Nope, not the effects of a heavy night…

[It]happened in the fourth inning, when Babe made a valiant effort for a long foul from Joe Judge’s bat, which just sailed over the wall into the crowded seats. The Babe ran into the pavilion parapet with the full force of his body, and dropped unconscious to the grass. Uniformed policemen ran to his assistance and kept back the crowd that seemed disposed to leave the chairs and get a close-up of the injured warrior. Several photographers happened to be on the spot and snapped the Babe as Trainer Doc Woods ran up with the water bucket and the little black bag of first aid preparations.

At first it was thought that Ruth had been knocked out by a blow from the concrete on his chin, but it was soon discovered that he had been knocked out by a jolt in the solar plexus. His left leg was also hurt at the hip.

[Yankee manager Miller] Huggins wanted Ruth to quit, but he insisted upon staying in, and got a double in the sixth… From page 23 of the July 6th, 1924 New York Times

The Yankees beat the Senator 2-1.

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Well that’s 50% of the Core Four gone as Jorge Posada officially joins Andy Pettitte in retirement.

Of the four the catcher probably ranked fourth in everyone’s affections. Probably didn’t help himself with his mid-season strop last year, after being demoted to ninth in the batting order. Might of had a case if his numbers at the time hadn’t been so bad that he was lucky to be ninth. I also seem to remember readings somewhere that the week chin might not have helped.

So while he ranks below Mariano, Derek and Andy in both fan love and maybe thoughts of that much overused word in sport greatness – scoring against a second division (in old money) side does not equal greatness – there’s some interesting facts included in the Yankees e-mail announcing Posada’s retirement.

Posada, 40, finishes his 17-year Major League career with a .273 batting average (1,664-for-6,092) with 900 runs, 379 doubles, 275 home runs and 1,065 RBI in 1,829 games-all with the Yankees. Of the 13 former Major League catchers in the Hall of Fame (Johnny Bench, Yogi Berra, Roger Bresnahan, Roy Campanella, Gary Carter, Mickey Cochrane, Bill Dickey, Buck Ewing, Rick Ferrell, Carlton Fisk, Gabby Hartnett, Ernie Lombardi and Ray Schalk), only Berra has better numbers in batting average, home runs and RBI (.285, 358 and 1,430, respectively).

As a player on five World Series championship teams (1996, ’98, ’99, 2000, ’09), Posada finished his career among Baseball’s all-time postseason leaders in games played (second, 125), doubles (third, 23), hits (fourth, 103) and RBI (tied for ninth, 42). His 119 postseason contests at catcher are the most all time, ahead of Berra (second, 63). In his career, he caught at least one game in six different World Series, tied with Elston Howard and Wally Schang for third-most all time, trailing Berra (12) and Bill Dickey (eight). In 2011, he batted a team-best .429 (6-for-14) in the Yankees’ five-game ALDS vs. Detroit.

Originally selected by the Yankees in the 24th round of the 1990 First-Year Player Draft, Posada holds the distinction of being one of just five players all time to record at least 1,500 hits, 350 doubles, 275 home runs and 1,000 RBI while playing at least 50.0% of his games at catcher, joining Ivan Rodriguez and Hall of Famers Johnny Bench, Gary Carter and Carlton Fisk. He ranks eighth all time in home runs among players whose primary position was catcher.

He’s also the only Major League catcher to ever have hit .330 or better with 40 doubles, 20 home runs, and 90 RBIs in a single season.

Interesting stuff. Hall of Fame stuff? But in the end when the Yankees were winning in the last two decades Posada was right there in the middle of it all.

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At Yankee stadium, Five for five, a homer for the 3000th and batting in the winning run.

Who writes the scripts for Derek Jeter?

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Andrew Eugene Pettitte…

click for full size

…someone can switch the lights out in Yankee Stadium for the season now.

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Another step to wiping the name of Barry Bonds off the top of the pile. Cleaning up the list that Bonds sullied when he took the record from Aaron.

…he’s just going to be another one with an asterisk to his name.

Sad really, had his chance but those three seasons in Texas means it ain’t going to be as big a celebration if he does get to the magic 763 than it should be – three seasons at 52, 57 and 47 homers that are making it only 444 he’s hit according to some.

And that’s if he does make it. 163 to go, took him exactly three years to get this last 100, factor in natural slowing down, seems to pick up more injuries these days, his game numbers have been down the last three years, will he need 6 or more years to get the remaining bombs? Even being the youngest, at 35 years and 8 days, to reach the 600 milestone does he have the time to top the chart?

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Three and a half months into the season and only one post about baseball – damn you all to hell channel 5 – and the second one is about the death of The Boss. And I’m a bit late on that.*

Not much to say really, what can I say that hasn’t already, whether good, bad or indifferent. All I know is the Yankees are a bit better off now than when he and his cohorts paid $8.7 million for them in ’73 – where can you go now in the wolrd and not see that famous NY logo on a blue cap?

And while some fans bitch and moan about the him and the Yankees, the players they bought and traded for he was paying the luxury tax to make the Yanks winners while other team owners were just making sure their pockets were well lined. Don’t blame George because your owners have produced crap teams.

Hey I know it’s not GMS III but Larry David but a fitting tribute?

Just wish he hadn’t fired Billy that fifth and final time before a certain trip to the new old Yankee stadium in ’88.

click to play

*Also so late I never mentioned Bob Sheppard’s passing, happy I got to hear him at his job.

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And it’s my first baseball post of the season – damn you channel five, damn you all to hell – hell it’s almost my first baseball post since the Yanks ended the Toxic Curse all those months ago, just over 5 ain’t it.

Nothing over the close season about the Yanks or the game, bar my absolute shock at the news that a home run record breaker took drugs in the 90s. So nowt about any of the reigning World Series Champions acquisitions or those they let go.

I wasn’t that bothered to see Johnny Damon go to be honest, sad to see Godzilla leave, always liked the unflappable, unfidgety way he went about his batting, but I kinda understood why it had to be. Especially with the arrival of Curtis Granderson from the Tigers. I’ve always liked the kid after he came over here during the off-season a couple of years back and appeared on channel five’s baseball show. Seemed like a top bloke and certainly put a hell of a lot of British sportsmen in the shade with his communication skills – I don’t seem to remember any “you knows” – he came across as a top bloke and a great ambassador for the game.

Added to all that he looked to have all the skills required on the park, skills that in a way need to be realised early on in a Yankees shirt for it to be the start of a Yankees career. Slow starts build a pressure that creates busted Yankees careers.

Now does it get any quicker than a homer in your first at bat – OK it could be quicker with a first pitch home run, we can also forget the game ending at bat in that first loss – and then the game winning HR against the Red Sux in their backyard to win the first series of the season.

Nice one Curtis, just have to keep it up for the next 159 games and you may have earned that pinstriped jersey

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Forget the Curse of Donnie, Curse of the Republicans, this is the big one and when Mariano got Victorino to ground the ball to Cano and the Yankees players almost made it onto the pitch from the dugout before the ball found it’s way to Teixeira’s mitt at first, it was the end of a long wait.

It was a curse that started some time ago, in the dim and distant past before mortals could get their hands on teh interweb, back when we only knew of The Babe and Joltin’ Joe. Back when the BBC ruled sport in Britain and Dickie Davies – he never did finish painting that ceiling – sat there on a Saturday afternoon in an ITV studio knowing most of the viewing public were watching Grandstand as he introduced World Of Sport‘s latest bizarre offering between the racing and the wrestling.

I’m pretty sure we witnessed Bucky Dent hitting a homer of some significance, back when I remember a wiry, mustachioed man in pinstripes with a 1 on his back going mental at an ump, kicking dirt at him, after a batter was called out when either the official or the batter or both were looking up at the passing BA 747 flying overhead in an advert for said airline.

Something caught my attention, then my family from New York came over for a visit, I saw that famous logo in other places and that was it. But there wasn’t much baseball round here, my first trip to a playing nation meant my first bat and first ball. That first ball also helped my allegiance as it contained the book pictured on the right, Catfish was wearing the right uniform and that ubiquitous logo was right there on his cap.

Downtown in the city we lived in there was an amazing sweet shop, but I’ve never been the one for gorging on candy I was more interested in little packets of cards and the first packet I got contained one card that just sealed it. How could Goosge Gossage not have me hooked into a life as a Yankee fan?

A trip to the baseball nation followed, I could now get my own Yankees cap, jacket, jersey, the mitt didn’t quite work out right but the Nolan Ryan job was the right price. Just couldn’t see a game as it was the wrong time of year. Still it was going to be a good time to be a Yankee fan Donnie had arrived. But no the Toxic Curse had kicked in the very moment I clamped my allegiance to the most successful and famous team in the sport. A glory hunter they said in the late 90s, ah yes the 1980s was just non stop glory. It’s hard to remember throughout it which was the most glorious moment, was it watching Bobby Meacham commit his last two errors as a Yankee player? Or was it watching Rickey, Donnie, Winfield, Randolph amass a whole hit between the four of them. Hell I didn’t even get to see that wiry little guy from the ad all those years earlier, he’d been sacked a few weeks earlier for the fifth and final time and Sweet Lou didn’t throw a fit. Or was it all those playoffs they didn’t reach?

There certainly wasn’t much glory when British TV decided, on the back of the NFL success, to give the game a go. Now what would be the worst year of that decade for baseball to be shown on telly with respect to a Yankees fan. Oh yes it would be ’86 now wouldn’t it, the Curse was working overtime that year. Your execution, would you prefer the gas chamber or the electric chair? Red Sox or Mets, thank you very much Channel 4.

Back to the States, I know lets head over to Uncle Tech’s to see England in the World Cup, thank you very much Graham Taylor. Oh well I’ll get to see the Yankees, thanks to the updates from my uncle I knew they were doing well. Top of the AL East, best record in the AL, second best in the majors. Bernie was burning, Paulie was hitting, Donnie had hopes. So what happens? The strike, baseball ends the middle of August, the Curse strikes with a vengeance.

At this point the Curse decides to play a cruel trick 1996 comes round, Pettitte, Jeter, Tino it was all here, it ended with #23. But better news was to come Channel 5 started broadcasting and decided to fill the wee small hours with various off the wall shows, including live MLB, just at the right time the beginning of a dynasty. Then the Curse pointed something out, you can’t get 5 round here, the signal isn’t strong enough. 1998, ’99 and 2000 passed with only teh interweb reports to follow. A couple more World Series appearances followed, but no wins, 2003 was the first thing I blogged about, testing various blogging packages. Damn fish.

Then finally a digibox, C5 is available, A-Rod is at the hot corner, all is well with the world. They’re on the TV every Sunday and Wednesday it seemed. Happy, happy, joy, joy. 101 games won, A-Rod spanks the Twins, the Sux are getting a lesson and then the Curse plays it’s cruelest trick yet. Game 4, it’s a Sunday, it’s the only game in town, live on 5. Live up to a point, that point being 6 o’clock, when they just cut off because some kiddies show has to be put out. You stay up all that time and it’s a mad rush to the PC to find out what happened, though I wish I hadn’t.

Game 7, Wednesday, so again on C5, didn’t really need to stay to the end the moment Ortiz hit the bleachers in the 1st, it just had that feeling written all over it. One curse had ended because The Curse was more powerful.

The following four years saw things go from bad to worse, the Sux winning another to the Yanks not making the playoffs last season. And then rumours started that changes in broadcasting rules meant C5 could get away with not using the live baseball to fulfill certain broadcasting requirements, it was to be binned by the channel.

Season ’09 started again with hope, a new stadium a new hope, hope that big spending brings. It also started with revelations, injuries and results that dented hope. I decided to test the Curse, I wouldn’t blog as much about the games, just the odd thing here and there, Swisher pitching, milestones for Mo and Jeter, the anniversary of the Iron Horse’s last game and retirement. All I had was interweb reports, highlight videos and blogs for what was going off out there. Funnily it seemed to have a positive effect on my fantasy team, one brief moment I was top of that C5 league, then August hit and I turned from Matsui to Cano in this World Series.

So 103 wins was reached, playoff bound, it had to happen I couldn’t watch it. Twins dispatched with ease, then the dreaded Angels, how many times had they destroyed the Yanks when I could view games? But no they’d bottled up ever mistake and error they could have made in those past games just for this series. I only viewed a bit of the games online, I was testing the Curse, it was working the Yanks were in the Series.

But I could test it no more, I couldn’t resist. I tuned into game 1, Cliff Lee worked the Curse to the full. Phills were up, I left early the Yanks lost. Even with this I couldn’t stop myself I had to watch games 2,3 and 4 each time the Yanks were ahead when I stopped viewing and each time they won, was the Curse working a pattern here? It did it again in game 5, Yanks losing, I’m off Yanks lose.

But game 6, I was going to stick this one out, it was going to end the Curse and at about 4:50 am, fittingly with Mariano on the mound, the Curse died a death. #27.

Apologies for this rambling mess of a post but, like CC, Pettitte and Aj, I’m on short rest so while there may be touches of CC and Andy in there it’s more likely to be an AJ game 5 ramble.

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Anytime you tie Lou Gehrig is a special time now Derek Jeter has just got to get one more hit to pass the great man’s record.

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