Say what you want about the early offensive struggles, but today's game was a win.
It wasn't pretty by any means, as the Yankees did leave a total of nine men on base, but in the end, the effort they put up was good enough, as it helped them beat the Twins 3-1.
Yes, they did fail to score despite loading the bases with nobody out in the bottom of the first, and yes, they did kill a sixth inning rally with bad base running.
But let's be honest, that was ok today.
When you have Masahiro Tanaka pitching, you can get away with a lot of stuff, just ask Alfonso Soriano and Mark Teixeira, whose pair of bad defensive plays put men on second and third with nobody out in the third.
Tanaka could've just surrendered a couple of sac flies, but instead went right after the heart of the Twins' lineup, striking out two and inducing a line-out to get out of the jam uninjured.
That Houdini impression kept the Yankees within one, a deficit that would be wiped out in the bottom of the fourth, when Yangervis Solarte took Kevin Correia (6 IP, ER) deep to right to tie the game.
Tanaka, who ended up throwing 8 frames of 4-hit, no-earned run ball on the afternoon, still wasn't in line for the win, but that didn't stop him from dominating, as the rookie retired the last eight hitters he faced to the keep the Yanks tied heading into the bottom of the eighth.
In that AB, the Bombers had to score in order to give #19 the W, something they did twice thanks to an RBI Double from Brian McCann and a post-rain delay single from Kelly Johnson.
After a three-strikeout ninth from David Robertson, the game was over, and just like that, all the frustration of the day was, too.
The Pinstripes didn't play well, but at least they and their starter ended up getting the win. I guess that makes everything else that happened irrelevant.
Has anyone seen the stats for the team this year so far? If not, and you are wondering why we are losing games check this out; Highest Avg= Solarte-.299 and Gardner-.285!
ReplyDeleteErrors 34, 48 Hrs', 48, GDP!
You can look at the negative run differential and see there is a problem.
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