Sometimes you just get beat, and the Yankees got beat by the Orioles on Tuesday night. This was one of those boring “that’s baseball” games where the O’s got some timely hits, the Yanks didn’t, and that was that. Know what I mean?
Results Matter
This felt like another one of those starts were CC Sabathia pitched better than the line score indicates. He allowed four runs on seven hits (five singles, one solo homer, one triple) and one walk in seven innings, striking out seven and getting ten ground ball outs compared to four in the air. The O’s scored one run each in the first (Adam Jones homer), third (Jones sac fly), fourth (Caleb Joseph single), and seventh (Everth Cabrera sac fly).
Sabathia threw a first pitch strike to 18 of 29 batters faced and 63 of his 91 total pitches were strikes, including eleven swings and misses. PitchFX says he averaged 89.5 mph with his fastball and mixed his pitches well: 16 four-seamers, 20 sinkers, 24 changeups, and 30 breaking balls. And aside from the Jones homer and Joseph’s triple into right-center field in the seventh, nothing seemed particularly hard hit. But, results matter, and four runs in seven innings wasn’t good enough to win.
Sabathia has 15 strikeouts (28.3%), one walk (1.9%), and a 67.6% ground ball rate through two starts. I feel like if he keeps doing exactly that, he’s going to be successful. It hasn’t happened yet though. Despite the loss I found this start encouraging. Sabathia was efficient and limited hard contact against a very righty heavy lineup. If he can keep doing that, at some point the four runs in seven innings will turn into two runs in seven innings, right? I hope so.
Too Late
Man, it was hard to not notice the Yankees squaring Miguel Gonzalez up in the first and second innings. Chase Headley hit a ball to the warning track that Jones ran down, Carlos Beltran ripped a double off the very top of the right-center field wall, Chris Young drove a pitch into the right field corner for a double, and then Stephen Drew and Didi Gregorius combined to see 13 pitches (five fouls) in their at-bats. Gonzalez was fooling no one.
I saw that and thought good things were coming. The Yankees were going to light Gonzalez up the second time through the order. Instead, he retired nine in a row until Jacoby Ellsbury poked a single just beyond the reach of the second baseman for a leadoff single in the sixth. Ellsbury took second on a wild pitch then scored on Mark Teixeira’s double into the corner for New York’s first run, cutting the deficit to 3-1.
Gonzalez managed to complete seven innings after those ominous first two innings. Kevin Gausman was summoned to pitch the eighth and the Yankees had an easier time handling his mid-90s heat and filthy offspeed pitches than they did Gonzalez’s kitchen sink. Gregorius blooped a single, Headley singled, Beltran drove in Didi with a ground ball, and Teixeira drove in Headley with a double off Alejandro De Aza’s glove in left. They ruled it an error but it was a tough play, De Aza had to run a long way.
The tying run was stranded at second when Brian McCann grounded into the shift against closer Zach Britton. The ninth inning was a little weird. Joe Girardi lifted Garrett Jones for a pinch-hitter against the lefty Britton (good!) and sent Gregorio Petit up instead (bad!). Meanwhile, Alex Rodriguez pinch-hit with two outs and the bases empty. I get saving A-Rod in case there was a man on base, but down a run, I say let the best hitter bat first so he can start the rally. Eh, whatever.
Leftovers
The #obligatoryerrors (plural!) belonged to Sabathia and Gregorius, upping the team’s MLB leading error total to eleven. Sabathia’s error was tough — it was a little ground ball along the first base line in the second inning, and his flip to first hit the runner. He didn’t really have a good angle to make the toss. Didi simply bobbled the transfer on a routine ground ball in the sixth inning.
Chris Martin was the only reliever used and he was damn impressive, striking out Jones and Steve Pearce as part of a perfect inning. He got hit around every time out in Spring Training it seemed, yet here he is throwing mid-90s gas to both sides of the plate with a nasty breaking ball in the regular season. No one knows anything about baseball.
The top four hitters in the lineup went 4-for-16 (.250) and everyone else went 2-for-18 (.111). They went 1-for-8 with runners in scoring position overall, with Beltran and McCann each going hitless in two at-bats in those situations. Gonzalez struck out ten, a new career high. Gross.
Box Score, WPA Graph & Standings
Here are the box score, video highlights, and updated standings. Also make sure you check out our Bullpen Workload and Announcer Standings pages. Where else are going to find how the Yankees’s win-loss record with both Michael Kay and Ken Singleton in the booth? Nowhere. That’s where. Here’s the win probability graph:
Source: FanGraphs
Up Next
The Yankees and Orioles wrap up this three-game series Wednesday night. It’ll be Nathan Eovaldi against Bud Norris. Winner wins the series.
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