Yanks Waste A Good A.J. Outing

It's not often that you get to see A.J. pitch into the 8th inning while giving up just 1 run on 6 baserunners allowed and striking out 8.  That's the type of game you HAVE to win and it's the type of game that good teams consistently DO win.  Unfortunately, the Yankees couldn't scratch together a run to help Good A.J. out tonight as they fell victim to their arch nemesis: the no-name pitcher with whom they aren't familiar.

In the bottom of the first, it looked like Carlos Carrasco was going to be in for a long night.  He gave up back-to-back singles to Jeter (more on him later) and C-Grand and then walked Teix.  But the Yanks could get nothing out of it and then stranded another 2 in the 2nd inning.  From then on, Carrasco seemed to calm down and he dominated the Yankee O through 7 shutout innings.  The Yankees certainly did their best to help him out, though, thanks to 0-7 with RISP, 8 men left on base, Brett Gardner's mind boggling decision to bunt with a full count on a pitch that was damn near over his head to lead off the 7th, Robbie Cano's continued unwillingness to take strikes early in the count, Francisco Cervelli's downright awfulness as a baseball player, and letting themselves get K'd in the bottom of the 9th by somebody named Chris Perez to end the game.

The loss sucks bad enough, but what makes it even worse is the real story of the night, that being Jeter leaving in the 5th inning after appearing to strain his calf on a swing.  No official word on what the injury is yet, but he was in pain almost immediately as he hobbled down the 1st base line and it looked like the type of tweak that will lead to at least a 15-day DL stint.  At this point, the Yankees pretty much have their own wing in the hospital.  Too bad for Jeter and all the fans.  I don't think I'm alone in saying I was getting excited about the possibility of him getting 3,000 at The Stadium.

More on Jeter's injury and Cervelli's suckiness tomorrow.