Worth a WOW

Joe Torre still has friends with the St. Louis Cardinals organization and they spoke highly of the character and ability of Miguel Cairo. Cairo is now part of the Yanks' two-man second base team; can handle a bat and has had some clutch hits. None bigger than the one tonight. After tripling to lead off the bottom of the 12th, but with his team unable to score, Cairo came up with two out in the bottom of the 13th with the Yanks down 4-3 and Ruben Sierra having just bounced a single through the infield to keep the game alive. Two pitches later, Cairo was down 0-2 to Curtis Leskanic, two pitches after that, Cairo rapped the game-tying double into the right-centerfield gap. Then, on a 3-1 pitch, the Yanks' last man off the bench, John Flaherty, smacked a straight fastball onto the warning track in left and over the wall on a hop for the game-winning ground-rule double as the Yanks completed the sweep with a 5-4 win.

Game notes: this was the game the RedStiffs could not lose -- Pedro against the Yanks' fill-in rookie starter, Brad Halsey. But the kid went 5-1/3, baffled the Sawx not named Ramirez or Ortiz and left with a 3-2 lead. The Yanks coughed up a run in the 7th so it was 3-3. More drama = Yanks with a runner on third, one out in the 9th and honk; RedSux with bases loaded, none out in the 11th and ARod starts a brilliant double-play to help clean up the mess. The Yanks' announcers were saying it was one of the best games they'd ever seen at the Stadium.

BTW, kudos to Jorge Posada for banging one out against Pedro, but he MUST NEVER AGAIN call for an offspeed pitch to Manny Ramirez with two strikes -- he did it in April and Ramirez took Vazquez out for the only runs in a 2-0 game; he did it tonight and Ramirez took Tanyon Sturtze out for what would have been the game-winner if the Yanks hadn't rallied in the last of the 13th.