There's More for the Yankees' Life With Sears

Brian Cashman's "Bomb the opposition out of the yard, so it doesn't matter how good your pitching is" philosophy often doesn't work. Especially when you get to a game where your starting rotation has a hole in it, and you need to call someone up from the minor leagues. Last night's game against the Oakland Athletics at Yankee Stadium was an example: Rookie JP Sears (like CC Sabathia, no periods) had been called up to start.

It turned out to be the 23rd time in their 1st 75 games this season that the Yankees scored 2 or fewer runs. But the pitching has been good enough that their record in those games is 9-14.

So after Aaron Boone put this game on his Sears card -- I can tell that joke, because I worked at a Sears store for a year and a half -- Sears pitched into the 6th inning, allowing no runs, just 3 hits and 1 walk. The store's old slogan was right on this occasion: "There's more for your life at Sears." Ron Marinaccio, Wandy Peralta and Michael King got the team through the 8th inning with no damage.

But you need to score runs to win. Jose Trevino singled home a run in the 1st inning, and Marwin González hit a home run in the 2nd. The Yankees didn't get many more chances. Isiah Kiner-Falefa got to 2nd base with 1 out in the 5th, and that was as close as they came to a 3rd run.

Clay Holmes has done a fantastic job substituting as the closer during the injury to Aroldis Chapman -- who, it has been suggested, may be activated today. (If he is, then it will probably be Sears who gets sent down to open the roster spot. "Thanks for the win, pal, now get back to Scranton.") But last night, Holmes struggled to finish the game off. He struck out the 1st 2 batters he faced. Then, Trevino committed catcher's interference -- after the Yankees benefited from that call twice in 1 inning the night before. King then allowed 2 singles, leading to a run, before getting a groundout to end it.

Yankees 2, Athletics 1. WP: Sears (3-0). SV: King (13). LP: Frankie Montas (3-8). The Yankees are now 55-20.

The series concludes tonight. Cole starts -- not Gerrit Cole for the Yankees, but Cole Irvin for the A's. The Yankee starter will be Jameson Taillon. Then we go down to Houston for a big, big series against the cheating Astros. The idea of starting Sears last night was to make the Yankee rotation line up better against the Astros this weekend.