SEATTLE – Shane Spencer topped the Yankees in homers, Tino Martinez in triples and Clay Bellinger was tied with Bernie Williams for the team RBI lead.
It is a reminder not to read much into early-season results. Nevertheless, this is not spring training. Everyone with a sanity quotient higher than George Steinbrenner and your fervent rotisserie league geek pretty much ignores Grapefruit League results. The opening series falls into a different realm. It is the beginning of the real hint-dropping process.
In the exhibition season, Ricky Ledee was MVP and Spencer MIA. But in three games that count for the back of the baseball card against the Angels, Ledee fell into an offensive and mental funk while Spencer bashed two homers. Dorothy, we are not in Dunedin any more. Or Fort Myers. Or Bradenton.
This stuff counts. And while you will hear both good and bad results brushed aside with “it’s too early” comments – right up until it is too late – the fact is the meter is now running on the season and some quick detective work on the initial clues could be insightful. For those that feel this irrelevant, simply look upon the following as an exercise to catch up hard-working New Yorkers, who probably slept through the season-opening series with its late West Coast start times:
1. What do we make of Jorge Posada’s hot start? Besides the obvious, that it beats the alternative, there is the fact that he never recovered from a poor April last season. He hit .146 in the first month of 1999, damaging his sometimes fragile psyche and putting him in a hole that he tried too hard – and failed – to completely get out of.
Posada was 5-for-10 with two walks against Anaheim. He hit the ball with authority to all fields and from both sides of the plate. More important, his catching was better than fine. He had one real shot to throw out a basestealer and did. He expertly blocked balls in the dirt in all three games with runners on third, which will only raise the confidence of the staff to throw breaking stuff in those situations. And Joe Torre praised Posada for handling the staff well.
All eyes are on how Posada interacts with pitchers, which was the great gift of the now departed Joe Girardi. The Yankees are expecting 130 games behind the plate from Posada. So far, so good.
2. What do we make of David Cone getting bombed? A lot, if you don’t have faith in him. But just about everyone with the Yankees does have the faith. They remember that in 1998 Cone allowed 18 hits and 16 earned runs over 9″ innings in his first two starts, and went on to win 20 games anyway.
The worry here, naturally, is that Cone is two years older. One of these seasons poor outings are going to be more than a glitch. But Torre, Posada and Cone all claim his stuff was fine Wednesday when he was crushed for eight runs in 2″ innings. There was talk of an inability to harness it and home-plate ump Paul Schrieber’s unfamiliarity with the sharp break of Cone’s stuff, causing some missed strike calls. The most important factor is that Cone is still saying he feels physically terrific. If that is the case, he is an artist with a history of making successful adjustments with lesser stuff as long as his arm is sound.
3. What do we make of early injuries? Williams did not start the first three games in center due to triceps pain. Scott Brosius is out at least two weeks with a rib-cage strain. And don’t forget, the Yanks already have lost Darryl Strawberry (drug suspension) and expected utilityman D’Angelo Jimenez (broken neck) for the season, and a back injury helped set back projected No. 5 starter Ed Yarnall.
One of the keys to the Yankee run of titles in recent years is that they have overcome injuries, but also that they have not had too many at one time or of the devastating variety. Are these early problems an omen?
4. What do we make of Ledee and Spencer? Ledee could not have looked better or more confident than he did just a week ago. Then he took a couple of oh-fers in the first two games and you could see the self-assurance drain out of him. Torre smartly got Ledee a pinch at-bat in Wednesday’s blowout loss and Ledee delivered an RBI single. Maybe that helps. But with Seattle starting two lefties this weekend, Ledee could have problems finding a groove.
Since Spencer needs to show he is not a Kevin Maas-like flash, the two homers were helpful. The Yankees will not have a lot of patience with him. He probably needs a strong April to help him survive the inevitable slumps of the long season.
5. What do we make of Chuck Knoblauch’s errorless series? Not much. After going much of spring and the first two games against Anaheim without betraying any throwing anxiety, Knoblauch short-armed one peg and nursed two others in the series finale. More than three games are needed to determine that his problems are history.
6. What do we make of Mariano Rivera giving up a run? That he is human.
7. What do we make of Derek Jeter’s slow start? See Rivera, Mariano.