Pirates 3 : At World's End

The New York Yankees faced the Pittsburgh Pirates this past weekend inside Yankee Stadium for the first time since Kenny Lofton was a Yankees outfielder and they took all 3 games against the Bucs.
The first game was a little bit of a nail biter as the Yankees had to go old school and take an extra inning win away from the wisting Pirates in the 10th inning as Derek Jeter hit a little dribbler to push across the winning run in the 10th inning.
The game was awesome in the context of excitement and the fact that we got the win, but a little bittersweet as Andy Pettitte is denied another win that he really deserved.
At this rate he could end the season with 250 innings pitched, 200 strike outs, 35 games started, and 9 wins.
If the defense, the offense, and the bullpen had done what it had done for other starters and what they should do in each and every game he could have 7 or 8 wins now and be on pace for a 20 win season.
I sometimes wonder if he is starting to wonder why he came back to New York after all?
I hope that they can get it together for him and so that he can have decent numbers this season.
I know that the team winning is what it's all about --- but he deserves better.
I mean, Matsui kept Andy in it with a 2 run homer in the 6th that tied the game at 2 --- but then the next inning Melky Cabrera has a ball hit to center field that should have been the third out and he misplays it into a 2 run inside the park home run.
Now, granted, it was a somewhat difficult play --- but I've seen Melky make some pretty spectacular plays.
Why can't he make one of those plays when Andy is on the mound and needs a pick up?
There's that and the way that he's been pitching I want him to pick up his player option for next season and the way things are going I wouldn't blame him if he didn't want to.
Anyway, we did get a nice win to start the series and the winning ways continued into Saturday when Roger Clemens made his long awaiting return to the New York Yankees pitching the Saturday afternoon home game against the Pirates.
Roger pitched 108 pitches and struck out 7 Pirates hitters in 6 full innings of work and gave up 3 runs.
He retired the last 7 batters in a row and looked strong all the way through for the most part.
You could tell that the Pirates hitters were taking as many pitches as they could and trying to run up his pitch count in an effort to get him out of the game early.
I thought he did a good job in his first start back and was impressed that he pitched 107 pitches and finished the 6th inning. I had heard most sportswriters speculate that Clemens would be a "five and fly" pitcher and that's not what happened.
He pitched 6 innings and if he can be a little more economical with his pitches in the first couple of innings in his next start --- I could see him going 7 innings.
To put it in perspective these same speculators that were assuring us that Clemens would only pitch 5 innings also were assuring us that he'd pitch somewhere between 70 and 85 pitches.
And just a few days ago Chien Ming Wang pitched a complete game with 104 pitches.
If Clemens can manage to get a few more outs from 100 pitches --- I don't see why 7 inning outings can't be in his future.
And in addition to his nice outing you could see the demonstrable effect of his return on the faces of his team mates and the fans in attendance at the game.
There seemed to be a renewed vigor and sense of enthusiasm with the team and there was an electricity in the air at the stadium.
He cost us too much money and he shouldn't get all of his special perks --- but on game day he adds something to the team that is just really special and that few other pitchers at any age can bring.
After that win, the third game of this series was almost anti-climatic.
Almost.
Almost --- but not quite as the third game was a hitting exhibition for the team as they banged out a remarkable 13 runs on 14 hits.
Bobby Abreu went 4-4 with 3 RBI's and a walk and was a home run away from the cycle.
Alex Rodriguez picked up the home run slack as he went 2 for 3 with 4 runs scored, 2 walks, 5 RBI's and hit his 23rd and 24th home runs in the ballgame.
Tyler Clippard was unfortunately knocked out of the game early as he game up 6 runs on 6 hits in just 3 and 2/3rd's innings pitched and wouldn't factor into the decision.
If he'd just stayed in for one more out he would be 4-1 right now instead of 3-1 and been the recipient of a monster offense with an ugly win.
But ugly or not --- it was a good win and gave us a three game sweep of the Pirates and ran our current winning streak to a season high six games. It seems like things are starting to turn a corner for this team and with Clemens back and Wang and Pettitte healthy and pitching well --- it might be turning around for this team.
As it stands now we are 9.5 games behind the league leading Boston Red Sox and 5.5 games behind the AL Wild Card leading Detroit Tigers.
If we can keep up this momentum lots of things seem more possible than when we looked at it this same situation last week.
I haven't given up hope yet for this season and this series sweep was sweet --- no matter who it was against !