"It's great to be young and a Yankee."

And we're back in a tie.

Half of me realizes how obnoxious that sounds. There are worse things than being in a tie for 1st. But I never really liked it when people would say stuff like, "Eat your food, there are people in the world who are starving" because--while tragic--really has nothing to do with me. You can count your blessings, but you don't have to EAT them if you're not hungry.

Anyways, that said, the Yankees may want to start giving some serious thought to driving in runs when they have the opportunity. Some teams can't even get runners on base to begin with, and you guys jam up the base paths like a gluttonous buffoon at an all-you-can-eat ribs bar. And then you just throw it all away.

My ex once took me to some restaurant where they charged you for the food you didn't end up eating. Like, charged extra for it. Don't have an all you can eat buffet if we have to stress out evaluating the realistic limits of our intestines! It's like the "Price is Right" meets "Seven": "How much was in that last can of beans? 16 oz? Ok, I'll take another 15 oz."

How many runners can you put on the basepaths without going over? And by "over" I mean, over homeplate. (Ovah.)


To be clear, the Yankees were 1 for 12 with RISP.

They left 9 on base in the first 6 innings.

The most runners ever stranded in one game was on September 11, 1974. Mets vs. Cardinals. Combined, they stranded 45 runners in 25 innings.

I don't feel like doing the math. But think about it. Whatever, or just muse over the fact these games were played on the same day, although retain little to no other similarities between them.

Cano grounds out to 1st to get the first run in the first. Yeah, that's how Cano drove a run in. He's like made out of a steel and has one of the best swings in the league, and that's how our big slugger is contributing. It's like having Beetlejuice make everyone break out in the Banana Boat song. You're a dead monster and that's the scariest shit you can come up with?

By the time I get off the train, it's stil 1-0, but by the time I get back home, it's 2-1. I like watching the games with my mom because she gasps in horror instead of groans whenever something bad happens. Like, imagine someone saying, "Remember Mikey from stickball? Back in 3rd grade? He died." My mom's reaction to that is what her reaction is to Pedroia's tie-breaking single in the 3rd.

As emotionally invested as she is in the game in the first 3 innings, that's how unemotionally invested she is for the last 6.




Jeter broke the tie with a ground rule double, and it was awesome. Well f'n played, Jeter. I rarely lionize this guy, but sometimes I'm too tempered when it comes to him. So, cheers, Captain. You deserve a bunch of people standing up on desks and reciting poetry to you. That's about the only thing you should take away from Dead Poet's Society. Oh, and the part where the guy barges in on the girl's class to recite this poem to her: "The heavens made a girl named Kris/ With hair and skin of gold. /To touch her would be paradise."

Yeah, they don't make 'em like Knox Overstreet anymore.

So, yeah, Pedroia comes back like the twerp that he is and hits a homerun and OH MY GOD HE'S SO GOOD! Blech. He is, but he isn't. Be more more non committal. Well, he is good at first blush. But once you blush again, you realize that like Aristotle said, "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not act, but a habit."

Pedroia's act cost the Yanks their lead though, so for immediate purposes, I don't care what we classify it as.

Arod struck out to end the 9th. I lovvvee when that happens at Boston. Nope. It's horrible I hate watching Arod try to act like it's not bothering him. It's like watching girls fall at an Upper East Side bar and then either run to the bathroom in tears or try to put on a brave face aka stick their face in a text message or something. Arod should just laugh at himself, I don't know. But the puffed out chest and "menacing" stare down is sad.

Also sad: Arod's hat trick of K's. Grandy fouling out to screw up a bases loaded situation in the 1st. Grandy grounding out to 1st to screw up runners on 1st and 2nd and end the inning in the 3rd. Actually the sheer number of K's that occurred to end the inning was baffling since Boston's pitching was all over the place. In the 5th inning, all 3 outs came from striking out SWINGING. Unbelievable. 8 walks issued and they're still swinging at shit. Whatever, maybe they see something I don't.

The Yankee pitching, meanwhile, probably has already severed the heads of many people. Kuroda did just fine (naturally) and maybe he's spitting Japanese nails to his translation right now, who's relaying the message to the team, "He just said, 'it's a tough loss but you can't dwell on it.' Also, 'good night.'"

Joba comes in and my mom looks up from Words With Friends to gasp. "Oh no! Well, there's a guaranteed loss." Yeah, she says things like nonapologetically. Doesn't say it to make anyone mad. Just says it because that's what she believes is true. And then she returned to Words With Friends.

Joba pitched brilliantly. Amazing. I was stunned and impressed. Congratulations, Joba. You did good things.

D-Rob didn't screw up the game, despite what the box score says, but it's harder to say this given the fact it's not the first blown game in recent memory. He was sooo close to getting us into the 10th inning. So close to the Yankees having THEIR VERY FIRST 9TH INNING WIN OF THE SEASON.

Ciriaco singles. And then who the hell knows what happened, but an inning-ending double play did not. I'm not sure if Jeter could've made a play there, but I think he could've. But you never know. And I'm not sure if R-Mart had a chance to get Ciriaco out at home, but I think he could've.

But nothing was ventured. A game was lost.

The Yankees spent 9 innings barging to the brink of taking care of business, only to shy away at the last second.

The season is drawing to a close. Trust nothing. We think we can wait on things, even important things…we can’t.

Stop fucking around, Yankees. Disembowel the Socks.

Eden is that old fashioned house, we dwell in every day/Without suspecting our abode, until we drive away./How fair on looking back the Day/We sauntered from the Door/Unconscious our returning/But discover it no more.-Dickinson