Yankees: Path to the World Series
The New York Yankees are on their way to the World Series. Sadly I could not watch, for you guys, yesterday’s game: it started at 2AM Dutch time this morning which is a little bit too late (or too early) for my taste.
Anyway, the Yankees… won. The Detroit Tigers have a great team, but the Yankees have Jeter:
The skies over Yankee Stadium were still rumbling with the roar of the pregame military flyover. Derek Jeter had seen it before. While his teammates stood along the baseline, Jeter squatted, stretching, ready to do what he does best.
He sprang up, grabbed Bobby Abreu by the shoulders and sprinted off, the first player to break off the line. Jeter hung a left around first base and bounded into fair territory. For a few moments, before the Yankees’ opening playoff game, he was the only player out on the field.
For nine innings, it basically stayed that way. There were others who starred in the Yankees’ 8-4 victory over the Detroit Tigers, but nobody sparkled as brightly as Jeter, who tied a postseason record with five hits.
[...]
Jeter, the Yankees’ captain, has made a career of rising to meet the moment. This time, he topped himself. Jeter went 5 for 5 and capped his night with a home run over the center-field wall in the eighth inning.Only five other players have had five hits in a postseason game, including Hideki Matsui in the 2004 American League Championship Series. Jeter singled in the first inning, doubled in the third, singled in the fourth and doubled in the sixth.
My second favorite team, the St. Louis Cardinals won as well. Oakland won from Minnesota: 3-2.
A good baseball day for me!
11 Responses to “Yankees: Path to the World Series”
Michael, howdja get to be a baseball fan? Not a usual thing for a European. . .
When I was… 11 years old, a trainer from the local team came to my school to talk about baseball and to teach us the rules and let us play it a couple of times (my teacher was a softball player himself by the way). I enjoyed it very much and was, if I may say so, quite good at it -> for someone who had never played it before that is.
At that moment, I did not sport, so I went to the local team, signed up and started playing baseball. I became quite good at it, relatively quickly and was selected for team north of the Netherlands to participate in the national championships (we finished 5th out of 8 team participating, not good, but hey, we weren’t last either
).
That’s how it all started I suppose.
The Wall Mart of baseball teams.
I put them in the same category as Notre Dame and the Lakers, and can’t stand any of them.
It is a patriotic duty of all Americans to root against the Yankees. While I am a Mets and White Sox fan, I live in Michigan now and I see the spectularly all-American story of the Detroit Tigers as worthy of any patriot’s support. Remember, just three years ago the Tigers’ record was 43-119 – the most losses for any American League team in more than 100 years. And now they are in the playoffs. This rags-to-riches story is the most inspiring story baseball has to offer. But then there are the Minnesota Twins and Oakland Athletics, two small market teams that consistently win because of good management and guile and character. I am no fan of the Twins for my own parochial reasons. But again, I see the quintessentially American success story of these frugal Puritans creating a sustainable winning model with the most modest resources the Creator could bestow. The New York Yankees are the unilateralists, the “ugly American,” the brash and arrogant Don Rumsfeld, the machine of corporate America, driven by its own glory and to hell with the rest of us. Be patriotic: beat the Yankees!
Rooting for the Yankees is like rooting for Hitler. It’s just bad for humanity.
Ow God here we go… Evil Empire.. blahblahblah.
I don’t know whether anyone of you saw that commercial about that Boston Red sox fan (girl) who does not want to come out of her room to watch the play-offs? If not, it truly is hilarious “october is the month to rout AGAINST the Yankees”. She comes out immediately, smiling, and goes to watch the play-offs
Hilarious.
Anyway: go Yankees!
It is a patriotic duty of all Americans to root against the Yankees.
I’m definitely on board with this and the other comments about Steinbrenner’s outfit. Always a pleasure to see them lose.
Elrod – Thaks for the plug for the Detroit Tigers. All real US fans will hail the Tigers Cinderella story, however, the two months the Tigers have played like a 43-119 team, instead of the best taem in baseball over all of the summer. I think the Tigers are luck if the win a game in this series.
Tigers had a lot of injuries this last month. But now they’re healthy. They showed a lot of fight last night. But their pitching staff doesn’t match up well with the Yankees. You need power pitchers willing to intimidate the Yankee hitters. The Angels and White Sox have done it. The Tigers, with Robertson and Rogers can’t. Hopefully Verlander and Bonderman will have better luck. They actually pitch inside.
I hate em too, sorry Michael. Born in Rhode Island, the Red Sox beating them was probably the most enjoyable thing I’ve seen in sports. This includes watching Armstrong whip the TDF, and the Dallas Stars win the Stanley cup in 2000.
Though I haven’t even watched a baseball game all year I’ll probably watch some of the playoffs and World Series.
Elrod – Some fans and the media in Detroit are now wining about Leyland and the Tigers. I think being swept by the Yankees afetr 19 years is better than putting up with Matt Millen.