Last Night's Yankees Loss Stung

Sometimes it hurts losing games you should win. Those little losses come back to hurt you by the end of the season (ask the Mets about that). Last night was one of those loses that really stung as the Yankees lost to the Chicago White Sox in a bottom of the 9th walk-off.

Maybe I'm just so used to the Yankees walking off on other people, but last night just felt wrong. First, the 2nd run for the White Sox should never have scored. Andy Pettitte slipped trying to quickly field a slow roller from Jim Thome. Why Andy? Thome is one of the slowest guys in baseball (only Mark McGwire has less stolen bases among 500-homer club members). Then a routine groundball was hit to A-Rod that he kicked away. Somehow, after the official scorer reviewed this one, he took away an error on the play. Then Phil Hughes came in and got a ground ball that should have easily led to a double play and ended the inning. But A-Rod threw it high to Robinson Cano, who was being barreled down on a dirty slide by douche-bag-extraordinaire, A.J. Pierzynski, and Cano flung one way wide of first. Mark Teixeira bobbled and slipped and the second run scored.

This was the Yankees second sloppy defensive game in a week. They also played horrendous defense on Tuesday in Tampa Bay. In that game, everyone on the field (except maybe Melky Cabrera) had a bad defensive play. It was awful. Amateur hour. The Yankees have not had a great defensive team all season but have been able to suppress that. The Yankees have committed less than the league average in errors and have the third best defensive efficiency in the AL (according to B-R), but their UZR is in the bottom third of the AL (according to FanGraphs), and their corner OF defense has been atrocious all season (despite the fact I thought Swisher would be good in RF). In fact, the only two guys that have a UZR over 1.0 are Brett Gardner and (surprisingly) Derek Jeter.

Last night, though, Nick Swisher hit a dramatic, 2-out, game-tying home run in the top of the 9th against his former team and his former manager (who he supposedly hates).

In the end, the White Sox won it on a walk-off by DeWayne Wise off the glove of Phil Coke (how did he not glove that one?). It was a tough loss to take. Phil Coke had two strikes on Wise, a .185 hitter, and let him get away.

It was one of those nights.

 

Peter Abraham wraps up the night by showing how many innocuous things can add up to a bitter loss. He also wonders (as I do) if Phil Hughes is being stretched out to start. Speaking of Phil Hughes, Mark Feinsand notes how his streak ended at 25.1 scoreless innings (longest for a Yankee since Rivera's 30.2 in 1999), while Andy Pettitte's winless streak continued...and neither one really deserved their fate. Bronx Banter (channeling their inner Get Smart) says that the Yankees missed it by that much. (Picture from the AP)

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