Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
July 01, 2004
All Out

I complain about Derek Jeter's defense a lot, but he just made one of those plays that makes it easy to forgive him for his limited range on ground balls. Men on 2nd and 3rd in the top of the 12th, two outs, Nixon hits a flair down the left field line. Jeter went all out, caught the ball in fair territory, and then his momentum carried him head first into the stands. He came out bloodied, but he held on to the ball. He played it like it was the 7th game of the world series. Giambi will bat for him in the bottom of the 12th after a Cairo triple leading off the inning.

Update: Millar comes in from the outfield to be a fifth infielder. Big shift on Giambi, but Millar is playing as if he's at third.

Update: Giambi strikes out. He looks thin after his illness.

Update: They put a shift on for Sheffield, moving Millar to first this time, but Leskanic hits Sheffield. 1st and 3rd with one out for A-Rod, and Millar moves back to the outfield.

Update: A-Rod is walked to load the bases. Millar is coming back into the infield to play first and McCarty is moved between 2nd and 1st again. Bubba Crosby batting.

Update: Crosby grounds to Reese, who gets the force at the plate. It's up to Bernie Williams, who is 0 for 5 today, defense back to normal.

Update:Williams strikes out, and looked bad doing so. To the 13th. This is one of the best Yankees-Red Sox game I've seen in a long time. Both teams have had plenty of chances, but great plays and great pitching in tough situations have prevailed so far.


Posted by David Pinto at 10:55 PM | Defense | TrackBack (0)
Comments

Wow, what a game.

"Giambi strikes out. He looks thin after his illness."

Is this true and funny, or just funny?

Posted by: Tarik at July 1, 2004 11:45 PM

Nope, it's just true. Nothing funny about having worms in you. Shame that Jason had to pinch hit tonight as he needs to go on the 15 day; now it'll be a whole 15 days, rather than backdating it. Nice to see him at least come out and try to help his team (not that I'm say anything Nomar, I don't know how your ankles are).

Posted by: Robert at July 2, 2004 08:29 AM

Have you seen Jeter's defensive numbers this year? I've seen his Zone Rating and Win shares - way up over where they've been in years. And watching the games, I've seen him get to balls towards the middle he wouldn't have been close enough to wave at in years past. It could be any number of factors, but right now switching A-Rod looks a lot smarter than it did in February.

Posted by: Dr. Manhattan at July 2, 2004 09:47 AM

The weight comment struck me funny in the context of the whole "is he skinnier or not" steroid debate that greeted giambi and others at spring training. Not having television access to the game, I was wondering if giambi was actually thinner, or if it was a tounge in cheek observation.

Anyway, heck of a game.

Posted by: Tarik at July 2, 2004 09:56 AM

He really looked thinner to me.

Posted by: David Pinto at July 2, 2004 10:15 AM