When Manager Joe Girardi returned on Sunday afternoon, the junk food disappeared again and the Yankees’ bats produced just enough to avoid a potential sweep at the hands of the Tampa Bay Rays.
Girardi was back in the dugout after spending the previous two games (both losses) holed up in his office with an upper respiratory infection, and the Yankees shut out the Rays, 2-0, to avoid a third consecutive loss to the Rays.
With Wang Chien-ming (王建民) leading the way, the Yankees also escaped, for now, losing their second consecutive series to the Rays at Yankee Stadium. Tampa Bay won two of three games at Yankee Stadium over late August and early September of last season. The teams were to finish this four-game set yesterday.
PHOTO: AP
Girardi still coughed and sniffled through sessions with reporters, but he said his fever had disappeared, as had his concern about spreading his illness to his team.
To mark his return, Mike Mussina wrote on a dry-erase board at his locker: “Joe’s back! Hide the chicken wings.” (Girardi does not allow junk food in the clubhouse, to the chagrin of some of the players.)
Still fighting the illness, Girardi had to brave the elements to sit through this one, with the temperature a blustery 46 degrees. “It’s nice being out in that fresh air,” he said. “Even though it’s chilly, you just feel better when you’re out there.”
Having Wang in control surely helped Girardi warm up, too. Wang’s pants flapped in the wind when he took signs from catcher Jorge Posada, and he struggled some with his command early (56 of his 96 pitches went for strikes), but he did not give up a hit through his first four and a third innings.
“That kind of shocked me when I heard the fans go, ‘Eww,’” Johnny Damon said of the crowd’s reaction to a potential no-hitter being derailed by Willy Aybar’s single in the fifth.
Wang’s location was off at times and he fell behind several batters, but the Rays bailed him out several times by swinging at pitches outside the strike zone. He also continued to work a few of his new split-finger fastballs into his repertory, and struck out Carlos Pena with one.
Wang (2-0) gave up four hits and no runs in six-plus innings, striking out six and walking two.
The Yankees supported Wang at the plate in the middle innings, not letting a solid overall performance from him go to waste. The Yankees (3-3) have scored only 17 runs in six games.
The Yankees’ bats heated up in the fourth inning against the right-hander James Shields, a changeup specialist who stayed ahead of hitters through the first three innings. The Yankees made him, and Rays right fielder Eric Hinske, work in the fourth.
Alex Rodriguez drove a curve deep into the right-center-field gap for a one-out double. Then Hideki Matsui blasted a 2-1 changeup into the right-field seats for the game’s only runs.
Matsui’s second home run of the season was his third against Shields in 10 career at-bats.
Robinson Cano followed Matsui with a line-drive single to right before Jorge Posada flied out to the warning track, also to right, and Wilson Betemit ended the inning with a ground out.
The Yankees went back to work in the fifth, but they were not able to score after loading the bases with two outs and Matsui at the plate again.
Matsui, who had three hits, struck out watching a pair of unexpected fastballs coast into catcher Shawn Riggans’ mitt.
“We had some guys who were struggling a little bit had a couple of hits,” Girardi said.
The Yankees had nine hits for the second straight day, their highest total of the season.
Before the game, reliever Joba Chamberlain jostled about the clubhouse, singing, dancing and hurling non sequiturs across the room.
“You know what you’ve got to do,” Chamberlain shouted to Wang, who does not speak much English.
Wang did what he had to do, then Chamberlain charged in from the bullpen in the seventh with runners on first and third and no outs. Chamberlain got the Yankees out of the jam with eight pitches, his second clocked at 101 miles an hour. He struck out Aybar with his first three pitches, then got Riggans to line into a double play.
Chamberlain pitched two no-hit innings, and Mariano Rivera threw a no-hit ninth for the save, his third.
So while there were no chicken wings to be seen, there were just enough hits for Girardi, who said he was tired of drinking so much orange juice as he continues to nurse himself back to health.
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