The day started with the 70th annual Old Timers’ Day ceremony and ended with the Yankees’ second straight loss to the Tigers. The final score was 4-1. At least Hideki Matsui hit a homer during the Old Timers’ Game. That was cool. The 2016 Yankees once again fell below .500 though. They’re 31-32.
Pineda Does His Part
Third straight strong start for Michael Pineda, who held the Tigers to two runs on six hits and two walks in six innings. It wasn’t like they hit him hard either. Detroit scored their first run on a ground ball single, an infield single, a soft line drive single, and a sac fly to center. They scored their second round on a walk, a ground ball single, and a ground out. The hardest hit ball against Pineda all afternoon was probably the sac fly, and it was a routine catch.
In those six innings Pineda fanned eight and got 19 swings and misses out of 114 total pitches. That’s an awful lot. It was his sixth game with 18+ whiffs so far this season. Pineda’s 12.9% strikeout rate is the sixth highest in baseball in 2016, which makes his early season struggles that much more frustrating. The stuff is clearly high-end. He was getting burned by too many mistake pitches. Pineda seems to have found something these last three starts. Hopefully he continues to build on it.
Shut Down By Fulmer
Right-hander Michael Fulmer, who went to the Tigers in the Yoenis Cespedes trade, went into Sunday’s start with a 22 innings scoreless streak. It is now at 28 and counting. He completely shut the Yankees down over his six innings, allowing only two hits and three walks. The Bombers had leadoff doubles in the third and fifth innings, and failed to score both times. Blah.
The Yankees had their best chance to make it a game in that fifth inning, when they loaded the bases with two outs. Austin Romine led off with a ground-rule double, and after Aaron Hicks popped out and Rob Refsnyder grounded out, Jacoby Ellsbury and Brett Gardner drew walks. They were completely different walks too. Ellsbury walked on four pitches, none of which was close. Gardner fouled off five pitches as part of a ten-pitch at-bat.
That brought Carlos Beltran to the plate with the bases loaded and a 2-0 deficit, and he is exactly the guy the Yankees want up in that situation. Fulmer worked Beltran over all afternoon — he struck him out feebly his first two times up — and he was able to keep the Yankees off the board by getting Carlos to fly out to center. Fulmer sure is mighty impressive, huh? The Mets have cranked out some big time power arms of late.
Leftovers
The Yankees scored their lone run in the eighth inning off former Yankee Justin Wilson. Ellsbury singled, Beltran walked, then Chase Headley singled to score Ellsbury. Ellsbury and Headley were the only Yankees to reach base twice in the game. Ellsbury had a single and a walk, Headley had a single and a hit-by-pitch.
The middle relief monster struck out again. First one out of the bullpen with a 2-0 deficit in the seventh inning was Anthony Swarzak, who promptly gave up a two-run homer to Ian Kinsler to put the game out of reach. The team’s non-big three relievers have a 4.61 ERA in 113.1 innings.
And finally, ex-Tigers farmhand Chad Green got a chance to pitch against the Tigers after warming up Saturday. Green struck out one in a perfect ninth. His reward? A trip to Triple-A. He was sent down after the game, presumably to make room on the roster for just signed Ike Davis.
Box Score, WPA Graph & Standings
ESPN has both the box score and updated standings, and MLB.com has the video highlights. Also make sure you check out our Bullpen Workload and Announcer Standings pages. Here’s the WPA graph:
Source: FanGraphs
Up Next
An off-day, finally. The Yankees went 23-17 during this 40 games in 41 days stretch and will now get a day to catch their breath. I think everyone needs the off-day, fans included. The Yankees open a quick two-game series with the Rockies in Colorado on Tuesday night. Nathan Eovaldi and Jorge De La Rosa is the scheduled pitching matchup.
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