16 Years Later, Tony La Russa Faces the Yankees Once Again
One could argue that Tony La Russa is living in the past.
The 76-year-old White Sox manager gave that impression once again this week when he publicly admonished his own player, Yermín Mercedes, for the crime of hitting a home run on a 3-0 count against a position player pitching in Chicago's blowout win. La Russa deemed the act disrespectful to the game, and he even said he was fine with the Twins, Mercedes’ victim, throwing at his star rookie the next day.
When La Russa was last a manager, in 2011, such unwritten rules were more strictly adhered to. But the game has changed dramatically in the decade that separated his most recent managerial stints, with younger players now prioritizing fun and flair over antiquated customs that never quite made sense.
But this is not a column about baseball tradition or letting the kids play. Rather, with La Russa fond of the past and in the news, and his first-place White Sox set to open a series with the Yankees on Friday, I thought it would be fun to take a trip back in time and revisit the skipper’s last matchup with New York.
It’s been a while.
The date was June 12, the year 2005.
The Yankees were wrapping up a weekend series in St. Louis against La Russa’s Cardinals and both teams were looking to take the rubber match. Each would finish the year in first place and playoff-bound, but New York was hovering around .500 at this point in the season. The Cards, meanwhile, already owned a comfy lead atop the NL Central.
The afternoon contest, played in front of 50,372 at Busch Stadium, was preceded by a brief pregame ceremony in which Tony Womack, a Cardinal turned Yankee the previous offseason, received his 2004 NL championship ring (for any readers trying to suppress the 2004 postseason and in need of a reminder, St. Louis lost the World Series to the Red Sox).
After that, the sellout crowd witnessed starters Carl Pavano and Matt Morris put up nearly identical stat lines, each allowing one earned run and six hits over six innings. The lone run surrendered by Pavano came off a third-inning David Eckstein single, which plated Yadier Molina. Molina and Albert Pujols were the only two players in that game who remain active (three if you count Robinson Canó).
The interleague matchup was delayed for several minutes when home plate umpire Derryl Cousins left the game after 4½ innings. Cousins had to be hospitalized due to an undisclosed illness.
Following the break in action, the Yankees were able to get on the board in the fifth. Alex Rodriguez, in the midst of an MVP season just like Pujols, doubled Womack home before Morris departed. Hideki Matsui then celebrated his 31st birthday with an RBI single in the top of the seventh, thus giving the Yankees a 2-1 lead. But Joe Torre’s bullpen imploded in the bottom of the inning, starting with Tanyon Sturtze and a somewhat familiar face batting for St. Louis.
With Molina already on base, La Russa called on Scott Seabol to pinch-hit.
An 88th-round pick of New York’s in 1996, Seabol saw just one big league at-bat with the Yankees in 2001. He popped out but became the lowest-drafted player to appear in an MLB game at the time. All in all, Seabol spent seven minor league seasons with New York and another few with St. Louis. It wasn’t until May 2005 that he finally returned to The Show.
It wasn’t until June 12 of that year that he hit his first—and only—major league home run.
Seabol jumped on the first pitch he saw from Sturtze, planting a fastball in the left field seats. The 30-year-old rookie soon found himself taking a curtain call and, later, drenched in booze after his two-run dinger put the Cardinals up for good.
After the game, Seabol admitted that he felt a little extra excitement facing the Yankees.
"I'd be lying if I said I didn't," he said, per ESPN.
Torre, meanwhile, briefly recalled the Yankees’ 2000 Minor League Player of the Year.
"We had him for a handful of days," the manager said of Seabol. "We knew he was strong, we knew he could do what we saw him do today. We just made a bad pitch."
It wouldn’t be New York’s last that inning. The Cardinals scored two more runs on a Jim Edmonds double off Mike Stanton, which also resulted in an ankle injury for Matsui, who slipped and fell on the play. Matsui exited the game with Torre’s help, though his consecutive games played streak, dating back to his days in Japan, ultimately continued.
Jorge Posada hit a solo shot off Julián Tavárez in the top of the eighth, but that would do it for the Yankees’ offense. The Cardinals won, 5-3, after Jason Isringhausen recorded his 18th save of the year.
The series victory capped off a rather successful week for St. Louis, which also took two of three from Boston in a Fall Classic rematch. La Russa was thrilled with his team’s effort after it was all said and done.
“I don't think that anybody that watched us play the two series had any problem with how we went about it," he said. "We just played as hard as we could and the coaches and I, we have no complaints."
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