2008 Woodie Awards
The Sports Guy; Game Seven Jitters
Jose Ortiz
Issue date: 10/21/04 Section: Sports
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The Sports Guy doesn't even know what to say. He is not alone with millions of Yankee fans across the country who have one question: how do you win 19 - 8 one game, and then lose the next four? It was unprecedented, incomprehensible, and unthinkable; are these our beloved Yankees?
The series shouldn't have even gone seven games. With a 3 - 0, there was a better chance that The Sports Guy would relinquish his love of baseball, buy a pink dress and get a sex change than the Red Sox coming back. Well The Sports Guy says you can strap on the breasts and roll out the nail polish because the Sox proved everyone wrong, and showed the power of heart over numbers.
Now the question is where do the Yanks and Sox go next? Well, obviously the Sox will go on to the Fall Classic, but The Sports Guy thinks that their journey will end there. Both St. Louis and Houston have to have fresher pitching right now, although NLCS has now gone to a seventh game. When it's all said and done the Cards will be standing tall, and the Sox will once again be feeling small.
The Yanks on the other hand will have a lot of questions to answer and a lot of off-season concerns to remedy. First off they have to fill the holes in their pitching staff. When the season started everyone knew that was a weakness, and they got by on mediocre pitching until the last four games of this series. Now they will have to look to the free-agent market and look to sign some young pitching talent. The Sports Guy says that the Yankees can't just keep patching their shoddy rotation with veteran has-been pitchers like Kevin Brown, like Loaiza, and so they certainly shouldn't look to pick up Pedro.
A good pitching pick-up for the Yanks would be Carl Pavano from the Marlins, or Odalis Perez from the Dodgers. Righty pitcher, Jaret Wright had a productive year, and would definitely benefit from the phantom run support in NY.
Another question that Steinbrenner and Cashman will have to tackle is what to do with who they already have. Lets face it, The Sports Guy says that Bernie Williams is on the downside of his career and will need to be shipped out to make way for new hungrier talent. Can anyone say Carlos Beltran?
Then what do you do with Giambi who basically took 40 homers and 100 RBI from the Yanks this season, and since coming to the Yankees has not been as productive as he was as an Athletic. Will Steinbrenner allow Giambi to just get paid millions to be sick on the sidelines while his team is blowing a three-game lead in the biggest series of the year?
Three years and counting without a ring in New York, and The Sports Guy can guarantee that the boss isn't happy and that there will be some changes. All the money that the Yanks spent and it counts for nothing in the end. It's not as if they didn't have their chances - the Sox were just hungrier for a championship. Consider that Jeter, Williams, Rivera, Lofton, and Sheffield all have won rings. Besides Schilling how many on the Sox squad have a ring? The Sports Guy says that they don't have enough to be complacent, and so in the end - heart was worth more than money. Till next time, this is The Sports Guy.
The series shouldn't have even gone seven games. With a 3 - 0, there was a better chance that The Sports Guy would relinquish his love of baseball, buy a pink dress and get a sex change than the Red Sox coming back. Well The Sports Guy says you can strap on the breasts and roll out the nail polish because the Sox proved everyone wrong, and showed the power of heart over numbers.
Now the question is where do the Yanks and Sox go next? Well, obviously the Sox will go on to the Fall Classic, but The Sports Guy thinks that their journey will end there. Both St. Louis and Houston have to have fresher pitching right now, although NLCS has now gone to a seventh game. When it's all said and done the Cards will be standing tall, and the Sox will once again be feeling small.
The Yanks on the other hand will have a lot of questions to answer and a lot of off-season concerns to remedy. First off they have to fill the holes in their pitching staff. When the season started everyone knew that was a weakness, and they got by on mediocre pitching until the last four games of this series. Now they will have to look to the free-agent market and look to sign some young pitching talent. The Sports Guy says that the Yankees can't just keep patching their shoddy rotation with veteran has-been pitchers like Kevin Brown, like Loaiza, and so they certainly shouldn't look to pick up Pedro.
A good pitching pick-up for the Yanks would be Carl Pavano from the Marlins, or Odalis Perez from the Dodgers. Righty pitcher, Jaret Wright had a productive year, and would definitely benefit from the phantom run support in NY.
Another question that Steinbrenner and Cashman will have to tackle is what to do with who they already have. Lets face it, The Sports Guy says that Bernie Williams is on the downside of his career and will need to be shipped out to make way for new hungrier talent. Can anyone say Carlos Beltran?
Then what do you do with Giambi who basically took 40 homers and 100 RBI from the Yanks this season, and since coming to the Yankees has not been as productive as he was as an Athletic. Will Steinbrenner allow Giambi to just get paid millions to be sick on the sidelines while his team is blowing a three-game lead in the biggest series of the year?
Three years and counting without a ring in New York, and The Sports Guy can guarantee that the boss isn't happy and that there will be some changes. All the money that the Yanks spent and it counts for nothing in the end. It's not as if they didn't have their chances - the Sox were just hungrier for a championship. Consider that Jeter, Williams, Rivera, Lofton, and Sheffield all have won rings. Besides Schilling how many on the Sox squad have a ring? The Sports Guy says that they don't have enough to be complacent, and so in the end - heart was worth more than money. Till next time, this is The Sports Guy.