What a terrible weekend for watching baseball on television. First, we had to suffer through the chuckle heads on Fox on Saturday. Then on Sunday we were inflicted with four-ish hours of Tweedle-Dum and Tweedle-Dee courtesy of ESPN. No doubt, there was a sense of foreboding as we headed into the start of the game but you block out how horrific it's going to be until Tweedle-Dum starts talking and then won't shut up and finally lays down such astute observations as: Because A-Rod is batting second he won't be able to hit a three-run home run to tie the game and then? Then it all comes rushing back to you.
At least they won. It wasn't a good, clean win but it was a win.
Nobody pitched well in the game. Matsuzaka who had impressed in his last two starts did little to improve on that impression today. He threw five innings and needed 116 pitches to get himself out of there. He couldn't find the strike zone and ended up striking out only two of the twenty-five batters he faced. Meanwhile, he walked six of them. The upside to his poor pitching was that it seemed to confuse the Yankee bats. So much so that they were swinging away at anything that was remotely close to the strike zone and, therefore, weren't getting good hits. They ended up with a grand total of five hits off fifteen balls put into play. He ended up allowing four runs, two of which started off as walks.
He was replaced by Aardsma who pitched two innings of scoreless ball. He walked two without striking out anyone or allowing any hits. Mike Timlin came in to replace him and his struggles continued. He faced three batters and gave up a home run (Giambi), and two base hits (Molina and Gonzalez) before Francona thought better of having him out there. Lopez was brought in instead and didn't do too badly. He pitched his was out of Timlin's jam with a double play and a put out at first. What's more he didn't walk anyone or give up any hits. Most impressive? The three outs he got were all off lefties. Manny Delcarmen finished off the game (the last two outs of the ninth.) He struck out Rodriguez and after a long battle got Matsui out at first.
There was some aggressive small ball being played. Coco laid down a bunt and stole second base (twice.) Ellsbury also had a steal, as did Pedroia. There was, maybe, a moment of bad baserunning on Pedroia's part. In the third inning when he hit the ball off the wall I thought double. Clearly, he did too. Matsui, on the other hand, he thought not. He played the ball really well and launched it to second base for the out (see photo.) Maybe because it was getting late or maybe because I had probably been listening to the Tweedle brothers babble on for a couple hours at that point but the play really tickled me when Pedroia yelled into somebody's mic: "Safe! No!" in a really high-pitched, whiny voice. Coupled with the fact that he was lying prone on the ground it looked and sounded like he was about to have a temper tantrum. I giggled about that for awhile.
The runs they did score came primarily off the walks issued by Phil Hughes in the early going. In the first, Manny knocked one in with a base hit and Youkilis with a sacrifice fly. (Manny came around to score on a passed ball.) In the second inning, Youkilis knocked another walk in with a base hit. (Casey had an RBI, Youkilis came around to score on another passed ball, and Ellsbury also had an RBI before the inning was over.)
After the second inning, they didn't score again until the eighth. The eighth inning was a strange affair. Posada hasn't been catching because of shoulder issues that prevent him from throwing. During the fourth inning their backup catcher, Molina, either pulled or strained his hamstring, he soldiered on through the pain but after he got the hit off Timlin it became clear to Girardi that he couldn't continue so he had Betemit pinch run for him. This move, while certainly nice, basically left them without a functioning catcher for the bottom half of the eighth inning. Posada armored-up and knowing he couldn't throw, they ran on him. Coco laid down a bunt, proceeded to steal second, was moved over to third by a fly out by Lugo, and came across the plate on a sacrifice fly by Ellsbury. Pedroia got a base hit and then stole second but was stranded there when Drew flew out to left.
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