Tim McCarver is in the Baseball Hall of Fame
If Phil Rizzuto earned his place in the Hall of Fame I suppose Tim McCarver does, too. Just like Shimon Peres deserved the Presidential Medal of Freedom, Warren G. Harding was equipped to be President of the United States, and Milli Vanilli was awarded with a Grammy for Best New Artist, so has McCarver’s insights and contributions to the game of baseball earned him permanent enshrinement in Cooperstown.
Joe Buck and McCarver could barely contain their glee when Yankees tied the game in the bottom of the eighth. Up until then they plodded through the game, barely acknowledging Jon Lester’s strong performance. When Lester fell apart in the fifth they came to life, giddy as they recounted Andruw Jones’s leadoff base on balls, Jayson Nix’s improbable homer, on and on until the Yankees trailed by only two runs.
Bobby Valentine summoned Vicente Padilla to the mound in the eighth. If Padilla got all three batters out he wouldn’t face his nemesis Mark Teixeira. Raul Ibanez led off with a liner to right, so a showdown between Padilla and Teixeira was nearly inevitable.
Padilla got to 2-2 with Derek Jeter and froze the shortstop with a sinker. Curtis Granderson struck out on three pitches, setting up the classic confrontation. Padilla fell behind 2-0 in the count and floated an eephus over the plate for a strike. The slow pitch didn’t have any effect on Teixeira’s timing as he lofted the next pitch into the stands to tie the game.
In the top of the ninth Jacoby Ellsbury walked with one out. With light-hitting Pedro Ciriaco at the dish Granderson stepped in rather than back at the sound of the ball off the bat. That miscue was just enough for the center fielder to miss Ciriaco’s fly ball. By the time Granderson gathered the ball Ellsbury scored and Ciriaco stood at third. Dustin Pedroia notched a sacrifice fly to make the score 8-6 and Buck and McCarver gloomily described Alfredo Aceves’s perfect ninth.
| Game 101: July 28, 2012 | ||
 Boston Red Sox50-51 |
8 |
H: Matt Albers (7) BS: Vicente Padilla (3) W: Andrew Miller (3-1) S: Alfredo Aceves (22) |
| 2B: Adrian Gonzalez (28), Will Middlebrooks (14) 3B: Pedro Ciriaco (2) HR: Gonzalez (10) | ||
| New York Yankees 60-40 |
6 |
L: Rafael Soriano (2-1) |
| HR: Chris Stewart (1), Jayson Nix (4), Mark Teixeira (20) | ||
