Results tagged ‘ Mark Texeira ’
This Team is Going Nowhere Fast
I know that Joe Girardi is a patient man, but it’s time to shake things up with this lineup. The middle of the order is consistently bad. He keeps saying they need to get hot, but if he is waiting for A-Rod, Texeira and Swisher to all get hot and sustain that, then he may be in for a long wait. I would much rather see Swisher in the two hole, with Cano third and Granderson fourth. That would move A-Rod down to fifth and Texeira sixth, which is much more where they belong than in the four and five hole. They are killing this team and it isn’t just this year. They have been inconsistent for most of the past two seasons and it killed them in the playoffs last year. They are not going to suddenly turn things around and hit well from their current spots in the order. It just ain’t going to happen. Time to shake things up and see if that helps any. What have they got to lose? And when is someone going to tell Texeira that being a one dimensional pull hitter is not the right approach. Last night, he got an outside pitch that he could have driven the other way and instead, he rolled over on it and bounced it off the plate. Pathetic.
Mo Done for the Season and This Team Could Be As Well
It was a freak accident and it would be terrible if this is the way Mo’s career ends. I wouldn’t bet against him coming back next year though. The real problem though is that this team is flawed. The middle of the order sucks right now. Texeira in particular looks putrid at the plate. They had a chance to win this game last night with runners on first and second and no outs. What did Texeira do? Grounded into a double play to end the rally. He does this regularly and it is getting old. Robbie Cano looks lost at the plate as well and A-Rod isn’t exactly setting things on fire either. This is a flawed team. They don’t hit with RISP, the Starting Pitching has been bad and their defense is bad as well. If this trend continues, I don’t see them making the playoffs, let alone making any noise when they get there. There is still time to turn things around as it is only May, but thus far, this team has been less than impressive. And now they won’t have Mo for the rest of the year.
Yankees are in denial
So this morning, I was reading some of the quotes from the Yankees players and from manager Joe Girardi and it struck me that they were in denial about what Tampa did to them this weekend. By repeatedly hitting directly into the teeth of defensive shifts, they cost themselves any chance they may have had of winning those games. A-Rod, Texeira and Swisher all talked about how they had hit the ball hard. Well what good is that if you hit it right at the defense? Girardi said this “It’s really hard to change who you are and revamp your approach because of the way a team plays you. You try to take what they give you, you try to hit the ball hard, and you take your chances. Sometimes part of the reason they do it is they want you to get away from what you’ve been doing so well for a long time. I just tell our guys to keep hitting the ball hard, and it’ll work.”
Well that may just be the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. How is continuing to hit the ball into the teeth of the defense taking what they give you in any way shape or form? It’s not taking what they give you, it’s the exact opposite. It’s playing to what they are trying to take away from you.
Yesterday, after the Yankees lost, I flipped over to the Red Sox/Detoit game. In the bottom of the 11th with Prince Fielder up, Boston employed the shift on the right side of the infield. Instead of drilling it right at the defense like the Yankees did, Fielder drilled one to left field and wound up scoring the tieing run. That, my friends is taking what the defense gives you. They gave him the left side and he took it. He didn’t just hit it really hard, right at the defense. My guess is the Yankees will now see a lot more of these shifts and they need to adjust or they will find themselves losing a lot of winnable games this year.
No Surprises Here
As I predicted yesterday, the Red Sox completed the sweep last night, with Josh Becket shutting the Yankees down and CC Sabathia imploding in the seventh inning. The fact of the matter is that the Red Sox own this Yankee team and have since late last season. The fact that they plunked Texeira in the first game and continued randomly hitting Yankees players for the entire three games says it all. They are taunting the Yankees and daring them to do something about it and this Yankee team can not. Yes, Sabathia finally hit Ortiz last night, but if I were running this team that would be a regular occurrence. He is constantly showing them up and laughing about it. I’m sure the Yankees will bounce back and Boston will falter. It always happens because Boston always plays better against the Yankees than they do against everyone else and the Yankees just can’t beat Boston right now. I fully expect that the Yankees will re-claim first place before these two teams meet again in August. This series however will define this team for the time being. They just aren’t good enough to beat Boston. Plain and simple. Results don’t lie. Six in a row at home is no fluke, it is a trend.
Yanks are Sissies
On a night when Texeira being hit and Papi’s bat flip should have been addressed, what did the Yankees do? Nothing. They served up another home run ball to Ortiz, didn’t retaliate at all for the bat flip and their best hitter being plunked and then listened as Ortiz cussed out their manager after the game. This team does not deserve to be in first place. Until they stand up and show that they can’t be bullied or beaten down by Boston, they are right where they deserve to be. That is in second place, second best to Boston who is treating this team like a bunch of sissies. Boston always gets up for the Yankees and the Yankees just can’t muster the desire to say “enough is enough”. I had a feeling this would happen with who the Yankees had going on the mound in this series and I fully expect another sweep when Becket dominates them tonight. Good job Yankees. You have showed the world who the better team is and it ain’t you.
Nice Road Trip
After starting off with two tough, avoidable losses in Seattle, the Yankees bounce back to sweep Oakland and take two of three in Anaheim. That was no easy feat. During this west coast swing, the Yankees faced some of the best pitchers in the league and to come away 6-3 is an excellent result. Now, there were lots of reasons for their success, but I think it would be unfair to start singling them out. Overall, the starting pitching was good, the relief corps was good and the offense produced when it needed to. Even the defense got into the act with some stellar plays in Anaheim. There are some other good things to take away from this road trip. It looks like Nick Swisher may be coming around. Mark Texeira is absolutely on fire and A-Rod looks to be bouncing back after a bit of a slump. The fact that this team is in first place and is tied for the best record in the AL is a testament to their work ethic and perseverance. I could not be more impressed. Now it’s three tough games against the Sox and I’m hoping this team can finally find a way to beat Boston this year. They have looked lost against them thus far and that just won’t do if this team is to be playing in October.
A Blowout and a Low Class Retaliation
So let me get this straight. Russel Martin hits two consecutive home runs, then gets plunked between the shoulder blades and according to Josh Rupe, it was just an accident. It was a mere coincidence. Well I for one am calling BS on this one. Everyone that watched the game knows it was no accident. It was a low class move by a low class team, with a low class manager. That’s right Buck. You are full of crap and so is your pitcher. If you want to throw at someone, then fine, just admit it and move on. The fact is neither of you has the cojones to admit the truth, because it would cost you money and a suspension. Well that makes you both cowards and lower than dirt. Personally, I thought maybe this game would get ugly after Robert Andino tried to push Mark Texeira off second base in the first inning. Personally, I would have thrown at Andino the next time he came up. The difference is, I wouldn’t have hit him, just knocked him off the plate and sent a message that being a punk isn’t okay. Guess it is for Buck and his team though.
Two down, 93 more wins to go
Well, this one started off pretty well and finished up pretty ugly. The offense was, once again top notch. Texeira hit another one out, So did Russel Martin and so did A-Rod. Jeter had a couple of hits, as did a bunch of other folks. My only complaint about this game was Girardi’s managing. What in the world was Luis Ayala doing in for a second inning? Wouldn’t you want Victor Martinez batting right handed instead of left, with Boone Logan pitching in the eighth? Instead, he left Ayala in, Martinez hit a home run to make it 10-5, then Logan warmed up again and came in to pitch the ninth. He was ineffective after warming up three times, then Girardi had to use Mo in a game where he really should not have been needed. I would have gone with Ayala for one inning, Logan in the eighth instead of the ninth, followed by Bartolo Colon in the ninth. Girardi got away with it this time, but it is these kinds of decisions that costs him games when they are close. It even sometimes turns blowouts into close games and losses. I was not impressed.
Exactly where I thought we’d be
I have to admit that looking at the pitching matchups at the beginning of this series, I had a feeling that after 3 games it would be 2-1 Texas. I stated in one of my posts that the Yankees would need to really bear down in games one and two in order to gain an advantage and they did that in game one, but not game two. Now here we are, down 2-1 with A.J. Burnett on the mound. All we can do is hope he has his stuff together this evening. There really is no reason to believe that he will as he has been terrible all year. All we can do is hope. And as for the rest of the team, I still have to wonder why Mark Texeira gets a free pass from the press. He is 0 for the series and hitting .167 overall this post season. If it were A-Rod, the press would be all over him. I for one am sick of waiting for Texeira to produce in the clutch. I can’t even remember the last time he got a big hit for this team. He needs to step it up if they are to win this series. If not, they could be sitting at home watching Texas play in the series. Not saying that is going to happen just yet, but tonight will go a long way in determining that. Time to step up your game Texeira. Or give back some of that money that you are not earning.
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