It Is What You Want

Former Yankee manager Joe Girardi once described a lost game at a press conference as follows: "It's not what you want."

What you do want is a good all-around performance that leads to a win. That's what the Yankees got at Comerica Park in Detroit last night.

The rebound of Luis Severino continues. He was allowed to throw 88 pitches, and 60 of them were for strikes. He went 5 innings, allowing 1 run on 7 hits and 2 walks, with 3 strikeouts. He allowed a double, 2 singles and a walk to start the bottom of the 2nd, but got out of it with just the 1 run thanks to a play at 3rd base, a caught stealing, and a groundout.

When he struck out Jonathan Schoop -- who used to hit the Yankees hard with the Baltimore Orioles -- to end the 5th inning, he pumped his fist. Really, it was his whole body that was pumped. He deserved to be the winning pitcher.

He wasn't. Chad Green allowed a 2-run double to Harold Castro in the bottom of the 6th, to blow the lead.

Fortunately, the Yankees had a lead to blow. Isiah Kiner-Falefa led off the top of the 3rd with a double. Kyle Higashioka drew a walk. After an Aaron Hicks lineout, Aaron Judge doubled IFK home. A groundout by Anthony Rizzo got Higgy home. And Rizzo hit a home run in the top of the 6th, so, at the end of that inning, it was tied, 3-3.

Cliché Alert: Walks can kill you, especially the leadoff variety. Josh Donaldson led off the top of the 7th with a walk. Tim LoCastro was sent in to pinch-run for him. With Gleyber Torres up, an error led to 1st and 3rd with nobody out. IFK singled LoCastro home to make it 4-3 Yankees. So now, Green stood to be the winning pitcher. Not really fair, but, as current Yankee manager Aaron Boone would say, "It is what it is." And the Yankees had the lead, so it is what you want.

Jonathan Loáisiga pitched a perfect 7th. In the 8th, the Yankees got another run on a fielder's choice, and Clay Holmes pitched a perfect inning. Aroldis Chapman came on for the 9th, and, Cliché Alert: He never makes it easy for us. He allowed a leadoff single to Willi Castro. (Although he was pinch-hitting for Harold Castro, they are not related.) But Chapman got the next 3 men out -- uncharacteristically, none via a strikeout.

I don't care, as long as we get the lead and the 27 outs, any way we can. Within the rules, of course: We are not the Boston Red Sox, or the Houston Astros.

Yankees 5, Tigers 3. WP: Green (1-1). SV: Chapman (3). LP: Drew Hutchison (0-1, a Yankee farmhand in 2019, but he never got into a game with us).

The series concludes this afternoon. Jordan Montgomery starts against former Yankee Michael Pineda. Miguel Cabrera enters the game with 2,999 career hits. So he has a chance at Number 3,000 today. In 1979, Carl Yastrzemski joined the 3,000 Hit Club against the Yankees' Jim Beattie.