BOSTON — Derek Jeter wants to watch the replay of his emotional and scintillating final game at Yankee Stadium because he admitted his mind wasn't always right during the evening that pebbled a lot of flesh.
Nevertheless, when the retiring shortstop views the historic game, there will be a degree of emptiness because a game-winning hit in the bottom of the ninth against the Orioles that will be celebrated forever came in the second straight season the Yankees won't be playing in October.
"Of course, that's why you play, you play to go to the playoffs and have an opportunity to win a championship,'' a tired looking Jeter said before watching the Yankees' 3-2 victory over the Red Sox to open a meaningless three-game series against at Fenway Park on Friday night. "And that is not happening this year.''
The Yankees long ago lost touch with the Orioles, who ran away with the AL East. On Wednesday, they were eliminated from the race for the second wild-card spot. Yet the scene at Yankee Stadium late Thursday night looked and sounded as if the Yankees won their 28th World Series title.
On Friday, reality began to settle over the Yankees' universe.
Jeter, for the first time ever in a big league game, told manager Joe Girardi he didn't want to play, and didn't. The plan is for Jeter to be the designated hitter in the final two games of his Hall of Fame career because what he wanted to take from Yankee Stadium was a vision of him playing shortstop in the home pinstriped uniform.
In fact, if the Yankees were not in New England's living room, Jeter said Thursday night would have been the final game ever.
"If it was anywhere else, I don't know if I would be playing,'' said Jeter, who explained that due to his respect for the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry, the Red Sox organization and Red Sox fans, his career won't end in The Bronx.
Talking at a podium, Jeter looked like the guy who said he got two hours of sleep after the Yankees arrived at the team hotel in the wee hours of Friday morning.
"It was a wide range of emotions,'' Jeter said. "I couldn't think of a better way to end a career at Yankee Stadium.''
The home portion of his career entered the history books in dramatic fashion with Jeter admitting there were times during the long day and night he came close to breaking down in front of teammates and fans.
The road part and his legendary career ends sometime late Sunday afternoon at a ballpark, where many games of baseball's bitter rivalry have occurred.
As he said in the days leading to the farewell in The Bronx, Jeter explained he couldn't describe what Sunday will be like.
"I don't know, I can't imagine it like being in New York,'' Jeter said. "That has nothing to do with where I am. That pretty much is as good as it gets.''
Girardi offered Jeter the option of playing another position and Jeter rejected that. A lot of teams, when there is nothing on the line, turn to a veteran to manage the final game of the season. Girardi gave Jeter that option and was turned down, too.
So, he arrived as a skinny shortstop nobody knew would develop into what he did. Jeter leaves Sunday as a lean, 40-year-old DH in a park where he was a central figure in the best rivalry baseball has to offer.
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