One Mo Loss

I had to eat 2 tickets yesterday after not being able to attend the game. Then had to sit through 8 innings of utterly boring baseball before Shelley Duncan hit a dramatic 2-out, 3-run HR in the bottom of the 9th to tie the Orioles at 3-3. Then the pain of watching Mariano Rivera, in his 3rd straight poor performance, give up 3 runs in the 10th to lose, 6-3. The Orioles took all 4 series from the Yankees this season. It's never acceptable, but when its the Angels you can understand it. Not when its the Orioles.

Erik Bedard bedazzled the suddenly slumping Yankees for 7 innings and left with a 3-0 lead. With closer Chris Ray on the DL, Danys Baez has been the latest pitcher to be tabbed by manager Dave Trembley to take that role. Baez gave up back-to-back singles to Alex Rodriguez and Hideki Matsui to start the 9th before striking out Jorge Posada on a 3-2 pitch that clearly would have been ball four.

Trembley went to lefty Jamie Walker to face Bobby Abreu, and got Walker retired Abreu on a 3-2 ground out for the 2nd out of the inning. Both runners moved up on the play. Rather than bring in a right hander that would have brough Jason Giambi off the bench, Trembley stayed with Walker against Duncan. The big rookie blasted a shot into the left field seats, than high-fived and armed bashed his teammates before taking a curtain call for the crazed crowd. Jose Molina kept the inning going with a single, but Chad Bradford came on to strike out Melky Cabrera to end the inning.

The crowd's joy didn't last long as Rivera (3-4) gave up back-to-back doubles to Nick Markakis and Miguel Tejada to start the 10th. After retiring Yankees-killer Kevin Millar on a ground out, Rivera served up a meatball to Aubrey Huff, who smashed his 10th home run of the season to put the game out of reach.

With Bradford (5-4) still pitching in the 10th, A-Rod made it a perfect 4-4 day (plus a walk) with a 2-out single, but Matsui hit a comebacker to end the game.

Phil Hughes had an up and down day in his start. His curveball was breaking beautiful, but 92-93 mph fastball was hittable. Markakis gave the O's a 1-0 lead in the 3rd with an RBI single and a misplay at 1st extended the lead in the 4th.

Huff and Melvin Mora reached on 1-out singles and moved up on a Hughes' wild pitch. The right-hander struck out Paul Bako for the 2nd out, but Tike Redman hit a slow grounder to Andy Phillips at 1st. Hughes hesitated slightly before breaking to cover 1st and then dropped Phillips' toss, kicking the ball away in the process. Both runners scored for a 3-0 lead. Strangely, the official scorer orginally recorded it as a 2-run single before changing it to an RBI single and an error that allowed the 2nd run to score.

The Yankees tried to get something going in the 1st against Bedard when Derek Jeter was hit by a pitch (possible retaliation for Tejada being hit on Tuesday night) with 2 outs and A-Rod walked. But Matsui grounded out to end the inning. A-Rod and Matsui had 2-out singles in the 6th, but Bedard struck out Posada to get out of it.

...

It was a tough day for the Derek Jeter. The Captain struck out twice, hit into a double play, was hit by a pitch, committed an error and turned his ankle/foot on the same play.

Edwar Ramirez had a successful return to the bigs. K-Ram pitched 2.1 scoreless innings and struck out 3.

In addition to his home run heroics, Shelley Duncan threw out Corey Patterson at home as the speedster tried to score from 3rd on a fly ball.

With no takers, Mike Myers and Miguel Cairo were officially released, and can now sign with any ball club.