The New York Mets are blown out by the Los Angeles Dodgers

The New York Mets were defeated by the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday night.  The game took place at Citi Field in Flushing, New York and the final score was 9-4.  Rafael Montero started and wasn't very good, the bullpen was pretty good and Curtis Granderson had three hits. 

Montero pitched 4 1/3 innings giving up seven hits and five runs.  He walked four and struck out four and lost his second game of the season.  Jeurys Familia pitched 2/3 of an inning giving up a hit, Carlos Torres pitched an inning giving up three hits and a run with two strikeouts and Daisuke Matsuzaka pitched 1 2/3 innings giving up a walk.  Scott Rice walked the only guy that he faced, Jose Valverde pitched 2/3 of an inning giving up two hits and two runs with a strikeout and Josh Edgin pitched 2/3 of an inning giving up two hits and a run. 

Josh Beckett won his second game of the season pitching five innings and giving up eight hits and four runs.  He walked two and struck out six, J.P. Howell pitched 1 1/3 innings giving up two hits and striking out three, Chris Withrow pitched 2/3 of an inning and Brian Wilson pitched an inning giving up a hit and striking out one.  Kenley Jansen pitched an inning striking out two. 

Eric Young Jr. had a hit and drew a walk, David Wright had a hit and Granderson had three hits and an RBI.  Chris Young had a hit, Lucas Duda had a hit and two RBI and Wilmer Flores had a hit, an RBI and drew a walk.  Juan Centeno had a hit, Eric Campbell had a hit and Bobby Abreu had a hit.  Granderson and C. Young each hit a double.  Granderson and Duda each hit a homerun and the Mets were 3-11 with runners in scoring position and left ten men on base.  Young Jr. had a stolen base, Centeno committed an error and Granderson had an outfield assist. 

Dee Gordon had a hit, an RBI and drew a walk, Yasiel Puig had three hits, an RBI and drew a walk and Hanley Ramirez had a hit, an RBI and drew a walk.  Adrian Gonzalez had three hits, two RBI and drew a walk.  Matt Kemp had two hits, Carl Crawford had two hits, an RBI and drew a walk and Juan Uribe had two hits and an RBI.  A.J. Ellis drew a walk, Beckett had a hit and an RBI and Andre Ethier had an RBI.  Gonzalez, Kemp, Puig and Uribe each hit a double.  Gonzalez hit a homerun and the Dodgers were 7-14 with runners in scoring position and left 12 men on base.  Crawford had two stolen bases. 

In the second Beckett hit an RBI single giving the Dodgers a 1-0 lead.  The Mets tied the game in the bottom of the second on a Flores RBI single.  In the fifth Gonzalez hit a two run homerun, Crawford hit an RBI single and Uribe hit an RBI single to give the Dodgers a 5-1 lead.  Ramirez hit an RBI single in the sixth to increase the lead to 6-1.  In the bottom of the sixth Granderson hit a solo homerun and Duda hit a two run homerun to cut the lead to 6-4.  In the ninth Ethier reached on a fielder's choice and a run scored, Gordon hit an RBI single and Puig hit an RBI single to give the Dodgers a 9-4 lead.  The final score of the game was 9-4.  The two teams will play game two of the three game series on Wednesday night. 

Blockbust deal between Dodgers and Red Sox is completed

There was a blockbuster deal between the Boston Red Sox and Los Angeles Dodgers which was completed on Friday and made official on Saturday.  The final hurdles were getting Josh Beckett and Carl Crawford to waive their no trade clauses.  The medicals also had to be signed off on.  This is one big deal that is hard to fathom but it was accomplished. 

The Dodgers who have a new ownership group led by Magic Johnson are trying to make a splash and boy are they ever.  They aquired Hanley Ramirez from the Miami Marlins last month and now this.  They should be the favorite to win the NL West now and they trail the San Francisco Giants by a couple of games. 

The Red Sox are cleaning house and starting over.  I think from their perspective it is the right way to go.  They are saving so much money and won't be hamstrung now from doing other things.  They weren't going to win with that group that didn't want to play for Bobby Valentine and also collapsed last year leading to Terry Francona getting fired.  The Red Sox are a real mess but now they can rebuild and try to bring them back to prominance, it may take a few years but they feel in the long run it will be worth it. 

The deal is Adrian Gonzales who the Dodgers were looking at since April, Josh Beckett, Carl Crawford and Nick Punto.  The Red Sox get back James Loney who is a first baseman, the Dodgers fell out of favor with him.  Allen Webster a minor league pitcher, Ivan DeJesus Jr. a minor league infielder and two players to be named later. 

We understand that you have to spend money to be good in this league,” said Magic Johnson, the former NBA star who is part of the rich new Dodgers ownership group that has dramatically revamped their roster in the last month.


 

The Yankees ride the Japanese players to victory over the Red Sox

The New York Yankees defeated the Boston Red Sox by the score of 4-1 on Sunday night. The game took place at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, New York. Hiroki Kuroda started for the Yankees and he was great once again. Derek Jeter and Ichiro Suzuki led the Yankees offense. Josh Beckett started for the Red Sox and was ok but not great. Their bullpen was good and their offense only managed five hits.  Kuroda pitched eight innings giving up one run on four hits with no walks and four strikeouts. Kuroda earned his 12^th win of the season. Rafael Soriano picked up his 31^st save of the season pitching a scoreless inning and giving up a hit. He had a strikeout, Beckett pitched six innings giving up seven hits and four runs with three walks and six strikeouts. Beckett lost his 11^th game of the season. Andrew Miller pitched 1 1/3 innings giving up a walk and he struck out two and Junichi Tazawa pitched 2/3 of an inning giving up a hit.
Jeter had three hits, Nick Swisher drew a walk and Robinson Cano had a hit and drew a walk. Curtis Granderson had a hit, an RBI and drew two walks, Suzuki had three hits and two RBI, Jeter had two doubles and Granderson hit a double. Suzuki hit two homeruns, the Yankees were 1-8 with runners in scoring position and left eight men on base. Jeter and Swisher each had a stolen base.
Carl Crawford had a hit, Adrian Gonzalez had a hit and an RBI and Ryan Lavernway had a hit. Jarrod Saltalamacchia had a hit and Nick Punto had a hit. Gonzalez hit a homerun and the Red Sox were 0-1 with runners in scoring position and they left three men on base.
In the first Granderson hit an RBI double to make it 1-0 Yankees. In the third Beckett threw a wild pitch and Jeter scored to make it 2-0 Yankees. Suzuki hit a solo homerun in the fourth and in the sixth innings to make it 4-0. In the seventh Gonzalez hit a solo homerun and that would be the final run of the game.
The Yankees won two out of three in the series. The Yankees record improved to 72-49 and the Red Sox record dropped to 59-63. Jeter leads the major leagues in hits and Suzuki is hitting over 300 as a Yankee and showing a little more power. The Yankees will head to Chicago to take on the White Sox in a three game series beginning on Monday night.

Yankees Saturday night postgame notes

Here are the Yankees postgame notes.  They are courtesy of the Lohud Yankees blog and my own thoughts mixed in as always. 

David Phelps continued to make a positive impression despite taking this 4-1 loss to the Red Sox. The rookie went a career-high 6 2/3 and gave up just three runs and seven hits. He struck out seven and walked none in what will likely be his final start before CC Sabathia comes off the DL. Joe Girardi said he hopes that will be Friday night in Cleveland.  Girardi is cautious but Sabathia said emphatically he will be starting that game.  I guess anything can happen before then but I would be shocked if he wasn't pitching on Friday. 
But Phelps can still be an asset in the bullpen. He’s 3-4 with a 2.69 ERA in 24 outings overall. In his five starts, including two since Sabathia went down with his elbow problem, Phelps is 1-1 with a 2.92 ERA. Someone will have to go to make room for Sabathia, but Phelps is pitching better than Joba Chamberlain and Cody Eppley right now.  I think Eppley might be the odd man out, Joba is secure they know he is coming off tommy john and will give him some time to get the rust off. 
“We like what he does,” Girardi said about Phelps. “He’s a guy that’s somewhat of a swing guy for us. If we need him to start, he can start. If we need him to give us an inning in the bullpen, a couple of innings in the bullpen, he can do that. If we need him to give long relief, he can do that.  I like what he does also, he is like Ramiro Mendoza used to be and even Alredo Aceves who is now the Red Sox closer. 
“He’s a valuable guy on your team because he can do so many different things, and he’s had success in all areas.”
Phelps was done in by an opposite-field, two-run homer in the first by Adrian Gonzalez.
“It was right where we wanted it,” Phelps said. “The ball was down and off the plate. … It’s incredibly frustrating.”
Jon Lester’s inconsistency has been problematic for Boston, but the Yankees managed just five hits off the lefty. He’s still only 7-10 with a 5.03 after back-to-back starts with one run allowed.  He may be turning it around but it looks to be too late especially if the rest of the staff and especially Josh Beckett. 
“When you look up at the numbers, you kind of step back because you know that’s not the type of pitcher he really is,” said Nick Swisher, who had two of his three hits off Lester. “Tonight you got the best Jon Lester that we’ve seen in a while.”
The Yankees finished 0 for 9 with runners in scoring position.
“It’s hard to win a game when you do that,” Girardi said.
Curtis Granderson seems to be breaking out of his slump, coming through with a homer and two hits for the second consecutive game. Both homers were off left-handers. He has hit 11 of his 32 off lefties.
Derek Jeter lost his 13-game hitting streak. He batted .367 over that stretch.
Robinson Cano is struggling right now. He went hitless for the fourth consecutive game with an at-bat, his worst stretch since a four-game hitless run in 2008. His career high is five straight. That was in 2005.  It just seems like that can't happen to Cano but it does happen to them all.  Cano will get hot again and then you will think he can never get out. 
The Yankees need to come up with an answer for Pedro Ciriaco. He had a four-hit game against them at Fenway last month and he went 4 for 4 in this game. He’s batting .517 against them in seven games, going 15 for 29. He’s batting .276 in 28 games against other teams.  That is just weird, I have heard of Yankee killers but this is just nuts, he hits 241 points higher against them then any other team. 
“He’s on fire against us,” Phelps said. “It’s one of those things.”
Sunday night baseball on ESPN with feature a pitching matchup between Hiroki Kuroda, who has been very good, and Josh Beckett, who has not.  It is the rubber game and the Red Sox have to win series if they are going to make a run at the playoffs at all

The New York Yankees win a wild one in Boston

The New York Yankees defeated the Boston Red Sox by the score of 10-8 on Friday night. The game took place at Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts. Hiroki Kuroda started for the Yankees and didn’t pitch well especially early and the same with Josh Beckett for the Red Sox. The Yankees bullpen pitched a little better then the Red Sox. Alex Rodriguez had three hits and Mark Teixeira had four RBI to lead the Yankees offense. David Ortiz and Adrian Gonzalez led the Red Sox offense with three hits each. 
Kuroda pitched 5 2/3 innings giving up 10 hits and seven runs with six of them being earned. He walked one and struck out three. Boone Logan got his fourth win of the season pitching 2/3 of an inning and giving up two hits and a run with a strikeout, Cody Eppley pitched 1/3 of an inning giving up a hit and David Robertson pitched an inning giving up a hit and a walk with two strikeouts. Rafael Soriano saved his 20^th game of the season pitching 1 1/3 innings. He struck out two batters. Cano and Ibanez each had a double and Granderson and Teixeira each had a triple. The Yankees were 4-10 with runners in scoring position and they left six men on base. Rodriguez had two stolen bases and Teixeira had one. Chavez committed an error and Ibanez had an outfield assist.

Daniel Nava had a hit, Ryan Kalish had a hit and an RBI and Ortiz had three hits an RBI and drew a walk. Cody Ross had a hit, an RBI and drew a walk, Gonzalez had three hits and an RBI and Jarrod Saltalamacchia had a hit and three RBI. Gomez had two hits and an RBI, Mike Aviles had a hit and Nick Punto had a hit. Nava, Gonzalez and Punto each had a double. Saltalamacchia and Ross each hit a homerun. The Red Sox were 4-13 with runners in scoring position and they left nine men on base. Nava had an outfield assist.

The Yankees scored five runs in the first inning. Cano had an RBI walk, Teixeira had a two run single, Swisher had a sacrifice fly and Chavez had a sacrifice fly. It was 5-0 Yankees after the top of the first. The Red Sox came back with five in the bottom of the first. Kalish had a sacrifice fly, Gonzalez had an RBI double and Saltalamacchia hit a three run homerun. In the second Rodriguez had an RBI groundout to make it 6-5 Yankees. Ortiz hit an RBI single in the bottom of the second and the game was tied at six. Gomez hit an RBI single in the fifth to give the Red Sox a 7-6 lead. In the seventh Teixeira had a two run triple making it 8-7 Yankees. Ibanez had an RBI double and Chavez had an RBI single to make it 10-7 Yankees. The Red Sox would score their eighth and final run on a Ross solo homerun. The run came in the bottom of the seventh. The final score would be 10-8 Yankees.

The Yankees record improved to 50-32 and the Red Sox record dropped to 42-41. The Yankees are nine games ahead of them in the loss column in the AL East. This was the first of four games between the two teams. The two games on Saturday will be at 1:00PM and 7:00PM. The series will conclude on Sunday night at 8:00PM.

Yanks/Red Sox Preview

The Yankees and Red Sox will begin a two game series tonight at Yankee Stadium. The Yankees come into tonight in second place in the AL East behind the Tampa Bay Rays. The Yankees have the second best record in baseball. The Red Sox come into town as a 500 team in fourth place so it doesn't have the same juice as usual but is still Yanks/Sox. Here are the pitching matchups and it will be interesting to see if the Red Sox can do some damage and turn their season around or will they fall further behind in the AL East. Tonight-Phil Hughes vs. Daisuke Matsuzaka Tomorrow-CC Sabathia vs. Josh Beckett I am going to say the Yankees take both games and send the Red Sox away licking thier wounds.

More from last nights classic

That game was the longest a Yankees/Red Sox game has gone being scoreless. Junichi Tazawa was making his major league debut replacing Hall Of Famer John Smoltz on the roster. A-rod ended his longest single season homerun drought with his walkoff in the 15th at 72 at bats. You knew how much this game meant when you saw Josh Beckett and A.J. Burnett hanging out in the dugout when usually they would be in the locker room. CC Sabathia also hung around, he is today's starting pitcher. The Yankees clubhouse is so big and nice though maybe he just slept there last night. It was amazing how many bad swings there were, it was like no matter who came in to those last couple of innings, no one was going to hit them. The Yankees only used Hughes for 1/3 of an inning and Mo for 1 inning so they will be ready to go today. Bucholz is pitching for Boston and their bullpen is depleted a bit, this could be interesting for them. The stadium was finally alive and most people stayed right to the end, i give them credit but it was a friday night and how could you leave that game.

MLB Notes

I saw that the Pirates traded Nate McClouth to the Atlanta Braves today for Charlie Morton a right handed pitcher, Jeff Locke a left handed pitcher and Gorkys Hernandez a outfielder. This is an interesting trade because it happend a month plus ahead of the trade deadline. This is a significant upgrade for the Braves in centerfield and puts the Mets and Phillies on notice that the Braves think they can contend this year. The Braves also realeased Tom Glavine. The Red Sox won today to move into a first place tie with the Yankees with Josh Beckett pitching into the 7th inning with a no hitter. Kevin Youkilis left thgh the game with a ankle injury though that will be worth monitoring. I wonder if there will be more trades made ahead of the deadline now that there was already a big deal. I am sure guys like Nick Johnson some relievers like Heath Bell etc will be on the block.