Game 83: (Love Is Like A) Heatwave

It's far too hot to piece together anything resembling a cogent preview. It's the middle game of the series between the Yankees and A's, as hometown guy CC Sabathia faces off against Trevor Cahill. Both hurlers were named to the AL All-Star team on Saturday. However, with both starting tonight they're on pace to start again on Sunday, thereby making them ineligible for the mid-summer classic.

Forecasts call for a 62 degree game-time temperature in Oakland tonight. It's currently 97 in my neck of the woods and 102 in NYC. By the time Cahill delivers the game's first pitch, the sun will have been down for a good hour plus on the East Coast, yet it will still be a good fifteen or twenty degrees warmer here than at the Coliseum. And there isn't much relief in sight.



[Song Notes: If Martha and the Vandellas aren't exactly your thing, here's a version from Standing in the Shadows of Motown, featuring Joan Osborne backed by the Funk Brothers, the Motown house band. Also, apparently The Who covered this one too, which I never knew until seraching YouTube earlier.]

-Lineups-

Yankees:
Brett Gardner leads off for the second night in a row, Nick Swisher DH's for the second night in a row, and Colin Curtis starts in right field for the second night in a row. Jorge Posada is back behind the plate; he left Sunday's game after a foul ball sprained his ring finger.

Brett Gardner LF
Derek Jeter SS
Mark Teixeira 1B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Robinson Cano 2B
Nick Swisher DH
Jorge Posada C
Curtis Granderson CF
Colin Curtis RF

A's:

Coco Crisp CF
Daric Barton 1B
Kurt Suzuki C
Kevin Kouzmanoff 3B
Mark Ellis 2B
Jack Cust DH
Adam Rosales SS
Matt Carson RF
Rajai Davis LF

Twin Killing

In tonight's game preview, we detailed the Yanks four game sweep of the Twins in May. Despite the four game sweep, the Yanks run differential for the series was only +5 and they required three walk-off wins. Tonight, they continued beating the Twinkies, and this time did so far more handily.

The Yanks scored early and often, scoring in three of the first four innings to take a 5-1 lead, and tacking on five more in the sixth to put the game far out of reach. Derek Jeter led off the game with a single and was later plated on a Hideki Matsui single. In the second, Robinson Cano led off with a double, moved to third on a Brett Gardner infield single, and scored on a Frankie Cervelli sac fly. They then added another run as Gardner scored on a Mark Teixeria base hit.

CC Sabathia gave a run back in the bottom of the inning on a Michael Cuddyer solo shot. But the Yankees chased Scott Baker in the fourth, adding two more runs. Carlos Gomez robbed Alex Rodriguez of a grand slam hauling in a drive that was ticketed to land over the fence. A-Rod had to settle for a sac fly, and a bases loaded walk from Nick Swisher forced in the Yankees' fifth run.

In the sixth, the Yanks ended the game for all intents and purposes, and all the damage was done with two outs. Robinson Cano finally broke his twenty-plus RISP oh fer, dropping a broken bat single into centerfield to score Teix and A-Rod. Brett Gardner followed with a two run triple scoring Swisher and Cano, then Cervelli ripped a double off the leftfield fence, to plate Gardner and close out the scoring.

The entire Yankee offense was great. Every starter had at least one hit, Cano and Cervelli had two each, Gardner three, and Teix four. Five of the starters drew walks, including two each from Matsui and Swisher. With the big lead, Damon, Jeter, and A-Rod all got the late innings off, saving them from the turf.

The Cuddyer homer was the only blip on the radar screen for Sabathia, as he rebounded from last Thursday's poor start. He needed 100 pitches, 68 of them strikes, to get through 7 innings. He allowed just three hits and a walk, and struck out three. He didn't allow more than a single baserunner in any inning. The big lead made it safe for Brett Tomko to close out the last two innings, but not before allowing the second Twins run in the eighth.

Game 83: The Arrival

The last time the Yankees entered a series against the Twins, they were sitting at 17-17 and the hand-wringing among Yankees fans was reaching a crescendo. It was getting a little late in the season to be at .500. That night marked was A-Rod's first night back in the Bronx and the last time they would see that winning percentage (hopefully for the season). The game was highlighted by a Brett Gardner inside-the-park homer and a walk-off hit by Melky. It was the first of three walk-offs by the Yankees in that series, one in which they swept all four games by a grand total of 5 runs.

Minnesota actually came into that game a half game ahead of the Yanks, but that series sent them spinning in opposite directions. With three games decided by one run, and the other by two runs, it could have easily gone the other way. Instead, the series was a major part of a 9 game winning streak for the Yanks whereas the Twins lost 6 in a row and were at .500 as recently as June 29th. At 43-40, the Twins are 1.5 games behind the Tigers in the AL Central but 5.5 games behind the Bombers in the Wild Card standings.

Taking the hill tonight and looking to avenge his poorest start since Opening Day will be CC Sabathia. Despite striking out 8 in 5 2/3, the big fella got tagged for 6 earned runs and the loss last Thursday against the Mariners. He followed up that clunker on Opening Day with 7 2/3 of shutout ball, so perhaps he's got another bounceback in him.

Twins righthander Scott Baker is coming off a strong June, during which he produced quality starts in five out of six tries, and went 4-0 with a 3.20 ERA and a 0.966 WHIP. That might be slightly less impressive when you consider those starts came against the Indians, A's ,Cubs, Brewers, Astros and Royals, but you've still got to get the job done. He's at 6-6 with a 4.99 ERA on the year and in his two previous starts against the Yankees (both in 2006), he's 2-0 with a 1.50.

Frankie Cervelli gets the start behind the plate tonight. Sabathia has a 51 to 14 K/BB ratio in 8 games with Cervelli as opposed to 23/19 in 7 games with Posada back there. Brett Gardner gets the start in center with Damon and Swisher on either side.

The Yanks arrive the HHH Metrodome having won 8 of their last 10 against the Twins and hoping they can catapult themselves to another winning streak. They've had their struggles in the building, however, going only 8-11 there since 2004. Barring a meeting in the playoffs this will be the last series the Yanks play there, so John Sterling will no longer have to refer to the outfield wall as "the baggy".

Don't forget that the game starts at 8, like I did until just now.

[Tonight's song comes to you from the Minneapolis-based hip hop group Atmosphere. They've got a pretty extensive song catalog, so if you are a fan of the genre, I would highly recommend checking it out.]

They've arrived, with the excitement of a newborn,
Came to join the main event and fight against the lukewarm.
They've arrived, with nothing but their word and their history,
Take a can of paint and try to decorate the dignity.