MARLINS WIN SERIES, 4-2
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Marlins Win Title, and Yanks Face Cold Winter
By TYLER KEPNER
The New York Times
October 26, 2003
They had seemed so close to overcoming everything, to stamping a most uncomfortable season with a happy ending. When the Yankees beat the Florida Marlins' Josh Beckett last Tuesday in Miami, they were two victories from the championship demanded by their principal owner, George Steinbrenner. They were that close to a winter of relief.
But the World Series, and the season, has come crumbling down. The Yankees had trusted in their pitching to pull them through, as it has so many times before in October. But Beckett beat the Yankees at their own game last night at Yankee Stadium, lifting the Marlins to the championship with a 2-0, five-hit shutout in Game 6. Andy Pettitte was stellar; Beckett was better.
Beckett, the 23-year-old Marlins ace who was pitching on three days' rest, baffled the Yankees with curveballs and overpowered them with fastballs. Pettitte allowed two runs, one earned, in seven innings, and Mariano Rivera blanked the Marlins for two. But the Yankees' offense did nothing to support them.
The Yankees went 0 for 12 with runners on base last night and hit just .169 in that situation in the World Series. In the tense off-season that is sure to follow, the Yankees will ponder how to add more thunder to their lineup. Steinbrenner thirsts for elite hitters and does not tolerate losing.
Vladimir Guerrero? Gary Sheffield? Kaz Matsui? The reincarnation of Babe Ruth? The Yankees will search everywhere for the punch that disappeared in this Series, and especially in this game.
As usual, they had their chances in Game 6.
Jorge Posada led off the seventh inning with a double into the left-field corner, but Beckett took over from there. Jason Giambi grounded out to third, and Beckett snapped a 3-2 curveball that Karim Garcia took for strike three. Ruben Sierra, batting for the dormant Aaron Boone, could not touch a 96-mile-an-hour fastball to end the inning.
The Yankees led off the eighth inning with another hit, a single by Alfonso Soriano. Beckett fell behind Derek Jeter — who went 0 for 4 and made an error — with two balls, but Jeter flied to center field for the first out. With a left-hander, Dontrelle Willis, warming up in the bullpen, Marlins Manager Jack McKeon let Beckett face the left-handed Nick Johnson. It was a wise move: Johnson grounded to second for an inning-ending double play.
The game, and season, ended quietly for the Yankees. Bernie Williams and Hideki Matsui flied out to left, and it was up to Posada to save the season. The 55,773 fans rose, but seemed stunned. With a 1-1 count, Posada grounded weakly to the first-base side of the mound. Beckett grabbed the ball, crashed into Posada along the first-base side and tagged him for the final out.
Ivan Rodriguez, the free-agent catcher whose signing heralded a new direction for the listless Marlins, flung his mask into the air, and Beckett exulted in foul territory. The Marlins, a wild-card team that had shocked the San Francisco Giants and the Chicago Cubs in the National League playoffs, were the world champions for the second time in their 11-year history, trumping the Yankees in the final three games.
The Yankees came into Game 6 with a better batting average than the Marlins — .275 to .237 — but an anemic showing with runners on base. The Yankees' .195 average with runners on base was the primary reason they lost three of the first five games.
Manager Joe Torre had shuffled the lineup in Game 5, benching Soriano because of a slump and scratching Giambi because he could not play in the field with his damaged left knee. With the designated hitter back in effect at Yankee Stadium, Giambi returned, batting sixth. Soriano was back in the lineup, too, batting ninth.
"I just thought I'd get him out of the spotlight," Torre said of Soriano, who came in with a .158 average in the Series. "Once we get through that first time, he's batting first, Jeter's batting second, and nobody knows the difference."
After Beckett struck out Boone with a shoulder-high 95-m.p.h. fastball to end the second inning, Soriano came up as the leadoff man in the third. He checked his swing on a first-pitch foul, then stayed back on a curveball and ripped it to center field for a single.
Torre's premonition seemed to be coming true. Soriano had led off with a single, and Jeter was up next. Wary of Soriano's speed at first base, Beckett threw over twice and pitched out once. Soriano ran on his fourth pitch and was safe at second base when Jeter grounded to second.
Johnson walked, putting two runners on for Williams. After doubling off the glove of center fielder Juan Pierre in the first, Williams had a .455 average, the highest of any player in the Series. Beckett approached him cautiously, with three curveballs, before running the count to 2-2 with a fastball.
Then Williams topped a ball to second, starting an inning-ending double play. The crowd recognized that the Yankees had wasted a precious chance against a top pitcher, and Yankee Stadium went silent.
The Yankees still had their stalwart, Pettitte, on the mound, and they were playing fine defense behind him. Garcia made a running catch against the right-field wall to end the third inning, and Jeter made a leaping throw from the outfield grass to end a 1-2-3 fourth.
But with two outs in the fifth, Alex Gonzalez and Pierre singled to center, bringing up Luis Castillo, with a .130 average in the Series. On a 2-2 pitch, after a pair of two-strike fouls, Castillo lined a ball to right, and the Marlins' third-base coach, Ozzie Guillen, sent Gonzalez, challenging Garcia's arm.
Garcia made a strong throw to the plate, and Posada shifted to his right to catch it on one bounce. Posada stretched to his left to try to tag Gonzalez, who slid wide and tapped the plate with his fingertips. Pettitte cocked his fist, ready to celebrate, but he was not out of the inning. Posada had missed the tag and did not argue when Gonzalez was called safe.
Pettitte escaped that inning when he struck out Miguel Cabrera on a cutter with the bases loaded. It was only 1-0, and the Yankees had a chance to tie in the fifth inning, after Boone bunted Garcia to second. Soriano and Jeter were up next, effectively the top of the order.
But Soriano popped out on the first pitch, and Beckett whizzed a 97-m.p.h. fastball past Jeter for strike three.
Jeter's rough night took an inexplicable turn in the sixth. Jeff Conine led off with a routine grounder to Jeter's left, and Jeter fielded it but could not get it free from his glove. He dropped the ball, then hurried his throw to first, firing wildly past Johnson. It was scored a fielding error, and Pettitte walked the next hitter, Mike Lowell, on four pitches.
Derrek Lee hit a comebacker to Pettitte, who threw to second but could not get a double play. With Conine on third, Juan Encarnacion lifted a sacrifice fly to right field, and Conine scored without a play at the plate.
It was 2-0, and Pettitte's pitch count was nearing 100. Jeff Nelson began to warm up in the bullpen, but Pettitte struck out Pierre after Gonzalez's bunt single, ending the inning.
Pettitte was pitching well; after a 1-2-3 seventh inning, he had given up six hits and one earned run. But the Yankees were down to their final nine outs, facing a confident pitcher in command, and there was nothing Pettitte could do about that.
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