For This Relief Much Thanks

Of all the statements to come out of the exhilarated Yankee players following yesterday's World Series, the one that reflects my own personal feelings came from Mariano Rivera, who said, "What was going through my mind is that it's finally over. Thank God it, it's over."

After a month of post-season baseball, an exhausting physical challenge to professional ballplayers and equally debilitating emotionally for their legion of fans, the marathon has ended triumphantly, but it has ended, and I am so, so relieved. As an intense Yankee partisan for 55 years (!), I succumbed to a sort of monomania characterized by anxiety and a nervous stomach and a loss of appetite over the 29 days in which only 15 games were played. Now I can eat again and stroke my overly solicitous dog rather than scare her away by grumbling at a bad umpire call or Robbie Cano's ten millionth failure with runners in scoring position.

But before I proceed with my analysis of the Series, I must stop to honor the greatest Yankee pitcher ever, Mariano Rivera. If it weren't for Matsui's remarkable Reggie-like spree in Game 6, the World Series MVP would have been Rivera, who closed out all four Yankee wins and got three saves. He was the sure thing, a weapon unlike anything other teams could offer. His dominance was made even more remarkable in the face of failures by all the other closers during the post-season. Only Mariano had the ice water in his veins to respond to the intense pressure of the play-offs, with amazing consistency.

It's hard not to overstate his importance. The Yanks would certainly not have won five championships without him. His looming intimidating presence must be terribly disconcerting to opposing managers, and his consistency thoroughly maddening. His stature is transcendent; he towers over his peers like Vin Scully or Meryl Streep in their respective trades. And we tend to take him for granted because he's been around so long. But boy, when he's gone, will he be missed, and deeply appreciated.

Another word that occurred to me during the Yankee's ascendancy was "Valedictory." It was sort of a tribute to all those venerable Yankees from the Torre championship years, the "Core Four" of Jeter/Posada/Pettitte/Rivera, who saw New York hopes flounder since the Arizona disaster of 2001. Their long-term contributions merited at least one more victory parade. And Matsui, whose Yankee career may have ended on this high note, certainly deserved the experience after years of consummate professionalism. The same can be said for Johnny Damon, who won another World Series after destroying the Yankees in that ALCS of 2004, but finally paid them back with the most talked-about play in this year's World Series.

Most commentators pinpoint the turning point of this series as Damon's clutch performance in the ninth inning of Game 4, which seemed likely to go Philadelphia's way after Pedro Feliz hit a clutch homer off of Chamberlain in the 8th inning. Had Philly won in the 9th, they would likely have taken a 3-2 game edge back to New York. But Damon was able to get on base with two outs, and then with Texiera up, smartly stole second. To get into scoring position was enough of a play, but then he took off for third, which had been vacated due to the extreme infield shift. Baseball lore says never to be thrown out at third for the final out of an inning, but apparently there was no such risk. Still, the Yanks were lucky that Lidge hit the slumping Texeira and was forced to pitch to Arod, who this year turned into Scott Brosius and got every clutch hit imaginable.

Did an occupied third base really take away form Lidge's arsenal of sliders, or was that an overanalysis of the situation? I think it was Lidge's loss of composure and Arod's aplomb resulting in a sharp double that won the game and the series for the Yanks. In due time Damon's opportunistic play will be deemed overrated, but baseball analysts want to have their Moments, and this one is as good as any.

But the telling moment to me was when Arod's double in Game 3 was ruled a homer after instant replay caught the ball bouncing off the outfield camera. It was an eerie reminder of the Jeff Maier home run from 1996, and was just as important, because it put the Yanks back in the game, which they were trailing 3-0 at the time. (It was also legitimately a homer, which Jeter's 1996 shot was not). Given that Posada grounded out after the Arod homer, it's possible they may not have scored at al that inning, and the Yanks might have have taken two of three in Philly. So that was the Turning Point for me, and indicated that luck, which had been absent from Yankee post-season play since 2003, had returned to Pinstripe Land.