Current “lasts”:
HR: Jose Molina
RBI: Robinson Cano
Run: Brett Gardner
Andy Pettite stands to get the last win. Chris Waters is on the hook for the last loss.
If things stay as they are, Mo won’t have an opportunity to save; the lead’s too large.
Yup- it’s officially not going to be a save situation now that the 8th is over. I’m guessing you won’t be able to tell by the crowd reaction, however. 
No save but Jeter is due up 3rd at least. Lets see if he can do something magic.
Well, I suppose the Yanks could bring in someone else, give up a run, then bring in Rivera. Not that they will, but a save is still technically possible.
Enter Sandman for the last time.
(You Tube Link above)
Goodbye, old girl. It’s not a bad ending, as these things go.
These little town blues o/`
I never lost it, I am amazed. I think Yes is suppose to be showing a post game followup.
Good Night all.
So sleep your sleep, old girl
Our love will keep, old girl, till then…
It was one hell of a night…
We had the Sunday ticket plan this year, mainly so that we could get the last game.
We got there around 2:45 - and despite the pre-announced schedule that you could get access to the field from 1 to 4, already at 2:45 they said that was done cause the line was too long. So we grabbed a bite to eat before heading in to the stadium around 4:15.
Got to watch both teams take batting practice (can’t remember the last time I was in the stadium early enough to see the Yankees take batting practice). Then a little bit of waiting around as the stadium filled up before the pre-game ceremonies.
The ceremony itself was a blast (although I could have done without the guys who came out in replica uniforms representing the 1923 Yankees). Great ovations for O’Niell, Jeter, Scott Brosius, Yogi and Whitey - and of course the biggest ovation of all for Bernie Williams. Was real nice to see him back in the stadium - and in uniform - one last time!
Probably the funniest moment was Willie Randolph coming out and sliding in to second base, and then deliberately rubbing dirt into his uniform.
Would have like to have seen Rickey there - I missed my chance to see him at old-timers day.
Conspicuous by their non-mention during the ceremonies (for various, understandable, reasons) - Jim Leyritz, Roger Clemens and Joe Torre.
The game itself was pretty good - well-paced for the most part. Thank goodness it wasn’t one of the typical O’s - Yanks 4 hour affairs! The crowd was a little deflated after Baltimore came back and tied it after Damon’s home run put the Yankees ahead. But when Jose Molina hit his homerun, that removed all doubt I think. Despite a little struggles by Jose Veras, the bullpen was lights out. Phil Coke remained unscored upon for the year, Joba was dominating, and Mariano was Mariano.
One surreal moment - sometime in the bottom of the seventh, the scoreboard said “Warming up in the Yankee Bullpen - SIDNEY PONSON and DARRELL RASNER”. There was a collective “Hunh?” from the crowd. Needless to say, neither got in to the game.
I’m not sure I like the gesture Joe Girardi did of taking Derek Jeter out with one out left in the ninth. I know he wanted to get Jeter one more hand, but you’d think Jeter would have wanted to be out there at the end.
The celebration after the game was a great capper - Jeter thanking the crowd from the pitching mound, with all his teammates around him, and then leading the team in one final lap around the stadium to thank all the fans. Then it was fun to watch the players and others stay on the field for the next hour or so, taking pictures, scooping up some dirt, and just enjoying the moment and the memories. Several Yankees brought their families out, which was a nice touch as well.
Then when we finally started to walk out of the stadium, probably around 12:45, it was amusing to see some fans try to pry off paint chips from the walls (look Ma! I brought home some asbestos from the Bronx!). Also there were a lot of people writing on the stadium walls (I guess signing their names). Seems a little odd to me to sign something that’s going to be torn down in a few months, but whatever.
All in all, a great day, and a great capper to my many trips to the stadium. I think I’ve been there around 150 times in the last 15 years.
Looking forward to the new stadium next year!
I see that we have a very different opinion then of what a “well-pitched” game is… At least it was a fitter, more earned way to blow the game than Kenny “walk the free-swinging Andruw Jones to force in the winning run of the NLCS” Rogers the year before. Which now that I recall it, came after TWO Mets relievers, closer Armando Benitez and former closer Johnny Franco, blew the leads in the 8th and the 9th innings. Why do I do this to myself?!
I have to say though that I was very impressed that not a single fan, Yankees fans all of them, so much as twitched as Todd Zeile’s would-be go-ahead home run was hit soared toward the left field stands with two outs. It ended up ricocheting off the very top of the wall and back into play, and Timo Perez, jogging his way around from first base, was thrown out at the plate with room to spare.
Yes, I cursed Timo for not doing that simplest of baseball jobs: to run hard until the HR call is made. But given that just a few years earlier Jeffrey Maier made a series-changing “HR catch over the wall” in the Yankees favor, I doubly cursed that nobody put a hand even six inches over the wall to catch Zeile’s ball. I highly doubt any ump would have called interference on it, since the ball looked like a foregone homer when it left the bat. So props to the Yankees fans for choosing the right spots to catch those balls to the stands!
(Of all the Mets fans at the Stadium that day, why could none of them be in that particular section in a position to catch Zeile’s ball!)
I recall that even with Timo not running hard it took a perfect relay by Jeter to gun him down at home. Timo did indeed embarrass himself that game but it still took a good play off the wall and that perfect relay to get him.
Yes, it was a perfectly played ball off the wall and a perfect relay throw by Jeter to get him at home. Which just goes to show that (a) if he’d been running just a little bit harder off of first base, he’d have been safe, and (b) that’s what set those “Dynastic Yankees” apart: full-effort execution on plays against things that seemed foregone, so that their opponent could never, ever take anything for granted. See also: Jeremy Giambi not sliding into home plate in the 2001 ALCS suddenly becoming a key out and a series momentum changing play. Yes, Jeter made a career-defining defensive play, an incredibly acrobatic, no-way-did-he-do that range, dive and flip to home… That still only mattered because the opponent assumed the play was over, which the Yankees – those Yankees – never did.
In other words, pure hustle. You may beat me, but I’ll be damned if I give you a hand in it.
If it hadn’t been against my Mets, I’d have applauded. Even so, I can appreciate it even as I gnash my teeth.
The last game was pretty undistinguished on its own terms, as opposed to the 1-0 win Saturday, which was really cool. I can’t remember the last time I saw a scoreless tie headed into the bottom of the ninth. But the Yanks did say goodbye to the stadium in style: they won their last five games there, and closed the ultimate homestand 8-2 against two first-place teams.
[quote=“robardin, post:32, topic:464605”]
That still only mattered because the opponent assumed the play was over, which the Yankees – those Yankees – never did.
In other words, pure hustle. You may beat me, but I’ll be damned if I give you a hand in it. /QUOTE]
Except for game 2 of the 1998 ALCS, when Yankee 2B Knobloch held the ball and argued with the umpire while the Indians scored a vital run. 
Of course that play stands out do much as it was unusual. As unusual as Rivera failing to cleanly throw the ball to 2nd in Game 7 of 2001. The difference being that Knobby had a bad moment of brainlock.
A friend and I saw the Yankees play against (and beat) Vida Blue and the A’s at Yankee Stadium, circa 1972. Those were the best seats I’ve ever had at a ballgame (we were prepared to buy tickets for nosebleed seats, but an incredibly good Samaritan gave us box seat tickets a couple rows in on the first base side.
Have the Yankees decided yet on who gets naming rights for the new stadium? After the company leading the bidding dropped out because of the, um, Nazi-era connection, who’s left? Krupp Works Field? Stuka Stadium?
Yankee Stadium to the best of my knowledge will be Yankee Stadium. The naming rights gimmick will be something different from normal.
They will have two approaches. It will be Yankee Stadium at the “Sponsor’s Name” Plaza.
Apparently various parts of the Stadium will instead having naming rights purchased. I suspect the Yanks will still pull in more cash than anyone else has in the end.
I have several good Yankee Stadium stories, which is odd because for almost all my life, I’ve detested the Yankees. But when I was 8 years old, I liked the team. I got it into my head that I wanted to go to the Stadium the next Saturday, because this Maris guy was closing on the other guy’s HR record, and maybe we could go (Puh-lease, Dad?) and see it being broken.
So we went, got walk-up tickets, and rooted for Rog from behind a pillar. (I didn’t know any better, thought they were pretty good seats.) No HR, but I had a fantastic time, and didn’t appreciate until decades had passed how strange it was to get tickets easily the day of the game, how strange it was that thousands seats remained unsold, and also (since I became a Red Sox fan) how odd it was that my first MLB game ever was a Sox-Yankees game (I looked it up since: Don Schwall vs. Ralph Terry.).
My other story has my girlfriend (later wife, still later ex-wife) getting great box seats behind the Yankees dugout for a game vs the Mariners ca. 1977 or 1978. Thurman Munson hit into , I think three or four doubleplays, or maybe just two and two strikeouts, but a really awful day, and all the fans were getting on him. The guy right in front of us asked him some sort of question after his final, frustrating at-bat (“Why don’t ya hit the ball, awready?”) and Thurman gave the guy the finger and asked him “Why don’t you suck my cock?” Billy Martin pulled him from the game straightaway.
Here’s a link to a detailed box score for my first game at Yankee Stadium: Boston Red Sox vs New York Yankees Box Score: September 30, 1961 | Baseball-Reference.com
Interesting stuff I discovered: I saw Yaz play in his rookie year. I saw Tom Tresh play as a pre-rookie (a few years later I would wear Tresh’s 15 on my Little League uniform.) I missed Mantle–Maris played CF that day (Maris hit #61 the next day–I discovered that it was the only run of a 1-0 game.) The Yankees drew 19,061 fans, meaning that about 45,000 people could have bought a chance to watch Maris hit #61 but decided “Meh.” (The weather was 68 degrees, slightly overcast, a perfect Saturday afternoon for sitting in the seats.)
I actually got to see Mickey Mantle hit a homer at Yankee Stadium… five years after he retired.
Seriously, I was at the 1973 Old Timers Day game at Yankee Stadium- one of the last that Joe Dimaggio actually played in. Babe Ruth’s widow was there, along with Lou Gehrig’s.
Mantle was probably only 40 or so. His knees had been shot for years, but he still had the bat quickness, and probably could still have been a designated hitter. He got up to bat against his old pal Whitey Ford, and he hit a long homer!
That’s STILL my greatest moment at Yankee Stadium.