ST. PETERSBURG – Gary Sheffield, even slower on the bases these days than George Steinbrenner is to remember Joe Torre won four World Series, says it makes sense for him to drop from the No. 3 spot he has held “all my life” to cleanup in the Yankee order.
“You don’t want to put me in the three-hole where Jason [Giambi] hits the ball in the gap and I have to score,” he said. “Four spot, OK. You don’t want to clog up the bases.”
And Hideki Matsui, remember him, five-hole hitter with 109 RBIs, 30 more than Giambi? He must be chopped liver.
Certainly it appeared to be chopped liver that Sheffield was running in from first base last night on Matsui’s first-inning, two-out double to the right-field corner. Don Zimmer could score on that hit, but not a gimpy Sheffield, who died at third when Bernie Williams struck out.
You can’t run from the truth that the Yankees – who last night had Sheffield at DH, Ruben Sierra in right and Giambi at first – are lead-footed. No question, either, that Joe Torre, equipped with a luxury RV of a team, understands he pays a price for the needed premium grade as he pushes it to the floor with 18 games remaining.
Steady won the race over the speedy Devil Rays last night, mostly one base at a time. Sheffield singled twice and
walked once while Sierra worked walks in two different innings to set up two-out, two-run singles by Robinson Cano and Derek Jeter. The Yankees took a 6-5 victory that likely wouldn’t have been won with Matt Lawton (four-for-37 as a Yankee), Tony Womack or Bubba Crosby – healthier and speedier outfield options.
Sheffield, who returned Monday from a four-game absence with a thigh muscle strain, probably will have to DH at least through this weekend in Toronto. Thus the only way to get Williams’s bat into the lineup is to play him in center, where, one night after throwing out Carl Crawford at second, the same Devil Rays speedster took an extra base on what should have been a single.
Crawford didn’t score, but the Rays made third on every single during a two-run fourth, then turned a Crawford triple that Sierra had no chance to run down into a two-run fifth.
Nevertheless, another Matsui double, Williams and Sierra walks and maybe the oldest reliable Yankee thing of
all, Jeter, taking an inside pitch to right with two outs and two men in scoring position. Together, they kept the Pinstripes even in the loss column with Cleveland, justification for Torre’s decision to dance with all the left and heavy feet who brought him this far.
Basically, the manager would rather have a ponderous Sheffield than no Sheffield at all.
“We’re shooting craps here,” Torre said. “You just keep your fingers crossed in a double-play situation.
“He’s in there for his bat plus. And, by plus I mean a presence that makes everybody around him a little bit better.”
At the plate, he means. On the bases, not, at least until Sheffield can move well enough to play right again, which Torre hopes will be the case when the Yankees are off the turf fields on this double-dome trip and home to play Baltimore Monday.
“I’m barely making it around the bases,” Sheffield said. “But there are a lot of slow people in baseball.”
Well it is, if it reduces Matsui’s RBI capabilities and sets off chain reaction defensive problems that can saw up an inning like another Jason, from the movies.
But you have to weigh everything. And it wouldn’t be Joe Torre, or very smart at all to not stick with his heavyweights, considering the alternatives.