Schadenfreude 99 (A Continuing Series)

John Harper, Daily News:

This can't happen, right?

Logic tells you this can't possibly turn into a panic-stricken final-week pennant race in which the Yankees need oxygen masks to breathe while trying not to look over their shoulders at the back-from-the-dead Red Sox. ...

The problem, of course, is that there is nothing logical about September collapses. Ask the Mets. ...

Anthony Mccarron, Daily News:

[T]he Yanks have played so poorly they are making some of their normally uber-confident fans antsy ... Certainly, unease was the dominant feeling among the souls at the Stadium Saturday ...

George A. King III, Post:

On every level yesterday, the staggering Yankees converted Yankee Stadium into the world's largest and most expensive toilet bowl. ...

No wonder the 7-3 loss to the Red Sox was met with boos from the sold-out gathering of 49,558, which begged Girardi to remove Nova before he did and booed Gaudin off the hill. ...

Joel Sherman, Post:

[T]his weekend has the feel of a reverse Boston Massacre, or as if the ghosts of the 2004 ALCS Yankee choke job are being revived. That four games remain between the teams means the Red Sox have re-opened a door that seemed closed. ...

And Girardi's schizophrenic managing style has helped open that door. He has alternately pushed hard and pulled back so often over the last few weeks that his team has been left as tight as its high-strung skipper.

The Yankees had Tony Dungy, who coached Indianapolis to the 2007 Super Bowl championship, address the team before Saturday's game.

Phil Hughes said Dungy talked "about preparing for what's ahead of us".

Like yet another loss?

On the morning of Sunday, September 5, the Yankees were 86-50 and they led the AL East by 2.5 games. Since then, they have gone 6-13 -- and are mired in their second four-game losing streak in the last three weeks.

Without a couple of opportune ninth-inning home runs, New York might have gone 4-15. In one road trip, they watched the Rangers, Rays and Orioles walk off with extra-inning victories.

Amazingly, New York has blown a 2.5-game lead and tumbled into second place twice in the last 17 days. On September 10, they led Tampa Bay by 2.5 -- and promptly lost four in a row, falling 0.5 GB the Rays.

But then the Yankees won four out of their next five games and on September 21, they were once again 2.5 games up. But they have dropped four straight games since then -- while the Rays have won four straight -- and so the Yankees find themselves 1.5 GB this morning. It's the farthest they have been out of first place since June 10.

Jed Lowrie, asked if the Red Sox are still holding out any hope for a playoff spot:

Why not?

Daniel Bard:

Everyone's been counting us out for almost two months now. We just haven't given up. I think we're playing with a little something to prove but really no pressure on us. Like I said, we've been counted out.

They're playing with something to lose. They've been holding that top spot in the division and, if not, the wild card, all year. If anything, they have the reason to be nervous, it seems like. ...

If we keep doing what we need to do and a little bit of luck happens, that last series could be pretty interesting. ... Any team's capable of running off nine in a row or running off a 1-8. ... [C]razier things have happened for sure.