Good Enough
Everyone else is saying it, and I’ll say it here as well. We did what we needed to do this weekend. Taking 2 out of 3 would have been great, a sweep would have been awesome, but all we really needed to do was make sure we got one and not get swept ourselves.
A 3 game lead with 20 games left to play is certainly not a lock, but when you look at what these 2 teams have been doing lately, and what they have coming up, it seems like a lot of ground for the Yankees to make up.
Even though we only managed to take one this weekend, I still liked what I saw. Wells wasn’t great, but he was good enough to win and got victimized by some terrible defense on Friday night, but despite that, we were still in the game and made it interesting right until the last out.
Everything about Saturday’s game was encouraging. The win, the way Schilling pitched, Papelbon in the ninth, the defense, and the hitting.
Yesterday we played a flawless game in the field and got one of the best pitching performances that I can ever recall by Wakefield in a Sox uniform. He actually out-pitched Johnson, going 8, striking out 12, and only giving up 3 hits and 1 walk. Unfortunately one of those hits was a fly ball by Giambi that just made it into the right field stands in the first inning.
Unfortunately for us, although Johnson was out-pitched, he was still right on his game and looked like the Johnson of old, the one that we haven’t seen very much of since he changed into pinstripes. But we still made it interesting against Gordon and Rivera, with a little luck, Damon’s line drive in the 8th lands a couple of inches to the left, Renteria’s liner in the ninth is a little higher, a little harder, or a little more to either side, we pull that game out.
That’s okay, I’ll take what we got and be happy with it. We blew them out once and hung in there with them twice in their ballpark. The pressure’s on them, they really can’t even worry about the East right now as they’re still 1 ½ behind the Indians in the Wild Card race. And the Indians are looking like a very good team who has put it all together at the right time. Of their remaining 19 games, 7 are against the Royals, 3 against the D-Rays, and although they still have 6 against the White Sox, the final 3 are the last 3 of the season when the Sox will have the Central wrapped up and will be looking to rest their regulars and set up their playoff rotation.
Meanwhile the Yankees have all AL East opponents remaining on their schedule. They have losing records against the O’s and D-Rays who have played them tough all year, and although they’re 8-4 against the Jays, they’re still a tough team, plus 3 more against us at Fenway. There’s a very good chance that the Yankees don’t even make the playoffs this year.
Of course, we can’t worry about that since we also have some tough games coming up against the O’s (3) and Jays (7), both of whom we’ve had our troubles against, 7-8 and 3-8 respectively. Fortunately we’ve got our pitching really coming together at the right time for us and that should make a sizeable difference. If we can keep getting that kind of pitching we should be able to hold off the Yankees and come away with the AL East.
A 3 game lead with 20 games left to play is certainly not a lock, but when you look at what these 2 teams have been doing lately, and what they have coming up, it seems like a lot of ground for the Yankees to make up.
Even though we only managed to take one this weekend, I still liked what I saw. Wells wasn’t great, but he was good enough to win and got victimized by some terrible defense on Friday night, but despite that, we were still in the game and made it interesting right until the last out.
Everything about Saturday’s game was encouraging. The win, the way Schilling pitched, Papelbon in the ninth, the defense, and the hitting.
Yesterday we played a flawless game in the field and got one of the best pitching performances that I can ever recall by Wakefield in a Sox uniform. He actually out-pitched Johnson, going 8, striking out 12, and only giving up 3 hits and 1 walk. Unfortunately one of those hits was a fly ball by Giambi that just made it into the right field stands in the first inning.
Unfortunately for us, although Johnson was out-pitched, he was still right on his game and looked like the Johnson of old, the one that we haven’t seen very much of since he changed into pinstripes. But we still made it interesting against Gordon and Rivera, with a little luck, Damon’s line drive in the 8th lands a couple of inches to the left, Renteria’s liner in the ninth is a little higher, a little harder, or a little more to either side, we pull that game out.
That’s okay, I’ll take what we got and be happy with it. We blew them out once and hung in there with them twice in their ballpark. The pressure’s on them, they really can’t even worry about the East right now as they’re still 1 ½ behind the Indians in the Wild Card race. And the Indians are looking like a very good team who has put it all together at the right time. Of their remaining 19 games, 7 are against the Royals, 3 against the D-Rays, and although they still have 6 against the White Sox, the final 3 are the last 3 of the season when the Sox will have the Central wrapped up and will be looking to rest their regulars and set up their playoff rotation.
Meanwhile the Yankees have all AL East opponents remaining on their schedule. They have losing records against the O’s and D-Rays who have played them tough all year, and although they’re 8-4 against the Jays, they’re still a tough team, plus 3 more against us at Fenway. There’s a very good chance that the Yankees don’t even make the playoffs this year.
Of course, we can’t worry about that since we also have some tough games coming up against the O’s (3) and Jays (7), both of whom we’ve had our troubles against, 7-8 and 3-8 respectively. Fortunately we’ve got our pitching really coming together at the right time for us and that should make a sizeable difference. If we can keep getting that kind of pitching we should be able to hold off the Yankees and come away with the AL East.
posted by Bob at 9/12/2005 10:07:00 AM
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