DAVID SWANSON / Staff Photographer
Pedro Martinez pitches in the first inning. He struck out Derek Jeter to start the game and finished with eight strikeouts.
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Martinez was good, Burnett better
NEW YORK - Maybe Pedro Martinez was "at times" the most influential player who ever stepped in the House that Ruth Built. That was the convoluted claim Pedro made this week at a news conference/stream-of-conscious monologue.
Playing across the street last night at the new Yankee Stadium, Martinez wasn't even the most influential pitcher in Game 2 of the 2009 World Series. This was kind of like Game 1, with some roles reversed. Martinez pitched fine, just as Yankees starter CC Sabathia had in the World Series opener on Wednesday. But A.J. Burnett was better, taking the Cliff Lee lead role this time in the 3-1 Yankees victory.
Martinez gave up two runs in six innings, a couple more hits to lead off the seventh, then saw his bullpen immediately tag a third run on his pitching line.
Afterward, Martinez explained that he had felt sick the last couple of days - "a little under the weather." He hadn't eaten right, he said, and gotten "very little sleep." At one point, Phillies pitching coach Rich Dubee asked him if he could still go.
"I never felt as strong as I would like to do," Martinez said. "I felt good enough to still make pitches. That's all I could do for today. I don't feel like I saved anything."
In a way, the 38-year-old is the hardest-luck Phillies pitcher in the postseason. He lost a start in the first round to a Colorado snowstorm. He pitched a two-hit gem against the Dodgers, only to see the bullpen blow it. While Charlie Manuel took Martinez out with a lead in L.A., he left him in last night to try to pitch the seventh. Neither decision worked out as planned.
Martinez did show he deserves his current crafty-and-wily-vet status. His old fireball days long gone, he performed his best Jamie Moyer impersonation. His change-up was nasty, fooling the Yankees early and often. His fastball was well-placed, and his curve was working, too. He struck out Derek Jeter to start the game, and made Alex Rodriguez look bad a couple of times.
"I still feel like I can get people out with what I have," Martinez said after striking out eight. "I struck out a lot more batters than you probably expected."
When the Yankees got to him, however, fans got souvenirs. Mark Teixeira led off the fourth, and Martinez left a change-up up in the strike zone. Teixeira hit it out to tie the game.
"I saw a pitch up in the zone, and I let it fly," Teixeira said. "It kind of put a little crack in his armor."
The pitch that became Hideki Matsui's go-ahead homer in the sixth, a curveball, was down - but, given the chance to do it again, Martinez said he'd have thrown something else. He just felt like he was in a groove at the time.
Older and wiser, sure, Martinez also is the losing pitcher again in a crucial game at Yankee Stadium, serenaded again by "Who's your daddy?" chants, just like old times. He smiled when he came out, but afterward talked of a guy in the front row - "his daughter in one arm, and a cup of beer in the other hand and saying all kinds of nasty stuff. I just told him, 'Your daughter is right beside you. It's a little girl. It's a shame you're saying all these things.' "
Pedro being Pedro, he pointed out that if wore the pinstripes, attitudes would change about him in the Bronx. "I would probably be a king right now," he said.
Contact staff writer Mike Jensen at 215-854-4489 or mjensen@phillynews.com.
