Captain Clutch: The Anti WAR Hero

Derek Jeter is the original anti-WAR hero, he gives baseball moments that can't be measured with statistics. The statisticians use WAR, Wins Above Replacement, as one of their base measures to define players’ worth and worthiness. WAR tries to quantify how much a player is worth above an average Major League player. It’s been a blood sport for years to beat Jeter up statistically, using UZR like Uzis, and totally missing the point manager Joe Girardi summed up so eloquently, “Jeter’s life is like a movie”.

Jeter is The Natural come to life.

Jeter gives his sport history, meaning, passion, class and elegance. His career has been scripted every bit as improbably as Bernard Malamud’s Roy Hobbs. Thankfully Derek missed Kim Basinger on the train, but there were lots of actresses, singers and other women he didn’t miss. He is after all the man every man would secretly like to be. He’s the American James Bond.

Last night was the equal to the big scene in “The Natural” where the home run hits a light pole and the field was bathed in sparks like fireflies. Yankee Stadium was bathed in sound as the most improbable script was played to s final scene nobody dreamed would happen. Todd Hollingsworth said on XM Radio this morning the old ballpark was a bigger noise factory, that the old Yankee Stadium actually shook when the crowd got loud. But last night’s crowd tried its best to shake the foundation of the House that Jeter Built.

You just can’t make this stuff up, and if you do Hollywood never buys it. Too smaltzy. Too predictable. Too All American Apple Pie. Too…. Derek Jeter.

Jeter had already done his part for what looked like a Yankee victory. After the Orioles jumped out to a 2-0 lead when the first two batters took Hiroki Kuroda deep, Jeter keyed the rally in the bottom of the first with a booming double to Death Valley in left center that went further than the two Oriole home runs. He just missed a light pole…. Nah he hit off the top of the wall but it drove in the first run and he scored the tying one when Brian McCann grounded out.

He came up in the seventh with the bases loaded and this looked like an opportune time for our baseball-loving God to intervene and write an ending to make Hollywood and the sabermatic crowd groan. Instead, Jeets got his bat broken and hit a slow roller to short. The lead run was going to score on that, but J. J. Hardy, a shortstop on the short list to replace Jeter, grabbed the roller and threw it into right field trying to get a force to let in a second run. Some are not yet ready for Prime Time. A third run in the inning scored on a McCann fly ball and Yanks were up 5-2.

Kuroda was rolling along as he often has after the first inning, one hit in the ensuing seven innings. Derek played the field in the eighth with the Bleacher Creatures thundering Der-ek Je-ter and Yan-kee Cap-tain. Jeter tipped his cap and tugged on it and blinked a lot. He said after the game he was praying for the first time for the ball to NOT be hit to him as he fought his emotions.

It seemed the only thing left was for Girardi to figure out how to take Jeter out of the game to maximize the moment. Some theorized Girardi would let Jeter go out to shortstop alone and the rest of the Yankees would stay in the dugout. That didn’t happen as Mark Texeira went out on the field with Jeter so that opportunity was lost if it was ever in the cards.

A funny thing happened on the way to Jeter’s Farewell Tour Parade: The Baltimore Orioles.

The “Big Baseball Book of Managing” in the new Millenium calls for the closer to come in if the lead is three runs or less in the ninth inning of a game at home. Girardi, who keeps this book handy, took out the Kruising Kuroda and brought in David Robertson. This has been a logical and safe move all season. Robertson isn’t Mariano Rivera, but he’s filled the role of Yankee’s closer better than anyone dreamed.

However, Robertson is no Rivera or Jeter as far as keeping his emotions in check. It may have been the weight of the moment, but Robertson wasn’t up to his usual standard. The Baseball-loving God had something in mind and used Robertson as stage setter rather than a curtain closer.

Robertson lost Nick Markakis on a walk with a couple of pitches on the outside corner called balls. He rallied and got an out from Alejandro De Aza. Adam Jones, the Orioles super star, came up and Robertson got two strikes but then couldn’t finish him. A curveball got away and buzzed Jones, which didn’t improve his mood. He hit the next pitch just inside the left field foul pole for a two run homer. Once again, the O’s had a homer that didn’t travel as far as Jeter’s double. Location, location, location.

Stunningly, it was a one-run ballgame. All thoughts of taking Jeter out early were gone. The Captain is all about winning even if the Yankees are eliminated from playoff contention. Girardi, Joe Torre and the rest of the Core 4 Plus Bernie couldn’t have dragged him from the game.

It was about that moment a thought dawned on the announcers. If Baltimore tied it, Jeter would bat in the bottom of the ninth. Nah, too predictable. Never happen.

Steve Pearce is a journeyman right-handed hitting first baseman who has spent most of his career with the Orioles or their AAA club. They even leased him to the Yankees awhile back. Pearce has been that Replacement Player defined by WAR personified. Until this year. This season he has hit .300 and clubbed 20 home runs and been a big part of providing a soft landing for the bad year from Chris Davis. I suspect Pearce may have done what Joe Hardy did in “Damn Yankees” and sold his soul to the Devil. Let’s call him “The UnNatural” with no suspicion of PEDs involved. Just for fun.

A home run from The UnNatural was beyond the realm of possibility. John Sterling & Suzn Waldman, the Yankee radio team, have a nightly mantra about how you can’t predict baseball. Except sometimes you can see the design, read the fingerprints and the writing on the wall before the actual act. I sat in my lounge chair and said he’s going deep just before the ball started to soar.

I think a majority of the people in Yankee Stadium knew it was about to happen. We were all shocked, stunned, shaken. Blown save. Tie score. But nobody was surprised somehow. You could see the script coming to a predictable end. Or could you?

So the Yankees came up in the bottom of the ninth with Kuroda’s win washed away and Gardner reduced to a mere pawn in a game bigger than himself.

Let’s lapse a moment into Ernest Thayer’s cadence from Casey at the Bat:

Rookie Pirela let drive a single, to the wonderment of all, And Gardner, to no one’s surprise, put a perfect bunt on the ball; And when the dust had lifted, and events had been reckoned There was the rookie pinch runner Antoan safe at second

From 50,000 throats and more at home rose a lusty yell; It rumbled through the Bronx, it rattled in the dell; It knocked upon the subway and recoiled upon the flats, For Jeter, beloved Jeter, was advancing to the bat.

Let’s return from the poetic to the recent present of last night.

The script has played out perfectly so far. Jeter is up with the winning run on base. The stadium is crazy, everyone watching is out of their minds and holding breaths. Reality has outdone any possible hype. Joe Girardi had said earlier in the game he wanted Derek’s exit to be with a walk off winning hit.

Is life imitating art? What do the statistics say in this situation? They say Jeter’s 40 years old. His bat has slowed. He’s hitting a shade over .250, the line for a replacement player. His last two at bats have been strikeout, weak grounder. He’s not ready to go to WAR. Somewhere you can hear Darren McGavin’s gambler from “The Natural” scoffing as probability is on his side.

But you can’t predict baseball Suzn. Jeter defies WAR because he has the one element that can’t be measured – he’s a warrior. The Jeterian inside out swing on a first pitch fastball deposits the ball in right field. Antoan Richardson comes streaking home as only a wheels first outfielder can. Ballgame! Yankees Win! “Yaaannnnnkkeeees Wiiiiinnnnn,”shrieks John Sterling over the airwaves. Start spreading the news! Cue Frank Sinatra and “New York, New York.”

In the grand scheme the game is meaningless except to the Orioles, who are trying for the best record in the American League to position themselves for the playoffs. Even Jeter didn’t need that hit. He was already a legend before he stepped to bat.

But the fact he did what he did under the circumstances. Fighting emotions held in check for 20 years as every Bleacher Creature chant widened the lump in his throat. I couldn’t breathe just watching him at home. Yet he came through everything and gave us the unexpected, one last moment to cherish before he disappeared into the home clubhouse for the last time.

He gave us one last moment even The Babe, Lou, Joe D. or The Mick couldn’t match. As for the sabermetrics crowd? Jeter’s got game and he’s got WAR:

Way Above Replacement.