NEW YORK | When the New York Yankees want to do it big, they have the contacts to make it happen.
Wednesday night’s World Series opener, the first at the new Yankee Stadium, was supposed to be a coronation of baseball’s glitziest stage. And they spared no effort in turning the place out, bringing Yogi Berra to the mound with the first and second ladies of the country on each arm and featuring celebrities worthy of a Hollywood premiere.
The Philadelphia Phillies? They were just a footnote. Never mind that they were the defending World Series champions; the Yankees’ opponent needn’t cause any worry. At least, not before the game.
By the early innings of Game 1, it was evident the Yankees had a big problem. Phillies left-hander Cliff Lee continued his otherworldly postseason tear, rendering baseball’s most expensive lineup helpless in a complete-game victory.
The Phillies got to CC Sabathia with a pair of home runs, then shredded the Yankees’ bullpen. No “Enter Sandman,” no victorious singalong of “New York, New York” - only Yankees fans bolting early for the exits in a 6-1 gut punch of a Phillies victory that quickly shifted the occasion at Yankee Stadium from celebration to calamity.
“Getting that first one out of the way is big for us,” Lee said. “At worst, we can split here in New York, go back home and have that home-field advantage. Now we have a chance to take both of them and go into Philly in a really good spot.”
All of a sudden, the Yankees need struggling right-hander A.J. Burnett to deliver a shutdown outing Thursday night, lest they go back to Philadelphia in a 2-0 hole with the task of beating the Phillies at least twice in a place where they’ve lost one playoff game the past two years.
If they don’t even the series, shortstop Jimmy Rollins’ brash Phillies-in-five prediction starts to look like a real possibility.
Put simply, they need to win because they could see Lee twice more in this series, and there isn’t much chance of beating him the way he has thrown this month.
Dominant for the first half of his start and crafty for the second half of it, Lee turned in his fourth masterpiece in as many starts this postseason. His 10 strikeout victims included Derek Jeter, Mark Teixeira (twice) and Alex Rodriguez (three times). He was able to change speeds with his fastball, his change-up was effective and both his breaking pitches (a curveball and a cut fastball) had bite.
Perhaps most importantly, Lee aggressively pursued a lineup that can grind out at-bats and force pitchers to labor early in games. Despite striking out seven in the first four innings, he threw just 56 pitches in that time. That gave him plenty of room to work deep into the game, making the precarious state of the Phillies’ bullpen a nonfactor.
His only run was unearned, and even his glove was on a plane above everyone else’s; Lee made a nonchalant basket catch of a Johnny Damon popup in the sixth inning, then reached behind his back to snare a Robinson Cano comebacker in the eighth.
“This is the stage I’ve wanted to get to from [being] a little kid,” Lee said. “I’ve already put all the work in. There’s no sense in being nervous and worried. It’s time to go out there and let my talents take over.”
With his former Cleveland Indians teammate buzzing through the Yankees’ lineup, Sabathia couldn’t keep the same pace against the Phillies.
Facing Chase Utley with two outs, Sabathia packed fastballs and the occasional slider on the outer third of the plate, and Utley fouled off five. On the ninth pitch of the at-bat, Sabathia threw a low fastball that caught too much of the plate, and Utley turned on it.
It wasn’t as much a mistake by Sabathia as an impressive piece of hitting by Utley, who blasted the pitch into the right-field stands for a 1-0 Phillies lead. The homer Sabathia gave up to Utley in the sixth inning, though, was a different story.
On that at-bat, Sabathia grooved a fastball over the plate, and Utley launched it to right-center for another homer.
“I was going to try to lay off the slider and try to hit his fastball,” Utley said. “He left one kind of in the middle of the plate, and you can’t miss those pitches against that type of pitcher.”
Sabathia was gone after the seventh inning, leaving the Yankees’ bullpen to try to keep the Phillies close while they hoped their hitters could break through against Lee.
But the bullpen failed.
Yankees manager Joe Girardi needed three pitchers to get through the seventh inning after slumping right-hander Phil Hughes walked Rollins and Shane Victorino. With two outs, David Robertson walked Jayson Werth, and Raul Ibanez hit a bleeding single that scored two runs.
It was a final shot that ensured two things: The celebrities went home unhappy, and the Phillies are not to be overlooked.
“We won a game tonight. We got one win,” Phillies manager Charlie Manuel said. “Tomorrow we’ll come to the ballpark, we’re going to come to win.”
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