BALTIMORE — You hear so often about what an unforgiving game it is that the word — “unforgiving” — can lose its impact. Every time something bad happens to a player — an error, a bases-loaded strikeout, a grand slam allowed, a passed ball — you hear it. It’s an unforgiving game. A maddening game.
“A humbling game,” Russell Martin said. “And an unforgiving one.”
He knows. He has endured as unforgiving a baseball season as the law allows. On Opening Day, in Tampa, Martin went 0-for-5. He started the season 0-for-9, and 1-for-13, and 4-for-30. Through the first 44 games of the season, Martin went to bed with his average over .200 exactly four times. From June 23 through Labor Day, a stretch of 51 games, 72 days and 180 plate appearances, he never once reported to the ballpark without the “1” at the front of his average.
You don’t think that wears on a guy?
“It’s a grind,” Martin said. “This game. An unbelievable grind sometimes.”
But what’s the other word you hear so much as it applies to the game? Redemption? Yes. It is a game of redemptive qualities, and it is a long season. And so there has been these past three days for Martin — a tiny sample size, for sure, a speck on the mountainside of 162 games. But the calendar says it is September now, and the standings say there are teams close enough to the Yankees’ heels to start a hot foot.
And Russell Martin, he believes in the redemptive qualities of this unforgiving game.
“I told the guys that if things even out the way they’re supposed to,” he said, “then I’ve got a lot of hits left this season.”
Across the last three days, he has delivered three of the most important hits of the season, against the two teams causing the loudest headaches for his team. Thursday night in Tampa, it was a two-run double and a tie-breaking home run. Last night, it was a three-run shot in the top of the fourth that shattered a scoreless tie and propelled the Yankees to a five-run inning and an 8-5 win over the Orioles that restored their solo slot in first place.
“I thought maybe that helped unloose the bats a little bit,” Martin said, but it did more than that, you could see the calm come over the Yankees as they watched Martin’s blast sail over the left-field wall. One long, extended, expansive exhale.
“I’ve been swinging the bat better lately,” Martin said. “And it’s satisfying to finally see some results.”
“He’s been a good hitter,” Yankees manager Joe Girardi said. “You look at his stats. He knows how to be a good hitter at this level.”
Still, for weeks at a time — months at a time — Martin has reported for work, been forced to look at the scoreboard, stare at the most nauseating numbers possible for a man who makes at least half his living with a bat in his hands. He slipped as low as .176 on July 8. For a stretch of 22 out of 24 games in August and September, he ended his day somewhere between .195 and .199.
But never higher. He spent more time on the Interstate than a state trooper. It can be a cruel game, too.
Girardi never wavered, kept encouraging him, told him at the All-Star Break to forget the average, keep grinding, keep believing things will go better. And it’s true: Martin may well have been as useful as a hitter can be who has lived so often beneath the Mendoza Line; last night was his 16th home run, after all.
But all of that is prologue now. In his last three games Martin is hitting .333 with two homers and six RBIs. Without him, the Yankees might be officially in the tuck position, spinning toward the abyss. The average is up to .204 this morning, as high as it has been at the start of any day since June 16. For Martin, it looks like .406.
For the Yankees, it feels like something else. Maybe there really are a lot of hits left in Martin’s bat, as it turns out. If so, there may be a lot of wins left for the Yankees in September. Good thing. They’ll need every one.