Moose loose on a Wednesday

Tonight is the second game of a 3 game set between the NL West Arizona Diamondbacks against the AL East New York Yankees.
Taking the Mound for the New York Yankees will be the veteran righty Mike Mussina who comes into the ballgame with a 2-3 record this season with a slightly bloated 5.63 ERA.
He came back from the disabled list on the road against Texas on May the 3rd and pitched well enough to get a win.
Then the next week he pitched well again against those same Texas Rangers on May the 9th --- this time in New York --- and got another win.
So it started out looking pretty promising for Mussina after returning to the team...
But then --- that's when things started to get a little messy as he allowed 14 earned runs and 24 hits over 18 innings in his next three starts against the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago White Sox.
In those three games he earned one loss and two no decisions.
That equaled a 7.00 ERA for those starts and he did not pitch well. Then in his last start (July 7th against the Chicago White Sox) he pitched one of his best games this season. He left the game with a lead and ended up with another no decision but his command seemed much, much better and he allowed only one run on four hits with no walks and four strike outs in his six plus innings of work.
And the Yankees did win that game.
He'll be up against Livan Hernandez for Arizona who has been pretty good this season for the Diamondbacks and who has a record of 5-3 with an ERA in the mid 3's.
Livan ended up surrendering three earned runs on five hits in his seven innings of work in ano-decision this past Tuesday against the Giants.
The Cuban right hander also walked two and struck out two in that game.
Livan gave up all three runs and four of the five hits in a rocky third inning, but besides that he kept the Giants in check.
He left the game in line for his sixth victory before the DBack's closer Jose Valverde blew the save.
If the Yankees can close out the game tonight they will be above the .500 mark for the first time since April.

That's it for now....
and before I forget....

LETS GO YANKEES !!!