After splitting a 4-game series away to the Houston Astros, the Yankees flew to Southern California, to play the Whatever They're Calling Themselves This Season Angels of Anaheim.
CC Sabathia started on Monday night, and pitched as well as he has all season, but the Yankees didn't back him up. He pitched 7 1/3rd innings, allowing 4 runs on 6 hits and 1 walk -- but no more than 1 run in any inning.
Brett Gardner went 3-for-5, but with no RBIs. Carlos Beltran (who was placed on the Disabled List this afternoon) went 2-for-4, but with no RBIs. The only other Yankee hit was an RBI single by Alex Rodriguez in the 3rd inning.
Angels 4, Yankees 1. WP: C.J. Wilson (6-6). SV: Huston Street (22). LP: Sabathia (3-8, and half of those losses have hardly been his fault -- but the other half have).
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Ivan Nova made his 2nd post-injury start on Tuesday night. Joe Girardi only allowed him to pitch into the 6th inning, allowing 2 runs on 8 hits and 2 walks. Again, the Yankees didn't back their pitcher up with runs.
Mark Teixeira led off the top of the 2nd with a home run, his 19th of the season. Gardner singled to center in the 3rd. Chase Headley drew a walk in the 5th. Gardner reached 1st on a dropped 3rd strike in the 6th. Teixeira led off the 7th with a walk. Didi Gregorius reached on an error in the 8th.
And that was it. Just 6 baserunners in he entire game -- only 2 of them hits. The last 3 runners were all erased on double plays.
Nova "lost" the game in the bottom of the 6th, giving up back-to-back home runs by Albert Pujols and Erick Aybar. It wasn't fair. Angels 2, Yankees 1. WP: Andrew Heaney (1-0). SV: Street (23). LP: Nova (1-1).
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The Yankees absolutely had to get some runs on Wednesday. They had finished June just 4 games over .500, 41-37. Fortunately, the American League Eastern Division was still as tight as the Wilpons' wallets.
Naturally, I figured, if the Yankees did score a lot of runs this time, they wouldn't get the pitching. Or the defense.
Thankfully, I was wrong. Nathan Eovaldi was scorching as July began, pitching into the 6th, and reaching 100 miles per hour on the radar gun. Aside from a Mike Trout homer off Justin Wilson in the 8th, the Yankee pitching of Eovaldi, Chasen Shreve, Wilson and Dellin Betances was very good: 9 innings, 1 run, only 6 hits, 5 walks. And the Yankee defense played errorless baseball.
Now, about those runs: Gregorius led off the 3rd with a single. Stephen Drew sacrificed him over to 2nd. Gardner's grounder to 1st allowed him to reach 3rd. Headley singled him home. 1-0 Yankees.
With 2 outs in the top of the 6th, Garrett Jones hit a home run. 2-0 Yankees.
With 1 out in the top of the 8th, Brian McCann singled. Jones drew a walk. Chris Young singled to load the bases. Gregorius singled to score McCann. But no other runs could come home, and when Trout took that run back in the bottom of the 8th, the uh-ohs came to us.
But Betances finished it off. Yankees 3, Angels 1. WP: Eovaldi (8-2). SV: Betances (7). LP: Matt Shoemaker (4-7).
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Coming into tonight's action, the Yankees are tied for 1st in the AL East with the Baltimore Orioles. The Tampa Bay Rays and Toronto Blue Jays, for all their respective troubles, are just 1 game behind the Yanks and O's, although they're 2 back in the loss column, as the Yanks and O's have 2 games in hand on them. The Boston Red Sox are 6 games back, 7 in the loss column. (Serves the bastards right.) Only the Oakland Athletics have a worse record in the AL.
Tonight, the Yankees are home again, to begin a 3-game series against the Rays. Here are the projected starting pitchers:
Tonight, 7:05: Masahiro Tanaka vs. Chris Archer.
Tomorrow, 1:05: Michael Pineda vs. Nathan Karns.
Sunday, 1:05: The Yankees have not yet announced a starter, but it would most likely be Sabathia, vs. Erasmo Ramirez.
Come on you Pinstripes!
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