July 20, 2012, Bronx, N.Y. — It’s hard not to feel good about the three-game sweep of the Reds by the home-standing Yanks coming out of the All Star break, particularly in light of the five straight losses the team suffered to conclude their last home stand. Those losses, one uglier than the next, handed the “Bombers” a home mark five games under .500, their lowest standing in that respect in decades.

Granted, the Yanks were facing a Cincinnati squad missing two infield stars in Joey Votto and Brandon Phillips, but given their own starting rotation four-fifths depleted by injury, the pinstripers are not about to cut the visitors any injury-affected slack. The team received three excellent starts despite the fact that two of those pitchers were replacements. It is a little sad, however, that of the three guys who began these games on the mound, it was the lone incumbent, Hiroki Kuroda, who failed to earn a “W” for his effort, this in spite of the fact that he allowed no earned runs two outs into the seventh Sunday, when Joe Girardi replaced him at 99 pitches thrown.

Kuroda did everything right Sunday, with a 67/32 strikes/balls ratio; he threw 20 first-pitch strikes to 26 Reds batters, allowed just three hits and two walks, and used 17 opposition swings and misses to garner six strike outs. In this aspect Hiroki followed up on the fine Friday and Saturday work of David Phelps and Brandon McCarthy, who punched out seven and nine batters, respectively. Yankee pitching amassed 31 punch outs among the 81 outs they recorded on the weekend.

Despite the unearned run second baseman Brian Roberts’s miscue set up in the top of the fifth, Kuroda left with a 2-1 lead because Derek Jeter and Jacoby Ellsbury rbi singles eclipsed the error in the frame’s bottom half. And they could have entered the eighth inning with a little insurance. Following the loss of Ellsbury’s leadoff fly to center in the sun in the bottom of the seventh, the middle of the Yankee order could have made it 3-1. Mark Teixeira’s deep liner to right moved Jacoby to third, but Brian McCann bounced a harmless grounder to first with the infield in against Jonathan Broxton’s first pitch, the kind of outcome we’ve become accustomed to seeing in the Bronx in 2014.

The weekend has actually produced some hope in that area. McCann has been hitting better lately, and both he and the largely absent Carlos Beltran knocked in runs Friday night. Beltran homered on an 0-2 pitch for the Yanks’ first run in the 7-1 victory Saturday, and Brian had hits in all three games. But then, once the unfortunate reliever Dellin Betances, who has been nothing short of superb all year, surrendered a tying home run to Todd Frazier in the top of the eighth, Kuroda had lost yet another chance at an elusive victory.

But the middle of the order would have another chance in the bottom of the ninth. With Ellsbury on third with the winning run and no one out, Teixeira struck out against fireballing Aroldis Chapman. McCann took the first pitch this time, for a ball. But he swung at pitch No. 2, lofting what I have taken to referring to as “a towering drive” to short right. But with both Cincinnati’s infield and outfield playing in with the winning run 90 feet away, and the first and second base positions manned by players not as accustomed to them as their injured starters, confusion reigned supreme.

Frazier at first, playing the deepest of the infield positions, seemed to give up on the ball, which may have exceeded 100 feet in height, but not much more in distance from home plate, and second baseman Skip Schumaker seemed to hope that right fielder Jay Bruce was positioned shallow enough to get it. Realizing Bruce wouldn’t make it, Schumaker backed quickly and spun, but lost his bearings, and the ball hit outfield grass, as Ellsbury scored.

In case you missed it, my use of the term “towering drive” for McCann’s game winner was tongue in cheek. I’m sure Brian will take it; we all will. As said, he has been hitting better, Beltran too. McCann could use a little luck, and he got it. And the replacement (and one original) Yankee starters have been good for some time. The bullpen has been good all year.

The hit film The Towering Inferno hit theaters 40 years ago, in 1974, and it was a blockbuster. But if there was a tower of strength that led this team to the weekend sweep, it was Jacoby Ellsbury. Without his two-run home run, the Yankees lose the Friday night game, despite the McCann and Beltran rbi’s. A big game wasn’t needed out of him Saturday, but on Sunday, he collected four of the 11 hits, one of the five walks; he drove in the second run in the fifth, and made a run-saving catch on Frazier’s sinking liner to center in the third, the only frame where Kuroda allowed two baserunners, except the fifth when Roberts made his error.

Ellsbury went 4-for-4, and down 1-2 to Chapman’s 102-mph fastball leading off the ninth, he fouled off three pitches before stroking an opposite field single. Then he easily stole second base two pitches later, and scampered to third on a short wild pitch three tosses after that. Finally, he scored the game winner running from third with one down on McCann’s second-chance “hit.”

Call him star of the game, star of the weekend. To this fan in the stands, Cincinnati left the Bronx having been swept in three straight, due to the Yanks’

Towering Inferno

BTW,TYW
YANKEE BASEBALL!!!