Mariano Rivera got loose in the Yankee bullpen during the top of the ninth inning tonight but that is as close as he came to contributing to the team’s 5-0 win over the Blue Jays. Shawn Chacon pitched eight brilliant innings (allowing just three hits and walk to go with three strikeouts) and the very flammable Scott Proctor worked a scoreless ninth (around two bases runners). It was the Bombers fifth consecutive victory and their 10th in their last 11 games. Derek Jeter and Robinson Cano hit back-to-back dingers in the first inning, as the team scored four times off of Ted Lily giving Chacon all the support that he would need. Thankfully, it wasn’t a one-run game, and in the process the bullpen got some much-needed rest. Chacon was nothing short of terrific.

The Yanks remain a game ahead of the Red Sox who came back from an early 3-1 deficit (thanks in large part to a careless throwing error by Miguel Tejada) to bury the hapless Orioles, 6-3. Jose Contreras, who has been fantastic recently, pitched a complete-game as the White Sox beat the Twins, 3-1, while the Indians out-lasted the Royals, 7-6. Everything’s the same cause tonight, everbody won.

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Man, can you believe it’s been a whole four days since the Yankees have played the Blue Jays? Feels like . . . Oh, right.

The Jays roster remains the same as it was last weekend when the Yanks took two of three in Toronto, though there’s a chance that Orlando Hudson could return to action this weekend after sitting since September 7 due to an ankle injury. Considering the fact that all three of last weekend’s contests were decided by a single run, and that the Jays are coming off a split with the Mariners in which they outscored their opponent by a single run over the course of four games, the Jays could use any advantage that might tip the balance in their favor. Still, one hopes that the upgrade from struggling rookie Aaron Hill to a less mobile Hudson wouldn’t be enough to overcome the disadvantage the Jays face as a .459 road team coming in to face a team playing .654 ball at home that has handled them nicely thus far this season (Yanks own the series 10-5).

While the Yanks play three at home against the Jays followed by four on the road against the O’s, the second-place Red Sox (now trailing by a nice, round full game) do the exact opposite (three in Baltimore, then four at home against Toronto), so one would hope that neither of these teams is ready to roll over completely. Still, it sure would be nice to see the Yanks clean house on their final home stand of the year.

One item already in their favor is that Joe Torre has decided to go with Chien-Ming Wang on Sunday (as well he should) moving Aaron Small to the bullpen, which can use all the help it can get. With that, I’ve been able to project the pitching match-ups for the remainder of the season on the side bar.

Tonight, the Yanks send Shawn Chacon to the mound. Chacon has owned the Jays in two starts since joining the Yanks (total line: 15 IP, 10 H, 2 R, 0 HR, 5 BB, 7 K), and turned in a gem in Toronto last Saturday. The next day, Ted Lilly, who starts against Chacon tonight, turned in his first quality start since Bastille Day, handing the Yankees their only loss since September 10, but was lit-up by the Bombers in two starts at the beginning of the season. One hopes the Jays aren’t overly familiar with Chacon at this point and that he can continue his dominance of the remaining Canadian team. Meanwhile, here’s hoping the O’s take the never-say die spirit that gave us all fits over the past three days and perhaps some individual anger and stick it to the Sox.

Well, I guess we Yankee fans just need to reside ourselves to the fact that each and every game from here on out is going to be dramatic in one way or another. The Bombers seem incapable of playing anything but a one-run contest these days–last night was their sixth in the last seven games as they beat the Orioles 7-6 on a cool and breezy night in the Bronx. But right now the bottom line, more than ever, is the the bottom line: winning. And no matter how uncomfortable or ugly it might be to watch, the Yanks have been winning, not losing and that makes all the difference in the world doesn’t it?

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I covered the significance of tonight’s game in yesterday’s pre-game post, but there are two corrections that need to be made to what I said yesterday.

The first is that, while the Yankees will indeed erase the half-game in the standings between themselves and the Red Sox for better or worse tonight, they will not do so with regard to the Indians until Monday as Cleveland opens a four-game series in Kansas City tonight, but will be off on Monday. Of course, the Yankees hope that half game with Cleveland is a moot point as, with a half-game lead in the AL East entering tonight’s game, their focus is entirely on winning the division, as well it should be as they still trail the Indians by a half game and the White Sox by three.

The other correction is that Joe Torre appears to have backed off his six-man rotation idea. Last night the YES announcers reported that Aaron Small would be the odd man out, but on today’s Mike & the Mad Dog show on WFAN, Torre claimed not to have made up his mind yet, though the choice does appear to be between Small and Chien-Ming Wang, one of whom will start thus Sunday against the Blue Jays and, barring a disaster outing in that game, will return to the hill in Game One of the season-ending showdown with the Red Sox.

Assuming that Torre goes with Wang, who I think is not only the no-brainer choice between the two, but the Yankees second best starter at the moment (behind only Randy Johnson), this is how the rotation would project over the remainder of the year.

Thu 9/22 v Bal: Mussina
Fri 9/23 v Tor: Chacon
Sat 9/24 v Tor: Wright
Sun 9/25 v Tor: Wang
Mon 9/26 @ Bal: Johnson
Tue 9/27 @ Bal: Mussina
Wed 9/28 @ Bal: Chacon
Thu 9/29 @ Bal: Wright
Fri 9/30 @ Bos: Wang v. Wells
Sat 10/1 @ Bos: Johnson v. Schilling
Sun 10/2 @ Bos: Mussina v. Wakefield

Of course, having Small and Leiter in the bullpen gives Torre the option of using either one in place of Wright (should he struggle this Saturday) or Mussina (should he tank tonight and/or Tuesday), or of using either or both in tandem with the starter listed above to complete a must-win game (as if there are any that aren’t at this point). After all, if the season does wind up coming down to that final game on October 2nd, the starting assignment is merely a formality. Any sign of struggle and the hook comes out and everybody, perhaps even the previous day’s starter, will be available to pitch.

In other news, Jason Giambi will sit tonight due to the sore back that drove him from yesterday’s game in the middle innings. Tino Martinez, who walked and doubled in two plate appearances in relief of Giambi last night, will start at first base. Bernie’s back in center after last night’s day off. Matt Lawton, who went 2 for 3 last night with a two-run dinger that accounted for all of the Yankees runs last night, will start in right in place of Bubba Crosby (also 2 for 3 last night) against the left-handed Bruce Chen.

Speaking of Chen, he was bounced to the bullpen after a few rough outings in July, but quickly returned to the rotation and has turned in eight quality start in his nine outings since doing so, the one exception being an start against Cleveland in which he allowed just one earned run in five innings. Since returning to the rotation he’s posted a 1.84 ERA with a 0.92 WHIP.

Mike Mussina, meanwhile, will likely be on a short leash with Al Leiter ready to come in as a second-leg starter if need be. So that’s your match-up, Chen against Mike Mussina on 23 days rest for a guaranteed half-game swing in the AL East race. Gulp. Here’s hoping the first-place Yankees, the hottest team in baseball right now (yes, they’re even a game better than the Indians over the last ten games), finds a way to pull this out and go a full-game up on the reeling Red Sox.

When a Yankee player crosses home plate after hitting a home run it has become customary for his teammate to raise a finger to his lips in the universal expression of “shhh.” That is very much how I feel this morning after the Yankees edged in front of the Red Sox into first place. According to The New York Times:

“I don’t think it really means anything,” shortstop Derek Jeter said. “We still have to play well. There’s no time to congratulate anyone or walk around and be happy, because we haven’t won anything. If we play well and win our games, everything will be fine.”

Behind a vintage performance by Randy Johnson the Bombers beat the Orioles 2-1 last night in the Bronx–their fifth one-run contest in their last six games–while the Devil Rays came-from-behind to topple the Sox, 7-4 in Tampa. The Bombers are a half-a-game up on the Sox, who have the day off, and remain a half-a-game behind the Indians for the wildcard. Mike Mussina will take the mound for New York tonight (with Senator Al Leiter waiting in the wings should Mussina falter in his return); the Yanks have eleven games left, while the Sox have ten.

Johnson was simply overpowering. He didn’t allow a hit until the fifth inning. In the sixth, the fleet Bernie Castro reached first on an infield single. He slapped a shot down the third base line, a sure double, but it was stabbed by Alex Rodriguez, but there was no way to nab Castro. Melvin Mora then pounced on one of the only mistakes of the night for Johnson–a belt-high fastball–driving it into left center field for a double. After Miguel Tejada flew out to center, Javey Lopez hit another smash to third. This time it was to Rodriguez’s left. The Yankee third baseman slickly picked the ball and threw on to first to end the inning, saving a run in the process.

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If the Yankees win tonight and tomorrow to complete a four-game sweep of the Orioles, they will wake up on Friday in first place in both the AL East and the Wild Card race, and there’s not a damn thing that Boston or Cleveland can do about it. That’s because the half game by which the Yankees currently trail those two clubs is the result of the Bombers having played one less game thus far this season. On Thursday, the Sox and Tribe will be idle while the Yankees finish the current series with the O’s, thus that pesky half game will be gone, for better or worse, come Friday.

As a result, with the exception of the final three games of the season in Boston, each of which counts for a full game the AL East standings, tomorrow night’s game is the most important one on the Yankees remaining schedule, as it is guaranteed to effect a half-game swing in the race for the playoffs. Joe Torre knows this. Prior to last night’s game he made a comment about how much he was looking forward to eliminating that half game come Thursday. Thus his decision to give Mike Mussina his first start since Aug 29 tomorrow night is . . . well, maybe it’s just Joe being Joe.

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The Yankees and Orioles have played a lot of turgid, exhausting games against each other during the past decade, and last night’s unsightly 12-9 Yankee win was no exception. Weighing in at a combined 21 runs, 34 hits, and 345 pitches in 3 hours and 41 minutes, it was an ugly victory for New York, one which left me feeling more frustrated than pleased, but hey, a win, is a win, is a win, and I should not complain. Aaron Small was forgettable as he improved his record to 9-0, and the Yankee relief corps were just as bad, so bad that Mariano Rivera was forced into a game in which the team scored a dozen runs. Fortunately, Rivera only needed eight pitches to retire the Birds in the ninth, but with precious little time remaining in the season, this was not a night where you wanted to see Mo in the game.

However, the Yankees did pick up a game on the Indians who lost to the White Sox in a dramatic, extra-inning affair in Chicago. They are just a half-a-game behind the Tribe and remain a half-a-game behind the Red Sox who battered the Devil Rays 15-2 (David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez were the stars, belting the bejesus out of the ball all night, prompting John Olerud to observe, “Maybe they ought to put out a public address announcement to tell those children out there to be careful.”) The backpage headlines in both the Daily News and New York Post this morning read “Half and Half.”

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Bubba Crosby’s game-winning home run last night just might have solved the Yankees’ right field situation, which has been in flux since Gary Sheffield injured his leg at home against the Devil Rays two weeks ago. At the time of the injury, Matt Lawton had just “hit” his way out of the line-up, having gone 4 for 25 with a homer and three walks (.160/.276/.280) in eight games since joining the Yankees. Lawton’s benching forced Bernie Williams back into center (where Lawton’s arrival had temporarily placed Hideki Matsui), and created room for Ruben Sierra at DH.

Sheffield’s injury created another opportunity for Lawton, who promptly squandered it by playing abysmal defense in right while going 0 for 12 against the Devil Rays and Red Sox. That opened the door for Bubba Crosby, who proceeded to go 7 for 20 over the next five games, starting two of them in right and one in center.

However, Crosby’s grip on the starting job was jarred loose when Sheffield returned to the line-up as the DH, forcing Torre to give Ruben Sierra a trio of starts in right in order to get his favorite 39-year-old out machine in the line-up. However, Sierra also played his way out of Torre’s rotation, going 2 for 27 with a homer and a pair of walks in the wake of Sheffield’s injury, mixing in some costly defensive mistakes in the Yankees lone loss on the just-completed road trip.

Ultimately it was Sierra’s defense that prompted Torre to start Crosby against the left-handed Erik Bedard last night, as Joe told MLB.com, “Yesterday, we may have given away too much, defensively. Bubba probably gives us our best defense, so where it may cost you a little on the offensive side, you hope he can make up for it.”

Crosby, who is clearly the Yankees best defensive outfielder, responded by going 2 for 3 against Bedard by victimizing 320-pound Oriole firstbaseman Walter Young with a hot shot down the line and a bunt, then won the game by homering off of lefty reliever Eric Dubose in the bottom of the ninth.

With that 3 for 4 night under his belt, Crosby is now hitting .379/.379/.552 in 29 September at-bats (his triple against Tim Wakefield and last night’s homer being his only extra base hits of the year), which has brought his season line comfortably above the Womack line to an almost respectable .278/.307/.347 (speaking of whom, Womack has made just one plate appearance since August 24, which is exactly what has to happen for this team to make the postseason). Last night’s game has also thrown Crosby’s splits for a loop as he’s now hitting .357/.357/.571 against lefties in a mere 14 at-bats, three of his five hits and all of his extra bases against lefties coming last night.

Crosby made the Yankees’ 25-man roster out of spring training the last two years due to his ability to get extremely hot at exactly the right time, hitting .320 during spring training this year and .357 last year. Thus it would be foolish for Torre to do anything other than ride Crosby until he runs out of gas, particularly as he is leaps and bouds better than his other options defensively. Fortunately, Torre seems to have caught on, as Crosby will again get the start in right field tonight as Aaron Small looks to extend his perfect record to 9-0.

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Yankee fans have been hollering all year about the team’s propensity for leaving runners on base. Last week, a reader wondered where the team ranks in that category. David Pinto has pointed me in the right direction, and it should come as no surprise that the Yanks lead the American League in runners left on base with 1163. The Red Sox are second with 1149, followed by Oakland (1089), Cleveland (1049) and Minnestoa (1036). However, as Pinto also mentioned to me, the Yanks and Sox score a lot of runs so it is natural that they would be at the top of the league in leaving men on. Boston currently leads the league in runs scored with 838, followed by Texas (816), New York (806), Cleveland (727) and Oakland (724). The team that looks the worst here are the Twins who are dead last in the AL in runs scored (637).

“I’ve never hit a walk-off homer, ever, in my whole life, not even in Little League,” Crosby said. “To do it at Yankee Stadium, this time of year, when it counts, it just doesn’t get any better than this.”
(N.Y. Times)

C.W. Wang pitched his best game since returning from the DL last night, holding the Orioles to two runs over eight innings. He was a little shaky in the first three innings but after that, he cruised, getting Baltimore to hit ground ball after ground ball. I can’t recall him throwing harder either. The YES broadcasters said his fastball was hitting between 93-96 mph. Wang had nine assists himself (two shy of the League record). He left the game after eight fine innings with the score tied at two. The Yankees blew a scoring opportunity in the third inning (Gary Sheffield, depleted of his power, grounded into an inning-ending double play with the bases loaded) and left nine men on base in total for the night. However, they managed to score two runs in fifth (RBI single by Alex Rodriguez, RBI ground out by Sheff) to tie the game at two.

Mariano Rivera pitched the ninth. After striking out Jay Gibbons (check swing) for the first out, Javey Lopez popped out to Tino Martinez. Actually the ball was in foul territory up the first base line. Crosby raced in from right and Cano motored over from second. Cano almost collided with Tino, who was once again called on as a defensive replacement for Giambi, but Martinez held onto the ball for the out. B.J. Surhoff followed and hit the first pitch in virtually the same spot. Actually, this play was even easier for Martinez but an overeager Cano bumped into him and the ball dropped out of Tino’s glove. (Martinez shot Cano a look that said, “Now, listen here, son, lemme ‘splain something to you…”) Surhoff worked the count full before lining out to Hideki Matsui in left.

Bubba Crosby, who already had two hits, led off the bottom of the ninth and plastered a 1-0 breaking ball deep into the right centerfield bleachers. Crosby, who hasn’t hit a home run in well over a year, knew it was gone immediately, and went into style-mode. He practically froze at the plate, like he was doing a dance move, admiring his unlikely moment in the spotlight.

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Doity, filty, stinkin’ boids. C.M. Wang squares off against the Orioles’ talented southpaw Erik Bedard tonight in the Bronx. Yanks must to take at least three of four against Baltimore, both this week and next week. Hopefully, they come out on the good foot and nab a “w.” Whatta ya say, let’s go boys!

My assumptions panned out this past weekend, with the Indians sweeping the Royals and the Yanks and Red Sox taking two of three in their respective series. As a result the Yankees are a game and a half out in both the East and the Wild Card race.

Meanwhile, the Indians have moved within 3.5 games of the White Sox and still have all six head-to-head match-ups remaining (including a three-game series that starts tonight in Chicago). That’s bad news for the Yankees’ Wild Card hopes as they still trail the White Sox by five games.

Tonight our heroes play the first of eight remaining games with the Baltimore Orioles. The Orioles team that the Yanks will face in the Bronx tonight is drastically different from the one that last visited the House that Ruth Built back in late June. That team arrived in New York with a .543 winning percentage, but, starting with a pair of loses to the Yankees, went on to post a 18-33 (.353) record through the end of August. Along the way they changed managers, traded their left fielder, released their would be ace starter, and lost a pair of would-be hall of famers to a combination of injury and steroid suspension.

Things have been looking better for the O’s since the calander changed to September. The birds have posted a .500 record on the month, but that’s largely been the result of a pair of series wins against the lowly Mariners and Rangers, which produced a four-game winning streak last week. They’ve also dropped series to the Red Sox, Blue Jays and Devil Rays. The Yankees hope to complete the divisional sweep this week.

Tonight’s Oriole starter, Eric Bedard, has pitched reasonably well since being activated from the DL in late July, but has walked a lot of men and had trouble going deep into games. His opposite number, Chien-Ming Wang, has looked good in his two starts since being activated, though he has yet to really deliver on his pre-injury promise. Here’s hoping he has a breakthrough tonight after a pair of warm-up starts against those gall-darn Devil Rays.

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Every loss hurts more. The Yankees fell to the Blue Jays on a bright sunny afternoon in Toronto 6-5 leaving Yankee fans to grind their teeth for the rest of the day. Although the team went 5-1 on their road trip, this was a sour ending as they blew an opportunity to move to within a half-a-game of Boston. They did, however, lose a game in the wildcard standings to Cleveland, who crushed Kansas City. It wasn’t so much that the Yanks lost, it was they way they played: tight and sloppy. After two important wins on Friday and Saturday, this was another example of a game they let slip away.

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The Yankees have won six games and already taken the weekend series against the Blue Jays. Funny to think that they could start the week having lost ground on Boston and Cleveland should those two teams win today and the Yanks lose. Our old friend Ted Lilly will square off against Jaret Wright this afternoon in Toronto. Wright tends to get hurt early, but the Yankees desperately need him to make like Shawn Chacon and give them some length. More to the point, they need the offense to put up at least a half-a-dozen runs, which is possible, though no lock against Lilly, who can be nasty when he’s on. Jorge Posada is showing some signs of life, and Robinson Cano has been hot. Let’s see who can step up today. Got to drive ’em in when they are on, boys. Let’s see youse guys get them ducks off the pond.

One more pin Rodney. Just win it. Any which way you can.

The last two victories for the Yankees are just the kind of games that could make you start to believe. Then again, if you are an Indians fan, I’d think you are feelin’ the faith pretty strong right now too. The Yankees won 1-0 yesterday afternoon putting pressure on Cleveland and Boston, who in turn both won one-run games last night as well. It was the Yankees league-leading 13th shutout on the year (go figure that), a nail-biter that featured some timely defense. I counted seven fielding plays over the course of the game (two by Jeter–including his John Stallworth over-the-shoulder routine, two by Cano–one featuring a nice pick by Jason Giambi, one by Matsui, another by Ruben Sierra, and the icing-on-the-gravy by Rodriguez-Cano-Martinez). Vernon Wells also robbed Bernie Williams of extra bases with a basket catch in right-center field that was the definition of smooth.

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Last night, the Yankees won a game by the skin of their teeth, a game that felt like they were going to lose seven different ways even though they held an 11-3 lead at one point. It’s just the kind of game that could mean the difference between them making or missing the playoffs and in the end, they won it. Good thing too as both Cleveland and Boston were victorious as well.

The last week, in which our heroes went 5-1 against the rival Red Sox and dastardly Devil Rays, has been a physically and emotionally draining one for both the Yankees and their fans. Fortunately, while there are no off-days left in the Yankees season, their schedule does get decidedly easier starting tonight when the Yanks begin a stretch of fourteen games against the Blue Jays and Orioles.

But it is exactly that that concerns me about these four series against the weaker sisters of the AL East. The Yankees avoided a let down after taking two of three from the Red Sox, and they avoided a let down after both unloading 17 runs on the Devil Rays in the first game of that series and pulling out a one-run victory in Game Two. But in both cases they were facing a team that had made them angry, the Red Sox by virtue of the natural rivalry, last year’s humiliating ALCS, the standings, and all of the accompanying baggage, and the Devil Rays by inexplicably pushing the Yankees around during the first five series between the two teams this year.

The Blue Jays and Orioles, on the other hand, have thus far minded their manners. After a hot start, the Orioles have tumbled to a .476 record, 14 games behind the still second place Yankees, and they haven’t been seen ’round these parts since just before the All-Star break when they dropped a pair to the Yanks in the Bronx. The Blue Jays, meanwhile, have gone a very accommodating 4-8 against the Yanks thus far this season, most recently dropping three of four to the Bombers at the Stadium in late August, the only Blue Jay win in that series coming on what remains Mike Mussina’s last game of the season, when the inflammation of his elbow became too severe for him to continue.

The fear, of course, is that after the fever pitch of their last six games, the Yankees will ease off against the Jays this weekend, forgetting that they’re markedly better than the Seattle team that split a four game set with the Yanks two and a half weeks ago, and perhaps completely unaware that Toronto has a .545 Pythagorean Winning Percentage, which, if substituted for the Blue Jays’ actual record, would rank them just two games behind the A’s and Angels in the overall American League standings.

Then again, looking back over the Yankees’ schedule, other than their struggles against the Devil Rays, the Yanks haven’t lost a series to a team not currently in a playoff slot since they dropped two of three to the Mets in late June, and other than that Mariners series the only other split they’ve suffered over that span was the rain-shortened two-game set against the Orioles that immediately followed that Mets series.

What that tells us is that, over the last two and a half months, the Yankees have done their job against the lesser teams in the league, but simply winning these four series may not be enough to get the Yankees in the playoffs. Let’s speculate, shall we?

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“That’s why the Yankees are the Yankees,” Rays DH Jonny Gomes said. “The buffoonery they had earlier, that was something else. But they’re the Yankees and they’re here now. They mean business. And they’re not taking no for an answer.” (N.Y. Daily News)

Welp, Cliff was right: neither pitcher was pretty last night. But that didn’t stop the Yankees from winning their fourth straight game. Down 5-1, the Bombers scored seven runs in the top of the sixth inning, giving Aaron Small all he would need in order to up his record to an improbable 8-0. The final score: Yanks 9, Rays 5. According to the YES broadcast, it was the tenth time this season that the Yanks have come back from a deficit of four or more runs, a team record. Robinson Cano hit a huge grand slam and Alex Rodriguez made like David Ortiz with a tie-breaking two-run blast which gave the Yanks the lead for good. New York inched to within a half-a-game of the idle Cleveland Indians and a game-and-a-half to the Boston Red Sox who lost to Oakland last night at Fenway Park.

Aaron Small had two bad innings. In the second, he allowed two doubles and hit a man as the Rays jumped to a 2-0 lead; in the fifth, he gave up two singles and a long home run (which hit the catwalk) to Johnny Gomes (hey, the dude can hit the high fastball, ‘specially when it ain’t that fast). He also retired the side in order three times. The most important work for Small came after his offense reclaimed the lead in the top of the sixth. He retired the next five men, throwing strikes, and keeping the aggresive Rays hitters off-balance with his breaking pitches, throwing them slower rather than harder.

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It won’t be a beauty contest tonight when Aaron Small and Seth McClung face off in the final game of the year between the Yankees and Devil Rays (and, yes, I just accidentally wrote “Red Sox”–sure feels like it), but McClung, who has made just one relief appearance and no starts against the Yankees this year, sure will be a welcome change from the endless parade of Hendricksons and Fossums the Bombers have seen in this match-up.

McClung, a burly 24-year-old in his first full season, is a hard cat to figure. His last four starts have alternated between quality wins (including an eight-inning gem in Toronto in his penultimate effort), and disaster loses (a total of three innings pitched in two starts, including just two in a rematch against the Blue Jays his last time out). The bad news is that means McClung is “due” for a quality win this time out. The good news is that he’s had difficulty harnessing his stuff and a patient Yankee offense (like the one that made Mark Hendrickson throw 113 pitches in five innings last night) could wear him out quickly.

Like McClung, Small will be making his first start against the Devil Rays this year after facing them once out of the bullpen. Unlike McClung, Small has been nothing if not reliable for the Yankees this year. The four runs he allowed against the Red Sox in 6 1/3 innings in his last start were the most he’s allowed in any outing this year, and one of those scored after Joe Torre had pulled him from the game. Prior to that he had thrown fourteen scorless innings.

Small’s success may be a fluke, but there’s no reason why that fluke has to come to an end prior to next season, as Tom Zachary’s 1929 campaign demonstrates (a point Steven Goldman likely didn’t realize he was making). The Yankees certainly hope Small’s coin stays balanced on its side, as any loss at this point in the season will feel like a catastrophic one, especially if it comes at the hands of these blasted Devil Rays in the final confrontation of the year.

Oh, and don’t look now, but the Yankees have the fifth-best record in baseball (behind the Cardinals, White and Red Sox, and Indians). It sure would be a shame to see the Yankees sit home this October with a better record than both western division winners. Unfortunately, there are a number of ways that could happen, but none of them can occur if the Yankees keep winning.

Aaron Small, I turn it over to you.

It didn’t come easy, but the Yankees finally took a series from the Devil Rays, by pulling out a 6-5 victory in Tampa last night.

Throughout the game, the Yankees seemed on the verge of yet another collapse against the Devil Rays. They left the bases loaded in the first inning after plating just one run, stranded runners at the corners in both the third and fourth (scoring another run in the latter inning thanks in large part to a Julio Lugo throwing error), then promptly surrendered their 2-0 lead in the bottom of the fourth on a two-out game-tying single by Toby Hall.

The first true sign of life came in the fifth when, with a man on first and two outs, Bernie Williams reached on an infield single to second and Ruben Sierra drew a five-pitch walk, just his fifth of the season, to load the bases and bring Robinson Cano to the plate. Cano, who was 1 for 15 on the season with the bases loaded coming into that at-bat, fell behind Tampa starter Mark Hendrickson 1-2, then lined a single into right that scored two runs, restoring the Yankees’ two-run lead.

That the second Yankee lead was in part the result of two things that never happen–a Ruben Sierra walk and a Robinson Cano hit with the bases loaded–was an indication that last night just might be the night the Yankees broke through against the Devil Rays, but things weren’t quite that simple.

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