Johnson delivers big win for Yanks
BY BILL MADDEN
New York Daily News
NEW YORK - (KRT) - From the Bronx to the Battery and Hartford to Hackensack,
they were poised to leap from rooftops, bridges and window ledges. Crisis time
had come entirely too early for kvetching Yankee fans whose season, they feared
, was in the process of being torpedoed after just 18 games by a series of
unconscionable circumstances - more Kevin Brown misery, too many players, A-Rod
and Jason Giambi in particular, not playing up to their paychecks, and a
shoulder injury to Jaret Wright, the man who replaced Jon Lieber.
So it was Sunday, with anxious eyes, Yankee Nation turned to Randy Johnson for
reassurance that the great expectations being held for this team can and would
still be realized.
Apparently, Derek Jeter felt the same sense of urgency. After Saturday's
embarrassing 10-2 shellacking they'd taken from Buck Showalter's Texas Rangers,
in which the Yankees' abysmal hitting was equaled only by their sloppy fielding,
then compounded by Wright's injury - the clubhouse was closed for 15 minutes
for a clear-the-air session. According to sources, Joe Torre offered his
caustic assessment of the team's play, then Jeter took it upon himself to give
his.
And the captain, the sources said, didn't mince his words. The gist of his
address was that this team had too much talent to be playing like this and that
guys were getting too consumed with themselves and not doing the little things
it takes to win. Everyone went home and slept on it and then, Sunday morning
after batting practice, the players had a meeting of their own during which,
presumably, Jeter's pointed "what's wrong here" sum-up of the day before was
reiterated.
Jeter refused to confirm his role in either of the meetings other than to say,
as captain, he talks to his teammates every day. But another source present
at the Saturday meeting said that what Jeter had to say "was pretty damn good."
The circumstances demanded a meeting, but as Lou Piniella was fond of pointing
out during his tenure in Seattle as manager of the Mariners: "If you're going
to call a team meeting, it's always best to make sure it's the day before the
Big Unit is pitching."
For sure, Johnson pitched like a man on a mission Sunday, allowing only one
baserunner through the first five innings. Only in the sixth when, with two out,
Alfonso Soriano singled and Gary Matthews Jr. tripled to deep right-center, did
the Rangers apply any damage on him. By that time, the noticeably reenergized
Yankees were up 7-1 en route to an 11-1 cakewalk that brought their worried
fandom back in off the rooftops and ledges.
And other than rookie Andy Phillips, who doubled home one run in the four-run
second and added a three-run homer in the eighth, nobody seemed to inject more
energy into the Yankees than Jeter, who hit a sac fly in the second, had an RBI
double in the fifth and a two-out solo homer in the sixth and made a
spectacular, in-the-hole play on Mark Teixeira to help Johnson complete a 1-2-3
third.
"Derek was Derek," Torre said, "with his bat, his defense and homer that got
the run back for Randy."
"The intensity was definitely a lot better today," Jeter said. "It was one of
those games where, afterward, you wish you didn't have the next day off."
Still, one game doesn't make a season, especially with the Yankees who, as we
all now understand, are the one team in baseball that plays 162 separate
seasons. But this was about as important an April game as they have played in
a long, long time. Had Johnson stumbled and Jeter's and Torre's admonishments
fallen on deaf ears, there would have been bodies in the streets. Until now,
their one consolation was that the Red Sox haven't been playing so hot either
as further emphasized Saturday when Curt Schilling couldn't hold a four-run
lead against the lowly Devil Rays.
mBut make no mistake: If this Yankee team is to live up to its $205 million
price tag, A-Rod is going to have to prove he's a big time player when it
matters and not just in garbage time, Giambi is going to have to stop being
so stubborn in his refusal to hit to the opposite field and the starting
pitching, suddenly a black hole in the No. 4-5 slots, is going to need a rookie
boost such as the one provided by Phillips Sunday when Chien-Ming Wang takes
over from the fallen Wright on Saturday.
At the mention of Phillips, Jeter's eyes widened.
"He can hit," the captain said. "That's the bottom line. I called his homer."
"What did Phillips say when you told him that?" he was asked.
"Thanks," Jeter said.
A sentiment that was echoed throughout a relieved Yankee Nation after season
19.
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c 2005, New York Daily News.
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※ 編輯: terryyeh 來自: 140.110.59.226 (04/25 17:37)