-Duke gets the Yanks 1-2-3.
-We had to get some food so were listening to the radio broadcast. Susan Waldman says "you could get mesmerized by this view" Sterling follows with his usual understated way: "I was just thinking that. It's overwhelming." then they were quiet for 2 minutes.
4-0 Yankees
Bottom of 5th-LaRoche strikes out meekly on a ball in the dirt.
-Bautista walks.
-JackW is up with Duke on deck but a PH likely if Wilson does anything. Maybe if he doesn't. He takes one for the team and saunters to first.
-Rivas to PH for Duke. Like all but one of his previous PH appearances, Rivas makes an out. At least it's not 2, but he's now 1-14 as a PH.
-Morgan swings at 3 bad pitches to strike out. Maybe they should ahve PH for Nyjer too. Chamberlain has thrown 87 pitches through 5. No pitch count on him tonight.
4-0 Yankees
Top of 6th
-TJ Beam in on the hill.
-
Paul Meyer at pg.com is blogging this as well. He feeds us this gem from Elias:
The always-working Elias Sports Bureau researched this gem about Yankee pitcher Darrell Rasner walking in his first two plate appearances Tuesday night. Rasner became the first pitcher to walk in his first two plate appearances since Baltimore's Mickey Scott in 1972 -- the season before the designated hitter rule went into effect.
-Cano beams one right out of the park;
5-0. No wonder that Beam is the guy who will likely be sent down when a starter for Friday is called up.
-Christian makes out.
-Chamberlain hits and lines out to Morgan; 2 outs.
-Cabrera walks.
-Mr. 3-3 Jeter is up. Lookout. Walk. Beam is on the edge of implosion here.
-Beam went right off the edge and into the fire - Abreu goes deep;
8-0. Bye bye TJ, your time up here was not so sweet.
-Russell keeps him in and ARod greets him with a basehit. This isn't Bronson Arroyo bad but Beam is not leaving a good impression.
-Giambi grounds out 4-1. It's over.
Yankees 8-0
Bottom of 6th-Kay and Singleton note that the Bucs 25 batting titles have been won by 11 different players. Including one in 1966 when Matty Alou finished first and his brother Jesus was 2nd. Honus Wagner won 7 and Clemente 4, Parker 2, Madlock 2.
--Two fly outs and a double by Doumit.
-Bay leaves with more groin tightness and Michaels K's.
Yankees 8-0
Top of 7th-Doumit for All-Star? Not going to happen but he his hitting .350, tops by far among catchers and so is his .636 slugging. His 10 HRs are 3rd most. McCann, Martin and maybe Molina are having as good or better years. Soto is doing well too. But you could argue that Doumit has been the 2nd most productive catcher in the NL behind McCann. He just hasn't played enough.
-Burnett is in and he gives up a hit to Cano but gets Christian to ground into a nicely turned DP, 6-4-3.
-Time to stretch, or pour another drink if you're a Bucs fan and still sitting through this.
Yankees 8-0
Bottom of 7th-LaRoche is just horrible, grounding out the first meekly. Everything is meek with him. He had 3 hits yesterday, maybe starting something, but then looks horrible tonight.
-If anyone can look worse than LaRoche, Bautista just did on about as ugly a swing as you will see in striking out.
-JackW singles. Bucs have 5 hits tonight. They had 19 last night. It always seems to go that way.
-Mientkiewicz is the PH and the Yankee announcers talk about how much he wants to get back to the Yankees. He wants to win these three games but that the Yankees belong n the playoffs. So much for his great attitude, the Bucs don't need this guy, let him try to hook on again with the pinstripers. He singles anyway, moving JackW to 2nd and Chamberlain to the showers.
-Morgan K's.
-The Bucs have only been shutout once this year, fewet in the majors I believe. They have 6 outs to keep it at 1.
Yankees 8-0Top of 8th-Osoria is on!! This could get real ugly. Balls will be hit hard.
-Betemit singles.
-Cabrera singles. Betemit to 2nd. Seriously that just happened on 2 pitches; 2 hard hit balls.
-At least Jeter is done for the night. Some Gonzalez is hitting for him. McLouth runs down a ripper in the gap, 1 out.
-Abreu doubles;
9-0. The over/under of runs for this inning was 4 at the beginning and has gone up.
-an out!
-LaRoche snares the hardest hit ball of the inning for the 3rd out. The pitcher hit it. Yikes.
Yankees 9-0
Bottom of 8th-Two quick outs from Sanchez and McLouth.
-Doumit hacks away but K's.
-3 more outs to avoid a shutout.
Yankees 9-0
Top of 9th-Grabow is in for some reason. It's not as if he hasn't had work recently.
-He walks Posada.
-Cano singles, he has 3 hits.
-Basically, the Yankees are doing what the Pirates did last night, maybe even a little moreso since the Bucs haven't really mounted a threat.
-Grabow walks Christian. Again, why is Grabow in this game?
-Interesting DP: grounder to Bautista who steps on 3rd for teh force then throws home to get Posada, who was obviously running half speed either thinking Bautista would go to first or that it didn't matter in a 9-0 game.
-Cabrera singles home Christian;
10-0. Grabow hasn't pitched in 4 days and it shows.
-Little pop is the 3rd out.
Yankees 10-0
Bottom of 9th-LET'S GET SOME RUNS!!!!
-had to do it.
-Michaels singles to keep the hope alive.
-but LaRoche is up. And of course he K's. Can we throw him in the river now?
-Attendance of 38,952. That tops last night so is now the third highest ever at PNC.
-Bautista flies out.
-JackW keeps the flame burning with a single.
-First and second, two outs and the PH will be.... Raul Chavez! And he flies out.
-That's the Yankees 6th shutout of the year and the 2nd time the Bucs have been blanked.
That was about as much fun as a hammer to my big toe.
Tomorrow is the rubber match: Mussina vs Maholm.
Let's update the
ALL IMPORTANT STANDINGS (up to the minute including the Mets game tonight but not the Tigers game, which is still in progress):
Yankees 42-36 - $209M
Mets 38-39 3.5 $138M
Pirates 37-41 5.0 $49M
Tigers 36-40 5.0 $139M
vs. 
