I Hate L.A. I Hate Not Hitting. And I Hate the Transfer Window.

Randy Newman has written a lot of great songs, and the score for The Natural. So as far as I'm concerned, at least professionally, he can do whatever he wants.

But he can start by taking his song "I Love L.A." and shoving it.

Yeah, I know, it doesn't put Los Angeles in a great light. But I still hate L.A.

I hate the Dodgers and I hate the Lakers and I hate the Kings. When the Raiders were there, I hated them, too. (I still do, although I don't hate Oakland as a city.) I hate the city's superficiality and the fact that, until the early 1990s, they refused to acknowledge that not everybody had a car and that a subway system was needed.

That the Dodgers have been in L.A. for more than half a century is a slap in the face to everyone who ever loved them in their Brooklyn phase -- and, while you've got to be at least 65 years old to really remember those days well, there are still lots of people who cared about Brooklyn fans, and the very existence of the Los Angeles Dodgers is an affront to them.

Did L.A. deserve a Major League Baseball team? Certainly. But they should have gotten their own. If Walter O'Malley is to blame for moving the Dodgers out of Brooklyn (and he is, don't let these revisionist bastards tell you otherwise, look at the facts), the City of Los Angeles is also to blame for giving him the easiest means to do so.

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But, putting aside my irrational reasons for not liking Los Angeles, the Yankees needed a win last night. And got the necessary pitching. But, once again, they didn't hit.

Don't tell me that Zack Greinke is a great pitcher. His career record, counting last night, is 99-81, a winning percentage of .550, an ERA of 3.75, a WHIP of 1.246. In contrast, last night's Yankee starter, Andy Pettitte, has a record of 252-150, a WP of .627, ERA 3.87, WHIP 1.352. And Greinke has pitched a grand total of 16 2/3 postseason innings. Andy pitched more than that in the postseasons of 1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2003, 2005 and 2009. He's proven himself a great pitcher.

Don't tell me Greinke has a Cy Young Award: Much better pitchers than Greinke don't, and some forgotten names do, like Dean Chance, Mike McCormick, Mark Davis.

Don't tell me that Greinke is a great pitcher. The Yankees have hit better pitchers than Greinke is many a postseason. The Yankees should hit anybody.

Greinke pitched 7 innings, allowing 2 runs on 5 hits and no walks. Pettitte pitched 7 innings, allowing 2 runs on 8 hits and no walks. Their starts last night, in the same stadium, off the same mound, in the same weather conditions, were functionally the same. Greinke is 29, so he should be at or near his physical peak. Pettitte is 41, and has thrown over 3,500 innings in his career, counting the postseason, and by nearly every measure we usually see, should be done.

The Yankees got a solo home run from Lyle Overbay in the 2nd (his 12th homer of the season), a leadoff double in the 4th, by Alfonso Soriano that led to a wild pitch and an RBI groundout by Overbay, and a one-out double by Ichiro Suzuki in the 7th. But that was pretty much it. The Yankees didn't even really strand all that many runners.

David Robertson pitched a perfect 8th, but Kenley Jansen pitched a perfect 9th for the Dodgers. Shawn Kelley got the first out in the bottom of the 9th, but allowed a single to Andre Ethier. Kelley struck out Juan Uribe, who had homered earlier, but Ethier stole 2nd, and Mark Ellis singled him home.

Dodgers 3, Yankees 2. WP: Jansen (4-3). No save. LP: Kelley (3-1, and he didn't deserve it).

The Red Sox and Rays both won last night, so the Yankees are now 8 1/2 games out of 1st, 8 in the loss column.

The trading deadline is this afternoon at 4:00. And to make matters worse, the Sox pulled a 3-team trade that brought in former San Diego Padre ace Jake Peavy, who seemed to be wasted with the Chicago White Sox. The Scum have improved for the stretch run; the Yankees, Soriano aside, have not. And, as of this writing, they have a little over 6 hours to do so.

The brief 2-game series with the Bums concludes tonight, with Hiroki Kuroda going against Clayton Kershaw -- at this point, each team's ace. Not quite a classic Dodger Stadium matchup of Sandy Koufax vs. Juan Marichal or Bob Gibson, since they didn't have Interleague play in those days. But it will have to do.

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In case you're wondering, I'm not going to do a post on the A-Rod situation until I know what that is: How long his suspension is, and precisely why. I want to know what MLB has on him, and whether the punishment fits the crime -- or the "crime," as the case may be. Until then, it's all just speculation, and to comment on it makes a blogwriter look like one of these yutzes yammering about European soccer's transfer window.

Which is currently ongoing, and, no, Arsenal haven't signed a "big name striker" yet, nor should they, because they don't need one. And even if they did, none of the available strikers is worth the money and/or the aggravation they'd bring. So forget Wayne Rooney and Luis Suarez.  Let those overrated troublemakers go elsewhere.