So I'm watching the Yankees last night, because they're the Yankees. In the second inning, with Baltimore's Kevin Millar on first base, Corey Patterson bunted. Broadcasters Michael Kay and Ken Singleton, take it away ...
Kay: A push-bunt toward third, A-Rod fields, there was nobody covering second, so A-Rod will take the out at first. Sacrifice successful, 5-3, and heads-up by Jeter: third base was not covered when A-Rod fielded the ball, and Jeter darted over to cover the bag.
Singleton: Now I don't know if there's supposed to be somebody at second or not, but when this ball is fielded by Alex Rodriguez, they had plenty of time to get Kevin Millar. He's not the fastest runner. The ball is bunted fairly hard. I mean, a couple hops, and you can see there's a play at second base if somebody's there to cover.
Kay: Robinson Cano never made a move toward covering second. His initial step was to first, because he was backing up the throw, I guess, to first base.
Singleton: No, he is supposed to go over there on a bunt play. If the first baseman charges, he's the one that's supposed to cover first. My question more would be with Derek Jeter, who alertly -- as you said -- went over to third to cover up in case Millar went there. But at first, if he moves over to second, there's a chance for a force play there.
Kay: But Phelps never charged, that's why it seemed strange that Cano didn't move to second.
Singleton: That's my point. When a bunt is laid down, the second baseman, his job is to get to first base and cover. If the first baseman doesn't charge, he lets the first baseman take it.
Awkward pause. Followed immediately by change of subject.
If you weren't paying attention, it would slip right past you, but Singleton was suggesting, ever so gently, that perhaps Jeter should have covered second base. Singleton also, and again ever so gently, made it terribly obvious that even after all the years Kay's been in the broadcast booth, he doesn't seem to know that the second baseman automatically breaks for first base when the batter squares around to bunt.
Here's the way it's usually supposed to work, when the batter's bunting: first and third basemen charge plateward, second baseman goes to first base, shortstop goes to second base, catcher goes to third base, and pitcher covers the plate. (Four years ago, Jeter suffered the only serious injury of his career when he collided with Blue Jays catcher Ken Huckaby, who was defending third base.)
Michael Kay went out of his way to commend Jeter for covering third base -- the sort of thing that shortstops do routinely, every day of the week -- and tried to blame Cano for not being at second base, but seemed utterly unwilling to acknowledge the possibility that Jeter did something wrong.
Isolated incident? Maybe. Except it happened again in the fourth inning.
Melvin Mora's on first base, and tries the delayed steal. That never works. Except it worked this time, because when Jorge Posada popped out of his crouch to throw, nobody was covering second. He then unleashed a one-hopper to the shortstop side of second base, which Jeter snagged. After which came this dialogue:
Singleton: You can see that Mora gets in there safely, ahead of the tag. Posada had nobody to throw to, and sometimes when you're catching you're taught just throw it to the bag, if nobody gets there it's not your fault.
Kay: That's exactly what happened, Kenny: Nobody was at second base, so Posada double-clutched, and then threw it wide.
OK, so we've established that it wasn't Posada's fault. Then whose fault was it?
Insert sound of crickets chirping here, because again the discussion, just as it approached the prospect of saying something negative about the beatified shortstop, simply ended.
What you think about all this depends on what you believe is the broadcaster's role. If you believe his role is to create and perpetuate myths about the local boys, then you probably don't mind at all. But if you believe he should report the facts on the field, then a steadfast refusal to consider a player's possible mistakes is something that should bother you quite a lot. The Yankees have all the advantages a baseball team could have. They don't need any extra help from the guys in the booth.
Rob Neyer
