2009 Yankees: Robinson Cano Was at the Peak of his Powers

Welcome back to the next chapter of 2009 Yankees: The Last Championship - a week-by-week remembrance of the year in which they gave us their most recent World Series title. Today, with the defending World Series champion Phillies in town, the Yankees’ dropped the opener to snap their nine-game winning streak, and lost the finale, but in between they managed their sixth walk-off win with Robinson Cano in the middle of the dramatic rally.

NEW YORK (May 23, 2009) - It’s unfortunate that today, when you think about Robinson Cano and the way his major league career ended in such disgrace, it overshadows just how a great a player he was for the Yankees.

Across nine seasons, Cano was on track for the Hall of Fame as he compiled a “back of the baseball card” that was virtually unrivaled during those years from 2005 to 2013 - a .305 average, an .860 OPS, 204 home runs, 822 RBI, five All-Star berths, five Silver Slugger awards (given to the best hitter at each position), and two Gold Gloves.

He was sometimes overlooked in the Bronx because he played with megastars like Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, and Jason Giambi, not to mention Jorge Posada, Bernie Williams, Hideki Matsui, Gary Sheffield, Johnny Damon and Mark Teixeira.

But Cano was brilliant in his own right, as reliable a player as the Yankees have had in the 21st century. He missed only 12 games between 2007 and 2013, and when he was on the field his talent was as effortless as it was boundless.

Yankees fans were in an uproar when he turned down a seven-year, $175 million free agent offer after the 2009 season, but he did so only because the Mariners wowed him with $240 million for 10 years. You could be pissed off at him, but you really couldn’t blame him for leaving the bright lights of New York City for the faraway outpost that was Seattle because think about it - would you leave $65 million on the table?

In his first four years with the Mariners he was nearly as great as he had been with the Yankees, but in 2018, it all began to collapse and Cano descended into a darkness from which he never really emerged. Of course, it was lowlighted by two lengthy suspensions for PED use, one that cost him 80 games in 2018, the other wiping out his entire 2021 season. Couple that with his diminishing skills and he bounced from the Mariners to the Mets to the Padres to the Braves, a mere shell of the player he once was before it finally ended when the Braves released him late in 2022.

We digress, though, because early in 2009 Cano was in the middle of his peak prosperity as a Yankee.

When Alfonso Soriano left in free agency after the 2003 season, the Yankees never adequately filled that void at second base as Miguel Cairo and Enrique Wilson shared the job in 2004 and provided little offense. And in 2005, Brian Cashman and then manager Joe Torre didn’t think the 22-year-old Cano was ready to make the leap to the Bronx coming out of spring training, so they decided to go with veteran Tony Womack at second base.

However, when Cano drove in 24 runs in 24 games at Triple-A Columbus with an OPS of .943, it was time to bring him up, a decision that immediately proved bountiful. Cano would go on to finish second in the AL Rookie of the Year voting and by 2006, a year in which he hit .342, he was playing in the first of his eight All-Star games.

There was another fine season in 2007, but Cano started slowly in 2008; he was hitting .151 at the end of April and while he finished the season at .271, he never felt like he got into a good groove and that led to some offseason reflection on what went wrong.

“Last year I used as an example, as a lesson,” Cano said. “I looked at what I did on video in November and learned from it and then put it away and started over for this year.”

One of the things he pinpointed was his plate discipline. Cano knew he had a world of talent as a hitter and he could hit just about any pitch anytime he wanted, but patience was never his strength and he knew that had to change in 2009.

“It’s hard if you are not a patient person, but it’s easier now,” he said on May 21 after he enjoyed a second straight three-hit game as the Yankees completed a three-game sweep of the Orioles. “I noticed a difference right away in spring training. I would take a strike or take two strikes and get a hit. It just worked out for me. I just know there’s going to be ups and downs; just be patient at the plate, be patient in the field - even when you’re driving (a car), being patient is good.”

Helped by his new approach, Cano shot out of the gate with five homers and 16 RBI in April and when the month ended, thanks to a career-best 18-game hitting streak, he was batting .366. He cooled off in May, but his eruption against the Orioles got him back on track at a good time with the defending World Series champion Phillies up next on the schedule for a highly-anticipated three-game set, the same Phillies who five months later would be New York’s World Series opponent.

The opener and the finale did not go the Yankees way as they lost 7-3 on Friday and then 4-3 on Sunday with Cano going a combined 1-for-8. But in the middle game Saturday afternoon, the Yankees, the new cardiac kids of baseball, pulled off their MLB-leading 17th come-from-behind victory, their sixth in walk-off fashion thanks to a thrilling three-run rally in the bottom of the ninth to win 5-4.

Andy Pettitte gave up a solo homer to Raul Ibanez in the second inning, but Cano led off the bottom half with a double and scored on a groundout by Nick Swisher. Pettitte then yielded a three-run homer to John Mayberry Jr. - the kid’s first career MLB home run - to put the Yankees in a 4-1 hole in the sixth.

Jeter cut the deficit to 4-2 with a solo shot in the sixth, but the Yankees went down 1-2-3 in the seventh, Phillies reliever Ryan Madson whiffed Swisher, Matsui and Jeter in the eighth, and now the Yankees were confronted with star closer Brad Lidge for the ninth, a guy who had gone 48-for-48 in save chances in 2008 and then 7-for-7 in the postseason as the Phillies won their first championship since 1980.

Lidge was a beast, but here’s what gave the Yankees hope. He had been anything but a beast nearly two months into 2009. He had already blown two saves and by the end of the day, that number rose to three, as did his ERA which soared to a hideous 9.16.

“As a manager,” Girardi said, “I’m thinking, ‘Johnny, just get on and give us a chance, with those guys coming up, one of those can put one in the seats.’”

Sure enough, Damon drew a six-pitch walk, then stole second while Teixeira was striking out. That brought A-Rod to the plate and while his first two weeks back from his hip surgery had produced just a .204 average, the few hits he had managed could not have been more impactful.

Lidge threw him six straight sliders, the last of which almost no one would have hit. But A-Rod did, a drive to right field that just cleared the wall and tied the game as the crowd, more than 46,000 which was the largest since the home opener, rocked the stadium with glee.

“Pretty impressive what he was able to do with that pitch,” Lidge said. “Obviously we didn’t think he was going to, so sometimes you have to tip your hat. He’s a great hitter and he got to a pitch we didn’t think he was going to be able to.”

The work was not complete, though. Next up was Cano and he fell into a 1-2 hole before grounding a single through the middle, the type of at bat he’d been producing all season. Never much of a base stealer, here came an opportunity because Lidge was terrible at holding runners and the Phillies had backup catcher Chris Coste behind the plate. Cano took off on the first pitch, made it safely and thus was in position to race home with the winning run when Melky Cabrera lined Lidge’s next pitch to right-center for the winning single.

For Cabrera, it was his third game-winning hit of the year. “Melky’s been phenomenal,” A-Rod said. “He’s been working his tail off. He’s the first one here, he’s the last one to go home. He’s going a great job and its been fun to watch him.”

A-Rod had been fun to watch, too. This was just his 10th hit but seven of those had been home runs and he had 13 RBI.

“Right now, I’m probably the happiest .200 hitter in baseball,” Rodriguez said with a smile.

“This was a big game. We had the last punch. We’re at home and we feel very comfortable. As long as we have the last three outs, or the last six outs, we feel like something good is going to happen.”

To which Cano agreed. “We say we always have a shot until the last out.” A statement that so far in 2009 could not be more obvious.

Here’s how the rest of Week 7 went for the Yankees:

• May 19: The juice from sweeping the Twins continued against Baltimore and the Yankees swept three to extend their winning streak to nine games. The 9-1 opener was decided by a seven-run seventh inning highlighted by Jeter’s three-run double and Teixeira’s two-run homer to help CC Sabathia earn his first win at Yankee Stadium.

• May 20: The offense continued to roll 11-4 as Swisher, Cano, and Cabrera hit back-to-back-to-back home runs in the second, and after the Orioles crawled within 5-3, the Yankees had a six-run eighth that included RBI singles by Cano and Cabrera and a two-run double by Jeter to put it away. “Winning is second only to breathing,” Swisher said. “It’s been a heck of a ride, man.”

• May 21: Sweep complete as the Yankees jumped to a 6-0 lead after two innings and coasted to a 7-4 victory. Jeter, Cano, Teixeira and Cabrera all hit doubles during a four-run first and Cano hit a two-run homer in the second. Joba Chamberlain had to come out in the first after he was hit by a line drive, but the Yankees bullpen led by Alfredo Aceves, Jonathan Albaladejo, Jose Veras and Mariano Rivera covered the final 8.1 innings.

• May 22: The winning streak ended at nine when the Phillies earned a 7-3 victory. A.J. Burnett struggled as he gave up a leadoff homer to Jimmy Rollins and was charged with five runs, then Chien-Ming Wang, just off the disabled list, covered the final three to help a tired bullpen.

• May 24: The Phillies took the finale 4-3 on Carlos Ruiz’s RBI double off Brett Tomko in the 11th inning, after the Yankees had forced extra innings on Cabrera’s RBI single in the ninth off Lidge who blew another save. Thus, a 10-game homestand concluded with the Yankees winning eight to improve to 25-19 and pulling them to within one game of the first-place Red Sox.

NEXT SATURDAY: Rookie Brett Gardner was on a heater at the end of May and he helped lead the Yankees past the Rangers, a victory which vaulted them into a tie for first place in the AL East.