Sunday, April 25, 2010

Why I Watch Yankee Baseball

There are many reasons why I watch Yankee baseball: they're on my basic cable package - so are the Mets - reason enough; bad judgement; can't find Office reruns.


The real reason, of course, is the expectation of seeing something brillant. Love them or hate them, over the course of 50 years of viewing, you will see more incredible baseball from the Yankees than any other team. Derek Jeter's back hand flip to nail Giambi at home or his head first launch into the 3rd base seats, coming out bloodied but with the ball. Reggie Jackson, Mickey Mantle, and Don Larsen performing World Series magic. Watching the Yankees offers the potential display of baseball perfection. Today's game in Los Angeles - Anaheim was no exception.


Nick "The Eyeball Swisher" was facing LA's hard throwing right hander Jepsen in a batter's count. Swisher tracked a waist high fastball on the inner half of the plate and unleashed his home run swing complete with a high, wide open picturesque finish. As Nick watched his drive soar gracefully deep into the right field seats, the ball simple vanished before instantly reappearing in the catcher's mitt behind Nick's left ankle. So that's a slider. I laughed warm and heartfelt knowing we had witnessed the embodied definition of "swing and a miss." From this day on, every time I hear the phrase I'll think of Nick's moment of perfection.


And there's more. With 1 out and two men on, the hot, switch-hitting Kendry Morales faced The Yanks Marte. Cervelli, the Yankee catcher stood up an signaled for an intentional walk. Marte obliged with ball 1. The Yankee dugout got busy telling both Cervelli and Marte not to give up the intentional walk but rather to pitch to Morales. On a 3-0 count Morales blasted a 3 run HR giving LA a 8 - 4 lead. Perfect irony and, again, a heartfelt laugh of enjoyment. Tip for Joe Girardi - stop signing and start texting.


Side Note: It must have been a slow baseball day yesterday. Picasner actually wrote about a comment made in the Yankee broadcast booth, a booth manned by Ken Singleton and Flash. As we all know, Kenny is incapable of saying anything mean, disrespectful, or controversial about any one or any thing in or out of baseball and Flash is incapable of saying anything interesting at all. It seems P's undies got into into a bit of a bundle when one of the aforementioned referred to Scot Shields as someone considered to be the best set-up man in baseball. Forgetting the prior 8 years of Shields' career and well earned reputation as, well, "the best set-up man in baseball" (ask Dwight Perry), Picasner the Merciless offered a sarcastic backhand given Shields performance over that past 17 games. I hope Mark Teixeira doesn't go into a batting slump any time soon.

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