Morning Mariano Roundup

I said my piece in last night's game recap, now let's hear what others are saying about Rivera's accomplishment on this Monday Mo'ning.

-----

Shysterball: Mariano Rivera got his 500th save. More impressive: he drew a bases-loaded walk, giving him his first career RBI in 15 seasons. Francisco Rodriguez gave it up, which in some cosmic way illustrates the vast gulf between those two pitchers in my mind. How do you walk Mariano Rivera? Nerves is all I can think, and you can bet your ass that if the situation was reversed, Rivera would never have walked Rodriguez, because Rivera's body temperature runs at a constant 57 degrees.

-----

PeteAbe: If you’ll permit me a personal aside, I’ve been doing this job since I was 17 and Mariano is the best athlete I have covered. He is the model of professionalism in how he approaches every aspect of his job, how he treats his teammates and how he treats those around the team, including reporters. [He's got some audio from the postgame as well].

-----

Emma Span (From Bronx Banter): Rivera closed out the game afterwards with a minimum of fuss for his 500th save, and while I think most everyone reading the Banter would agree that the save is a deeply flawed statistic, this is really just another opportunity to reflect on how freakishly awesome Mariano has been, is now, and hopefully will continue to be - for at least a while longer. You can’t really overhype Mo, and that’s saying something.

-----

David Pinto (As it was happening): If Rivera converts this save, he’ll earn his 110th long save, a save of more than one inning. That will double the next closest total from 1996 on, 55 by Keith Foulke.

-----

She-Fan: After he notched the final out, there was no fist pumping, no theatrics, just his customary classy, humble demeanor. His teammates gathered around to congratulate him, and I sat in my living room sobbing like a sentimental fool.

-----

Tyler Kepner: There was something poetic in the strange walk Mariano Rivera drew with the bases loaded in the top of the ninth inning on Sunday at Citi Field. It made the score Yankees 4, Mets 2 – the same score as it was in Flushing on Oct. 26, 2000, the fifth and final game of the World Series.

That was the last time Rivera closed out a championship, the last time he allowed himself to show much emotion after a victory. Rivera views everything through the prism of the team. Like Derek Jeter, part of his greatness is in his rigidly simplistic view of his craft. He never complicates anything.

-----

Ben K. (From River Ave. Blues): On Friday, he had just his second career at-bat, and he nearly managed to knock in a few with a line drive. Today, he was more patient. He saw seven pitches from K-Rod — including one foul ball — and the Yanks’ Hall of Fame closer worked out a bases loaded walk. It would be his first RBI of his career, and the timing — coming on the same night as his 500th save — could not be better.

-----

Joel Sherman: "I didn't expect any of this," Rivera said afterward.

How could anyone expect it? He barely made the team in 1996. But slowly -- with one success after another -- he gained then manager Joe Torre's trust, and moved from mop-up to long man to main set-up guy to Wetteland's fill on that May night.

-----

Ken Davidoff: Rivera's career, at a job in which the shelf life of most pitchers is a few years, has been remarkable. The milestone reminds us. Rivera's overall performance makes us look silly for questioning whether he was done.

Diminished? A little, at age 39. Done? Not even close.