You’ve probably heard Michael Kay tell the story.  I know that I’ve heard him say it twice on two different Yankees broadcasts this season.  It goes like this…

At the end of April, Kay had Cleveland Indians G.M. Mark Shapiro on his ESPN Radio Show (in NYC).  And, Shapiro brought up that Yankees-Tribe game from 2007 where A-Rod won it in the bottom of the 9th with a two-out, three-run, homer off Joe Borowski. It was a killer loss for the Indians – as they had a 4-run lead, in the 9th, with two outs when the Yankees started to rally back.

According to Kay, Shapiro claimed that game was an important point in the Indians season last year – because he wanted to see how the team would bounce back from such a defeat. Reportedly, he realized that they could have tucked tail after that and went into an ugly skid.

But, the next day, the Indians won a close one – with a run in their 9th inning against the (then Devil) Rays – and Borowski got the save. Including that win, the Tribe went on to .600 ball the rest of the season and came within one win of reaching the World Series.

I’m going to pull a Mark Shapiro here and mark last night’s Yankees loss as a game like that Indians loss last season. And, it will be important to watch how the Yankees come out to play today after that game last night. Will they rebound? Or, will they act like a scared dog?

The end result just may be a good clue as to what we can expect from this Yankees team over the rest of this season.