Great managing job by Joe last night. The trip out to Randy in the fifth to settle him down, and then leaving Farnsworth in to face Ortiz–tremendous. We are going to need Farnsworth in big spots. Most managers would have played by the numbers and brought in Villone. I did not want to see Villone there–he’s not going to dominate a guy like Ortiz.

I get on Joe when I think he’s bad, so I have to give him his due when he does a great job.

If they’re keying on the fastball early, Steve, what does RJ throw? Slider? Uh, not if it’s flat. He needs to locate his fastball. Easier said than done for a guy who’s never been particularly concerned with location. BTW, Harold Reynolds thinks that Yankees catchers are setting the target too late (after he’s already started his wind-up). Showed some tape of his DBacks days and the catchers set up early. But, a difference of 3 or 4 mph helps the batter if he knows location. Worth a try, I guess. But, generally speaking, setting a target too early is a no-no for the other pitchers on the staff so…Can RJ develop a slow curve?

Take out the Manny HR, and Unit was OK. Why take out the Manny HR? Shoot, Manny was hitting HRs against everyone and anyone. I’m not sure if that HR was a Unit or a Manny thing. Now, I would say it was more Manny and less Unit.

Anyone willing to take anything good from RJ’s performance last night?

The bad: to start the game, he looked awful. We might as well have run Sean Henn out there. How is it that Randy Johnson with lesser stuff isn’t as good as Aaron Small? Is that possible? If he continues to pitch like that, I don’t think he can win a game unless the team scores 8-10 runs.

The good: he did more or less settle down, and he had plenty of swing-and-miss strikeouts. He also handled the lefty, which was another thing he stopped doing.

Definitely not a good performance, but maybe he can improve to just be average — because right now he’s horrible.

Maybe that strikeout of Papi will get Torre off Farns’ back. Well, probably not — after all, he did give him a finger-in-the-face talking-to once he got back to the dugout. Farns got unlucky in the inning, but got out of it. And now the last two times Farns has faced Papi, he’s struck him out.

I’m happy to see Melky getting it done. It means he’ll be sticking around. I know Long got a few hits last night, but I don’t want him on the team. They should keep Melky in left (he’s even starting to get comfortable in the field) and have a revolving door in right of Bernie, Sheff and Hidalgo/whoever/someone-not-named-Bubba.

Exactly JJay.

Raf – I think that Steve was just trying to point out that after that high pitch (HIGH, not even high and tight) Manny stepped back in the box and completely waved at the next couple of pitches.

Harold Reynolds even did a segment on Baseball Tonight showing how different Manny’s body language was after that pitch. It was really interesting to see.

The minute you come close, he’s going to stop diving into the plate. (Remember his AB against Clemens in the 2003 ALCS game at Fenway?)
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Yeah, I remember he had to be restrained from going after Clemens. Also remember Zim trying to take on Pedro.

Manny was 1-4 in that game. Overall, he put up a .310-.333-.552 line in the ALCS. We know what he has done lifetime against the Yanks. There’s no right way to pitch Manny. He’s a hitting savant.

El Duque’s a Met…