Orioles 12
Yankees 2
Jaret Wright couldn’t throw strikes, but the bigger issue – with a five-game series against archrival Boston beginning this afternoon – was that Wright overtaxed an already tired Yankees bullpen.
No surprise the final result yesterday was a horrendous 12-2 loss to Baltimore.
It was an “ugly” and “sloppy” effort, manager Joe Torre readily admitted, and the Bombers (70-48) squandered a chance to move up on the idle Red Sox. Instead, they head to Beantown only 1½ games in front in the AL East.
“They didn’t look good,” George Steinbrenner said of his Yanks. “They just got the bad game out of their system.
“We’ll be ready up there.”
The bats went dead after homers by Johnny Damon and Robinson Cano in the first two innings, and Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter collided on a popup that neither caught in the middle of a five-run sixth.
“Hopefully we got this stinker out of our system,” Torre said. “We stunk today, no question.”
Brian Roberts led off the game with a homer off Wright, a harbinger of doom. Three walks came around in the third on a wild pitch and a two-run single by Jay Gibbons, and Torre mercifully yanked Wright after a leadoff walk in the fourth.
“I couldn’t throw strikes,” Wright said. “It was awful. No command of the fastball. It was completely gone.”
After Wright bombed, Ron Villone was called upon for the third day in a row. The left-hander, working for the fourth time in five games, allowed a three-run homer to Nick Markakis with two outs in the fourth that finished Wright’s line (3-plus IP, 2 H 5 ER 4 BB 2 SO) and gave the O’s a 7-2 lead. Torre admitted he’s very concerned that the pen worked six innings.
Baltimore put its first seven runs on the board with just three hits. Yesterday was only the fourth time in 21 starts Wright failed to notch five frames. However, he has gone six innings in only six starts and hasn’t gone seven yet. If and when Carl Pavano finally returns, the Yanks will have an interesting decision to make.
Octavio Dotel, just activated off his rehab from Tommy John surgery, was asked to pitch back-to-back days – something the Yankees wouldn’t allow him to do while guiding him slowly through his most recent rehab. The Yanks wanted to stay away from Scott Proctor after he threw 21/3 innings over the previous two nights. So Mike Myers, ostensibly a one-hitter lefty specialist, worked 21/3 innings and volunteered to pitch the ninth.
It looked like Myers would get out of the sixth after three pitches without being charged with a run, but Jeter knocked a popup out of Rodriguez’s glove. Jeter was shading the sun with his glove and screaming, “I got it!” Rodriguez, though, was camped under it, and the ball fell to the ground when their two gloves collided. A run scored, and the next hitter, journeyman Fernando Tatis, ripped a two-run homer to right.
It was that kind of day.
“Sometimes a game like this, as sloppy and as goofy as it was, is easier to put behind you than a 2-1 crusher,” Rodriguez reasoned.
Additional reporting by George King and Evan Grossman
