Bronx, N.Y., June 19, 2005 — The Yankees received another great start from Mike Mussina on an at-one-time gorgeous, then drifting-to-overcast Sunday afternoon in the Bronx. The crafty righty proved that he was a master as he dominated the gritty Cubs to the tune of just two runs over 6.3 in the Yankees’ 6-3 win, even though it was clear early that he did not have the control for which he is well known. But he mixed speeds well, and was effective with several pitches, although uncharacteristically inexact on his location with all of them.

Then what could be labeled SturGorMo 2005 carried the Yanks through eight outs while allowing one run in the 6-3 Yankee win. Five days ago, Moose managed to throw 25 of 32 first strikes in a complete-game win. With just one strike thrown to the first nine Cubbies Sunday afternoon it was clear that Mussina would have to work a little harder this day.

The Yankees had taken early leads, many on home runs, in the first five games of this homestand, but Jeromy Burnitz turned the trick on a 2-2 flat fastball leading off the top of the second for a 1-0 Chicago lead. With twin aces Kerry Wood and Mark Prior on the shelf, young Cubs righty Sergio Mitre, who allowed only one run over 17 innings winning his last two starts, has helped pick up the slack. He had the Yanks hitting ground balls from the get-go, and if he had received the solid defense Moose found behind him, I might be writing a very different column.

Mitre kept the ball down, the Yanks pounded it into the ground, but the Cubs made some bad plays. Then too, some Yankee grounders found holes, none more fortuitous than the Bernie Williams hit-and-run slow roller that cleared shortstop in the decisive home fourth. The lumbering Jason Giambi, on with a walk, made the turn and continued to third as the ball trickled out toward the outfielders, and the Yanks were set up with one out. Robinson Cano’s second single plated one, and a resurgent Tony Womack added another, driving Bernie home with a sac fly to center after a Derek Jeter hit-by-pitch.

When the schedule makers pored over this one, someone had to smile at the thought of constant Yankee opponent and shortstop Nomar Garciaparra revisiting the Bronx with a different bunch of players, but the ex-Red Sox star is out long-term, and Neifi Perez did all he could to demontrate just how big a detriment that was to the visitors’ chances. He was 0-for-5, including a meek comebacker to Tanyon Sturtze for a 1-2-3 double dip that crushed the Cubs’ last best chance to mount a comeback.

But it was more what Perez did in the field to contribute to the lead the Yanks achieved that ruined his team’s chances. He was wrong-footed as Williams’s “hit” set the table and he failed to flag Rodriguez’s hard smash just a step or two to his left that took the 3-2 Yankee lead and stretched it to 5-2, still in the fourth. Further, he made an error to set up the Yanks’ sixth score, again on an A-Rod grounder. Alex promptly stole second, and rbi pro Hideki Matsui delivered him with a hard single to right.

Mussina had fallen behind to the Burnitz homer in the second; ironically the second Chicago lead came via a fourth-inning rbi single from the one guy in attendance who actually could remind the locals of Boston, Todd Walker. The second sacker in the 2003 Sox infield that was vanquished by an Aaron Boone home run, Walker had two rbi’s and two fine plays, despite a reputation as a good-hit, no-glove player.

Mussina overcame the wildness that led to a 10 percent drop in first-pitch-strike efficiency, and generally pitched quite well. He struck out Todd Hollandsworth for the second out in the first on an 89-mph fastball that looked 99 after the knuckle curve that preceded it. Six pitches later, Derek Lee was so out in front on strike three on a slow curve that he was muttering and slamming his bat down by the time the ball reached Jorge Posada’s glove. But Mike threw 17 off the plate among 43 tosses in the second and the fourth, walked two, and broke the 100-pitch mark two innings eralier than he did five days ago.

Mike had nice backup too, although the best Yankee play was his own unsuccessful attempt to retire Lee in the fourth after a swinging bunt down third with a leap, wheel, and toss that Derek Jeter would have been proud of. Robinson Cano made a fine catch and throw on a Perez third-inning bouncer, and Jason Giambi was also unsuccessful on a Burnitz sixth-inning shot down the line, though he held a potential double to one base by knocking the ball down. (He was booed with cries for “Tino” anyway.) But the best play was when Bernie Williams measured Travis Lee’s long drive to right center that followed and ran under it about 380 feet from home plate.

The Yankee offense continued to click, although how much was Yankee thunder and how much Chicago fielding is an open question. Cano’s two hits were smacked, Womack singled twice with a sac fly, and the three-four-five guys knocked in five of the six runs. Tanyon Sturtze was good, Tom Gordon stiffened for a big strike out after two singles notched the Cubs one in the eighth, and Mariano Rivera continued his domination in a one-two-three ninth inning.

So 67 years after the Yanks’ second World Series sweep of the Cubs, they swept them in the Bronx in perhaps the last time the two will ever meet on this field. Fifty years ago this Sunday, beloved Yankee star Mickey Mantle was hitting his 100th career home run in a doubleheader sweep in Yankee Stadium. The Cubs, of course, were not the opponent. But the Chicago White Sox were.

BTW,TYW

YANKEE BASEBALL!!!