Friday, September 26, 2014
Blest be the Jeter that binds
I had the Jeter game on for the most part while I was running around the house. As my kid was prepared to go to bed, it was the 7th inning. I told him that there's no bedtime if he wants to watch the rest of the game. Him being a fan of not-going-to-bed and a fan of if-it's-on-TV-i'll-watch-it, it was an easy choice. My wife was in the room as well, and she was interested. It turned into an impromptu "family night" of watching TV. Normally, it would be Sophia Vergara that is the star for us, but last night, Jeter had that role.
One of the lovely quirks of baseball is the half home of the ninth. Jeter probably batted for the last time in the 7th as I explained the rule, because it was 5-2, and it was kind of improbable for him to come to bat again. I didn't explain to my family that MLB didn't give him credit for getting on base in the 7th, and didn't give him credit for not making an out in his time at bat. No reason to sully the evening with the inertial reasoning of MLB's scoring practices. I leave that for blogging.(*)
(*) He, after all, pounced on a mistake pitch that led to a mistake throw and a mistake catch. Run Expectancy is much more honest with Jeter on that play: it identified Jeter as the batter when all that commotion happened. Whether that commotion is caused by mistake throw of a pitcher that leads to a HR or a mistake throw of a SS that leads to reaching base, these are things that are good for the offense and bad for the defense. It's a simple enough concept of accounting. We don't care about why. We just care about the what. As in, what really happened (say it the way Chris Penn said it in Reservoir Dogs... that's how I feel about this). The offense scored and no out was made. Let's reflect that as best we can. OFFICIALLY, MLB doesn't do that. Which is why I track Reached on Error, and I count that in a player's OBP.
Back to the point. Which I don't have. But I'll continue anyway. The 8th inning, the Yankees sent enough batters so that if it went to the 9th, Jeter would be third, guaranteeing that he'd make yet another final appearance if the unwritten script was followed.
And then the script started. A very good pitcher gives up three runs to set up the 9th. The first batter reaches base, he's given a fast runner to take his place, who is bunted over to second, in a bunt that anyone who is human agrees was completely necessary, regardless of where the fielders were positioned. Again, I wasn't going to sully the game by talking about the finer points of when to bunt. All to bring Jeter up. All that was needed was a pitch for Jeter to lace. And he did.
This may not be Kirk Gibson's reenactment of the script of The Natural, who had the good fortune to also have the godly Vin Scully's voice narrating for him. But that was as close as we could hope to come to that. Outside of a Cubs/Mets game in person at not-Shea, I watched with my family three innings of baseball in all of 2014. And it was these three. And we'll remember this game for... well, I guess pretty much forever. The last time I sat down to watch a whole inning of baseball with my family, it was the Cubs/Marlins 8th inning in 2003.
That's called Clutch Viewing.
And that's what these games do. It really transcends sports. Or you can even argue it explains sports. It's not about the rules of the game that makes up the sport, but the drama that it creates, and can pull in anyone who isn't even a fan of the sport. And that's what Jeter did.
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