http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/19/sports/baseball/19yankees.html?_r=1&ref=baseball&oref=slogin
Forget the Pitching Woes. It’s Hitting That’s Giving the Yankees Problems.
By TYLER KEPNER
Published: May 19, 2007
There were no Steinbrenners in the field box beside the Yankees’ dugout at
Shea Stadium last night. Legends Field in Tampa, Fla., was the place to be.
That is where hope took the mound in the presence of Roger Clemens, the man
the Yankees are hoping will save their shaky season.
But Clemens is a pitcher, not a hitter, and the Yankees need more of the
latter right now. They fell meekly to the Mets, 3-2. General Manager Brian
Cashman watched from the front row as Andy Pettitte lost another well-pitched
game.
The Yankees have scored two runs or fewer in 6 of their 11 games since
Clemens signed May 6. They have lost six of their past eight games, and their
pitchers have little margin for error.
The team’s rough start was easier to explain in April, when four starting
pitchers were on the disabled list and the Yankees’ brawny offense could not
keep up. Now, an offense that seemed capable of scoring 1,000 runs has
stalled, bumping the Yankees to 10 games behind Boston in the American League
East.
“I have no doubt that we’re going to score runs and hit — and hit a lot —
this year,” Cashman said before the game. “Right now, we’re not doing it.
But I continue to believe in the players we have here, especially the ones
struggling right now.
“I have no doubts, and it’s just a timing issue. It’s not a matter of if,
but when. That’s a fact.”
Two seasons ago, when the Yankees struggled into June, Cashman responded by
promoting Robinson Cano to starting second baseman and making center fielder
Bernie Williams a part-time player. But there is little shuffling he can do
this time, and nothing he would even want to change.
“Obviously, we’re better than what we’re showing,” Cashman said. “I
believe in all the people that are here.”
With the personnel not changing, Manager Joe Torre was left to juggle the
lineup. He did so again Friday, benching Bobby Abreu for the first time this
season. Jason Giambi, who is hobbled by a bone spur in his left heel, was
also on the bench.
The result, though, was a bottom of the order that looked meager: Melky
Cabrera (batting .226 at game time) in the sixth spot, followed by Cano
(.234), Josh Phelps (.256) and Pettitte.
Through the first seven innings, the Yankees moved up a runner only twice:
with a ground ball in the first inning and with Hideki Matsui’s two-run
homer in the fourth. Matsui’s home run drove in Jorge Posada, the American
League’s leading hitter, who had singled. It gave the Yankees a 2-1 lead,
but it was the only extra-base hit they managed off Mets starter Oliver
Perez.
When Derek Jeter led off with a single in the sixth, the Yankees were
helpless to advance him. Alex Rodriguez, who has for hits in his past 32
at-bats, struck out on a 92 mile-an-hour fastball at the knees. Posada lined
out and Matsui flied out, ending the inning.
There was another lonely single in the seventh inning, by Cano, who was
erased on a double play by Phelps to end the inning. Giambi was on deck at
the time, but when the eighth inning started, Abreu was the one who
pinch-hit.
He struck out looking, the first of three Yankees to fan in the eighth. Damon
went down on a checked swing and Jeter on a called third strike from reliever
Joe Smith. The Yankees looked tentative — in between, in the baseball
vernacular — and closer Billy Wagner held them in the ninth.
“There’s a lot of frustration in our clubhouse,” Torre said before the
game. “Nothing you’d characterize as unrest, just knowing we’re a better
club.”
Better than whom? Certainly not the Mets, not last night, and not for this
season.
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