Peña replaces injured Cabrera on Yankees' roster
Photo credit: Getty Images | Melky Cabrera is tended to by manager Joe Girardi and a member of the team medical staff in Game 4 of the 2009 World Series. (November 1, 2009)
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PHILADELPHIA - Melky Cabrera's groundout in the sixth inning of World Series Game 4 was his final at-bat of whatever is left of the season.
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Cabrera strained his left hamstring while running to first and the Yankees replaced him with infielder Ramiro Peña on their World Series roster before Game 5 last night.
Joe Girardi said if the injury had occurred during the regular season, it would have kept Cabrera out "a couple of weeks'' and likely would have resulted in a trip to the disabled list.
Still, the move wasn't officially approved by Major League Baseball until about 2½ hours before the first pitch. Any team wanting to make an injury substitution to its 25-man roster must make a formal request to MLB - a process, Girardi said, that "they're very involved in.''
MLB wants to prevent teams from attempting to take unproductive players off the roster, and the swap must be position player for position player. In other words, the Yankees could not have replaced Cabrera with a pitcher, not that they were looking to do so.
Brett Gardner started in centerfield in Game 5, getting the nod over veteran Jerry Hairston Jr. "Gardy defensively in centerfield we like, and he's had some success off Cliff Lee,'' Girardi said. "Gardy's more of a centerfielder.''
Entering Game 5, Gardner was 2-for-5 and Hairston 1-for-6 against Lee.
Too well-rested
Girardi said there was "a little'' consideration about the Yankees pitching Chad Gaudin instead of A.J. Burnett on three days' rest in Game 5. That would have allowed Burnett to start a Game 6, if necessary, on regular rest. But Girardi announced before Game 4 - which the Yankees won to take a three-games-to-one lead in the Series - that Burnett would pitch Game 5.
"The interesting thing is Chad hasn't thrown much in the last month, and that's a difficult spot to put him in,'' Girardi said. "With CC only throwing about 100 pitches [in Game 4 on Sunday], we feel good about that. A.J. feels good, and we feel good about A.J. going out there. So we feel that this is the right move, and that's why we did it.''
The Yankees were 6-0 in games Gaudin started this year. Gaudin, however, has hardly pitched in the last month. He went 11/3 innings Oct. 3 in his final regular-season outing and threw a scoreless ninth in the Yankees' 10-1 victory over the Angels in ALCS Game 4 Oct. 20.
Bad timing
Before Game 5, Girardi reiterated his issue with warnings being issued to both dugouts after the Philllies' Joe Blanton hit Alex Rodriguez with a pitch in the top of the first in Game 4.
"I just hate seeing it in that situation, first inning,'' Girardi said. "There's a long way to go, a lot of things can happen. I just don't like seeing that. But I understand why they do it. This is something they've tried to do to stop all the bench-clearing brawls and I understand that because that's not good for baseball.''
Asked if he thought there would be one in this World Series, Girardi smiled and said, "I doubt it.''
Extra bases
Before the current World Series, of the 43 teams that led three games to one in the Series, 37 went on to win. The team leading 3-1 was 24-18 in Game 5 . . . In World Series in which they led 3-1, the Yankees entered last night 6-2 in Game 5, with the only losses coming in 1936 and 1977. They went on to win the Series both years.
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