Game 45 Wrap-Up: NYY 6 OAK 3

("Seriously, guys.  I thought I was going to make it to third."  Courtesy of The AP)

The Yankees had their travel day on Thursday, I had mine yesterday.  I still made it home in time to watch the majority of their series opener in Oakland last night, and it was a great feeling.  Ivan Nova was on the hill, trying to move away from the issues he's had locating the ball in the strike zone and giving up a ton of extra base hits, and the offense was trying to keep their positive trend going and hit more of them.

Game Notes:

- Nova said after his last start that he wanted to get back to generating more groundball outs and he was doing that early last night.  Through 4 innings, he hadn't allowed a run and had 4 GB outs and 2 Ks.  He was keeping the ball down and working efficiently against the light-hitting A's lineup.

- The Yankee offense didn't appear to have missed a beat after the travel day.  They were on Tyson Ross from the top of the 1st when they put 2 runners on.  A bad error led to 3 unearned runs in the 3rd, but credit Mark Teixeira for hitting the HR and making Oakland pay for their poor D.

- And it didn't stop there.  Robinson Cano led off the 4th with a HR to dead center field, and after Teix inexplicably tried to stretch a bloop double into a triple (and failed miserably), Raul Ibanez doubled to left-center and Nick Swisher homered to left to make it 6-1 Yankees.

- Nova got a little inconsistent with his fastball command the 2nd time through the lineup, giving up a solo HR to Josh Reddick in the 4th and another run thanks to a couple of hits and a sac fly in the 5th, but his offspeed stuff looked very sharp.

- His XBH woes continued to plague him in the 7th, when he hung a curveball to Kila Ka'aihue for a HR that made it 6-3 Yankees.  He made it out of the inning, and overall it was a better outing, but 3 runs and 6 hits allowed against the A's still isn't anything special.

- The offense pounded Ross, but went silent once the game got in the hands of the Oakland bullpen.  They were retired in order from the 6th-8th inning, and had A-Rod's 9th inning single represent their only baserunner after the 5th.

- Rafael Soriano threw a scoreless 9th for the save.  Strangely enough, he still hasn't thrown a 1-2-3 inning this year.

F*ck Yeahs:

- Swish: 2-4, 1 2B, 1 HR, 1 R, 2 RBI, 1 K, 1 LOB.  Good to see Swish hitting the ball with some authority and good to see him hit an opposite field HR from the left side.

- Teix: 2-5, 1 2B, 1 HR, 1 R, 2 RBI, 2 K, 3 LOB.  I'll give him props for getting 2 XBH as well, but getting thrown out at 3rd trying to stretch the double was idiotic.

- Ibanez: 2-4, 1 2B, 1 R.  I even saw him make a nice running catch in left field.  I swear.  It really happened.

Oh Nos:

- Derek Jeter: 0-5, 3 K, 3 LOB.  Oofda, guy.  Oofda.

- RISP Fail: For all the early offensive fireworks, the offense did manage to only go 2-10 with RISP.  Against a better offense, that could have come back to haunt them.

Next Up:

OK, NOW I can call this a winning streak.  The Yanks are up to 3 in a row and things look like they've started to turn.  Perfect time to have your ace on the hill, and perfect time for him to follow suit and start turning things around after 2 uncharacteristically poor outings.  It's Sabathia vs. old friend Bartolo Colon at 4PM today.