2002 and 2005 Postseasons in Review

From 1995-2005, the Yankees made the playoffs every year and made it past the first round all but four years. In 1995, they were without Derek Jeter and the Mariners won 3 amazing games. In 1997, they ran into a better Indians team. And in 2002 and 2005, they Yankees were stopped by the Angels. As Mike Vaccaro wrote for the New York Post, Mike Scioscia has been a thorn in the side of New York for years now in the playoffs and his tenure as manager has been no different. The Angles have beaten the Yankees in the regular season but they've been especially rough in the playoffs. What happened to those 2002 and 2005 teams? Let's take a look

2002
The Yankees won 103 games that year too and looked like they would steamroll over the Angels in the first round. This team had a great pitching staff. Mike Mussina had an "off year" but still won 18 games. David Wells went 19-7 with a 3.75 ERA. Roger Clemens struck out more than a batter per inning. El Duque had a 3.64 ERA in 22 starts. Andy Pettitte would only start 22 games, but he was the best of the bunch with a 3.27 ERA. Ted Lilly even pitched well (3.40 ERA in 16 games) before he was traded with two prospects for Jeff Weaver. And in 2002, Weaver was not bad as well, going 5-3 with a 4.04 ERA. The bullpen was really solid that year with 4 pitchers (Mariano Rivera, Ramiro Mendoza, Steve Karsay, and Mike Stanton) each having adjusted ERA's of at least 129.

The problems of this team didn't even have to do with hitting. Jason Giambi (.314/.435/.598 with 41 HR and 122 RBI in his first season in the Bronx) and Bernie Williams (.333/.415/.493) each enjoyed very productive years. Jorge Posada and Derek Jeter each had productive years as well (though Jeter failed to hit .300 or get 200 hits for the first time since 1997). Nick Johnson enjoyed a fine rookie campaign, Raul Mondesi was about league average when he was acquired after a Shane Spencer injury, Robin Ventura enjoyed a fine season going .247/.368/.458 with 27 HR and 93 RBI (correction from Ben: fyi...Shane Spencer got injured in 2000...Raul Mondesi was acquired because Juan Rivera hurt his knee on a golf cart, Enrique Wilson wound up in right field, and dropped a ball...lol. How could I forget that?!) And Alfonso Soriano was one home run away from going 40-40. The only bad player on the team was historically bad Rondell (AKA RonDL) White who somehow managed to stay healthy for most of the year but still posted a .240/.288/.378 line.

The problem was that all of this didn't translate to the playoffs. Soriano tried so desperately for that 40th HR in the last 10 games that he changed his swing (12 Ks, 3 XBH in the last 10 games) and that carried over into the playoffs. Although he would hit a home run in the series, he would get only 2 hits. Juan Rivera, Nick Johnson, Jorge Posada and Raul Mondesi would all struggle to some degree. But the Yankees would hit 7 HR and scored 25 runs in te 4 games (Jeter, Giambi and Bernie would have a big series) so offense wasn't the problem. The real problem was pitching. The Yankees went with their big 4 (Clemens, Pettitte, Mussina and Wells) and they stunk up the joint. Clemens was the only starter who went more than 5 innings (he went 5 2/3). Rivera and El Duque were the only two who did anything in the playoffs. Here are the numbers for the pitchers (with their regular season stats as well):



The Angels would hit 9 HR and 56 hits that series, led by Troy Glaus (1.264 OPS, 3 HR), Tim Salmon (1.264 OPS, 2 HR, 7 RBI) and Garrett Anderson (1.088 OPS, 7 hits) but also had great series from Darin Erstad (8 hits), Benji Gill (4/5), Adam Kennedy (1.455 OPS), Scott Spiezio (6 RBI) and Shawn Wooten (1.667 OPS).

I famously remember that tied 1-1 and going to Anaheim with Mike Mussina and David Wells schedule to pitch, Chris "Mad Dog" Russo said that there was no way this series would not coming back to the Bronx unless the Yankees had won it in 4. He was wrong. The Yankees ran into the beginning of K-Rod which was the end to the Yankees season. Angels 3 - Yankees 1.

2005
This was an extremely formidable lineup on a really good Yankees team that won 95 games. The only "out" was Bernie Williams who posted an awful .249/.321/.367. A-Rod won the MVP with a .321/.421/.610 line with 48 HR and 130 RBI. Jason Giambi had a bounce-back year going .271/.440/.535 with 32 HR. Gary Sheffield, Jorge Posada, Derek Jeter and Hideki Matsui would continue to put up good numbers.

The bench was something awful. The "best" hitter (maybe "least worst" is a better description) was Bubba Crosby who posted a .276/.304/.327 line. The Yankees gave 351 PA to Tony Womack who was woeful, hitting .249/.276/.280 and playing a terrible second base. They tried to shift him to the outfield but he was not any better there (the Yankees dumped him on Cincinnati in the off-season). This was one of the worst Brian Cashman position player signings (Womack was coming off a "career" year...though everything is relative) and his overall haul this year was definitely the worst. The one good part about Womack is that his failure would pave the way for Robinson Cano to make his debut at second base this season (Melky Cabrera also make his major league debut). Ruben Sierra would get 181 PA and put up a .229/.265/.371 line. The backup catcher was John Flaherty and he made Jose Molina look like Babe Ruth posting a .165/.206/.252 line. Matt Lawton, Andy Phillips, Mark Bellhorn and Rey Sanchez were just as awful off the bench.

But regardless of the bench, the biggest problem this team had was pitching. Randy Johnson was their big off-season acquisition and he was the best of the bunch going 17-8 with a 3.79 ERA, a 1.126 WHIP and 211 K, and had a really good second half going 8-2 with a 3.31 ERA and a WHIP under 1. After him there were a lot of question marks. Mike Mussina had a down year with a 4.41 ERA. Chien-Ming Wang was really good as a rookie but only made 17 starts. Carl Pavano was their big free agent singing but would only be healthy enough to pitch 100 innings and put up a 4.77 ERA. Kevin Brown followed up his bad 2004 campaign with an dreadful 6.50 ERA and would pitch himself out of baseball. Jaret Wright would only make 13 starts and had a 6.09 ERA to go along with a 1.775 WHIP. The Yankees would give starts to Tim Redding, Darrell May and Sean Henn before they turned towards Aaron Small and mid-season pickups Shawn Chacon and Al Leiter. Leiter was not as good as many people remembered, going 4-5 with a 5.49 ERA in 16 games. But Shawn Chacon and Aaron Small saved the season. Chacon went 7-3 with a 2.85 ERA in 14 games. Aaron Small went 10-0 with a 3.20 ERA in 15 games.

The bullpen was also somewhat of an issue. It was lead by Mariano Rivera (.0868 WHIP) and Tom Godron, but after that employed the likes of Tanyon Sturtze (4.73 ERA), Scott Proctor (6.04 ERA), Felix Rodriguez (5.01 ERA), Paul Quantrill (6.75 ERA), Buddy Groom (4.91 ERA), Alan Embree (7.53 ERA), Mike Stanton (7.07 ERA) and Wayne Franklin (6.39 ERA), among others.

In the ALDS, the Yankees won Game 1 behind Mike Mussina and the Angels came back and won Games 2 and 3. Game 3 was especially frustrating as Randy Johnson got bombed, giving up 5 runs in 3 innings, but the Yankees came back to take a 6-5 lead only to eventually lose 11-7. The Yankees would win Game 4 behind strong pitching from Shawn Chacon, Al Leiter and Mariano Rivera.

Game 5 was a game the Yankees should have won. Bartolo Colon left after one ining and the Yankees jumped out in the second to a 2-0 lead of his replacement, Ervin Santana. The next inning featured the very, very painful collision between Bubba Crosby and Gary Sheffield in right center that gave Adam Kennedy a triple and scored two runs, giving the Angels a 3-2 lead. Cliff Corcoran would list this as the 15th biggest postseason blooper on SI. The lead would go to 5-2 before a Derek Jeter homer cut it to 5-3. Jeter then singled to start off the 9th inning which was followed by an Alex Rodriguez GIDP. Giambi and Sheffield would single, putting the tying runs on base for Hideki Matsui with two outs, but Matsui would ground out to end the series.

The Yankees were especially hurt by 5 Angels, 3 of which are still starting for them today:



Afterward, A-Rod would play the goat as his GIDP in the 9th inning ended an ugly series for him in which he only got 2 hits. Jeter, Giambi, Posda and Cano would have good a series, the Angels would only go 1-5 in steal attempts, and Mo would get two saves for the Yankees but to no avail. Angels 3 - Yankees 2.

So how will 2009 end? I don't know. But the Yankees have something to learn from both of those ALDS losses and hopefully those lessons help them finally solve the Angels, a team that has demonized them for some time. One thing the Yankees have to look forward to? The Angels no longer have Garrett Anderson. Otherwise, this is going to be another hard-fought series. The Yankees need to bring their A-game to advance.