This sounded brave, and even prescient after the Yankees clubbed four home runs -- including another by Jason Giambi -- but you and I and, most of all, Torre know that nothing substantial is going to be won without far better pitching than the Yankees have right now, when Esteban Loaiza, Javier Vazquez and Jose Contreras are looking like Cy Young, Walter Johnson and Grover Cleveland Alexander.
And speaking of the Yankees' revolving door, in this month of annual remodeling for the haves of baseball, we know Cashman will be working the telephones as if his job depends on it. Roger Clemens isn't going anywhere, with the Astros surging and his son Koby signed by the Houston organization. But there will be others made available by baseball's have-nots looking to unload salaries, and George Steinbrenner, 75 and getting no younger, won't hesitate to deal young talent to keep hope alive.
"I would trade young players," Cashman said, knowing what the memos from Tampa are going to say. "Depends which young players." Translation: Robinson Cano, having proven himself major league ready, is untouchable. Everyone else in the system is good to go, because what's happening now can't go on, no matter what happened Thursday night and how much of a romantic reality show for someone like Redding to pinch himself before pitching in pinstripes.
"I'm from Rochester," he said. "I grew up watching half the coaches in here fighting for the pennant."
Redding, 27, joined the Yankees on Thursday and watched another Yankees-Red Sox classic, with all the twists, all the turns, all the magic of another end-game confrontation, A-Rod against Schilling. "I left a split up, and he handled it," Schilling said. "And then turn around and on the next pitch hang a split to A-Rod."
That meant Mariano Rivera in the home ninth, striking out the side, moving the Yankees within a game and a half of first place.
"That game we don't win the first three months of the season," Rodriguez said.
They probably don't win it Friday night, or Sunday. But Thursday night was not the time to dwell on the bad news.
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