The Out-of-Towner (One Sixty-Two: Day Four)

Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.

Day Four: Javier Vazquez, New York Yankees

Every time a victorious third out is made in the top of the ninth inning at Yankee Stadium, more than 50,000 people stand up and begin a mass sing-a-long. As they slap high-fives and file out, the pinstriped faithful croon along with Frank Sinatra’s version of “New York, New York.” Some stand in place to sing, others sing while making a dash for the subway, and still others link arms and do a Rockettes kickline.

As they sing loud and clear, the Yankee fans come to a line they all know well:

If I can make it there / I’m gonna make it anywhere

As you walk out of the gates and onto River Avenue, another New York victory in the books and the buzz of humanity around you, it kind of feels as though you’ve made it in the big city, no matter where you’re headed after this game. It’s one of the heady, fleeting thrills of a ballgame in the city, and it emboldens Yankee fans to ask for more of their players the next time around.

Occasionally, however, a player will arrive in New York and have a tough go of it. If that player has succeeded on other teams, the news reporters will inevitably begin asking if this guy is choking under the pressure of playing for the Yankees. It’s such a pressure-packed situation, they write, and it appears that so-and-so just can’t hack it in New York.

The last time Javier Vazquez was pitching for the Yankees, he helped put an exclamation point on one of the lowest moments in New York history, when he served up a grand slam to Johnny Damon in the seventh and deciding game of the 2004 American League Championship Series. The Boston Red Sox went on to dominate that game en route to their historic comeback from three games down. Vazquez had pitched terribly for New York that season, and he was quickly shipped off the Arizona in a trade that brought Randy Johnson to the Yankees.

For every other team that he has played for, Vazquez has been a reliable pitcher – never the league’s best, but the kind of guy who will give you seven innings, give up no more than four runs, and strike out almost a batter an inning. Vazquez has been incredibly durable, and he’s got nearly 2,300 strikeouts. He’s pitched in Chicago, Phoenix, Montreal and Atlanta, and dominated many batters along the way.

When Vazquez left New York after the ’04 season, one wondered if he’d ever get a chance to pitch on the biggest stage again. This past December, the Yankees gave him that chance, trading for him and planting him directly in their rotation once more.

As April concludes, Vazquez’s 2010 numbers are very hard to look at: one win, three losses, and a run given up per inning. He’s having trouble even getting to the fifth inning. This is not the player who plowed through the National League last year with Atlanta. The New York papers are already pouring ink into the Vazquez story.

So, Mr. Sinatra, what do you think? Is this a man who can’t “make it” here? And if so, what should that mean to his reputation? Must every ballplayer prove himself on the biggest stage to be considered a success? Aren’t there people all over America who are more comfortable working in, say, Memphis or Little Rock or Fargo than they are in New York? What if you don’t really have little town blues, but actually enjoy a slightly slower pulse than that of the city that never sleeps?

It is OK, and always will be, to prefer something other than New York. For some, it’s a great place to visit, and that’s all. I’m not sure where Javier Vazquez stands on this. Maybe his struggles as a Yankee have more to do with arm mechanics, location, or the speed of his fastball. Maybe he’ll right his ship this spring and help the Yanks return to the “top of the heap.”

But if Vazquez is feeling too much pressure here in New York, I’m sure he’ll be sent elsewhere soon enough. He’ll hear the cascades of boos, and the papers will run him out of town. It’ll be a high-profile departure, but it won’t be the first of its kind. They won’t be cheering for Vazquez when they sing “New York, New York.” But that doesn’t make him a failure. Just an out-of-towner.