So let's talk about the Yankees. J.A. Happ started against the San Francisco Giants at newly-renamed Oracle Park yesterday, and he was terrific: 7 innings, no runs, 5 hits, no walks, 2 strikeouts. I'll take a start like that any day.
The start was so good (How good was it?), he probably should have been left in to pitch the 8th inning. He'd only thrown 95 pitches, but that seems to be Brian Cashman's magic number for a pitch limit.
Anyway, the Yankees did hit for him. And walk for him. Cliche Alert: Walks can kill you, especially the leadoff variety. New acquisition Cameron Maybin led off the top of the 3rd by drawing a walk off Giant starter Derek Holland. Happ, batting because it was an Interleague game in a National League team's ballpark, bunted him over. And DJ LeMahieu singled him home. One-nil to the Pinstripe Boys.
The 5th inning was the decisive one. Maybin led off with a single, Thairo Estrada followed with another, Happ sacrificed again, and LeMahieu walked to load the bases. Then Holland hit Luke Voit with a pitch. Not the best way to get an RBI.
Then Holland pitched like his name should have been Derek Italy, or maybe Derek Sweden, because he served an absolute meatball to Gary Sanchez. It was right in his kitchen, and he cooked it. I thought it was going to go into that giant glove behind the left-center field bleachers. Good way to break out of a slump. 6-0 Yankees.
It was still 6-0 when Aaron Boone sent Luis Cessa out to pitch the 8th. He pitched a 1-2-3 inning. Not wanting to exhaust the bullpen, Boone sent Cessa back out to pitch the 9th. It became clear that he should have let Happ keep going through the 8th, and then maybe let Cessa pitch only the 9th.
Cessa gave up singles to Brandon Belt and Buster Posey. He got Evan Longoria, a pain in the Yankees' necks when he played for the Tampa Bay Rays, to ground into a force play at 2nd, making it 1st and 3rd with 1 out. Then he gave up a home run to Yangervis Solarte. Remember him? He got off to a great start as a rookie with the 2014 Yankees, and then Cashman traded him for Chase Headley.
It was 6-3, and the game had suddenly become interesting. Brandon Crawford came up, and hit a long fly out to left. Then came Erik Kratz, and he hit an even longer fly to left. Home run. Now it's 6-4. This game had gotten a little too interesting. Or, as the great comedian Arte Johnson would have said on the late 1960s variety show Laugh-In, "Verrrry intereshting... but shtupid!"
Boone decided his best chance at the game not getting any more interesting was to bring in his closer, Aroldis Chapman. We've seen Chapman fool around in the 9th inning, before getting down to business and finishing it off. This time, he got right down to business, and fanned Pablo Sandoval to end it.
Yankees 6, Giants 4. WP: Happ (1-2). SV: Chapman (5). LP: Holland (1-4).
The series concludes this afternoon. Domingo German starts against Dereck Rodriguez.