Pena's 10th Inning Blast Downs Yanks

(AP Photo/Kathy Willens)

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10		R	H	E
Tampa Bay	0	0	1	0	0	2	0	0	0	1		4	9	0
NY Yankees	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	3	0	0		3	9	1

This was a tough one. Come to think of it, a lot of the losses this year have been just brutal.

A.J. Burnett started for the Yankees and pitched a good game, not great, and this was a game where the Yankees really could have used a great game. In six innings he allowed three runs six hits, walked two and struck out eight. He threw 114 pitches, 69 of them for strikes. He got into too many deep counts which caused him to throw so many pitches. It was an OK start, but I'm really not impressed at all with what I saw tonight from Burnett.

Rays' starter Andy Sonnanstine, who has been pretty bad all year, dominated the Yankees over the first seven innings, holding them to no runs on just four hits. After recording the first out in the eighth Ramiro Pena singled, and Jose Molina followed with a double, the Yankees had runners on second and third with one out and Sonnanstine was out of the game.

Dan Wheeler came into the game and struck out Derek Jeter for the second out. Tampa went to their pen once more, going with the lefty J.P. Howell to face Johnny Damon. He walked Damon on five pitches and that brought up Mark Teixeira with the tying runs on base. Howell threw a 2-1 changeup and Teixeira lined it just fair and into the left field corner. Carl Crawford had a little trouble picking the ball up, and by the time the ball was back in the infield all three runs had scored and the game was tied. It was a huge hit for the struggling Teixeira, at least at the time it was. Right after the Teixeira double there was about a 30 minute rain delay and once play resumed Hideki Matsui struck out to end the inning.

The bullpen, for the most part, did a very good job tonight. Edwar Ramirez pitched a scoreless seventh and struck out two. Jonathan Albaladejo pitched a scoreless eighth. And Mariano Rivera pitched a scoreless ninth, striking out the side after allowing a leadoff single Dioner Navarro.

With the score still tied in the top of the tenth Phil Coke came into the game and on the second pitch he threw gave up a solo homer to Carlos Pena to give the Rays a 4-3 lead. He then retired the next three batters in order, but the Yanks were now down to their last three outs.

The Rays went to their closer Troy Percival, and he got Jeter to ground out for the first out. Damon was next and he lined a ground-rule double over B.J. Upton's head in center. That brought up the hero of the game (so far), Mark Teixeira. It was all set up for one of those vintage Yankees moments. Tex ties the game in the eight with the big double, then either wins or ties it again in the tenth to propel the Yanks to a big victory. And it even looked like the gods were on his side because on the first pitch Percival uncorked a wild pitch and Damon was able to move to third. Percival followed with another ball and Teixeira was in the driver's seat with a 2-0 count. He got his pitch. It was a 91 MPH fastball right down Broadway, a pitch that he should have hammered into the seats, but he got under it and popped it weakly to shallow right leaving Damon stranded at third. Matsui was then up, but he flew out to left to end the game.

I was at the game, and actually spent most of the time standing behind home plate in the concourse. Apparently they don't mind if you just stand there and watch the game as long as you don't block the walkways, which is pretty cool. Here was my view for most of the game:

The view was as good as it gets and it's a great way to stay out of the rain, though, but it does feel kind of weird not being in seats. When I did go over to my seats in the left field bleachers for a few innings I was extremely disappointed by the fans. The people out there tonight didn't seem to care or even know what was going on. They seemed to care more about being at the new stadium than they did about the actual game. Sadly, I'm sure you could say the same thing about many places in the new stadium. Here's what it looks like from the left field bleachers:

And for more on the atmosphere at the new place check out this very good article from Tyler Kepner. He pretty much hits the nail on the head with this one.

Funny story about the Pena homer: Some drunk idiot Rays fan starts jumping up and down and screaming in some of our faces and he jumped by us (This was when I was standing behind home by the way). His sunglasses fell out of his pocket or off his hat, and landed in front of some fan who decided to smash them into pieces. The drunk idiot didn't even seem to realize that his glasses were now in fifty pieces all over the floor.

Regarding the state of the Yankees they're in a bad place right now, and hopefully it's as bad as it's going to be. Like I said yesterday, nothing has been decided yet, and that is still just as true today as it was yesterday, but, the Yankees better hope that this is their rock bottom. You would think that being without your starting catcher, right fielder, third baseman, setup man, plus your backup third baseman and lefty specialist out of them, plus a four game losing streak would qualify as rock bottom. If it's not, then this will be a long miserable season in The Bronx.

There were many times last season when we fans wondered and hoped that the team had hit rock bottom and would then turn it around. That turnaround never came. Hopefully this year it does.

By the way, how bad has Johnny Damon been in left? Minus his terrible arm, I thought he actually did a good job in left last year, but this year he's been embarrassing. Besides having zero range, his arm is somehow worse than it was last year, and it was already the worst arm in the league last year. If you're wondering about stats, he ranks second to last in UZR with -4.3, ahead of only Delmon Young. And he has the seventh worst UZR/150 with -20.4. In other words, he's been awful. He's hitting the ball well so there isn't much they can do besides keep playing him, but he's costing this team a lot of runs defensively.

The Yankees look to get a split in this short two game series with the Rays. Andy Pettitte starts for the Yanks, with Jeff Niemann going for the Rays.

	AB	R	H	RBI	BB	SO	LOB	AVG
Jeter, SS	5	0	0	0	0	1	2	.267
Damon, LF	4	1	2	0	1	1	0	.290
Teixeira, 1B	5	0	2	3	0	1	2	.209
Matsui, DH	5	0	2	0	0	1	2	.289
Cano, 2B	4	0	1	0	0	0	3	.333
Swisher, RF	3	0	0	0	0	2	0	.279
Gardner, CF	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.231
Cabrera, M, CF-RF	3	0	0	0	1	0	0	.328
Pena, 3B	4	1	1	0	0	0	2	.275
Molina, J, C	4	1	1	0	0	0	2	.262
Totals	37	3	9	3	2	6	13
BATTING 2B: Matsui (6, Sonnanstine), Damon 2 (4, Sonnanstine, Percival), Molina, J (1, Sonnanstine), Teixeira (4, Howell). TB: Damon 4; Teixeira 3; Matsui 3; Cano; Pena; Molina, J 2. RBI: Teixeira 3 (15). 2-out RBI: Teixeira 3. Runners left in scoring position, 2 out: Cano 2; Teixeira; Matsui 2; Molina, J 2. S: Gardner. GIDP: Cano. Team RISP: 1-for-9. Team LOB: 7. FIELDING E: Pena (2, fielding).

RAYS OFFENSE

	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	HR	ERA
Burnett	6.0	6	3	3	2	8	0	5.26
Ramirez, E	1.0	1	0	0	0	2	0	4.63
Albaladejo	1.0	0	0	0	0	0	0	6.43
Rivera	1.0	1	0	0	0	3	0	2.53
Coke (L, 1-2)	1.0	1	1	1	0	1	1	3.86

RAYS PITCHING

PLAYER OF THE GAME: Andy Sonnanstine (7 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 4 K)

HONORABLE MENTION: Carlos Pena (1-for-4, GW HR, RBI, BB)

Yankees vs. Rays @ New Yankee Stadium
Game Time: 7:05 p.m. | TV/Radio: YES, WCBS 880
Andy Pettitte LHP (2-1, 3.82 ERA) vs. Jeff Niemann RHP (2-3, 5.68 ERA)