Don’t hold your breath waiting for a third pitching duel between Mike Mussina and Boston ace Pedro Martinez.
Despite having put Orlando Hernandez on the DL before last night’s game with Cleveland, Joe Torre sounded like he was leaning on pushing Mussina back a day in the rotation to Tuesday, which would avoid Moose-Martinez III when the Yanks play the Red Sox Monday night at the Stadium.
“It’s nice to look forward to that kind of matchup, but my focus is the season, and what’s good for him, and he’s had two tough games in a row,” Torre said.
After Mussina beat Martinez, 2-1, nine days ago and lost, 3-0, Wednesday night, Torre said hard-fought battles like that tend to drain a pitcher.
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If Hernandez’ DL stint turns out to be longer than expected, the Yanks could become a player in acquiring David Wells. But the Bombers aren’t the only team to lose a starting pitcher last night.
Yankee-killer Chuck Finley, 17-9 lifetime against the Bombers, was scratched from his scheduled start last night and will likely miss his next two turns in the rotation on the DL.
“This has been bothering him,” manager Charlie Manuel said. “We need to find out exactly what’s wrong with Finley. I don’t want him to keep pitching and go down for a long time.”
Finley was replaced by C.C. Sabathia, who earned the win despite pitching just four innings – a statistical oddity that can happen when the opposing team only bats in five innings.
It was the first time it’s happened since Larry Luebbers got a four-inning win for the Cardinals on Oct. 3, 1999, according to Elias. The last AL pitcher to do it was Richie Lewis, who went 41/3 innings for the Orioles on July 31, 1992.
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Mike Stanton has given up runs in just two of his team-high 25 appearances, the last of which was tossing a perfect eighth inning in Monday’s win at Boston. He’s 4-1 with a 1.53 ERA, and hasn’t given up a home run all year.
Since switching spots in the order with DH David Justice on Monday, Paul O’Neill was 4-for-9 (.444) in the sixth spot. Justice, who had been 0-for-7 hitting third, had an RBI groundout in the first inning last night and hit a solo homer in the fourth.
Bernie Williams committed his first error of the year, and first since Sept. 12, 1999.
