October baseball's around the corner soon. The Red Sox are 4 games behind the Yankees, and are about to hit Yankee stadium for a 3 game series. The hottest hitter on the Yankees right now is team captain Derek Jeter. That's right. After starting the season in that awful, awful slump, he is hitting 25-for-60 (.417) in September which includes 8 doubles, 4 homers, 15RBIs, 21 runs, 8 walks.
Jeter said most of the games this month have been "close" to the intensity of postseason games, which is when he has proven to be at his best. He likes the stakes being high. "We're trying to win a division, so all these games are important," Jeter said.
Jeter has an 11-game hitting streak, has scored at least one run in 11 straight games and has a career-high 40 doubles. His average is up to .288, a far cry from .189 on May 25.He topped it off yesterday with the monstrous home run. He had trouble remembering any homers that traveled farther than that, though he said he hit a shot into the upper deck in rightfield at Yankee Stadium against Esteban Loaiza in 1999. "There haven't been many," Jeter said.
The Yankees believe there haven't been many players like Jeter.
Well, I don't think they exist in abundance in any sport either. Even the New York Times had to write this little piece:
Jeter was answering questions about the Yankees' weekend series with the
Boston Red Sox in the Bronx, not the finale of a sleepy series at Kauffman Stadium. But Jeter used the game as practice for his Mr. October routine. He is getting an early start on his heroics.
As the Calendar rolls around to October, the man steps it up a notch. We're used to this by now, aren't we? Of course all this is coming all too late to save my team in the Jack Kerouac Memorial League, but hey, I take the production as all good.
- Art Neuro
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