Here’s the good news for the Yankees coming off this weekend’s series at Fenway: It’s only April, they’re still a .500 team, and though a number of their players went on the disabled list, at least none of them, as far as we know, have swine flu. The bad news? Pretty much everything else that happened this weekend, because not only did the Yanks lose all three games in Boston, they lost each in a very different, ugly way.
The All-Too-Familiar Late-Inning Collapse
Friday night, they took a 4–2 lead into the ninth, and Mariano Rivera, who probably hasn’t actually blown as many games at Fenway as it seems he has, allowed a two-out home run to Jason Bay to tie the game. (Kevin Youkilis would eventually win it on a walk-off homer in the eleventh.)
The Historically Big Comeback
On Saturday, A.J. Burnett — whose career 0.40 ERA at Fenway probably earned him a few extra million dollars on his Yankees contract — couldn’t hold on to a 6–0 lead, and Boston would rack up sixteen runs before all was said and done, earning their biggest comeback victory against the Yankees in 41 years.
The Game Jacoby Ellsbury Stole Home
And then there was last night, which at 4–1 (and miraculously well under four hours) would have been the least eventful of the Boston wins, if it wasn’t forever going to be remembered as The Game Jacoby Ellsbury Stole Home. But what’s done is done, and hey, at least the Yanks won’t have to face Boston again for a whole … eight days. Oh.
