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How many times have you woken up and prayed for the rain?
How many times have you seen the papers apportion the blame?
Who gets to say, who gets the work and gets to play?

For his first ever start in Yankee Stadium, David Bush performed quite well, giving up 3 runs in 7 innings while striking out 4. The game did not start out that well, though, with Bush giving up two of those runs in the first inning alone. This led Bauxite Gardiner West to state:
    Bush looks really tentative today. Perhaps the Yankee Stadium mojo is messing with his head.
In this game report, we'll examine how other Jay pitchers performed in their first appearance at Yankee Stadium.

Dave Stieb - September 30, 1979

The first three innings went pretty well for Stieb, as he only allowed three hits, none of which resulted in a run. His second inning was particularly strong as he struck out DH Jim Spencer, grounded out SS Damaso Garcia, and struck out C Brad Gulden.

Things fell apart in the 4th inning with the following sequence of events:

  • 1B Chris Chambliss hit a double
  • 3B Graig Nettles hit a homer, scoring Chambliss
  • DH Jim Spencer singled
  • SS Damaso Garcia singled
  • C Brad Gulden moves Spencer to 3rd and Garcia to 2nd with a sac bunt
  • CF Bobby Murcer doubles, scoring Spencer and Garcia
At that point manager Roy Hartsfield yanked Stieb and replaced him with reliever Tom Buskey. The Jays would go on to lose the game 9-2.

Stieb's line for the day looked as follows:

Toronto Blue Jays     IP     H  HR   R  ER  BB   K
Stieb L(8-8)           3.1   8   1   4   4   1   2

Jimmy Key - June 8, 1984

Jimmy Key's first appearance in Yankee Stadium was not a start. Instead it came in the 8th inning of a 3-3 tie. With the left-handed hitting rookie Don Mattingly came to the plate, manager Bobby Cox replaced his right handed starter Jim Gott with the left-handed Key. Key ended up giving up a single to Don Mattingly. The next batter was the righty bat of Don Baylor, so Cox replaced Key with a righty reliever: Jim Acker.

The Yankees would end up winning the game in the 11th 4-3 courtesy of a Dave Winfield single and stolen base and a Steve Kemp single.

Jimmy Key's line:

Toronto Blue Jays     IP     H  HR   R  ER  BB   K
Key                    0     1   0   0   0   0   0

Juan Guzman - September 1, 1991

Guzman had an excellent first start in Yankee Stadium, allowing only 1 run and 5 hits over 6 innings. Unfortunately he would not pick up the win.

In the 8th inning the Jays held onto a 2-1 lead after a scoreless 7th from Mike Timlin. Timlin's contribution in the 8th was a walk to 2B Steve Sax. With the lefty 1B Don Mattingly up next (does this sound familiar?), manager Cito Gaston replaced Timlin with the left-handed Rob MacDonald. MacDonald got both Mattingly and RF Mel Hall to fly out, but could not collect the final out he needed. First he walked LF Roberto Kelly, then he gave up a single to C Matt Nokes, scoring Steve Sax. The game was all but over when DH Kevin Mass doubled, scoring both Kelly and Nokes. The score at that point was 4-2 Yankees, which ended up being the final score.

Juan Guzman's line:

Toronto Blue Jays     IP     H  HR   R  ER  BB   K
Guzman                 6     5   0   1   1   1   5

Pat Hentgen - June 8, 1992

Like Key, Hentgen's first appearance in Yankee Stadium was not a start. Instead Hentgen came in at the start of the 8th inning, replacing Rob MacDonald. This was a low pressure outing for Hentgen, as the score was 16-1 by that point. No, that's not a misprint.

Hentgen wasn't terrific, but he didn't need to be. In the 8th he gave up a run when LF Randy Velarde's single scored SS Andy Stankiewicz who had doubled his way on earlier in the inning. In the 9th he gave up a run on a solo shot by DH Matt Nokes. The Jays would win the game 16-3.

Hentgen's line:

Toronto Blue Jays     IP     H  HR   R  ER  BB   K
Hentgen                2     3   1   2   2   0   1

Roy Halladay - April 24, 1999

Halladay clearly did not have his best stuff when he started against the Yankees. Over 4 innings he gave up 4 runs on 5 hits. He seemed to be having trouble throwing strikes, as indicated by his 4 walks against only 2 strikeouts. I'd love to tell you more, but Retrosheet does not have play-by-play for this game. Doc's line:
Toronto Blue Jays     IP     H  HR   R  ER  BB   K
Halladay               4     5   0   4   0   4   2

A Bit of Everything

First appearances in Yankee stadium are a mixed bag. Some pitchers perform well, some do not. (How is that for going out on a limb?) The thing that jumped out at me was the fact that Jimmy Key, one of the best starters in Blue Jay history, made his first start in Yankee Stadium as a LOOGY!

Your thoughts?

Note: Thanks again to Retrosheet for their excellent website.

Roundup

Yankees 4 - Blue Jays 3 | 7 comments | Create New Account
The following comments are owned by whomever posted them. This site is not responsible for what they say.
Dunny - Sunday, May 01 2005 @ 10:41 AM EDT (#114623) #
Really a beautiful read this morning..

Yesterday was tough to swallow, but waking up today I gotta say I'm real proud of these guys, and they really don't give up an inch anywhere on the field.

2 outta 3 ain't bad

It's downright good at Yankke Stadium.
Mick Doherty - Sunday, May 01 2005 @ 10:53 AM EDT (#114626) #
Pepper, since his signing was emblamatic of the collapse of the Yankees for a number of years, let's be sure we know it's "Steve Kemp," as in "The Misbegotten Steve Kemp Era," not Dave Kemp.

Also, looking at Stieb's section, I'm probably just misreading something given it's a weekend morning, but his line says he gave up a homer, and your pbp recap doesn't include one. Who hit it?

Great angle this morning, but -- Steve Kemp, Matt Nokes, Steve Sax, Andy Stankiewicz, Bobby Kelly ... thanks for opening the wounds, pal.
Pepper Moffatt - Sunday, May 01 2005 @ 11:00 AM EDT (#114627) #
LOL.. the funny thing is, I changed Kemp's name *to* Dave. Because before then I was calling him Jack. Oops.

RE: Stieb. I left out a line. It was Nettles. I'll fix that. Thanks!
Mick Doherty - Sunday, May 01 2005 @ 01:02 PM EDT (#114639) #
Jack Kemp? The New York congressman and former failed VP candidate? Not to mention former Buffalo Bills QB? Well, he probably had a better arm than Steve, anyway.
Paul D - Sunday, May 01 2005 @ 01:52 PM EDT (#114647) #
What did people think of the Eliott article?

It seemed to me that he had some good points, but he'd be better if he didn't have "I was right all along" attitude.

Are the Blue Jays really that poor off because they don't have Izturis and Lopez? And did the Blue Jays really have an anti-high school policy, or did they just focus on college players?

Now, Elliot knows more than I do, but I"m almost certain that the Blue Jays have had an anti High School policy.
I think Elliot frustrates me more than Griffin, because I think that Elliot has tons of knowledge and could be one of the best baseball reporters out there, but he lets his biases get in the way of that.

On the other hand, maybe my biases are leading to my criticism of Elliot.
GrrBear - Sunday, May 01 2005 @ 05:34 PM EDT (#114825) #
A week before, we had written how manager John Gibbons deserved a contract extension.

I can't stand it when a columnist uses the royal 'we'. I mean, does Bob Elliott suffer from Multiple Personality Disorder? (A question for another time, perhaps) If you are just one person, and your column represents the views of that one person, then it's not 'we', it's 'I'. 'We' indicates a lack of self-confidence and I can only assume if you have a job writing for a newspaper, maybe you shouldn't be such a weenie about it.

And I was glad to see Elliott's 'J.P. Dig Of The Week':

If veteran hitters didn't have respect for fired hitting coach Mike Barnett, who didn't play in the majors, how are veteran scouts supposed to respect new scouting director Jon Lalonde, who had never scouted a game before being named?

Let's keep extending that logical fallacy, shall we? How about... How are the front office people supposed to respect J.P. Ricciardi, who had never been a major league general manager before? How is J.P. Ricciardi supposed to respect Paul Godfrey, who had never ran a ball club before? How is Paul Godfrey supposed to respect Rogers Communications, who had never owned a ball club before? How is Rogers Communications supposed to respect Bud Selig, who had never been Commissioner of Baseball before?

And on, and on, and on...
Craig B - Sunday, May 01 2005 @ 06:45 PM EDT (#114834) #
Most importantly, how am I supposed to respect the opinions of Bob Elliott, who has never had an intelligent one before?
Yankees 4 - Blue Jays 3 | 7 comments | Create New Account
The following comments are owned by whomever posted them. This site is not responsible for what they say.