Game 81: Pettitte beats Johan Santana

Andy Pettitte (9-5, 3.98) outdueled the Mets Johan Santana (7-7, 3.01) in a very close and tight game, that was rained delayed at the start and in the middle.

Cano, Giambi, and Posada had an RBI each, and Jose Veras, Kyle Farnsworth, and Mariano Rivera each hurled a scoreless inning to preserve a 3-2 Yankees victory in this Subway Series at Shea Stadium. Mariano is now 22/22 in saves, and had a 1-2-3 inning, with 2K. Don’t go to the bathroom when he’s on the mound, folks, you’ll miss the ending. Mariano, who the fans and MEDIA said was DONE and FINISHED last year thanks to a slow April, now is off to the best start of any relief pitcher in history (he has the lowest on base percentage against him for anyone with 20+ saves).

As I predicted before the season started, Santana’s Mets signing transformed him from an ace to a hard luck loser: Santana has a 2.53 ERA over his last five starts, yet he’s 0-4 over that span.

Many fans and members of the MEDIA said that Santana was a bigger game pitcher than Pettitte, and that the Yanks should have passed up on Andy after the HGH controversy. For at least one game, Andy has converted those critics to believers in him. (Of course, I guess everyone is forgetting that Santana out dueled Andy in Game 43.)

Andy picked off Jose Reyes at 2B with David Wright up at the plate, which may have been the biggest play of the game.

Review of FOX ANNOUNCERS Tim McCarver and Joe Buck

Pretty bad as usual, for the most part. Buck got on his Bob Costas high horse and said we must consider Pettitte’s HGH admission when talking about his Hall of Fame candidacy. McCarver was convinced that Andy should be in, since EVERY pitcher who was 100 games over .500 has been inducted. (Andy is 90+ games over .500). In my opinion talking about HGH and Andy so late in the season is uncalled for. I thank Tim for selling the “Andy Pettitte Hall of Fame” idea on a national TV forum, and I attack Joe Buck for brining up Andy’s limited HGH use.

Buck also attacked all modern day players for using greenies in the past, and how their stats are low now, since they don’t use them this year. I’ve learned so much about drug use in sports and wrestling in recent years, that I don’t blame the players for doing anything to get through tough traveling schedules. Buck is an idealistic fool, who wouldn’t last one minute in a real-world situation.

As standard practice, Buck didn’t sound thrilled to announce…since the Mets have been a train wreck this year, and he hates the Yanks, he couldn’t really take sides. Buck did a great job is being a typical Talking Head…just telling us schlock about both teams that ESPN and FOX normally do. Their third man, Ken Rosenthal was doing his Peter Gammons impersonation by trade speculating.

McCarver seems to think that Farnsworth is “much improved” under Girardi. Although Farnsy has been doing well under pressure in recent appearances, he STILL has given up a ton of HRs this year, and in my opinion he should be traded before July 31st.

Of course, McCarver was ALL over Reyes for getting picked off. Reyes truly is an idiot to do that on a Saturday FOX game…

Finally, I have to laugh how Buck and McCarver seem to know exactly what Jorge Posada (who was playing 1B in the 9th) was telling Mariano Rivera when Trot Nixon came up (“Here is Jorge telling Mo how to get Trot Nixon out”). Millions of people take it for granted that Tim and Joe somehow are mind readers, can lip read in Spanish, or have a bug and are listening in. Thank goodness my wife didn’t fall for it; she picked up on that immediately: “How do THEY know what Jorge is saying?” she asked.

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