Chalk One Up For The Bloggers

If it wasn't for Cliff Corcoran from Bronx Banter I might have lived the rest of my life thinking Shane Rawley was on the Yankees in 1980...


Not to disparage Kepner at all since his Twitter feed is a must-follow for Yankees fans, but more to praise Cliff because he gives a good name to us mother's basement-dwellers (even if he does write for SI.com too). Kepner's got 2,328 other followers and I doubt one of them even thought to double check that stat - myself included. If you are on Twitter, follow Cliff as well. He puts up some great stuff over there.

Happily Heading East

It was going to be a long flight either way, but the Yankees just made the red eye to Boston a whole lot more tolerable. Even though they lost back to back games on Sunday and Monday, they won both series out West and during a stretch where the Red Sox went 4-2, they picked up a half game in the standings.

The top third of the order accounted for bascially all of the offense against Brett Anderson or otherwise last night. Derek Jeter, Johnny Damon and Mark Teixeira each scored a run and Teix drove in all three on a groundout in the first and a two run shot to left in the second. The only other Yankee hit was Nick Swisher's single in the fourth.

Chad Gaudin put together a start in place of Joba Chamberlain which resembled something Joba himself might have done. He didn't allow a run, the only hit Gaudin gave up was a single to Adam Kennedy to lead off the bottom of the first and he struck out 5 batters. However, the five walks he issued drove up his pitch count and kept him from getting the win. Two of the walks came in the 5th inning and after 90 pitches he was lifted with the bases loaded and one out in favor of Alfredo Aceves.

I prefer to think of Gaudin's start tonight as a great long relief appearance which just happened to occur at the beginning of the game. Which isn't really a bad thing when you have a bullpen that has been pitching as well as the Yankees'. With a projected pitch limit of ~85 and the tendency to walk a lot of batters, Gaudin wasn't expect to go very deep into the game. In fact, before the first pitch Mark Feinsand predicted that he'd go exactly 4 1/3 innings on Twitter.

Aceves needed only two pitches to induce an inning-ending double play from Yankee-killer Kurt Suzuki and get the Yankees out of trouble when he was summoned from the bullpen. It wasn't all smooth sailing for Alf, though. Jack Cust chipped in with this first home run since July 20th and his first RBI since 7/23 on a solo homer off of Aceves with two out in the 6th. The A's picked up another two out run in the 7th after Rajai Davis singled, stole second and scored on a single by Mark Ellis.

In all, Alf went 2 1/3 and gave up 4 of the 6 hits and the only two runs the A's scored in the game, but didn't relinquish the lead. Phil Coke came on for the final out of the 7th, Phil Hughes worked into and out of trouble in the 8th and Mo mowed them down in the 9th. It was Rivera's 32nd consecutive save converted, the longest such streak in his career.

It wasn't the crisp pitcher's duel that a final score of 3-2 sometimes indicates, but it wrapped up in just over two and a half hours nonetheless. Each of the games in the series finsihed in under three hours, a fact which wasn't that the A's are 15.5 games behind the Red Sox in the Wild Card standings. It was much appreciated by those of us who stayed up to watch the games on the East Coast.

And they ended on a high note.

Game 121: Estimated Prophet

It was apparent from the time that the Yankees acquired Chad Gaudin that his time to take a spot in the starting rotation would come eventually. Although the details of the plan to limit Joba Chamberlain's innings this season hadn't been fully divulged, it was assumed that he would either have to be skipped or shut down and both of those scenarios would result in the need for someone to start in his place. With Sergio Mitre still holding his spot in the rotation and no one else having been picked up off of waivers, the Yankees turn to the former Mr. Weird Beard, who spent two and a half seasons as a member of the A's from 2006 to 2008.

Gaudin made 19 starts for the Padres this year before being traded, registering a 5.23 ERA and 1.539 WHIP. He gave up almost exactly a hit per inning while striking batters out at the same rate, but he walked 4.7 per 9 IP, which is unfortunately right near his bloated career average of 4.3. Worse still, he put together these numbers while pitching for the Padres and making 8 of his starts in spacious Petco Park in the NL West. Oddly though, Gaudin's numbers were actually worse in the 8 starts at home than the 11 on the road. His BABIP was .406 at Petco and .281 away from it, which begins to explain away some of the difference there.

Gaudin has made two appearances for the Yanks, once holding the Blue Jays scoreless in the 10th and 11th inning and getting the win and the other this past Sunday, giving up two runs in a game that was already lost against the Mariners. At least he picked the right spot to surrender the runs. He only threw 74 pitches combined in those two outings but Joe Girardi indicated that he would be available to throw up to 85 tonight.

Opposing Chad the Bad will be Brett Anderson. Anderson is a rookie lefthander, but fear not, the Yanks have already faced him twice this year and scored 9 runs in 12 innings. Anderson's last start was a slugfest with the White Sox wherein both he and Jose Contreras gave up 7 runs. Before that though, he put up a 2.22 ERA over his previous 8 starts and went 4-1.

This isn't the end of the road trip of the Yankees, but they do head back to the East Coast tonight and have a day off tomorrow before beginning a series at Fenway. The West Coast swing has been relatively successful as they've gone 4-2 and picked up a half game in the standings. Thanks in part to an excellent performance by CC Sabathia last night after the Red Sox had already recorded a win, the Yanks don't have to worry too much about what happens when Chad Gaudin is leading the way tonight.

[Music starts around the 1:30 mark]

My time coming, any day, don't worry about me, no.
It's gonna be just like they say, them voices tell me so.
Seems so long I felt this way, and time's sure passin' slow.
Still I know I lead the way, they tell me where I go.

Don't worry about me, no no no, don't worry about me, no.
And I'm in no hurry, no no no, I know where to go.

California, a prophet on the burning shore.
California, I'll be knocking on the golden door.