Post by The Vermont Bombers on Jun 6, 2020 21:03:56 GMT -5
Rockin' Reynolds
Yankees Second Bagger Keystone to Pinstripes 9-3 Victory
Oakland,September 13th-
Oakland has had nicer days than the thirteenth of September. It’s said that “It’s always sunny in Philadelphia”. On September 13th it seemed as if most of that sun had chosen to stay in Philadelphia. If one were to ask the Athletics, they would insist that it had instead chosen to remain over New York, at least if the outcome of the game was any indication. As the final score indicates, September 13th was certainly far more of a bright spot for the Yankees than it was for the Athletics. At first glance the game looked like a total mismatch. While it’s true that Oakland sits in the basement of the AL West at 72-74, that still places them at exactly twenty wins better than the generally feckless 52-94 Yankees.
On paper the pitching matchup of veteran Dickie Knowles (14-10) facing off against promising rookie Charles Nagy (6-14) looked like a mismatch. When the day ended, Knowles would be 14-11 and Nagy would have his seventh career victory. There was no indication when the first inning ended with the score tied at one, that it was going to be a wild game. What managed to slip under the radar in what looked like a fairly mundane inning, was the double by Yankees Second Baseman Harold Reynolds. It didn’t score any runs as he was batting leadoff, but it served as what would later seem like a portent of things to come.
From the second inning to the fifth, things settled down as Knowles and Nagy held their opponent’s lineups scoreless. The Yankees started off the fifth put putting two runners on courtesy of singles by BJ Surhoff and Chris Sabo. Then Reynolds walked up to the plate. With two on and one out, Reynolds worked a nice long at-bat out of Knowles. Just when it seemed as if Knowles was about to win the battle, Reynolds hammered a hanging slider to right that managed to get between Brady Anderson and Wayne Kirby. Surhoff and Sabo could have walked home backwards and beaten any throw by three feet. By the time the ball was retrieved and thrown back in, Reynolds had cleared the bases with his sixth triple of the season and give the Yankees a 3-1 lead.
The Pinstripes added an insurance run in the sixth and Knowles would be given the hook. By the time that his manager came out for him, he’d already given up five runs in his six innings of work. In that time, he’d struck out two, walked two and surrendered eight hits. All told, it had raised his ERA from under 3.00 to 3.22. Although Knowles was understandably unhappy with his performance, which became clear when the Gatorade cooler and his glove were introduced to each other in rather abrupt terms, one could certainly forgive the veteran for putting up a bit of a stinker given how his season had been thus far.
Sure, it was against the moribund Yankees, but these things happen.
The seventh was uneventful and the score remained Yankees 5, Athletics 1.
If one could compare the seventh to a relaxing stroll through Central Park for the Athletics, then the eighth could best be compared to coming up short at Pamplona. The inning began with singles from First Baseman Kevin Seizter, who was filling in while regular First Baseman Don Mattingly got a rest day, and Right Fielder BJ Surhoff to put runners on First and Second with nobody out. Light hitting Third Baseman Chris Sabo would bat third in the inning and in spite of his barely-above the Mendoza Line batting average, he hammered a run scoring double off of suddenly floundering Relief Pitcher Ken Dayley to make the score Yankees 6, Athletics 1. Because the Baseball Gods are nothing, if not exceedingly capricious at times, take a guess who strolled up to the plate next.
Yes, you guessed it.
Second Baseman Harold Reynolds.
Up to this point, Reynolds was already 3 for 5 with two RBI. He was the absolute last person who A’s fans wanted to see at the plate with two on and one out in a six to one game, especially with Ken Dayley pitching as if he needed a rain dayley.
Sorry, I couldn’t resist.
With two on and nobody out what did Reynolds do? Did he ground out softly to ease the pain a bit? Did he foul out into the glove of Catcher Darren Daulton? Did he request a pinch hitter so he could do get nachos from the vendor in the fifth row? (That’s right, I saw you). No. Of course he didn’t. At this point the fans at The Oakland Coliseum would have considered a random meteor strike to be merciful.
No such luck, my friends.
Instead of that, or any other number of fairly merciful actions he could have taken, Reynolds decided that it would be fun to toy with Dayley for a while. Dayley jumped out to a quick 0-2 count thanks to a pair of borderline strikes. The fans loved it. The A’s loved it. Yankees manager Adam Costa responded with a disapproving scowl, but he didn’t say a word. What was the sense of getting thrown out of a 6-1 blowout in the eighth, after all? The second strike seemed to wake up the crowd a bit, as they suddenly got loud. Maybe, just maybe the struggling Dayley would end the dayley of the 3 for 5 Reynolds with a punchout.
Ok. I’ll stop using that joke. I promise.
What wasn’t promised was an out. That’s both a good and a bad thing for Oakland, because that wasn’t what they got. Instead, Dayley threw an 0-2 Changeup. Unfortunately for Dayley, the A’s and their fans it’s quotient of “change” to “up” was imbalanced and while it most definitely didn’t “change”, at least not in the way Ken Dayley had wanted...
It definitely went up.
And up.
And up.
Meanwhile, Ken Dayley’s head went down.
As did the heads of the A’s and their fans.
Meanwhile the ball went up and over the centerfield wall.
To Reynolds credit, he didn’t ham up the home run. He rounded the bases at a good trot, stepped on the plate and smiled as Sabo, Surhoff and the rest of his teammates greeted him at home plate. Sure, it wasn’t a needed home run, the score had been 6-1 when he mashed it. A four for six day with five RBI is certainly worth congratulations, but this much? That might be a bit over the top. The truly funny aspect of the celebration was how dumbfounded Reynolds himself looked by it. It had somehow escaped the one man in the Coliseum who should have known what that home run had meant what that moment was.
He’d hit for the cycle.
From there the remainder of the game was basically anti-climactic. Oakland plated two more runs in the bottom of the 8th, but that still made the score 9-3. The Yankees went down quietly in the top of the 9th before putting Oakland away in the home half of the ninth. The final score was 9-3. It was a game that Oakland and their fans would most likely prefer to forget. Not so for the Yankees, who saw one of the most popular members of their clubhouse achieve a moment of baseball immortality in what had otherwise been an extremely disappointing season. Their disappointment could shoved aside for a day.
There was a cycle to celebrate.
