Yanks whiff at home, season ends with Game 5 loss
NEW YORK—One by one, almost all the big-money boppers had their chance.
Alex Rodriguez, Robinson Cano, Nick Swisher.
Bases loaded, two runners on, just about every conceivable opportunity. The New York Yankees never came up with that clutch hit Thursday night, and suddenly their season is over.
No parade up Broadway, no sparkling World Series ring to go with the 27 others. No fairy-tale ending for Jorge Posada.
Just a long, cold winter to look back and wonder why one of baseball's best lineups whiffed when it mattered most.
Doug Fister and three relievers stopped the Yankees in their tracks, pitching their way out of several pressure-packed jams and sending the Detroit Tigers into the AL championship series with a 3-2 victory in Game 5.
"I thought we had it, man," Cano said.
New York manager Joe Girardi tried almost everything. He went to the bullpen early, pulling his ailing rookie starter, Ivan Nova, after two shaky innings. CC Sabathia came in for the first relief appearance of his professional career.
None of it was enough. The bats let the Yankees down.
"This is a really empty feeling," Girardi said, "and it hurts."
Derek Jeter made a bid for a go-ahead homer in the eighth, but his drive to right was caught just in front of the fence. Jeffrey Maier was nowhere to be found to haul it over the wall as the young fan did to help New York in the 1996 playoffs.
Quite literally, the Yankees came up just short.
"Anything less than a championship is a lost year," Mark Teixeira said. "None of us were ready to go home. I don't think any of us thought we were going home. We had a lot of confidence."
They went 0 for 4 with the bases loaded and stranded 11. They finished 2 for 9 with runners in scoring position, and neither hit delivered a run. Cano cracked a solo homer that gave him nine RBIs in the series and Teixeira drew a bases-loaded walk.
That was it.
A stirring season that featured feel-good celebrations for Jeter's 3,000th hit and Mariano Rivera's record-setting save ended with a whimper.
"The level of disappointment is through the roof," Sabathia said.
In a quiet clubhouse, the 40-year-old Posada got choked up and cut off questions about his future.
"I gave it all on the field," said the longtime Yankees catcher, in the final year of his contract.
And when Rodriguez, in a most fitting finish, went down swinging against Jose Valverde for the final out, the Tigers rushed out of the dugout to celebrate on New York's home field. Bookends for Rodriguez -- he whiffed to end last season, too, in the ALCS against Texas.Continued...
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