Major League Baseball

THE MADNESS OF A.J. BURNETT - ENIGMATIC HURLER HAS SUFFERED THROUGH THE SEASON, TOO

Published Oct. 13, 2010 10:05 p.m. ET

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IT'S BEEN a few months since A.J. B u r n e t t popped into the DVD player the evidence of his finest hour as a professional baseball player. You can understand why. As maddening as Burnett's season has been to everyone else - his manager, his pitching coach, his catchers, Yankees fans - think about how frustrating it is to be him.

Think about owning a right arm that remains, even at 33, the envy of 97 percent of the other pitchers in the big leagues, and yet remains as much a puzzle to him as it is to everyone else. Think about the level of confidence it takes to be a big-league pitcher, a swagger bordering on arrogance.

And think about having to confront the reality of what you used to be . . . when the reality of what you are is so gut-wrenching.

"Believe me," Burnett said yesterday, "as angry and as aggravating as it is to watch me, it's even more so to be me. I live with all those bad outings every day."

Ah, but there was the night of Oct. 29, 2009, a crisp evening in The Bronx. The Phillies had muffled the Yankees 6-1 behind Cliff Lee the night before in Game 1 of the World Series, and now they were throwing Pedro Martinez at the Yankees in Game 2, and for three innings Martinez stole the show, striking out four, allowing no runs, while the Phillies had touched Burnett for a classic A.J. run in the second: two outs, none on, then a Raul Ibanez double and a Matt Stairs RBI single.

We've seen that so often this year, it's become like the refrain of a top 10 single, something that goes like this: out, out, double, single, walk, single, home run. And before you know it, Burnett is walking off the mound to boos (at home) or derisive cheers (everywhere else). But on that night, the damage was halted immediately, Burnett fanning Pedro Feliz. Across the next five innings he allowed only two hits and two walks. He struck out nine. The Yankees won handily.

He'd saved the World Series. Him. Untrustworthy A.J. Burnett.

"I was focused and I had confidence in every pitch I threw," Burnett said, smiling at the memory.

It has been harder and harder to remember that Burnett as this nightmare of a season unfolded, one that looked a lot more like the knockaround version we saw in Game 5 a few nights later - two innings, four hits, four walks, six runs - than the stopper of Game 2.

"It's still in there," Yankees pitching coach Dave Eiland said yesterday. "You can still see there's a twinkle in his eye. He can summon that."

That is what the Yankees are banking on. Look, there's no doubting that the last thing Eiland or Joe Girardi wanted to do was to expand their r o t a t i o n to a fourth man in the forthcoming ALCS when they only have three reliable starters. But Ivan Nova is a rookie, Javy Vazquez spent most of 2010 pitching like one, and Burnett has been so bad at times this year he was like a one-man stress headache for 4 million Yankees fans.

But Phil Hughes is still a young pitcher with a young arm, and three days' rest would be virgin territory for him. Andy Pettitte is coming off an injury. And while CC Sabathia is a horse, even Secretariat ran into a wall every now and again. So Burnett it is, and Burnett it will be, and in Girardi's perfect world he will take the ball in Game 4 with the Yankees up either three games to none or 2-1.

And in the doomsday scenario, they'll need to ask Burnett to save the season.

But he's done that before. He shut down the Phillies, seven strong innings that allowed everyone to forget that he'd had an up-anddown regular season in '09. Burnett admitted that even if he throws a two-hitter, it won't completely erase the failure of 2010.

"Those numbers are there," he said. "They'll be there forever."

But so is that DVD. And when he was asked if he might dust that baby off between now and Game 4, A.J. Burnett smiled.

"It's a good shot," he said. "Very likely."

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