A’s 5 – Yankees 2
OAKLAND – Considering the lineup Andy Pettitte pitched in front of yesterday it figured The Yankee starter’s margin for error was narrower than the distance between Kate Moss’ hips.
Jason Giambi sat out with an inflamed left eye. Robin Ventura didn’t play against A’s left-hander Mark Mulder. Nor did Jorge Posada. Because of a cranky knee, Bernie Williams was the DH and Charles Gipson started in center.
So, right away you knew Pettitte was going to need his “A” game to survive. He didn’t. Pettitte gave up homers to Ron Gant, Miguel Tejada and Eric Byrnes in a 5-2 loss that was witnessed by 45,390 at The Coliseum.
Gant and Tejada homered with the bases empty and Byrnes slugged a two-run homer in the seventh when the A’s extended their lead from 3-2 to 5-2.
Pettitte, who has lost his last two starts, fell to 4-3, allowing five runs and eight hits in 6 2/3 innings.
Mulder improved to 6-1 with his fourth straight victory. In eight innings, he gave up two runs and three hits. One of them was Enrique Wilson’s leadoff homer in the sixth that halted Mulder’s steak of retiring 15 straight batters.
Keith Foulke recorded the final three outs for his 10th save.
The loss sent the Yankees home with a 3-3 ledger on the West Coast trip that started in Seattle, where the Bombers copped two of three.
The beginning of the end for Pettitte in the seventh yesterday started with Terrence Long’s leadoff single. Long was bunted to second by Staten Island’s Frank Menechino. Pettitte retired Mark Ellis on a fly to left before leaving a 2-2 pitch where Byrnes could handle it. And Byrnes did, swatting his fifth homer to left.
Joe Torre hooked Pettitte for Juan Acevedo, who retired Tejada.
After Nick Johnson’s first-inning single, Mulder retired the next 15 Yankees before Wilson shocked the lefty with a line drive home run to left leading off the sixth. Wilson’s first homer cut the A’s lead to 3-2 and was followed by Mulder walking Johnson and Bernie Williams with one out. Mulder escaped unscathed when Raul Mondesi lined to left and Hideki Matsui took a called 3-2 pitch.
Gant made Pettitte pay dearly for leaving a 1-1 pitch up in the zone by crushing it for a one-out homer in the second that snapped a 2-1 tie. Tejada extended the lead to 3-1 with a solo blast in the fifth.
Down, 1-0, at the start of the home first, the A’s tied the score via Ellis’ leadoff double, Byrnes’ grounder to the right side and Erubiel Durazo’s RBI single to right.
The Yankees needed a bad decision by A’s catcher Ramon Hernandez to score a run in the first.
Alfonso Soriano slapped Mulder’s first pitch of the game for a single to left and was on the move when Johnson executed a perfect hit-and-run single through the vacated hole at short.
With runners at the corners, two outs, and Matsui up, Mulder bounced a pitch in the dirt that Hernandez blocked. Johnson broke from first, but stopped midway between bases, drawing a throw from Hernandez to Tejada.
Soriano bolted toward home and beat Tejada’s throw that was high and wide. Johnson advanced to second, but Mulder fanned Matsui with a 2-2 pitch to strand Johnson.
