The New York Yankees split a doubleheader with the Los Angeles Dodgers

The New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers played two games on Wednesday. They played at 1:00PM and 7:00PM. Hiroki Kuroda started the first game and pitched really well and Phil Hughes pitched the second game and didn’t pitch so well. The games were played at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, New York.

Kuroda pitched 6 2/3 innings giving up eight hits and two runs with a walk and two strikeouts. Kuroda earned his seventh victory of the season, Kelley pitched to one batter and struck him out, Preston Claiborne pitched 1/3 of an inning giving up two hits and two runs and David Robertson pitched 2/3 of an inning walking two batters. Mariano Rivera picked up his 25th save of the season pitching a perfect inning with a couple of strikeouts.

In the nightcap Phil Hughes pitched six innings giving up ten hits and five runs with three strikeouts and Adam Warren pitched three innings giving up two hits and a run with a strikeout.

Jayson Nix, Lyle Overbay and Robinson Cano each had a hit in the nightcap. The Yankees were 0-3 and left three men on base. Brett Gardner, Nix and Cano each had a hit in the day game. Cano drew a walk, Thomas Neal had a hit and Ichiro Suzuki had three hits and three RBI. Overbay had a hit and two RBI, Chris Stewart drew a walk and Overbay hit a double. Suzuki hit a homerun and the Yankees were 2-9 with runners in scoring position and left eight men on base. Gardner had an outfield assist.

In the day game Overbay hit a two run double in the second inning to give the Yankees a 2-0 lead. Suzuki hit a solo homerun in the sixth to extend the lead to 3-0. In the seventh A.J. Ellis hit a sacrifice fly to cut the lead to 3-1 and Jerry Hairston Jr. hit an RBI single to make it a 3-2 game. In the seventh Wells reached on a throwing error, which scored a run. Suzuki hit a two run single and it was a 6-2 game. Hanley Ramirez hit a two run homerun in the eighth to make it a 6-4 game and that was the final score.

In the nightcap Adrian Gonzalez hit an RBI single and Ramirez hit an RBI single in the first to give the Dodgers a 2-0 lead. Andre Ethier hit an RBI double to extend the lead to 3-0 in the third. Ramirez hit an RBI single and Hairston hit a sacrifice fly in the fifth to make it a 5-0 game. Puig hit a solo homerun in the seventh to complete the scoring. The final score was 6-0 Dodgers.

The two teams split the two game series and the Yankees will remain at home to begin a four game series with the Tampa Bay Rays on Thursday night. The Yankees record is now 39-32 and the Dodgers record is 30-40.

Regular Season Game 10-Rangers at Yankees

The New York Yankees will take on the Texas Rangers in game 1 of a 3 game series. This game is weather permitting as their are thunderstorms in the forecast and a 80 percent chance of rain. I looked outside and it is dark out there. Here are the lineups and some notes for the game if it is played tonight. Yankees Lineup: Jeter(SS) Johnson(DH) Tex(1B) A-rod(3B) Cano(2B) Swisher(RF) Thames(LF) Granderson(CF) Cervelli(C) CC Sabathia is starting opposite C.J. Wilson for the Rangers. The Yankees are 6-3 which is their best 9 game start since 2003 when they were 8-1. They won their first 3 series for first time since 2003. Robinson Cano completed his 5th multi homerun game last night. Granderson tripled twice in same game for 5th time in his career. Cano and Jeter have both hit safely in first 9 games, the last yankees teammates to do that were Jeter and Matsui in 2006. No Yankees teammates have ever done it in the first 10 games. Yesterdays game marked the first time a yankee had 2 homeruns and another had 2 triples in the same game since 4/24/60 when Elston Howard and Tony Kubeck did it. Joe Girardi needs 2 more wins for 200 in his career as a manager. Jeter is 2 doubles shy of tying Don Mattingly with 442 for 3rd on alltime Yankees list.

Some things I missed over the weekend

The Baseball Writers Of American announced the nominees for induction into the Baseball Hall Of Fame for 2010. The nominees are as follows: Bert Blyleven Andre Dawson Roberto Alomar Barry Larkin Pet Hentgen Fred McGriff Edgar Martinez Andres Galaraga Kevin Appier Mike Jackson Shane Reynolds Todd Zeile David Segui Robin Ventura Ellis Burks Ray Lankford Lee Smith Jack Morris Dale Murphy Dave Parker Tim Raines Don Mattingly Mark McGwire Alan Trammell Harold Baines There are 15 first timers on this list, the closest to getting in are Andre Dawson and Bert Blyleven. In order to be eligible you have to be retired for 5 years and in order to stay on the ballot you need 5 percent of the vote and then you can stay on for up to 15 years. Results will be announced on Wed Jan 6, 2010. I am a tough grader and on this list I really don't see many Hall Of Famers, my favorite player of all time is Don Mattingly and I wish he could get in but he just doesn't have the numbers for long enough unfortunately. I can see Dawson and Blyleven and Jack Morris should probably get in. There are a lot of players on here that I say wow good solid players but that is different from Hall Of Famer. I think Hall of Fame as Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Yogi Berra, A-rod, Honus Wagner, Roberto Clemente guys like that. I think it has been watered down and should be the best of the best. Rickey Henderson got in last year and that was a no brainer to me. Roy Halladay apparently on Friday said he would waive his no trade clause to go to the Yankees not suprisingly. This to me is not big news but intersting anyway. Alex Gonzalez signed with Toronto leaving the Red Sox scrambling again for a shortstop. They will probably end up signing Marco Scutaro away from the Jays. He had a career year last year with them. The New Jersey Nets tied the record by going 0-17, they can break the record with a loss Wed at home against the Dallas Mavericks. This actually happened officially today but was gaining steam over the weekend. Charlie Weis has been fired as Head Coach of Notre Dame.

Joe Torre Safe At home Dinner

Joe Torre had his annual Safe At Home Foundation Dinner last night at the Chelsea Piers. He of course had a lot of Yankees there and revealed that he was rooting for the Yankees in the World Series. He did say it was "surreal" to see the Yankees winning the World Series without him. Joe Torre said "but to watch what they've done, and especially with Joe Girardi at the helm, it really made me feel good even though I'm supposed to be a National League fan. When you're as close to these guys as I have been for all these years, I was just real pleased for them." It looks like after saying he would be done after this upcoming season that he is trying to extend his deal for another year. I can only say poor Don Mattingly it looks like Joe Torre may be one of those guys you have to rip the uniform off of him before he retires. Don Mattingly has been so loyal to him and saying all the right things. I know it was never formally said that Mattingly would take over but everyone has basically said that and been led to believe that but how long will Donnie Baseball have to wait. I know he did interview for the Cleveland and I think Washington job but didn't get them so he will continue on as the hitting coach for Joe Torre and the Dodgers.

Yanks take series and secure winning roadtrip

The Yankees defeated the Toronto Blue Jays tonight by the score of 3-2. I am not happy with the offense doing nothing against Brian Tallett but a win is a win. CC Sabathia pitched great again tonight throwing 8 innings of 2 run ball. He gave up 5 hits and 4 walks but also struck out 5. He was in control all night. Mo finished it off looking like the old MO 1-2-3 on 11 pitches with a strikeout to end the game. Hideki Matsui was the star of the game with the game winning homerun. A-rod had no hits but was robbed of a double and just missed 2 homeruns driving the ball to the warning track and the wall. Derek Jeter had a rbi single. Francisco Cervelli continued to be impressive with a couple of hits and a nice tag out at home plate off a Gardner throw. Johnny Damon had a double in the first inning to tie the Yankees team record for 10 consecutive games with a extra base hit. He tied Don Mattingly and Paul O-Neill who also did the same thing. Johnny will try to break the record tomorrow at home. The Yankees will now head home for a long 10 game homestand and the chance to play well and keep moving forward and get healthy.

Mo Blows game but he is not to blame

The story of the game will be that Mariano Rivera blew a two run lead with two outs in the ninth giving up a two run homerun to Jason Bay to tie the game and lead to a walkoff homerun in extra innings and the Yankees losing the game. I don't think anyone ever expects Mariano Rivera to blow a save especially a two run save with two outs but he is human and the Red Sox know him better then any other team. The real story of the game is the Yankees continued inability to score runs with runners in scoring position. The New York Yankees coming into the game were third worst in the league with runners in scoring position and then went out and were four for nineteen last night with runners in scoring position. This is unacceptable and just shouldn't continue to happen for this team, they don't do the little things right, I like the fact that Joe Girardi trys and steal, hit and run and bunt when he can but when they need a sac fly they don't get it or when they need a ground ball they don't get it. I blame one guy and that is the hitting coach Kevin Long, I still don't know how this guy has a job as I think he is just horrible, last year was bad and he had the excuse of the injuries but there is no excuse this year, No A-rod I know but they have everone else and this just can't continue. I think this team is too focused on hitting homeruns and not the little basehit or sac fly. A perfect example was last night in the ninth inning when they had a 4-2 lead and the bases loaded and no outs. Robinson Cano was up and instead of hitting the ball in the air what does he do, hits it to second with the infield in for a 4-2-3 double play. How can Cano even think of hitting the ball on the ground, because he is trying to pull the ball through the hole and getting two rbis, Kevin Long should be telling him before he comes up, you need to hit a fly ball. I know he is a major leaguer and shouldn't need to be told but what is the hitting coach for then. I just think it is the whole approach and he doesn't drill into these guys the little things like that, if they hit two fly balls and take a 6-2 lead instead of 4-2 then they win the game but once Boston got out of that mess they felt they had a chance and took advantage of it. I don't know how much longer this can go on but at some point this season if this continues I wonder if the talk of Kevin Long getting fired will heat up, Don Mattingly would never let this happen but I don't think he would come back.

Yankees Season Preview

I thought since the Yankees were off today and there was no news, tonight was a good time to do this mini preview. The Yankees are in the toughest division in baseball and it won't be easy but I think they will win the division winning 97 games. The way I look at it is that even without Arod for probably a month, the additions of Posada and Matsui and having Tex plus the pitching makes up for it. The Yankees won 89 games last year with no Matsui or Posada and Pavano, Ponson, Rasner, Giese making a lot of their starts. I don't know how that team won 89 games. That is enough about last year, lets talk about this year. I am going to project what I think will be the opening day roster and here it is: Starting Pitchers 1.CC Sabathia 2. Ching Ming Wang 3. AJ Burnett 4. Andy Pettitte 5. Joba Chamberlain I think this is the best starting pitching the Yankees have had in years. I can see CC and Wang winning 18-20 games each. Burnett I see winning 16 or 17 games, Andy Pettitte 15 and Joba 12. Ok on to the relievers: Relief Pitchers Closer:MO Setup Man: Brian Bruney Setup Man: Damaso Marte Middle Relief:Jose Veras Middle Relief:Edwar Ramirez All purpose Reliever:Phil Coke Long Man: Alfredo Aceves I love this bullpen, the guys are young and what I love is that if anyone fails they can send them down and replace them with other guys like Albaladejo, Melancon, Claggett, Jackson, JB Cox etc. Starting Lineup: 1b-Mark Teixera 2b-Robinson Cano ss-Derek Jeter 3b-Arod/Cody Ransom for the 1st month C-Jorge Posada LF-Johnny Damon CF-Brett Gardner RF-Nick Swisher DH-Hideki Matsui Bench: Xavier Nady Melky Cabrera Angel Berroa-for the 1st month at least until Arod comes back Jose Molina I dont think you can complain about this lineup, yes without Arod it will hurt but I actually think Cody Ransom is going to do better then people think. He plays good defense and I think he will hit 280 or 290. Mark Teixera is a huge addition to this team in many ways, he is going to bring defense to first base that we haven't seen since Tino left and really Don Mattingly, that is how good this guy is with the glove and hitting well he is just a switch hitting power, high OBP and hits for average. I don't think you can ask for much more. I think Cano will have a bounce back year at second all around, Jeter will be Jeter and Arod when he comes back will go on a tear. I think Posada will be healthy and make that position so much better then last year. I think Damon will have a good year and if Gardner can just slap at the ball and get on base 350+ he will be fine in CF. I think between Nady and Swisher they will have 30-40 combined hrs and 100+rbis and better defense out there then Abreu. I think Matsui will be healthy only being the DH and will be back to hitting around 300 with some power and a good clutch hitter. The bench is better then it has been in years with Swish or Nady on the bench, Melky, Jose Molina and Cody Ransom or for the first month Angel Berroa. I think this team is a cohesive group and Girardi will be better in his second year with more to work with and they have a great shot at getting to the World Series.