Monday, April 28, 2008

Yanks Head Home On High Note: Beat Tribe 5-2


1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
R H E
N.Y. Yankees 0 0 0 0 0 4 0 1 0
5 5 1
Cleveland 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0
2 8 1

The Yankees moved to a game above .500 with a 5-2 victory over the Cleveland Indians to split the 4 game series. Mike Mussina got the start and was good, evening his record at 3-3 for on the season. The only two runs he allowed came in the 5th on an RBI single by Jason Michaels and a sac fly by Travis Hafner. The inning could have been much worse as Cleveland had the bases loaded with nobody out and a run in, but Mussina was able to get out of it only allowing one more run to come in. He also had gotten into a little bit of trouble in the 3rd when he allowed runners on 2nd and 3rd with 1 out, but was able to strike out David Dellucci and get Jamey Carroll to pop out to end the inning. All in all it was a solid start for Moose: 5 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB and 2 K.

The Yankees bullpen was fantastic tonight. Although he allowed two men to reach base Jonathan Albaladejo pitched a scoreless 6th. Kyle Farnsworth pitched a 1-2-3 7th, and Joba Chamberlain followed with a 1-2-3 8th.

Mariano Rivera came in for the save in the 9th and continued his dominance retiring the side in order to pick up his 8th save of the season. In 11 innings he's allowed no runs on 4 hits, while striking out 11 and walking none.


IP H R ER BB SO HR ERA
Mussina (W, 3-3) 5.0 7 2 2 1 2 0 4.73
Albaladejo (H, 1) 1.0 1 0 0 1 1 0 2.08
Farnsworth (H, 2) 1.0 0 0 0 0 1 0 3.65
Chamberlain (H, 6) 1.0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1.59
Rivera (S, 8) 1.0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0.00

INDIANS PITCHING

The Yankees were held hitless by Aaron Laffey until the 6th, but Melky Cabrera and Derek Jeter led off the inning with infield singles. Bobby Abreu then lined a single into left field to load the bases for Alex Rodriguez. Laffey was ahead 1-2 in the count on A-Rod but overthrew a fastball and hit Rodriguez on the thigh to drive in the first Yankee run. Jason Giambi and Hideki Matsui followed with RBI ground outs to drive in runs 2 and 3 which gave the Yankees a 3-2 lead. After a pitching change Morgan Ensberg also reached on an infield single driving in the 4th Yankees run.

The Yankees 5th and final run came in the top of the 8th on an RBI double by Hideki Matsui that drove in Johnny Damon who had walked to leadoff the inning.

Robinson Cano continues his horrible April going 0-for-3 to drop his average to .153.

Alex Rodriguez left the game in the 8th, and Joe Girardi said in the post game that he's still not 100% and will get tomorrow off. Rodriguez also said there is "no way" he can play tomorrow. And said if he had to guess it would be more than one day.


AB R H RBI BB SO LOB AVG
Cabrera, CF 4 1 1 0 1 1 0 .289
Jeter, SS 4 1 1 0 0 0 0 .279
Abreu, RF 4 1 1 0 0 1 2 .280
Rodriguez, DH 2 1 0 1 0 0 2 .286
a-Damon, PH-DH 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 .275
Giambi, 1B 4 0 0 1 0 0 5 .167
Matsui, LF 4 0 1 2 0 0 1 .317
Ensberg, 3B 4 0 1 1 0 1 1 .256
Cano, 2B 3 0 0 0 0 0 1 .153
Molina, C 4 0 0 0 0 0 1 .245
Totals 33 5 5 5 2 3 13

a-Walked for Rodriguez in the 8th.

BATTING
2B: Matsui (5, Lewis, J).
TB: Cabrera; Jeter; Abreu; Matsui 2; Ensberg.
RBI: Rodriguez (11), Giambi (11), Matsui 2 (13), Ensberg (3).
2-out RBI: Ensberg; Matsui.
Runners left in scoring position, 2 out: Giambi; Ensberg.
Team LOB: 5.

INDIANS HITTING

PLAYER OF THE GAME: The Yankees bullpen: 4 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K

HONORABLE MENTION: Mike Mussina: 5 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 2 K

The Yankees finally come home to start a 3 game series with the Detroit Tigers at The Stadium. Phil Hughes gets the start for the Yankees and he will face Kenny Rogers. First pitch is set for 7:05 p.m., and the game can be seen on YES and heard on WCBS 880.

Be sure to check out my Yankees-Tigers series preview tomorrow afternoon.

3 Comments:

Joe said...

Wow a 4 run inning where one ball leaves the infield, pretty wild. Great pitching though.

Jeff said...

Great game. Mussina didn't stink, Bullpen has 4 pitchers throw 4 scoreless innings, Yanks get runs when they needed and finish up 1 game over .500 and 1 game out of first place. Hopefully we'll continue on our winning ways at home for a while.

Greg Cohen said...

zone,

I may have never seen such a "soft" rally before. But hey, I'll take any runs we can get.

Jeff,

It was a great way to end the trip. It's also a good thing for them to put that stretch on endless road games behind them.

I like what I've seen from Albaladejo, especially that he doesn't seem to get rattled by baserunners. And Farnsworth has been very good lately too.