Did You Ever Notice

...that when a team "shows up" they win. And when they don't "show up" they lose? It has to be true because Mike Lupica (I used to love watching The Sports Reporters)is writing about it:

Alex Rodriguez must step up for Yankees in Game 6 of ALCS against Rangers in Texas

I know he didn't write the headline, but whoever did really 7 Mary 3'd it there. Because it's cumbersome. And they had this song in the nineties. It was called 'Cumbersome'. It was like, "I have becoooooommmme Cumbersooooommmmme." You remember it, don't lie. My point being the last half of it should be cut out.

They are the Yankees,

BOOOOO! Oh sorry, gut reaction.

defending champions of the sport, best team money can buy, most expensive pitching staff ever assembled. They are Mo Rivera, the greatest money player of them all, and Derek Jeter

BOOOO!!! Sorry...sorry...

and Alex Rodriguez

BOOO!!! And no, I'm not sorry this time.

and Robinson Cano,

...-shrug-

their best player this season, maybe the MVP of the league and the league championship series before it's over. And here is where they are in Arlington Friday night: Playing for their season. Again. Trying to win a play-in game to get to Cliff Lee.
The Yankees showed up on Wednesday in Game 5, they did, hundred percent.

So did they not bother to try in the first few games? Is Texas so bad that the Yankees just need to "show up" and they'll win? I thought they were in this position because the Texas offense has been clubbing them to death with 25 runs in 3 games.

Now they have to do it again in Texas, or they become another big, bad Yankee team of this decade that got hit somewhere before the World Series and never recovered.
You know who is supposed to show up Friday night for Game 6? Alex Rodriguez.

You know who's not? Shawn Dunston. But "by gum it" he'll show up anyway, like that guy at the Halloween party who doesn't wear a costume. He's unwanted, but he's a friend of a friend so there's not much you can really do.

So far he has three hits in the series and only one of them - two-RBI single that Michael Young should have made a play on, eighth inning of Game 1 - has mattered.

Ha! So the only thing he's done is get a huge hit in one of the two games the Yankees have won. That's why they call him Choke-Rod!

There have been times when he seemed perfectly happy to take a walk, leave it to Cano when Cano was still hitting behind him.

UGH!!!! Are you kidding Lupica? I'm not sure if this is even worth making a joke about at this point. Seems too obvious. How about we go this way: The games the Yankees lost have been by 5, 8, and 7 runs. I'm pretty sure that's not just on A-rod. It certainly isn't because he was patient enough to get on base and help the team's odds of winning, as opposed to reaching out of the strike-zone like...well...Shawn Dunston. And you know what? This year, leaving it to Cano is not a bad idea, as you pointed out, in this article, when you called him a potential MVP.

This game Friday night, then in Game 7 if the Yankees make it, would be a good time for A-Rod to remind us that October and November of 2009 actually happened.

Great, so now the New York media is moving on to the, yeah he got hot once, but that proves nothing. So New York worships guys like Boone who had ONE big at bat for them, but rips the best player on the franchise for the past few years because he only had one good ENTIRE PLAYOFF RUN. Honestly, you guys don't deserve A-rod. He would be a god if he was a Cub or a Red, but the New York media seems determined to find something wrong with him. Oh no, I'm sorry, it's his fault for taking all that money, the rest of us would have turned it down.

Cano isn't supposed to have to carry this offense on his own. Carrying an offense is supposed to be Rodriguez's job description.

That is just ridiculous. Actually lets take a look at what Cano has done in this series while carrying the offense. Game one he did great, but so did A-rod so we're not including that. We're just talking about when he had to "carry" the offense:
Game 2: Double and a HR (win for Lupica)
Game 3: 0-3 (Win for me!)
Game 4: Another HR (Lupica)
Game 5: Another HR (Lupica)
Alright, so that did not work out the way I thought it would. Cano has 4 HR's in 5 games. That is definitely what Lupica calls: 'carrying the offense'. But my original point was...eh forget it, Cano is awesome, I'll just leave it at that.

Rodriguez got his numbers this season, the way he always does in the end, got to 30 home runs and 125 RBI, even hitting just .270. Friday night he is the one who's supposed to hit the ball over the fence, do something to get his team to Cliff Lee. This is the night when big Yankees show up, make the kind of swing A-Rod made against the Twins in the last postseason, the Angels, the Phillies.

Why can't Jeter do something? Isn't he the new Mr. October?

It is a good thing he did knock in those two runs in the Game 1 rally, or this October would remind people, exactly, of the ones when he looked like the easiest out on the team.
He's not the only one in the order who hasn't shown enough stick. Derek Jeter has hits, but has struck out six times.

YES! Someone actually laid some blame on the chosen one's doorstep. It's a big day for the New York media. And honestly, how can you go through this whole article and not blame the pitching at all? 25 runs in 3 games. Tough to get to the World Series with those kind of numbers.

Case Closed!