With the temperature a breezy 80 degrees, with the Royals in town, spray or roll-on never was a question in Joe Torre’s pre-game media session.
When the Yankees’ first four batters all scored, the next dugout shot figured to be of the manager in a Hawaiian shirt, telling more Bob Gibson stories between bites of Willie Randolph’s sandwich.
This, between sips of a drink taller than Randy Johnson, counting the umbrella in it.
It’s not even June, too early to sweat a two-game deficit for the AL East lead or a three-game deficit for the wild card, let alone a 6-0 lead over an 11-37 team.
Even after the Royals, who got it back to 6-5 with the tying run at second base in the seventh, were dispatched by Kyle Farnsworth and Mariano Rivera to lose some more in the next town, Torre had to keep it to one short breath. Johnson is pitching this afternoon in Detroit.
The long-suffering Tigers are 3515. The Big Unit’s ERA is 5.89. The Yankees, in serious danger of losing two out of three to Kansas City, yesterday barely managed to keep the world spinning on its axis, no guarantees today.
“I know [Johnson] seems to be feeling pretty good about himself,” said the manager. “But I could tell you all kinds of stuff and we’ll all watch tomorrow and see what it looks like.
“I thought (in Boston) he attacked the strike zone a little better.
Most of the time, not all the time, his release point was pretty damn good and other times he was getting under it. That’s when [the slider] flattens and just sort of sits there. “But I thought he battled his way through. When I went out [in the fifth], I told him to empty his tank, this was going to be his last inning. He got three outs real quick. Hopefully he can build on that.” There is no time allocated for building in The Bronx, where the $16 million-a-year pitcher is taking encouragement from two scoreless innings out of five, where a $7.6 million-a-year pitcher able to make only 13 starts last season couldn’t make it through the fifth yesterday after being presented with a 6-0 lead.
But at least Jaret Wright is pitching, unlike the $10 million a year pitcher, Carl Pavano, who we understand is coming back – just don’t hold your breath. After lasting only five innings in Boston due to a sore groin, Wright made it to 5 1/3. Progress!
“We like seven innings,” said Torre, asked if six is the goal. “As long as we’re wishing, we might as well wish for the right thing.
“But we’ll take whatever we can get, especially in Jaret’s situation.
He was a little more deliberate than normal and we asked him every inning about his groin and he swore there was no problem. You have to believe him.
“He had a lot of movement on the ball, a lot of times couldn’t keep it in the strike zone. He got the first out (in the sixth) pretty easily, but was probably getting tired.” Hits by Emil Brown and Tony Graffanino chased Wright, brought on the struggling Scott Proctor, who next inning had to yield to Mike Myers, who failed to get his required out and passed to Farnsworth.
“We got through it,” said Torre, but with considerable angst for one victory over the Royals. It still beat the alternative suffered Friday when the Yankees didn’t win a Mike Mussina start, not a good thing these days, since Chien-Ming Wang is the only other starter allowing Torre to never let us see him sweat.
“Even if you score 10 in the first, the manager hates when nothing else happens (afterward) offensively,” said Torre. “But when you have Larry Bowa in the dugout, you don’t worry about anybody falling asleep.” With The Big Unit going today in Detroit, Bowa becomes only the fallback plan.
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Way to go, Mo
Mariano Rivera recorded his 390th career save yesterday, tying him with Dennis Eckersley for fourth place on the all-time list. Here are the top five save leaders since 1969, when saves became an official major league statistic:
Rank — Pitcher — Saves
1 Lee Smith 478
*2 Trevor Hoffman 445
3 John Franco 424
*4 MARIANO RIVERA 390
(tie) Dennis Eckersley 390
*active