Chien-Ming Wang pitched another solid game last night, greatly helped by two double plays, as the Bombers beat the Tigers, 4-2. Wang doesn’t mince around. He works quickly, and puts the ball in play. He left the game with runners on first and third and one out, up by three, in the seventh inning. Mike Stanton relieved him and promptly gave up a single. Runners on first and second and in comes Taynon Sturtze.

Marcus Thames blooped a humpback fly ball to short center field. Bernie Williams came in but there was no way he was going to catch up to it. Robinson Cano got a good jump and arrived under the ball first. But he didn’t notice Derek Jeter, in full-on John Stallworth post-pattern, Super Bowl XIV mode. Jeter, with his back to the plate, stretched out his glove, made the catch, and fell on top of Cano. For his part, Cano looked like a free safety that spotted an errant pass. He drifted over to the ball thinking he was going to make an easy interception. But Jeter was John Stallworth, and he forcefully snatched the ball from him, at the last minute. (Bernie looked on like any good referee would.) Just as impressive as the catch, was how quickly Jeter got to his feet and returned the ball to the infield. Jeter’s spikes caught Cano, but the young second baseman appeared more startled than hurt. Add it to Jeter’s highlight reel.

Sturtze got the last out of the inning, Flash Gordon–pitching much better of late–struck out two in the eighth, and Mariano Rivera threw twenty-three pitches (walking one) in a scoreless ninth. Gary Sheffield, Alex Rodriguez and Jorge Posada drove in the Bombers’ four runs, and it was enough for another series victory. The Yanks go for the sweep tonight against the Tigers’ best pitcher. Kevin Brown will pitch for the home team. Which is a good thing considering that the Red Sox are up next.

My brother called me during the game last night and wondered if the Yankees would consider keeping Bernie Williams next year; buying out his option, then signing him to a small-time, one-year deal. After talking about it for a few minutes, the idea of Bernie in the DH/PH, Rock Raines/Chili Davis role would be appealing. He’d be a nice replacement for Sierra, that’s for sure. Whatta ya say? I know it’s still early, but do you think that Bernie and/or the Yankees would be interested in such a scenerio?

It hasn’t warmed up yet. Let’s hope that Bernie has another three-week hot stretch left in him. I know that I am appreciating every thing he does this season–especially the positive contributions–because it could be the last we see of him.

Having literally beaten the Tigers about the head and neck in the first game of their current series, the Yankees must now face two of the best road pitchers in baseball, Mike Maroth (2.03 ERA seventh in the AL among pitchers with three or more road starts, 0.84 WHIP) and Jeremy Bonderman (1.50 ERA fifth in the majors, 0.58 WHIP, 20:1 K/BB) with the task of beating one of them to claim their sixth-straight series victory and avoid entering this weekend’s Red Sox series on two-game losing streak.

Speaking of the Sox, they fell to the Blue Jays last night on a walk-off home run by Reed Johnson (his second dinger of the game) off Alan Embree, allowing the Yankees (still tied with the Jays, of course) to creep within 1.5 games. Thus a series win against Detroit would also put the Yankees in position to pass the Scarlet Hosers with a weekend sweep regardless of what the Sox do between now and then.

And that’s the trick: winning series. In the new Pinstriped Bible, Steven Goldman lays out a game plan that just might work:

The current price of the wild card . . . [is] equivalent to 94 wins, so expecting the Yankees to get there would be equivalent to saying we believe that the team is capable of going 71-47 the rest of the way, a .602 pace. Forty-seven of those games will come against the Red Sox (13), Orioles (12), Angels (7), Twins (6), White Sox (6), and Cardinals (3). Say the Yankees win one more than the lose against those clubs. They would then need to win two-thirds of their remaining games to maintain that .602 pace.

In other words, split with the good teams (the Yanks are 3-3 against the Sox thus far this season, though the O’s and Angels have had their way with them), and win series against the rest. [Incidentally, Goldman’s book on Casey Stengel is finally available for purchase. Also recommended reading: his review of Star Wars: Episode III in today’s Pinstriped Blog]

Defending the home turf tonight is Chien-Ming Wang, who hasn’t pitched since last Monday when he set down eighteen-straight Mariners while picking up his second straight win. Wang was bumped from his scheduled start on Sunday against Pedro Martinez and the Mets in favor of Carl Pavano, who turned in a fine performance of his own after early-inning struggles.

We can now see that that move was made not only to get Pavano in against the Mets, but to get Mike Mussina (who started in front of Wang yesterday on five day’s rest) in against the Red Sox this weekend. That’s certainly understandable considering how keyed in Moose has been of late and the fact that he generally does well against the Sox, but it carries the risk of the long rest resulting in a poor performance from Wang tonight that could aversely affect his standing in the rotation, which could lead to future skipped starts, snowballing into his being demoted if/when Jaret Wright ever comes back. Here’s hoping that Wang performs up the standard he’s set for himself tonight (6+IP, 3 or fewer runs), or, failing that, that Torre and Stottlemyre recognize the effect of the long rest give him a mulligan. Lastly, Wang’s strikeout total to beat tonight is four. Tiger vs. the Tigers. As Alex says . . .

The Yankees spanked the Tigers 12-3 on an unseasonably cold, and rainy night in the Bronx. (The weather was so bad that the Yankees gave the fans tickets to another game, later in the season.) Alex Rodriguez drilled a solo home run to right field. In the fourth, he smacked a two-run dinger in the same general direction to put the home team ahead 3-0. That made him 4-4 lifetime (all four hits being homers) against Wilfredo Ledezma. Rodriguez leads the league in home runs (16), runs scored (40) and RBI (46). He’s second in the AL in slugging (.642), and tied for fourth in on-base percentage (.413). He’d make Ron Washington happy if he brought his bat out to the field with him to help him with those tricky hops (he botched another easy play last night, though he wasn’t charged win an error).

Mike Mussina was sharp, hitting his spots and changing speeds nicely. The immediate question was whether they were going to be able to get the game in. The Yanks scored ten runs in the fourth and fifth inning, the rain contiued to fall all night, and nine innings were played. Jorge Posada added two dingers of his own, and Gary Sheffield and Robinson Cano went deep too (It was the first of Cano’s Major League career).

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Detroit Tigers

2004 Record: 72-90 (.444)
2004 Pythagorean Record: 79-83 (.488)

Manager: Alan Trammell
General Manager: Dave Dombrowski

Ballpark (2004 park factors): Comerica Park (96/97)

Who’s replacing whom?

Magglio Ordoñez replaces Alex Sanchez
Nook Logan fills in when Ordoñez is on the DL
Ramon Martinez replaces Eric Munson and loses some playing time to Brandon Inge
Vance Wilson replaces spare parts
Wilfredo Ledezma inherits Gary Knotts’ starts
Troy Percival replaces Esteban Yan
Kyle Farnsworth replaces Al Levine
Franklyn German inherits Steve Coyler’s innings
Matt Ginter replaces Danny Patterson
Chris Spurling and Doug Creek replace Craig Dingman and other spare parts

Current Roster:

1B – Carlos Peña
2B – Omar Infante
SS – Carlos Guillen
3B – Brandon Inge
C – Ivan Rodriguez
RF – Craig Monroe
CF – Nook Logan
LF – Rondell White
DH – Dmitri Young

Bench:

R – Marcus Thames (OF)
R – Ramon Martinez (IF)
L – Jason Smith (IF)
R – Vance Wilson (C)

Rotation:

R- Jeremy Bonderman
L – Nate Robertson
R – Jason Johnson
L – Wilfredo Ledezma
L – Mike Maroth

Bullpen:

R – Ugueth Urbina
R – Kyle Farnsworth
L – Jamie Walker
R – Franklyn German
R – Matt Ginter
R – Chris Spurling
L – Doug Creek

DL:

R – Magglio Ordoñez (OF)
L – Bobby Higginson (OF)
R – Troy Percival
R – Gary Knotts
R – Fernando Rodney
R – Colby Lewis (60-day)
L – Fernando Viña (IF) (60-day)

Typical Line-up

S – Nook Logan (CF)
R – Brandon Inge (3B)
R – Ivan Rodriguez (C)
S – Carlos Guillen (SS)
R – Rondell White (LF)
S – Dmitri Young (DH)
R – Craig Monroe (RF)
L – Carlos Peña (1B)
R – Omar Infante (2B)

Hovering around .500 (they’re two wins in the red, but 15 runs in the black), the Tigers continue to improve after the remarkable turnaround they made last year in the wake of their historically bad 2003 season. Last year, the team was revived by the infusion of an actual offense, lead by Ivan Rodriguez and the out-of-nowhere MVP-level performance of Carlos Guillen along with a career-saving season from Brandon Inge and a collection of solid, above-average seasons from Dmitri Young, Rondell White, Carlos Peña and Craig Monroe.

This year, the story is the pitching. Second worst in the league last year with a 5.21 ERA, the Tiger staff has posted an outstanding 3.66 ERA thus far in 2005, good for seventh best in the majors and fourth best in the AL (behind the Chisox, Twins and Angels). And before you accuse them of being a product of their pitching-friendly home park, they hold up with a 3.78 ERA on the road, still in the top ten in the bigs and sixth in the AL.

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There is no secret to the Yankees approach to Pedro Martinez–or any dominant pitcher, for that matter. You hang in there, keep the game close, hope to chase him by the late innings, and win the game against the bullpen. The Yankees have spoiled many good performances by Martinez over the past five, six years. True to form, the Yanks did it again yesterday, ruining a fine outing by Pedro, and beating the Mets, 5-3.

Alex Rodriguez is doing everything to live up to his new moniker. In the bottom of the second inning, with men on second and third, Martinez cued a soft ground ball to Rodriguez. It looked like a sure out, but the ball knocked off the side of Rodriguez’s glove, a run scored and everybody was safe. Another run came home on an RBI single, as Rodriguez’s muff led to two unearned runs. (Somewhere, Cliff Corcoran was slapping his forehead in disgust.) Cliff Floyd added a solo bomb off of Pavano the next inning and the Mets looked to be in good shape behind an effective Pedro, who was resuced from his only real jam in the first by a terrific diving catch which sent David Wright into the stands.

Several key faces were missing in action yesterday, as Carlos Beltran, Derek Jeter and Gary Sheffield all sat due to injury. Dig this: The Yankees 7-8-9 hitters were John Flaherty, Rey Sanchez and the pitcher. Womack, Williams and Matsui were the starting outfield. Yipe. This was far from an imposing line-up and Martinez took advantage. Rodriguez got one of his runs back with an RBI single (he finished the day 2-4 with a walk), and then got an opportunity for redemption in the top of the eighth. Errors by Wright and Reyes put runners on first and second wtih one out (Womack was the lead runner, and Derek Jeter, pinch-running, was behind him). On the first pitch, Womack and Jeter took off and easily pulled-off a double steal.

Here it was, but Rodriguez fouled out. Groan. Matsui followed though, and took a fastball that was low-and-away beautifully to left field for a two-run single. The man is tough in a big spot, right? The game was tied. Bernie Williams was next and he stroked a double into right, scoring Matsui. That was all the Yankees would need. They tacked on a run in the ninth, as Stanton-Gordon and Rivera set the Mets down without any drama to end it. Pavano pitched a solid game and the Yankees out-lasted the Mets to win the series. Or, if you want to be crass about it, the Mets just out-sucked the Yankees. Neither team play particularly well over the weekend, and if the Friday and Sunday games were close, possessing a degree of tension, they were not pretty.

But hey, but looks are overrated. Just ask Rodriguez.

Previewing the subway series on Friday I wrote “Kris Benson seems to be rounding into shape after being disabled with a strained pectoral muscle early in the year.” No doubt, Benson held the Yankees scoreless through six innings yesterday, allowing just three hits (Matsui, erased by an E-Rod double play, Posada double, E-Rod single) and not a runner past first in his first four innings of work.

However, he did walk two (walking Cano intentionally to pitch to Randy Johnson with two out and Posada on second doesn’t count) and hit Derek Jeter in the elbow. According to the radio broadcast (I only caught parts of this game live, and less than that on television), Jeter was in a great deal of pain, and left the game after being forced out at second. X-rays were negative and both he and Gary Sheffield, who was a late scratch in favor of Bernie Williams due to a sore left hand that he actually in jured two weeks ago on a check swing, are day-to-day. Both could start today’s rubber game against Pedro Martinez.

Neither of those injuries are as troubling as the inconsistent performances of Randy Johnson thus far this season. Johnson did strike out some men this time, five in 6 2/3 innings, but he also gave up hits. Lots of them. Three singles in the first (no runs thanks to a fielder’s choice and a caught stealing). Three in the second (one run). Three in the third (including an RBI double by David Wright). That’s nine hits in this first three innings. Johnson settled some after that allowing just one more hit (erased by a double play) in his next three innings. But then lost his grip in the seventh.

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Wait a second, Kevin Brown and Victor Zambrano faced off in a game that included five errors and thirteen walks and it was just 3-2 going into the ninth inning?

Yup. Both starters belied their shoddy reputations, despite exhibiting the same tendencies that typically get them in much bigger trouble. Zambrano walked six, but allowed just three runs, two earned. Kevin Brown, meanwhile, escaped a bases-loaded jam in the first (single and two walks) by striking out Doug Mientkiewicz on three nasty pitches low in the zone. He then survived a lead-off single in the second and a lead-off walk in the third and a one-out walk in the fifth. The only run he allowed all evening came in the fourth and it was unearned.

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The pitching match-up tonight has all the makings of one hellacious game. We’ll see if Brown has anything at all against the boys from Queens. (Once again, I’m not holding my breath.) As it turns out I was interviewed for a puff-piece that will appear on the Channel 11 News tonight after the game. Perhaps I’ll have a dopey sound bite or two. The angle is Met fans v. Yankee fans: Who is winning the war on the web? Jeez, I didn’t know we were fighting. But hey, anything to keep the Subway Serious fresh, right?

Go Yanks.

I have to disagree with Alex. While I’m not exactly “geeked” for this weekend’s series against the Mets, I do think this is one of the most compelling subway series match-ups in the now nine year history of interleague play.

One reason is the similarity in the two team’s records. With the Yankees’ loss on Wednesday and the Mets’ simultaneous sweep of the Reds, the Mets are a mere 1.5 games better than the Yanks. That not only reveals the two teams to be very evenly matched, but also marks only the second time in what will now be the fifteen series played between the two teams that the Mets have entered an interleague series with the Yankees with a better record than the Bombers. The previous occasion was in July of 2000, when the Mets were 47-35 to the Yankees’ 42-37 entering the second intracity series of the year. That turned out to be a memorable one, both for the unusual home/away double header that saw the two teams play in both stadiums on a single day, and for Roger Clemens’ now infamous beaning of Mike Piazza. The Yankees won 3 of 4 games in that series and, despite finishing the season with a worse record than the Mets for what remains the only time since 1991, would eventually defeat them in five games in that year’s World Series.

To me, this year is even more compelling than that 2000 match-up, because for the first time the Yankees are not the obvious favorites.

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It looks like it’s going to be a soggy couple of days in New York, and yo, like Flava Flav once said, I ain’t got nothing for ya, man. I don’t know what to say about the Subway Serious other than I hope the Yanks win two-of-three and that the games are exciting. Otherwise, I’m numb to the canned hype at this point. I just can’t get geeked about this match up, dude. I don’t know, maybe it’s just me. But the Mets just are not the Red Sox.

In other news, Joel Sherman reports that the Yankees are interested in keeping GM Brian Cashman:

[Yankees general partner, Steve] Swindall revealed to The Post that he opened extension talks with Cashman during spring training, and that Cashman “acknowledged he wants to come back.” Cashman verified the exchange and that his “preference is to return.” Both men said negotiations have been tabled because Cashman wants to focus right now on remedying the team’s deficiencies.

Meanwhile, over at the Times, Tyler Kepner has a nice puff piece on Joe Girardi, the Yankees’ bench coach.

All good things come to an end, and the Yankees winning streak ended ugly last night, as three errors (Womack, Sheff, and a crucial one by Jorge Posada) resulted in a 7-6 Seattle win. The Bombers had a chance in the ninth, but Jason Giambi struck out with the bases loaded to end the game. I didn’t stay up to watch, so I can’t speak about the particulars, but I gather it was a discourgaing way to cap off an impressive road trip. Regardless, the Yanks are in much better shape today than they were two weeks ago.

The Subway Serious is on this weekend against the Mets. I’m not one for manufactured excitement. As a result, the so-called rivalry with the Mets doesn’t get me amped. However, I’m in the minority on this one, and Shea stadium will be plenty packed. I’ve watched the Mets some this year and think they are an enjoyable team. I’ve always liked Piazza and Cliff Floyd. Beltran is a star, and David Wright is an appealing young player. If their pitching keeps them in the game, they should be a good match for the Yanks. Pedro Martinez has been pushed back to Sunday, so Victor Zambrano gets the nod on Friday night. He’ll go against Kevin Brown. That should be a wild one.

The road trip that is. The Yanks go for their second sweep of the Mariners in a ten day span tonight, with Mike Mussina–who started this whole winning streak thingy by shutting out the A’s a week and a half ago–coming off the three best starts of his season. His mound opponent will be Jamie Moyer, who hasn’t made it out of the fourth inning of any of his last three starts, the last coming against the Yankees when he was run with one out in the third. Moyer has a 19.80 ERA in his two May starts combined.

Bernie Williams, who has always owned Moyer and went 2 for 2 against him last week with a double and an RBI single, is expected to start, which might mean Womack will sit and the outfield will be an adventure.

Speaking of line-up changes, I had this fantasy that Joe Torre decided that, with the series in his pocket, he could sit E-Rod tonight in favor of Andy Phillips or Russ Johnson, or perhaps a two-at-bats-each in-game platoon of the two. You see, E-Rod has played third for all but one inning this season while Johnson has just one at-bat in the majors this year and Phillips hasn’t played since he took an 0-fer in Moose’s streak-starting shutout back on May 7. With the Yanks headed to Shea to take on the Mets this weekend, it would help to have those two bats a bit warmer than they are now (which is ice cold) for pinch-hit opportunities. And it wouldn’t hurt to rest E-Rod with the series in the bag and a 5-0 record on the current road trip.

Just a thought. I know it won’t happen.

Where’s the beef? Right here, dog. Yankee sirloin was in full effect last night, as Carl Pavano, Jason Giambi, Alex Rodriguez, and Jorge Posada powered the Bronx Bombers to their tenth straight victory. A night after hitting a grand slam, Bernie Williams was back on the bench. Characteristically, he took the news in stride, telling the Daily News:

“At this point in my career, who cares what I do?” he said. “All we care about is winning games and getting to the postseason.”

Speaking of meat, today, is the 18th. As a kid, this day had special meaning for me, because it’s Reggie Jackson’s birthday. Funny, how other people’s birthdays can make such an impression on you when you are growing up. For the rest of my life, I’ll never forget how meaningful this day used to be for me.

Or as Alex would likely title it “. . . and ya don’t stop.”

The Yanks won their tenth straight last night behind a dominating complete game shutout by Meat Pavano against the very same Mariner team that beat him bloody last week in New York. Here’s his final line:

9 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 7 K, 68 percent strikes

Pavano allowed just six baserunners all game, a full third of them in the ninth inning. Meat hit Bret Boone with a pitch in the second, gave up consecutive singles to Richie Sexson and Raul Ibanez in the fourth and a single to Boone in the seventh. Pavano did not allow an extra base hit, did not walk a batter, and did not allow a runner past second base. His seven strikeouts tied his season high and 15 of the 20 outs recorded by his defense came on ground balls. Seattle never had a shot.

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The Mariners are pulling Julio Mateo out of the bullpen to make his first major league start tonight. This may look like a great opportunity for the Yankees to extend their winning streak, but this sort of set-up always seems to go awry for the pinstripers.

Mateo, for example, may not have started since A-ball in 2000, and he may be averaging just two innings per outing this year, but that 2IP/G is up from his career average, and his last two outings have been the longest of his season at 3 1/3 innings each. What’s more, he has a 0.41 ERA, the opposition is hitting .154/.205/.179 (.137 GPA) against him (ten singles, two doubles, two walks against ten Ks in 22 innings), and in his second-most-recent outing he held the Yankee’s scoreless over 3 1/3. He’s pitching so well that Jason over at U.S.S. Mariner actually suggested the M’s move Mateo into the rotation in a post this past Saturday, with no expectation that the Mariners would actually do it, let alone so soon (to be fair, this is a spot start while Joel Pineiro works on his mechanics in the minors).

More encouraging for the Yankees and their fans, Dave added a very informative post yesterday that reveals that Mateo pitches to contact in the Quantrill/Lieber style except that instead of throwing ground balls, Mateo is an extreme fly-ball pitcher. Thus far this season Mateo has an absurdly low .176 opponents’ average on balls in play (against a league average of .293) and has yet to allow a home run. In other words, he’s pitching way over his head. Dave fears the odds will catch up with Mateo tonight over an extended outing against the Yankees’ major league leading offense. Here’s hoping he’s right.

Meanwhile, the Yankees have to hope that whatever ailed Carl Pavano in his last start (in addition to Alex Rodriguez’s defense, that is) has subsided in the days since. Especially since Joe Torre has inexplicably decided to bump Chien-Ming Wang out of his scheduled start at Shea on Sunday and use Thursday’s day off to let Pavano move up a day in his place. Wang should start one of the first two games of next week’s homestand against the Tigers instead.

In other news, don’t look now, but Mike Stanton is the only active Yankee reliever with an ERA over 4.00. Meanwhile, Ruben Sierra is playing extended spring training games in Tampa (batting left exclusively for the moment) and should start a Florida State League rehab stint mid-week. Take your time, Ru.

. . . and rolling, and rolling . . .

The Yanks made it nine straight in Seattle last night thanks to another strong performance by Chien-Ming Wang and a seventh-inning grand slam by Bernie Williams in his first start of the road trip.

Wang coughed up a pair of runs to the Mariners in the first on an Ichiro Suzuki single and stolen base, an Adrian Beltre single and a Raul Ibanez double. He then retired eighteen straight batters before getting knocked out of the game in the seventh by a Bret Boone double (misplayed just a half inning after his grand slam by Bernie, who started in center for the first time since the big shakeup) and a more legitimate double by Jeremy Reed that drove Boone home. TanGorMo kept the M’s scoreless the rest of the way. And yes, Wang did post a season-high four strikeouts, while not walking a batter for the first time in his four major league starts.

As for the Yanks, they got runners on in each of the first five innings against Aaron Sele, but only got one of them home, a Robinson Cano lead-off double in the third that was cashed in on a pair of groundouts by Hideki Matsui and Alex Rodriguez. Batting second for the first time (Womack sat), Cano went 2 for 5 and is now 13 for 22 with six doubles in his last five starts.

Sele struck out the side in the sixth, but the last strike was his 115th pitch, so, leading 2-1, Mike Hargrove went to his pen in the seventh. Shigetoshi Hasegawa loaded the bases with one out. Lefty George Sherrill (who replaced Joel Pineiro on the roster) got Tino (who didn’t homer, but drew an intentional walk earlier in the game with a man on second and two outs) to ground into a fielder’s choice, forcing Sheffield out at home and keeping the bases loaded with one out.

That brought up Bernie Williams, who had a walk, a groundout and a flyout on the night. Hargrove went to his top righty set-up man, J.J. Putz. Putz fired a fastball to Bernie and Bernie smacked it to dead center. Centerfielder Jeremy Reed went back, jumped and reached over the wall, the ball hit his mitt and the simultaneous impact of the ball and the wall knocked Reed’s glove off his hand. Grand slam. 5-2 Yankees.

The M’s pulled a run closer against Wang, as mentioned, but the Yanks came right back against Jeff Nelson on singles by Cano, Sheffield and E-Rod to put the final score at 6-3.

The Yankees are now one game over .500 and just a half game behind Toronto for third place in the AL East. Also, the A’s snapped their eight-game losing streak against the Red Sox, allowing the Yankees to pull within 2.5 games of the World Champs. The Yankees’ current nine-game winning streak is their longest since they won nine in late June and early July of 2001. Lastly, when the Yankees were struggling in April and the first week of May, Joe Torre repeatedly said that he was just waiting for the team to pull off nine out of ten and get going. Well, guess what?

The Yankees’ current eight-game winning streak matches their best such streak from last season. Interestingly, last year’s streak also included a 5-1 run against the A’s and got the Yanks out of an early hole and back over .500. The Yankees aren’t back over .500 yet, but they would be with a win tonight as they roll into Seattle to face a Mariner team they swept in the Bronx one week ago.

Not much has changed with the M’s since then, though they did have fun this weekend, taking 2 of 3 from the Red Sox (by comparison the A’s were swept by the Sox in between series with the Yanks). There have been a couple of roster changes in Seattle. Wiki Gonzalez, who was called up to replace Dan Wilson and promptly given the starting catching job over a severely slumping Miguel Olivo, has been placed on the disabled list with a hamstring injury. Olivo has been given the starting job back and 21-year-old rookie Rene Rivera has been called up to serve as the back-up.

Meanwhile, Joel Pineiro, who was to become the staff ace after the trade of Freddy Garcia last year only to spend the majority of that time on the DL thus far, has been sent to the minors to work on his mechanics following a rough Friday the 13th start. Reliever Julio Mateo, who has started just 12 games in his professional career, the last coming with Class-A Wisconsin in 2000, will take Pineiro’s start against the Yankees on Tuesday. He will be framed by Aaron Sele (tonight) and Jamie Moyer (Wednesday) against whom the Yankees scored twelve runs on eighteen hits in five innings last week.

Chein-Ming Wang takes the ball for the Yanks tonight. Removing his one rough outing in Tampa, he’s turned in this line in his other two starts: 14 IP, 10 H, 5 R, 0 HR, 5 BB, 3 K. Curiously, the only part of that that isn’t encouraging is the K/BB ratio, which was one of his strong suits in the minors. Expect that to correct itself. He’s already seen his strikeouts increase in all three starts, even if it has only been from 0 to 3.

On an afternoon when Randy Johnson allowed three first inning runs, and ended the game with no strike outs, Tino Martinez powered a Yankee comeback and Jason Giambi had the game-winning hit as the Bombers extended their winning streak to eight, beating Oakland, 6-4. They are now 19-19, and the win was the 1,800th of Joe Torre’s career. Johnson labored through the first four innings, and lasted through six; this was the longest outing of his career withouth recording a K.

But he was helped out by Tino Martinez, who hit two line-drive home runs to right field. Derek Jeter had three hits, and Robinson Cano had four (giving him nine for the three-game set), and Tony Womack swiped four bases for the second time this season. Though he struck out twice with men on base, Alex Rodriguez made one of the crucial plays of the game. With one out in the top of the seventh, Rodriguez walked. Tino Martinez followed and popped out to the third baseman Keith Ginter deep in foul territory. Rodriguez caught Ginter off guard, tagged up, and slid into second base safely. It was the kind of play that has made Derek Jeter an icon in New York. Next, Jorge Posada was intentionally walked, and then Giambi whacked Rincon’s first pitch into the right field corner for a run-scoring double.

Giambi did not talk to the media after the game, but he had a good day on the field. In addition to his clutch double, he hit the ball well in two other times. Sturtze, Gordon, and Rivera set the struggling A’s down in order over the final three innings, as the Yanks have finally reached even.

It was shortly after eleven o’clock last night when I went to get the car. My cousin’s wedding reception, which was held in a cool French bistro on 5th avenue in Park Slope, Brooklyn, made for a lovely evening. The car was a couple of blocks away and when I turned on the radio, the Yanks were comfortably ahead, 15-3 (Rodriguez, Jeter, Posada, and yes, that man Martinez, all homered, while Godzilla had four hits, including three doubles.) I’ll leave the real recap to Cliff, who I assume watched it. Instead, here are some quick links to what’s what in the Sunday papers:

Things might be going from bad to worse for Jason Giambi. Last night, a fan threw a beer on him. He also spoke to reporters and told them how “pissed” he was about being asked to go to the minors. This does not bode well for him. Giving the Boss an excuse to lay into him publicly is not wise.

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