Source: FanGraphs
Two games and two wins in the second half so far. Both have been come from behind wins too, raising the the Yankees’ league-leading total to 29. Let’s recap Saturday afternoon’s game…
- Oppo: When you’re hot, you’re hot, and Robinson Cano is hot right now. He extended his hitting streak to 17 games with an opposite field two-run homer in the very first inning, a ball that literally bounced off the top of the wall in front of the visitor’s bullpen. I’m kinda surprised Mike Trout didn’t put on his Superman cape and bring that one back, it was definitely playable had he gotten there in time.
- Sweaty: It was an ugly outing for Freddy Garcia, but not as far as the results go. Three runs in five innings hardly qualifies as a disaster. It was ugly in the sense that the Angels had runners on-base all afternoon long and he was constantly pitching through danger. Garcia walked five and only struck out four while giving up five hits (one double and four singles) and three steals (two to Trout). I’ve stopped caring about Freddy’s process a long time ago, this was a veteran guy grinding away against a good hitting team. I’ll take that from my fifth starter any day of the week.
- Grandyman: You gotta love the timing. The YES booth was ragging on Curtis Granderson’s swing for being too loopy in the third, saying he was missing hittable pitches and striking out too much. Grandy responded by shutting them up with a two-run homer into the second deck in right, a blast that turned a 2-2 game into a 4-2 game. Believe it or not, that was Grandy’s first homer in July and just his third in the last 22 games. Get hot, Curtis.
- Bullpen: Big ups to the relief corps. The trio of Cody Eppley, David Robertson, and Rafael Soriano took care of business after Freddy left the game. Eppley fired two key scoreless innings before Robertson and Rafi did their thing in the eighth and ninth. All told, they threw four scoreless frames with two baserunners — two singles — and four strikeouts. The bullpen wasn’t the story of the game, but it was an unsung hero.
- Leftovers: The top four hitters in the lineup combined to go 6-for-16 (.375) with two homers and a double while the bottom five hitters went 2-for-14 (.143) … Alex Rodriguez had that double and came around to score a big insurance run in the sixth, plus he stole his team-leading tenth base (in eleven attempts) … the offense collectively went 3-for-5 with runners in scoring position less than 24 hours after putting on a RISPFAIL clinic.
MLB.com has the box score and video highlights, FanGraphs the advanced stats, and ESPN the updated standings. The Orioles walked off against the Tigers, so New York’s lead in the division still sits at eight games. The Yankees will look to finish off the sweep against Jered Weaver on Sunday afternoon, sending Ivan Nova to the mound. Check out RAB Tickets if you want to catch that one.