CC DOMINATES, RASO ESCAPES DISASTER AS YANKS WIN BIG

I’m not a big believer in the term “must-win” games in the regular season, because in this case if the Yankees were to lose they would still keep playing. But boy, this is about as close as they come in terms of must-win games. The Yanks were coming off a brutal three-game sweep in Chicago and the Rays continue to creep closer in the American League East standings. A big 3-1 win in Cleveland is just what the doctor ordered.

 
Let’s start with the return of the big fella, CC Sabathia. He had been out for the last two weeks due to left elbow inflammation, but based on how he pitched on Friday night you wouldn’t even have noticed. He pitched 7.2 innings, allowed just one run (more on that later) on four hits while striking out nine and walking just one. He threw and even 100 pitches on the night and his record on the season stands at 13-3 while his ERA dropped to 3.44.

The Yanks were able to take a 3-1 lead thanks to a big two-run home run by Nick Swisher, who went 3-for-4 with a homer and all three runs driven in, in the seventh off rookie Cody Allen. After CC and David Robertson combined to pitch a clean eighth, Rafael Soriano took over in the ninth, looking for his 32nd save. He did get into trouble from the get-go, however, as he allowed back-to-back singles to Carlos Santana and Michael Brantley to lead off the inning. Rafael ended up loading the bases with one out, but he ended up inducing a pop-out off the bat of Ezequiel Carrera before inducing a ground out from Jack Hannahan to end the game. Talk about a climatic finish.

This game also included some extracurricular activities. Derek Jeter got hit on the side of the bill of his helmet from a Corey Kluber pitch in the second. He even had some words for Mr. Kluber as he took his base, which is something you don’t see from the Captain all that often. Then, in the fourth, CC retaliated by throwing a pitch behind Asdrubal Cabrera. He probably wanted to hit him, but either way, the message was sent. On the very next pitch of the at-bat, Cabrera clobbered a CC offering over the center field wall for a solo home run. Other than that, not much else happened in terms of batters getting hit and such.

Final Score again: Yankees 3 - Indians 1

As I said, this was a pretty big game for the Yanks and a much needed win. The Oakland A’s were useful and they held on to beat the Rays 5-4, so the lead in the AL East is up to 3.5 games. Co-Ace Hiroki Kuroda (12-8, 2.96 ERA) will oppose Justin Masterson (9-11, 4.73 ERA) in game two of this three game series on Saturday night.
  


--Jesse Schindler, BYB Lead Staff Writer
Follow me on Twitter @SchindlerJesse

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