees fan, you’re thinking to yourself sarcastically–and rightfully so. I’ve experienced more joy in the past decade than the fan of any other baseball team has, because my team has been more successful in the postseason for past decade than any other baseball team. I’m lucky. But after awhile, the joy of winning lessens, because you start to expect it.

I cannot relate to a Cubs fan. Ninety-five years. This isn’t the Red Sox, failures in the World Series for eighty-five years–this is the Cubbies, who haven’t won a postseason series of any kind since 1908. And if a 19-year old kid had thought to touch second base, they might not have won that series either.

They’re one game away from ending that streak. One game away from advancing to a higher postseason round for the first time ever. And for Cubs fans, that would be pure joy. Even if they lost the NLCS, even if they were swept, Cubs fans would finally have something to celebrate. It wouldn’t be their fondest hope, but for this year, it would be good enough.

About the Cubs and their fans, I agree with Larry and wish them nothing but the best — who wouldn’t love to see Dusty Baker stick it to the organization which let him go? I mean, besides Barry Bonds.

But about getting bored of winning… um, no. I’m lucky enough to have been blessed with a couple of World Champion Dodger teams in my youth (my first champs were actually the 1978-79 Seattle Supersonics of DJ, Gus, and Downtown Freddie Brown). Having grown up rooting against the Bronx Zoo, I didn’t come around to the Yanks until ’96 when I had been in the city for a year and a half, and Torre’s eminently decent bunch won me over. If that makes me a bandwagoneer unworthy of your time, hey, I’ve heard it all before.

But the ’98 team was like no other, and their championship was something special between me and my friends; it was the first year we took up our partial season ticket package, spent a good chunk of summer at the ballpark together, and attended our first World Series game. In ’99 I was actually at Yankee Stadium for the clincher, singing Frank Sinatra with 56,000 fans, and that’s the Top of the Heap; I wish that every baseball fan (except the ones from Boston — tee hee hee) got to experience its equivalent once.

The 2000 Subway Series brings back some unpleasant personal memories — a breakup, a lovers’ triangle in the midst of my friends — to the point that I recall the Yanks’ loss in 2001 with a bit more fondness. After all, that team was all about healing the heart, and even though those Yanks came up short, they did more for this city than even the previous three winners did.

The sensation of winning isn’t quite as heightened when it’s repeated, but anytime your team wins after a drought, it all feels new again, and it doesn’t matter if that drought’s two years or twenty-five. So while I won’t throw myself under the 4 train if the Yanks don’t win, I say this to the Sox fans and the A’s fans and the Twins fans pining for a breakthrough in the AL, and to those fans of the four long-suffering NL teams as well: with all due respect, I hope my team crushes yours.

As I relearned last year, even if my team falls by the wayside, I love the tension of October baseball. Butterlies in the stomach, cold sweat in the commercial breaks, living and dying with every pitch, waiting with anticipation for the next game, soaking up every victory like it’s the world’s best pasta sauce. Some things never get old.