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| Travis Snider and Ricky Romero share . . . A Moment. |
When both Yunel Escobar and Travis Snider struck out with the bases loaded in the sixth inning, I was of the opinion that this game sucked. Snider seemed to agree, too, as he indicated by snapping his bat over his knee à la mode de Bo. But we were both wrong, as it turned out, because we had failed to allow for a triumphant comeback in the bottom of the ninth against Mariano Rivera, the greatest closer in the history of baseball, no big deal.
Down by two, Escobar led off the ninth with a ringing double, and after a Snider ground-out moved him to third, he scored on a wild pitch as the Yankees did their best to pitch around Jose Bautista (they were right to want no part of him after his earlier rocket of a home run to left in a decisive blow against the haters, as I see it). Bautista went first to third on an Adam Lind single, setting the stage for a squeeze play to tie it in the bottom of the ninth against Mariano Rivera. It was at least as cool as that sounds, too: John MacDonald managed a perfect bunt down the line towards first on a tricky high pitch, and Bautista darted home on the safety squeeze, beating the tag after Texeira's fine play and flip to home.
Jon Rauch wasn't all that hot in the top of the tenth, walking two, but no real damage was done, so who am I to complain? Rivera understandably did not come back out to work the tenth -- he was lucky Eric Chavez was able to go 5-3 for a slick double play to end the ninth -- so it was Ivan Nova who gave up the leadoff single to E5, the selfsame E5 who, two outs later, would race home on a Travis Snider shot to the wall to win it. Full game highlights are here, and you really should click them, on account of the extent to which they own (that extent, for the record, is so hard).
An almost perfect night! Did Kyle Drabek throw smoke? Alas, he did not. Did A. J. Burnett fail utterly? Tragically, no. But those few shortcomings aside, this was a hell of a game.
KS
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