Bleacher Creature Feature

#5: Almost Perfect

7 April 2002

---The Jason Giambi Watch

For the second day in a row, Giambi was the DH, with Nick Johnson (who is rapidly becoming one of my favorite players on this team) playing first. I suspect this is due in part to the fact that Johnson's a better fielder, and in part to give Giambi a chance to focus on his hitting exclusively until he gets back on the wagon, as it were.

First at-bat, he comes up with Derek Jeter on second, nobody out, and a run already in, Alfonso Soriano and Jeter having hit back-to-back doubles to start the game. Loud, encouraging cheers.

He strikes out, and gets booed.

Second at-bat, he leads off and draws a walk on eight pitches, including two foul-backs, showing the selectivity for which he is renowned. A definite improvement. Three batters later, Jorge Posada walks, too, but the Yanks don't make anything of it, though they're winning 3-0 by this point.

Third at-bat, he comes up with Jeter on first and Soriano on third, with a run in already (Jeter drove in John Vander Wal, who started the inning with a single), and only one out. Perfect opportunity to keep the rally going. We start a "Ja-son!" cheer in the bleachers, with rhythm provided by The Cowbell Guy.

He swings at the first pitch and grounds into a rally-killing 1-6-3 double play, and is roundly booed.

However, the boos are forgotten by the fourth at-bat, and the "Ja-son!" chant starts again as he gets up with Jeter on first, two outs, and two more runs in (Rondell White led off with a double, Johnson drove him in with a single, then moved to second on a force out and to third on a wild pitch, with Jeter driving him in with another single). Yanks are now up 6-1.

He connects quite well, unfortunately hitting the ball into the deepest part of the park: left-center, where Jason Tyner settles under it and catches it. This being a somewhat more noble effort, there are no boos.

Fifth at-bat, Jeter's on first, having walked after Soriano singled and stole second. On a 1-1 pitch, he connects with a solid base hit up the middle, easily scoring Soriano and sending Jeter to third.

Never saw a single get quite that kind of ovation, at least not in April......

Giambi's still hitting only .160, but he's also walked an average of once a game so far, and he's fouling a lot of pitches off (five today). He's in a slump, is all, but the ability's there -- he just has the misfortune of going through that slump in the first week.

---The Alfonso Soriano Watch

Soriano went 3-5 in the leadoff spot, hitting two singles and a double, scoring twice, and stealing a base. He's better than he was last year, but he still occasionally swings early at crap pitches, and he needs to stop doing that, but he is doing it less. And his OBP right now is .344. This experiment could work.

---Before the game started at 1.05 there were concerns about Clemens's health after he collapsed following a bare-handed catch of a grounder on opening day.

Said concerns were pretty much gone by 1.25. Clemens started the game by striking out Tyner and Randy Winn, then got Steve Cox to ground out. Twelve pitches, three batters, magnificent pitching. He was then perfect for 4.1 innings, until Ben Grieve broke up the perfect game with a double.

(Grieve, of course, was already being showered with verbal abuse from our section by dint of being the opposing right fielder, and therefore closest, but the abuse went into overdrive after this. We Bleacher Creatures are not a forgiving lot.)

Clemens came out in the eighth after giving up back to back doubles, and his first earned run of the day. He'd only thrown 90 pitches, struck out nine and didn't walk anybody. He'd only given up four hits, half of them in his last two batters. He also made a spectacular fielding play in the fifth, spearing a sharp grounder by Brent Abernathy -- and, showing that he learns from his mistakes, caught it with his gloved hand...

Baseball Prospectus 2002 described Clemens as having a "much greater chance of retiring than of being ineffective," and today bore that out. He was about as dominating as you can be, throwing strikes, placing every pitch where he wanted it, and simply overmatching the Tampa Bay hitters. It was a privilege to watch.

---You have to like the chances of a team whose bottom three in the order is most days going to be some combination of Shane Spencer, Vander Wal, White, and Johnson. Today it was White, Vander Wal (replaced defensively by Gerald Williams in the seventh), and Johnson, and they each got a hit and went on to score a run, with Johnson adding an RBI for good measure. White also made a nifty catch on a sharp, dropping line drive by Winn in the fourth, preserving Clemens's then-perfect game.

---Greg Vaughn must've been, you'll pardon the expression, relieved to see Mike Stanton in the ninth, since in his three at-bats against Clemens, he struck out -- two of those on 1-2 pitches, too.

---Jeter's obviously seeing good pitches to start off. He hit the third, first, first, and second pitches in his first four times to the plate, and got hits three of those four times. Then in his final at-bat, he drew a four-pitch walk.

---Lost in all the Giambi hugger-mugger is the fact that Bernie Williams isn't exactly on track, either. In fact, just like Giambi, he's drawn a walk a game, but his BA is .087. The former, however, is a good sign that the latter is an aberration. Besides, it's Bernie. I'm no more worried about him than Giambi, and by May, this will all be forgotten.

---In other news, right now, this minute, all five teams in the NL East are tied for first place with 3-3 records.

That's weird.

NEXT: Jorgie Porgie

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