The Yankees lost 5-2 to the Angels Monday night as Joe Saunders pitched a gem. Saunders allowed solo homers to Alex Rodriguez and pinch-hitter Hideki Matsui (Godzilla’s first career pinch-hit tater) in the seventh and eighth innings, respectively, but otherwise allowed just five hits, no runs, and walked no one. Meanwhile, the Rangers crushed the A’s 10-3 to postpone the Yankees’ postseason clinch at least one more day.

None of that was particularly important, however. The most significant thing that happened for the Yankees on Monday night was that Andy Pettitte turned in a quality start, recovering from a rocky, two-run first inning to retired the Angels in order in the second, third, and fourth before giving up a third run in the fifth on a walk and a pair of singles. Pettitte then retired Vlad Guerrero, Torii Hunter, and Juan Rivera in order in the sixth, finishing his day at 91 pitches with just five hits allowed in six innings.

Pettitte had skipped his last turn due to some shoulder discomfort in his previous start, but after shaking off some rust in the first, he looked sharp, and more importantly, said he felt good after the game. In fact, Pettitte said his shoulder hasn’t hurt since that previous start ten days earlier. That’s a tremendous relief given Joba Chamberlain’s disaster start on Sunday and A.J. Burnett’s inconsistency. The Yankees’ biggest concern entering the postseason is the effectiveness of their starting rotation. Having Pettitte healthy and effective is of utmost importance.

Trailing 3-0, Joe Girardi used the remainder of the game to audition relievers for the postseason roster, giving the seventh to Brian Bruney and the eighth to Jonathan Albaldejo. Neither made much of a case for himself. Bruney gave up two hits including a booming home run to pinch-hitter Kendry Morales (Bruney said after the game that he was trying to be too fine with the pitch). Albaladejo gave up a run on a Vlad Guerrero single and a double to the wall by Juan Rivera.

The Yankees arrive in Anaheim needing just one win (or a Rangers loss) to clinch their first postseason berth under manager Joe Girardi. That’s a big deal, but it’s also an inevitability. Yankee fans tuning in this week to see a preview of a potential playoff matchup might be disappointed to see their team playing out the string, but that’s what the Yankees are and should be doing right now.

That clinching win will come. In the meantime, the Yankees have to make sure that, when they get to the postseason, their important players are healthy and rested. Getting A.J. Burnett and Joba Chamberlain straightened out are priorities that met with differing results in Seattle. Tonight Andy Pettitte, whose last start was skipped due to some soreness in his pitching shoulder, takes the ball. Getting him and David Robertson healthy and effective again are also priorities.

Brett Gardner seems to have gotten his swing back, but he’ll sit tonight against the left-handed Joe Saunders. The Yankees will get a look at possible Joba-replacement Chad Guadin tomorrow and Burnett again on Wednesday against newest Angel Scott Kazmir. Somewhere along they way, they’ll clinch a playoff berth.

The Angels’ roster is the same as it was last time these teams met. The Yankees are 3-1 against the Angels in the Bronx this year, but 0-3 in Anaheim, but whether or not that latter mark is corrected or reinforced this week will have little bearing on how the Yanks are likely to perform in Disneyland in October.

Skip to the bottom of the ninth. A.J. Burnett out-dueled Felix Hernandez for seven innings, passing a 2-1 lead to Phil Hughes, who mowed down the M’s in the eighth to hand that lead to Mariano Rivera in the ninth. Rivera had converted a career high 36 straight saves, the longest active streak in the majors and started the ninth by striking out Jack Hannahan and pinch-hitter Mike Carp.

Mariners manager Don Wakamatsu sends up veteran Mike Sweeney to bat for shortstop Josh Wilson. Rivera’s first pitch is at the knee, but over the plate, and the right-handed Sweeney crushes it into the opposite field gap. A home run in almost any other park, Sweeney’s blast hits the warning track just in front of the 385-foot sign in right-center, putting Sweeny, the potential tying run on second with one out and bringing Ichiro Suzuki to the plate as the potential winning run.

Suzuki was 3-for-4 on the night, but had been picked off first base twice by A.J. Burnett who both times caught the Seattle speedster leaning. The first pick-off came with none out in the third and was followed by a Franklin Gutierrez double that was subsequently plated by a Jose Lopez single for the only Mariner run of the game.

Now given a chance to make amends for those base-running blunders, Suzuki, like Sweeney, lights into Rivera’s first pitch, a cutter in off the plate but just below the belt. With his trademark bailing swing, Ichiro gets the sweet spot on the ball and deposits it four rows deep in the right field seats for a game-winning home run. The home run is just the fifth walk-off home run hit off Rivera in his career, and the first since Marco Scutaro’s shocker in Oakland in 2007. M’s win 3-2.

The Yankees scored their two runs on sac flies, both times with Johnny Damon doubles playing a key part in the inning, but failed to get Nick Swisher, who had doubled and moved up on a wild pitch, home from third with one out in the seventh when Jose Molina hit into a double-play. Other than that, there’s not much to reflect on here. Both starters and Hughes were excellent and Rivera had a lead with two-outs in the ninth. After the game, Rivera said he simply missed his location on both pitches. At least the Rangers lost, giving the Yankees a chance to clinch a playoff berth with CC Sabathia on the mound on Saturday with a win and another Rangers loss.

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The Yankees’ magic number for clinching a playoff berth is three. That means they could do it this weekend in Seattle, though it might require a little help from, ironically, the Angels, who are in Arlington facing the Rangers, the team whose inability to catch the Yankees would thus guarantee New York a return to the postseason. The most likely scenario would have the Yankees and Angels both taking two of three from their lesser opponents, putting the Yankees in the odd position of arriving in Anaheim on Monday with warm feelings about the Halos.

Looking at the pitching matchups in Seattle, the Yankees would seem to have the middle game, which pits CC Sabathia against the unfortunately named Doug Fister, in hand. Joba Chamberlain seems to finally be rounding back into shape after posting this combined line in his last two Rules-shortened starts: 7 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 2 HR, 1 BB, 5 K. That gives the Yankees more than a good chance against reclamation project Ian Snell on Sunday. One has to assume the Angels will at the very least avoid a sweep in Arlington. That’s three games. Of course, if the Yankees want to do it in style, they’ll start with an surprisingly unlikely win tonight.

A.J. Burnett has exceeded my expectations this year in exactly one way: he has made every single one of his starts. Tonight he’ll make his 30th start for just the third time in his 11-year career. That is worthy of a certain level of praise (Carl Pavano made four fewer major league starts in his four years as a Yankee combined), but the quality of those starts of late has been anything but praiseworthy. Just two of Burnett’s last five starts have been quality starts and over his last nine he’s gone 1-5 with a 6.14 ERA. Worse yet, he’s trending in the wrong direction. Four of his six starts in August were quality, but only one of his three in September has been and in those last five he’s posted a 7.67 ERA in part due to the eight home runs he has allowed in those outings.

Burnett hasn’t seen the Mariners yet this year, but shouldn’t find them much of a challenge given that they’re the second-worst offense in baseball and the only team in the junior circuit to have scored less than four runs per game on the season. What will be challenging is his mound opponent, Felix Hernandez.

Still just 23, King Felix seems to have finally become a pitcher worthy of his nickname. Despite the punchless M’s offense, Hernandez has already set a career high with 15 wins (against just five losses). More importantly, he has decreased his homer rate for the third year in a row, corrected the spike his walk rate experienced last year, and is striking out batters at a tick about his previous top rate (he’ll surpass 200 strikeouts for the first time in his career with seven more Ks). He has also benefited from the M’s improved defense, posting a BABIP below .300 for the first time since his rookie half season in 2005 and leading the league in fewest hits per nine innings. That last is a product of both his own effectiveness and the gloves behind him.

The Yankees have added first baseman Juan Miranda to the major league roster. With Jorge Posada serving a three-game suspension that finishes on Saturday, Jose Molina catches and bats ninth tonight behind the usual suspects. Melky Cabrera is in center despite Brett Gardner’s recent resurgence (six for his last 11 with two doubles).

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The Yankees have gone 24-10 (.706) against the two non-contenders in their division, the Baltimore Orioles and Toronto Blue Jays, but with this brief, two-game, mid-week series against the Jays in the Bronx, that gravy train is finally pulling into the station.

The Jays and Yankees split a four-game set in Toronto, two weekends ago. Given that Sergio Mitre is taking on Roy Halladay in tonight’s game, the Yankees would probably be happy with a split here as well. Though they beat him in their previous meeting, Halladay dominated the Yankees the last time he faced them, throwing a one-hit shutout against them while striking out nine. In his four starts against the Bombers on the season, Halladay has three complete games and lasted seven full in the exception. In those 34 innings he has compiled a 2.65 ERA and 0.91 WHIP.

Mitre’s last start, also against Toronto, was a disaster. He gave up 11 runs in 4 1/3 innings, though he wasn’t helped by his defense in what was one of the sloppiest games the Yankees have played all year. The Yankees run out their standard lineup behind Mitre tonight save for Brett Gardner starting in center over Melky Cabrera.

The Yankees will start Chad Gaudin against Brian Tallet in Wednesday’s finale, skipping Andy Pettitte until Monday due to a bit of late-season shoulder fatigue. Pettitte said he threw a light bullpen Monday night and “felt great,” so it seems the team is just being cautious in anticipation of the playoffs. Still, there will be some lingering concern given that it was a shoulder problem that undermined Pettitte’s performance in the second half last year.

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No one expected the Orioles to blow into the Bronx and take the first two games of this weekend’s three-game set, handing the Yankees just their third series loss of the second half. The O’s have done not just that, but won those two games by a combined score of 17-7. It seems the Yankee bats are in a bit of a mini-slump, with the team averaging just 3.5 runs per game over it’s last four contests, and unlike the final two games of the Rays’ series, the Yankees haven’t gotten the pitching performances they needed to make those paltry seven runs stand up.

Nonetheless, the Yanks are still 12-5 (.706) on the season against the Orioles, and 40-15 (.727) in the second half, and they have CC Sabathia going in today’s finale looking to help avoid an embarrassing sweep at the hands of Jeremy Guthrie. CC is seven starts into a dominant late-season run (5-0, 1.75 ERA, 0.92 WHIP, 11.05 K/9, 5.73 K/BB, 7 1/3 IP/GS, all Yankee wins).

Guthrie has had a nice little run of his own over his last five starts (3-1, 1.33 ERA, 0.96 WHIP, 3.75 K/BB, 6 2/3+ IP/GS), his one loss in that stretch coming against Andy Pettitte and the Yankees in Baltimore on the final day of August.

Rain delayed the start of Friday night’s Yankees-Orioles schedule-filler by an hour and 27 minutes. Then during a pitching change with two outs in the seventh, the umpires called the tarp back out, leading to another hour-plus delay.

Things started off well for the Yankees during those first seven innings. Alex Rodriguez crushed a three-run homer into the second deck in left field in the first. Derek Jeter got his team-record 2,722nd hit, a single to right, leading off the third. His next time up he extended his new team record with another single to right, this one driving home Robinson Cano with a two-out run that pushed the Yankees’ lead to 4-1 after four.

Then the pitching fell apart. Andy Pettitte wasn’t sharp, needing 103 pitches to get through five innings. After giving up a second run with one out in the fifth, he loaded the bases, then made a great play on a chopper to the third base side for the second out. The ball tipped off Pettitte’s glove and headed toward the foul line, but Andy scrambled after it, picked it up with his bare hand and made a spinning, falling throw around the runner for the force at home. Unfortunately, Pettitte then hit Melvin Mora in the right elbow to force in the third Baltimore run.

Damaso Marte replaced Pettitte in the sixth and coughed up three more runs and the lead, plus a fourth which scored on a sac fly off Jonathan Albaladejo. In the seventh, Edwar Ramirez gave up three more, all with two outs, at which point the mid-game rain delay struck.

When the tarp came back off around 12:45 am, there were just a few hundred fans left. Ronan Tynan, out to sing “God Bless America” for 9/11, sang it to almost no one on 9/12. Down by six runs, Joe Girardi wisely put his bench in the game to protect his starters for the playoffs, leaving only Melky Cabrera, Brett Gardner, and DH Hideki Matsui in the lineup.

Jeter’s hit was a nice moment. The stadium was packed in anticipation of it, and he delivered, bringing about a huge ovation. His teammates came out of the dugout to congratulate him, and he tipped his helmet to the crowd and signaled to his family in their suite. Unfortunately, it was buried in a miserable morass of a rain-soaked 10-4 loss to a bad team. If nothing else, it worked well as a metaphor for all of the hype the hit was buried in. I’m genuinely pleased and impressed by Jeter’s accomplishment, but the Yankee hype machine nearly killed those emotions. The Yankees are an easy team to root for, but they can be a hard organization to like.

The Yankees are 12-3 against the Orioles this year and 12-1 against them since the third day of the season. Last week, the Yanks swept the O’s in a three-game series in Baltimore, outscoring them 24-9. The Yankees now welcome the Orioles to the Bronx having just swept the third-place Rays in four games amid one of the most dominant second-half runs in major league history. The O’s are 12-25 (.324) since the trading deadline and have won just two of their last eight stretching back through that last series against the Yankees.

What makes this series different, other than its location, is that the Yankees get their first look at the O’s two young starting prospects, Chris Tillman and Brian Matusz, who start tonight and tomorrow. Tillman is a tall, skinny, 21-year-old righty who came over in the Erik Bedard trade. Matusz is an equally tall (though not as skinny), 22-year-old lefty who was drafted out of college with the fourth overall pick last year. Neither has had much success in the majors thus far, but they, along with catcher Matt Wieters and outfielders Nick Markakis, Adam Jones (currently on the DL with a bad back), and to a lesser degree Nolan Riemold, should be thorns in the Yankees’ side for years to come. Thus far, Matusz, the polished college product has had more success, though per my man Kevin Goldstein at Baseball Prospectus, Tillman remains the better prospect and a potential ace.

Taking on Tillman tonight (weather permitting, and it don’t look good) is Andy Pettitte, who has been ace-like himself in the second half, going 5-1 with a 2.88 ERA while the Yankees have won his last seven starts. Johnny Damon sits out the bad weather with a stiff back. Melky’s in left with Gardner in center, those two hits 8th and 9th. Swisher hits 2nd.

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Joba Chamberlain’s third start under the new spring-training-style Joba Rules didn’t start terribly well. Jason Bartlett led off by smacking a 2-1 pitch over the wall in left for a homer. (After the game Joba said it was the pitch he wanted to make and pointed out that Bartlett was having a great year; Joe Girardi said the pitch was “a mistake.”) Carl Crawford followed with a single, moved to second on a wild third-strike to Evan Longoria, stole third while Chamberlain was in the process of walking Ben Zobrist, then scored on a Pat Burrell single.

After that, the Yankee shortstop went to the mound and gave Chamberlain a quick verbal kick in the pants. Chamberlain struck out the next two batters on nine pitches and retired the side in order in the second and third innings. Because Chamberlain’s night ended there (due, I assume, to the 32 pitches he had thrown in the first), it’s difficult to say if that is likely to have been a meaningful turnaround in Joba’s performance going forward, but it was the most encouraging performance Chamberlain has had since his final start in July, which also came against the Rays.

Tampa Bay starter Jeff Niemann, a 6-foot-9 righty who bears a slight resemblance to the actor Jeff Daniels and is having a fine rookie season five years after being drafted fourth overall in the 2004 draft, made those two runs stand up for seven innings, stranding runners in every frame while striking out eight. Meanwhile, the Yankee bullpen matched Niemann by following Chamberlain with six hitless innings, including three from Alfredo Aceves and two from Jonathan Albaladejo.

Alex Rodriguez led off the bottom of the eighth by singling up the middle on Niemann’s 110th pitch, driving the tall 26-year-old from the game. Joe Maddon curiously chose righty Lance Cormier over lefty Brian Shouse to face Hideki Matsui. Matsui singled, sending Rodriguez to third, and Chris Richards threw Nick Swisher’s ensuing grounder into left field while attempting to start a 3-6-3 double play, sending Alex home and pinch-runner Jerry Hairston Jr. to third. Maddon then went to Shouse, who struck out Robinson Cano for the first out of the inning.

With one out, the tying run on third and the go-ahead run on first, Girardi sent Jorge Posada up to bat for Brett Gardner. Gardner made a spectacular, game-saving play in Monday’s day game, but has been struggling to rediscover his stroke since coming off the disabled list, going a combined 1-for-18 since starting his rehab assignment. Maddon countered with hard-throwing Aussie Grant Balfour, flipping Posada around to the left side. Posada worked the count full, fouling off the two strikes, then launched the next pitch into the seats in right for a game-changing three-run home run.

And that was that. Protecting a two-run lead, Brian Bruney typically walked the first man he faced in the ninth on four pitches, but got the next two out on three more tosses before yielding to Phil Coke, who got the final out and a cheap save. The 4-2 win was the 24th game the Yankees have won in their final at-bat this season, a total which leads the major leagues. On the season, the Yankees are averaging more than two runs scored per game in the final three innings and 1.2 runs score per game in extra innings, when one is usually enough to win it.

The win gave the Yankees an unexpected four-game sweep of the rival Rays, who are now a shocking 18.5 games out in the division, and ran the Yankees’ second-half record to 40-13, good for a .755 winning percentage. If they can keep that up through the final 20 games, it will stand as the third-best post-break mark since the All-Star Game began in 1933.

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The Rays arrive in the Bronx today for a Labor Day doubleheader and resultant four-game series trailing the Red Sox by seven games in the Wild Card standings. The Yankees, meanwhile, hold a 7.5-game lead over Boston in the division. It’s thus fair to say that, as secure as the Yankees’ division lead feels, that’s how unlikely it is that the Rays are going to return to the post season.

Put more simply: the Rays are out of the race.

That doesn’t make the remaining seven games between the two teams meaningless (though the three in Tampa in October most likely will be by then), and it doesn’t make the Rays any less competitive. It does, however, deflate the excitement most had expected this September series between division rivals to bring.

Make no mistake, the Rays are rivals. They won the division last year and the two teams are roughly split in their season series to this point, the Yankees taking 6 of 11,but the Rays having scored one more run (60 to 59). Home field hasn’t been much advantage thus far, as the two teams have split six games in Tampa with the Yanks taking three of five in the Bronx. That said, the series has slowly tilted the Yankees way as the season has progressed, with the Rays taking three of the first five and the Yankees four of the last six.

Some accused the Rays of giving up on the season when the traded Scott Kazmir. I’m not entirely sure that’s the case, but the trade was clearly a hedge; Andrew Friedman didn’t want to get stuck without a playoff berth and the remainder of Kazmir’s contract ($20 million the next two years plus an option with a $2.5 million buyout) given the arrival of young, talented, team-controlled arms such as Jeff Niemann (12-5, 3.67 in his first full season), and 23-year-olds David Price and Wade Davis (7 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 BB, 9 K in his major league debut last night).

The Rays proved they were going for it when they benched Dioner Navarro and his .221/.252/.331 line and replace him via trade with Gregg Zaun, who has since hit .311/.333/.508. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough. Look at the lineup at the end of this post for a clue as to why.

The last time the Yankees saw the Rays, B.J. Upton was leading off and Evan Longoria was hitting third. Now they’re hitting sixth (Longoria) and ninth (Upton). Save for a hot June, Upton has been punchless all year, and has hit just .225/.276/.335 with 2 homers and 12 walks since July 1. Longoria, meanwhile, got out to a big start, then did very little in June, July, and August, though he has turned it on of late, hitting .441 and slugging .853 during an active eight-game hitting streak.

All-Star Ben Zobrist replaces Longoria in the three-hole, but he seems to have run out of pixie dust. Since snapping a 12-game hitting streak on July 23, he’s hit a very ordinary .243/.357/.407, and with Akinori Iwamura back from an ACL injury, Zobrist is now a corner outfielder again, making that production all the less useful (though it’s a smidge more than the Rays were getting from Gabe Gross). New leadoff man Jason Bartlett seemed to be out of magic as well in July, but silenced doubters with a .357/.443/.577 August, though he’s cooled off again over his last ten games.

As for today’s double header, the Yankees have stacked the deck, throwing CC Sabathia in Game 1 and A.J. Burnett in the nightcap. Sabathia’s numbers over his last six starts are eyepopping: 5-0, 1.83 ERA, 0.90 WHIP, 10.76 K/9, 7.57 K/BB. The Yankees have won his last seven starts, his last loss coming against the Rays on July 28.

CC goes against Matt Garza, who has spiked his strikeout rate this year and leads the league in fewest hits per nine innings (7.8), but the latter is due to an abnormally low .268 BABIP (though he was at .271 last year), and his home run rate has also spiked, giving him a higher ERA than he had a year ago. Garza’s allowed just 3 runs in 12 innings against the Yanks this year, but has posted a 6.00 ERA over his last five starts.

As for Burnett, everyone keeps talking about the fact that he hasn’t won a game since July 27, a stretch of seven starts, but the Yankees have won three of those starts and A.J. has four quality starts in that stretch, which includes his dominant outing against the Red Sox in that 15-inning scoreless affair on August 7. Still, two of his last three have been awful. With his first playoff start looming roughly a month away, he needs to use his remaining starts to rediscover that groove he had in July lest he become what I’d always feared he’d be, the 2009 version of Randy Johnson, who blew a pair of crucial ALDS Game 3s in his only two Yankee playoff appearances.

Facing Burnett will be Andy Sonnanstine, who initially looked like Kazmir’s replacement down the stretch until Davis announced his presence with authority last night. Not that it really matters. Though Sonnanstine spent all of July and August in the minors, the Yankees have already seen him thrice this year. Sonnanstine got the better of the Yanks the first two times (though without earning a decision either time), but the Yanks touched him up for four homers (by Tex, Swisher, Damon, and Jeter) on June 8, marking his career high for a single game.

Brett Gardner returns for today’s action. He’s playing center and batting ninth in the opener, with Melky in left, Hinske at DH, and Damon and Matsui on the bench. Nick Swisher bats second, Robinson Cano moves up to fifth, and Hinske, Melky, and Gardner, in that order, make up the bottom three.

I’m going to be car shopping today (my 12-year-old Saturn was totaled by a tree branch a month ago and I’ve been too busy in the interim to get to the dealers), so this post will have to serve game threads for both games. I’ll be back late tonight to wrap it all up.

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Those of you who chose to do something other than watch the Yankees’ series finale in Toronto on a beautiful Labor Day weekend Sunday made the right choice as the Yankees lost perhaps the ugliest game they’ve played all year by a score of 14-8. The four errors in the Yankees’ line doesn’t even begin to capture how poorly they played. Sergio Mitre gave up 11 runs (nine earned) in 4 1/3 innings, but after the game, Joe Girardi said Mitre had really gotten 21 outs out there. He wasn’t far off.

After the Yankees stranded two in the top of the first, the very first batter Mitre faced hit a grounder to third, where Jerry Hairston Jr. was giving Alex Rodriguez a day off. Hairston let the ball play him, fielding it back on his heels and firing high to first base, inducing a collision between Mark Teixeira and the runner (neither was hurt). That set the tone.

Aaron Hill doubled home the run on the next pitch as the Jays went on to score three in the first. The first batter in the bottom of the second hit a soft grounder to Robinson Cano, but Cano dropped the ball on the transfer for the second Yankee error in as many innings. Amazingly, the Jays failed to score in that frame.

The Yankees tied the game in the third, then with one out in the bottom of the third, Nick Swisher lost a fly ball in the sun on a cloudless day in Toronto, turning an out into a double. Mark Teixeira then got eaten up by a grounder that scored the run on what was ruled an error. Mitre worked a 1-2-3 fourth, and the Yankees took a brief lead on a two-run Swisher homer in the fifth, but then everything fell apart.

With one on and one out in the bottom of the fifth, Mitre struck out Edwin Encarnacion on a nasty pitch that dove down and away from the righty, hit off Jose Molina’s glove, and ricocheted back the other way, allowing Encarnacion to reach base. That opened the door for an eight-run inning. After the next two batters singled, putting the Jays up 6-5 and leaving men on the corners with still just one out, Mitre induced a chopper to third, but Hairston couldn’t make up his mind whether to throw home or first and, after finally choosing first, threw too late to get the runner on what was ruled an infield hit (the run scored from third anyway). After another single, Mitre walked in a run and got the hook.

Mark Melancon came on and walked in another run on four pitches. After getting the second out, he then let two more in on an infield single and another walk, passing the ball to ex-Jay Josh Towers. Towers got ahead of Bronx native Randy Ruiz 0-2, then hit Ruiz in the face with a 90 mph fastball, bloodying his lip and forcing in another run. (Ruiz came out of the game, but suffered no serious injury.)

At this point it was 12-5, Jays, but the Yankees weren’t done. In the sixth, Ramiro Peña, in as a sub for Derek Jeter, bounced a throw past Mark Teixeira to let in another run in the sixth. Immediately following, Johnny Damon and Melky Cabrera collided while chasing a fly in left-center, though neither was hurt and Melky held on for the third out. The next inning, the Yankee infield consisted of Eric Hinske at third base, Hairston at shorstop, Peña at second, Molina at first, and Francisco Cervelli behind the plate, but that combination fielded it’s only two chances (a pop up to Peña and a grounder to Molina) cleanly.

So to wrap that all up: four errors (Hairston, Cano, Teixeira, Peña), two outs played into hits (Swisher & Hairston), two collisions (at first base and in left field), a bloodied opponent (Ruiz), a rally started by a strikeout, three runs forced in by walks (one by Mitre, two by Melancon), and another forced in by a hit-by-pitch (Towers).

As for Mitre, he officially recorded 13 outs, but if you give him credit for inducing outs on the three errors and two misplays behind him and the strikeout Molina couldn’t corral (ruled a wild pitch), he really got 19 outs, the equivalent of 6 1/3 innings. I’m not saying he pitched well, or that I think he should be a candidate for the postseason roster (he shouldn’t), but he didn’t pitch as poorly as his line suggests (note his five Ks, and that the walk that forced in a run and got him pulled was just his second of the game). Given all that went wrong and his tenuous hold on his job, Mitre did a good job of not showing up his teammates on the field or to the press afterwords.

Me, I spent the day at a local park with my wife, three-month-old daughter, and dog. We had a nice picnic and a walk, played some frisbee with the dog, and took a collective nap (dog and cat included) on the couch after we got home. I then zipped through the game on fast-forward on the DVR. I’m hoping most of you saw as little or less of it and have an equally pleasant Labour Day tomorrow.

It’s thus far been a beautiful Labor Day weekend in the tri-state area, and with a double-header against the third-place Rays coming tomorrow, watching Sergio Mitre and Brian Tallet face off on artificial turf in Toronto’s half-empty concrete behemoth of a ballpark might not seem like the best way to spend your Sunday afternoon. Still, there’s a bit of intrigue as the Yankees are looking to win the series. If they do, they’ll have won 14 of 16 second-half sets. As it stands, the Yanks have won eight of their last nine games and should have Mariano Rivera available to close again today.

There’s also the fact that, since Chien-Ming Wang went back on the disabled list, the Yankees are 8-2 in games started by their fifth starter (be it Mitre, Chad Gaudin, or Alfredo Aceves). Mitre is coming off a legitimately dominant outing against the White Sox (0 R, 1 H, 1 BB, 11 of 19 outs on the ground) that was ended after 6 1/3 innings when he was hit on the pitching elbow by a comebacker. Mitre pitched that game on seven-day’s rest and is pitching today having had another seven day’s off.

Tallet has made two starts since July 25 and has a 10.07 ERA over his last four starts. He does, however, have two quality starts against the Yankees this year, both of them Blue Jays loses.

Alex Rodriguez and Jorge Posada get the day off. Jerry Hairston Jr. plays third and bats seventh ahead of Melky and Jose Molina.

So much for Cito Gaston’s brilliance. Yeah, the Blue Jays traded Scott Rolen, let Alex Rios go via waivers, lost Rolen’s replacement, the disastrous Edwin Encarnacion, to a hamstring injury, and have been forced to play musical closers due to injury and poor performance, and have had to similarly improvise their starting rotation for similar reasons. Despite all that they have outscored their opponents only to find themselves with an actual record eight games worse than their Pythagorean.

The Jays have been in free fall since the end of June, playing .340 baseball (18-35) over that stretch. Since eking out a one-run victory over Sergio Mitre and the Yankees on August 10, they’re 5-16 (.238!). They haven’t won a series, or even had consecutive victories since they faced the Orioles the series before that. Even, Roy Halladay, who pitches tomorrow, has gone 0-3 with a 7.94 ERA over his last three starts. Top prospect Travis Snider has come back from the minors to replace Rios and has hit .167 in 16 games. Things really can’t get much worse for the Jays.

Well, I suppose there’s the Yankees coming to town. The Yanks, like they were against the Orioles prior to their just-completed sweep, are 9-3 against the Jays this year, and two of those losses came in May. The Yankees are 7-1 against Toronto since then. No wonder the Yanks figured they could bounce A.J. Burnett to Monday’s double-header against the Rays and throw Chad Gaudin (tonight), Sergio Mitre (Sunday), and the innings-challenged Joba Chamberlain (tomorrow) in this series. At least they’re giving the Jays a sporting chance.

Rookie of the Year candidate Ricky Romero starts for the Jays tonight. He has two quality starts in as many tries against the Yankees on the season, though the Yankees won the later contest via one of their many extra-inning walkoffs (Cano single). Gaudin was been alternately great and awful in August, striking out 12 in nine scoreless innings in his three “great” appearances (including his one start, in Oakland, all three as a Yankee) and giving up 11 runs in 8 1/3 innings in his three “awful” appearances (two in relief for the Yankees plus one start for the Padres). If he makes like Saberhagen, he’s due for “awful” tonight. Hopefully the Yankees can out-hit whatever it is he gives them.

With Mariano Rivera nursing a tender groin, Phil Hughes will close this weekend. Jonathan Albaladejo has been called up to add innings to the pen. Yanks run out the standard lineup tonight.

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The best game Andy Pettitte ever pitched in his life was Game 5 of the 1996 World Series. In that game, which began with the Yankees and Braves tied at two games a piece in the Series, Pettitte out-dueled John Smoltz for 8 1/3 shutout innings. Pettitte wasn’t perfect in that game. He only struck out four, walked three, two of whom then stole second on him, and gave up five hits, but while Smoltz allowed just one unearned run, Pettitte didn’t allow a runner to third base until the ninth inning and yielded to John Wetteland with one out in the ninth having thrown just 96 pitches. Wetteland got the last two outs to seal the 1-0 win and send the Yankees home for what would prove to be a triumphant Game 6.

Game 5 of the 1996 World Series stands as the pinnacle of my baseball fandom, and it remains the pinnacle of Andy Pettitte’s career, but for six-plus innings last night, Pettitte looked like he was about to reach a new peak.

Andy Pettitte had everything working last night. He was throwing in, out, up, down, using all of his pitches, locating perfectly, and dropping some devastating curveballs into the strike zone. While the Yankees eked out a pair of runs against Orioles starter Jeremy Guthrie on a Nick Swisher homer in the third and doubles by Robinson Cano and Swisher in the fifth, Pettitte was busy retiring the first 20 men he faced.

With one out in the sixth, Matt Wieters hit a slow chopper in on the grass toward third base. Jerry Hairston Jr., giving Alex Rodriguez a day off at third base, charged, barehanded, and fired to first in what was really the only difficult play that needed to be made behind Pettitte all night. Ty Wigginton hit a grounder directly to Derek Jeter on the next pitch for the third out. After six innings, Pettitte had thrown 66 pitches, struck out six, and not once gone to three balls on a batter.

Every so often a pitcher will take a no-hitter or perfect game into the middle innings despite not looking any sharper than usual. A.J. Burnett had a game like that earlier this year. Sergio Mitre had one just a few days ago. Monday night, Andy Pettitte looked like a pitcher throwing a perfect game. He looked like David Cone pitching to the Expos, but instead of Cone’s characteristic improvisation, Pettitte was methodical, precise, and seemingly effortless.

The first two batters of the seventh inning flew out to Swisher in right field on 2-2 counts. Swisher took a wrong step on one of the two flies, but recovered and struggled to contain his relieved grin as he threw the ball back into the infield. Adam Jones, who had just missed a home run foul down the left field line earlier in the game, took ball one from Pettitte, then hit a routine grounder directly at Hairston, the previous inning’s defensive hero.

Hairston booted it.

After the game Hairston’s teammates told him and the media that the ball took a funny hop, but Hairston was honest. It was a routine grounder and he just plain missed it. The ball hit off the heal of his glove and trickled through his legs for an error that erased Pettitte’s perfect game. It was the second time this season that I’ve seen a perfect game come to an end on an error. The first was Jose Uribe’s eighth-inning error in Jonathan Sanchez’s no-hitter against the Padres on July 10. Sanchez finished the game without a hit or a walk, the only blemish being Uribe’s error.

As difficult as it might be to swallow losing a perfect game to a fielding error, the most impressive thing Sanchez did in that game, particularly given his reputation for being over-excitable and folding after bad breaks, was to gather himself and complete the no-hitter. Monday night, Pettitte tried to do the same, but Nick Markakis put a good swing on a fastball up and away and lined it inside the left-field line for a single. That didn’t make Hairston feel better, but it made him less infamous.

With the Yankees still up just 2-0, Pettitte had lost a perfect game and a no-hitter in the course of four pitches and now had the tying runs on base. He then went to his first (and only) three-ball count of the night, going full on Nolan Reimold, but got another grounder right at Jeter to strand both runners.

With Guthrie out of the game in favor of veteran lefty Mark Hendrickson, and Pettitte’s balancing act off their minds, the Yankees put up three insurance runs in the top of the eighth. Pettitte gave up a lead-off homer to Melvin Mora in the bottom of the eighth, scuttling the shutout as well, but struck out the next two men and got one more groundout for good measure on his 104th pitch, leaving the ninth for the bullpen after eight innings, no walks, just two hits, and eight strikeouts.

Brian Bruney’s first three pitches were balls as he walked Brian Roberts to start the ninth. A one-out single followed, prompting Joe Girardi to bring Mariano Rivera in to finish the job, extending the major league record held by Rivera and Pettitte for most games saved by a single pitcher for a single teammate. Pettitte also moved past Lefty Gomez into sole possession of third place on the Yankees’ all-time wins list.

After the game, Pettitte found Hairston in the locker room with his head down and went over to cheer his teammate up. “You took the pressure off me,” he told Hairston. “Besides, if I hadn’t thrown one already, I wasn’t going to. I didn’t want to pitch nine innings anyway.”

This just in: the Yankees are cruising to their first AL East title since 2006. There, I said it. The Yankees have a six-game lead with 32 left to play and nearly half of those remaining games, 15 of 32, will come against the Royals, Blue Jays, and Orioles, three teams with a combined .416 winning percentage.

The Yankees are 9-3 against the Orioles this season and 9-1 since dropping the first two games of the season in Baltimore due to poor starts by CC Sabathia (who has since turned back into CC Sabathia) and Chien-Ming Wang (who has since landed on the 60-day DL).

Since the Yankees last saw them, the Orioles have traded away first baseman Aubrey Huff, closer George Sherrill, and veteran backup catcher Gregg Zaun. Lone All-Star Adam Jones has been fighting back pain and hasn’t had a hit in over a week, and supposed rookie phenom Matt Weiters has been slower to adjust to major league pitching than was expected (.258/.307/.366 in August with 24 Ks against 6 walks in 25 games). The debuts of top pitching prospects Chris Tillman (yet another product of the Erik Bedard trade) and Brian Matusz have kept the O’s interesting, but the Yankees will miss both this week.

So, really, there’s nothing to see here. The Orioles are 10-19 (.345) on the month and have won just one series in August. The Yankees have lost just two series since the All-Star break, have scored 7.5 runs per game in their 11 contests since being shutout by the A’s and Brett Tomko, are coming off a sweep of the White Sox, and have their top three starters lined up for this series in Andy Pettitte, CC Sabathia, and A.J. Burnett. The O’s will be lucky to avoid a sweep.

Jeremy Guthrie takes the hill for Baltimore tonight coming off a pair of strong starts against the White Sox and Twins. In both outings, Guthrie allowed just one run on six hits in seven innings. In the latter he struck out five against no walks or homers. Of course, his season ERA is 5.26, and he’s 1-2 against the Yankees in three starts this season. Guthrie’s first two starts against the Yanks were similar quality starts (6 IP, 7 H, 3 R). He won the first thanks to Sabathia’s bad outing and lost the second when CC got his revenge with a four-hit shutout. He last faced the Yankees on May 20 and gave up five runs in seven innings to lose to Phil Hughes.

Despite a hiccup in Boston hidden by the offense’s 20-run outburst, Andy Pettitte’s second-half numbers are still fantastic: 2.79 ERA, 1.12 WHIP, 9.4 K/9, 3.6 K/BB, just 2 HR allowed in 8 starts averaging more than 6 1/3 innings per start. Andy started that run with 7 1/3 dominant innings against the O’s (1 R, 8 K). Surprisingly, that was his only start against Baltimore this season prior to tonight.

Alex Rodriguez gets the night off tonight. Jerry Hairston Jr., hitting a fluky .316/.413/.553 as a Yankee, plays third and bats eighth. Everyone else moves up a spot.

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Mark Buehlre and CC Sabathia entered last night’s game having had very different Augusts. Buehrle had posted a 6.21 ERA in six starts since his perfect game, while Sabathia had a 1.78 ERA over his previous four starts. In ten previous head-to-head meetings, Buehrle had never beaten Sabathia, who was 6-0 in those matchups. Early on it seemed those trends would continue. After CC worked a 1-2-3 first, Derek Jeter connected for a leadoff home run off Buehlre, who then gave up a pair of singles before getting Nick Swisher to ground out to strand both runners. CC then stranded a leadoff double in the second by striking out the side.

Johnny Damon doubled the Yankee lead by leading off the third with a solo shot, but for the second straight night, the Yankees couldn’t get the job done with runners on base, stranding two in the first, one in the second, two in scoring position in the third, erasing a lead-off single with a double play in a three-batter fourth. Robinson Cano ground out with two outs and the bases loaded in the fifth, then Buehrle worked his first legitimate 1-2-3 inning in the sixth.

CC Sabathia had struck out ten and still thrown just 88 pitches heading into the seventh, but was greeted by a Jermaine Dye double. He then issued his first walk of the game, a five-pitch pass to Carlos Quentin that drew Dave Eiland to the mound. Two pitches later, Alex Rios doubled home Dye to cut the Yankee lead in half and push the tying run to third. Alexei Ramirez got a hold of an 0-1 pitch, but put just enough of a hump in it to allow Cano to hop backwards and make the catch for the first out. Ramon Castro then hit a chopper toward third that Alex Rodriguez gloved and fired to Jose Molina, who tagged Quentin out at home. Jason Nix followed by hitting a hard hopper that stayed just fair over the bag and seemed headed for the left-field corner, but Rodriguez made a full-out stretch and gloved it, holding Nix to an infield single and lead-runner Rios at third. That loaded the bases for rookie Gordon Beckham. CC fell behind 3-1 before getting strike two with Beckham taking all the way. On the full count, Beckham laced a game-tying single to right, but with Castro running from second, Nick Swisher fired a strike to home in time for Molina to tag out his opposite number, ending the inning and keeping the score tied. (Tyler Kepner tweeted after the game that Swisher said he had been getting throwing tips from Dave Eiland and Phil Coke.)

That inning pushed CC to 113 pitches and ended his night. Buehrle was at 99, but Ozzie Guillen quit while he was ahead and went to the majors best set-up man in Matt Thornton in the seventh. Thornton set the top six men in the Yankee lineup down in order in the seventh and eighth, while Phil Hughes struck out Dye, Paul Konerko, and Jim Thome in between. Mariano Rivera then pitched in a perfect ninth, and Scott Linebrink worked around a one-out Jose Molina single in the bottom of the ninth to force extra innings.

Though I would have preferred to have seen Hughes work an extra frame and Mo pitch the tenth, Joe Girardi kept the line moving, getting a 1-2-3 inning from Brian Bruney in the top of the tenth, after which, with Mark Teixeira and Alex Rodriguez due up, Guillen turned to . . . minor league journeyman lefty Randy Williams?

To Williams’ credit, he struck out Tex, but Alex Rodriguez crushed the first pitch he saw to left center for . . . the first out.

It rained throughout the game, and the swirling winds stopped several would-be home runs short of the left field wall. Rodriguez absolutely crushed Williams’ pitch, but he hit it into the wind in death valley and it fell a step shy of the warning track to Alex’s obvious disbelief. Given a reprieve, Williams walked the next two hitters on eight pitches, bringing lefty Robinson Cano to the plate with two out and two on in the bottom of the tenth with the game tied 2-2. Fittingly, Cano ran the count to 2-2, then launched a no-doubter into the Yankee bullpen to win the game. Cano styled on the homer like fellow number-24 Manny Ramirez, watching it from home while Alfredo Aceves ran out into the rain to gather the ball like a kid in the empty wings of the old Stadium in the ’80s.

Helmet toss. Pie. Yankees win 5-2.

Prior to the Rangers’ just-complete series win in the Bronx, the only series the Yankees had lost in the second half came against the White Sox in Chicago. The Sox took three-of-four in that weekend series as July turned to August. The first win came via an unearned run off Andy Pettitte in a 3-2 game. The next two came by a combined score of 24-9 as the Sox tore into Sergio Mitre, Alfredo Aceves, A.J. Burnett, and Phil Coke, who combined to allow 22 of those 24 runs.

Since then, the White Sox have acquired two high-profile players, but have yet to see any benefit from either addition. The first actually occurred on the eve of that last series, when the Sox traded for injured Padres ace Jake Peavy. I analyzed that deal for SI.com:

The White Sox’s trade for Jake Peavy appears on its surface to be a trump card designed to keep them in the division race. It is not that. . . . Peavy is hurt. He tore a tendon in his right ankle in early June, hasn’t pitched since, and isn’t expected back for several of weeks — if at all this season. Certainly the White Sox could benefit from activating Peavy down the stretch if they’re still within striking distance (they’re 2½ games out entering the weekend), and would benefit from his presence in the postseason should they get there. But more likely, the Tigers, with Washburn, are going to win the division.

Indeed, the Sox have since fallen to four games behind the Tigers as Peavy remains on the DL while the Sox have scrambled to fill Clayton Richard’s spot in the rotation. Richards’ spot has come up four times since he was dealt to San Diego in the Peavy deal. The Sox won the first two with spot starters, but have lost the last two behind Freddy Garcia, who will start again on Sunday after Peavy took a liner off his elbow in what was supposed to be his last rehab start.

The other big acquisition was their waiver claim of the Blue Jays’ Alex Rios. The White Sox seemed like one team that could actually benefit from taking on Rios and his contract given their proximity to first place and the .224/.280/.311 line their center fielders had put up prior to Rios’s arrival. However, Rios has started just eight of 13 games in center since joining the Sox, including just three of the last eight and is hitting a mere .200/.213/.333 in that limited time. Rios isn’t helping the White Sox at all, but he’s still going to cost them $59.7 million over the next five years. There’s still a month to go in the season, but Kenny Williams’ claim of the 28-year-old Rios is already looking like a worse move than the contract J.P. Ricciardi signed the 27-year-old Rios too last April.

It will be a great story if Peavy and Rios suddenly emerge to carry the White Sox to the Central title in September, but it ain’t gonna happen. In the meantime, the team the Yankees face this weekend is much the same one they faced at the beginning of the month, minus speedy second baseman Chris Getz, who is out with an oblique strain, and with better work from their bullpen (led by the major’s top set-up man), but weaker work from their rotation.

Tonight’s game pits lefty aces Mark Buehrle and CC Sabathia against each other. The two have had wildly disparate Augusts:

Sabathia: 5-0, 2.65 ERA, 0.88 WHIP, 9.40 K/9, 7.8 K/BB, 1.2 HR/9
Buehrle: 0-3, 6.03 ERA, 1.76 WHIP, 2.59 K/9, 1.5 K/BB, 1.7 HR/9

On top of that, Sabathia and Buehrle have met up ten previous times without Buehrle ever picking up a win. CC is 6-0 in those match-ups.

Jose Molina starts again today as Jorge Posada continues to rest his bruised ring finger. Same lineup as yesterday.

In other news, the Yankees have decided to put Joba Chamberlain back in regular rotation, but to honor his innings limit by taking him out early. Sounds like a move to long relief minus the baggage of the word “bullpen.” This is a viable option because of the team’s lead in the division and rosters expanding on Tuesday, thus deepening the bullpen in support of Joba’s short starts. Given how poorly Joba’s pitched on irregular rest and how well he’s pitched in short stints in the past, this does seem like a better plan, even if it will drive some fans nuts to see Joba repeatedly pulled after five or fewer dominant innings.

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My good friend Steven Goldman called Tuesday night’s loss to the Rangers the most annoying game of the year due to Joba Chamberlain’s struggles with two outs and the botched Nick Swisher bunt that appeared to kill the ninth-inning rally. Having held off on assigning that title, I’ll slap it on Wednesday afternoon’s contest.

What do you imagine the final score would be of a game in which A.J. Burnett struck out a season-high 12 Rangers and allowed just two hits, and the Yankees put 14 men on base? Would you believe 7-2 Rangers?

The Yankees staked Burnett to an early 1-0 lead when Johnny Damon walked, stole second, and scored on a Mark Teixeira single in the bottom of the first. Burnett responded by retiring the first 11 men he faced. Then, suddenly, with two outs in the fourth, he walked Josh Hamilton and Nelson Cruz and gave up a three-run home run to Ian Kinsler on a first-pitch fastball.

That was the game. After Damon scored, Rangers starter Dustin Nippert walked six more men, but the Yankees stranded three in the first, one in the second, two in the third, two in the fourth, two in the seventh, and two in the ninth, scoring just one more run along the way.

All together, the Yankees went 2-for-12 with runners in scoring position, both hits coming off the bat of Mark Teixeira, who singled Jeter home in the fourth. The Yankees drew eight walks, but didn’t manage a single extra-base hit, and two of their six singles didn’t leave the infield. They also struck out ten times, three each against Nippert (in 3 2/3 innings), Jason Grilli (in 2 1/3), and lefty C.J. Wilson (in 2), and once against closer Frank Francisco in the ninth.

Burnett left after six innings and 105 pitches, yeilding a 3-2 deficit to Phil Coke. Coke’s first three batters doubled, bunted for a hit, and homered, boosting the Texas lead to 6-2. The home run, by lefty Chris Davis, was the sixth Coke has surrendered to a lefty this year. Coke has otherwise dominated southpaw batters (.196 average, .224 OBP), but the nine home runs he’s allowed this year to batters of all types have given him a Farnsworthy rate of 1.57 HR/9, moving him ahead of the broken Chien-Ming Wang as the most homer-prone pitcher to throw more than 40 innings for the Yankees this year.

The Rangers scored all seven of their runs on homers in this game, with Kinsler rubbing it in with a two-out, 1-2 solo homer off David Robertson in the eighth to set the final score. Meanwhile, over the final five innings, the Yankees managed just a walk and two singles, only one of which left the infield.

With that, the Yankees dropped a series at home for the first time since the Nationals were in town in mid-June. It was just the second series loss for the Yankees since the All-Star break. The other was to the White Sox, who come into town on Thursday having salvaged the final game of a four-game set against Boston on Wednesday to protect the Yankees six-game lead.

The Yankees have scored 47 runs over their last five games. That works out to 9.4 runs per game. They’ve scored a minimum of eight runs in four of those five contests, all of which have come against the top two teams in the Wild Card race. That’s what 28-year-old righty Dustin Nippert has to contend with this afternoon.

Nippert has made just seven previous starts this year. Just one of them was a quality start. This is just his fifth start in regular rotation. In the previous four the Rangers have gone 1-3 despite Nippert’s average 4.50 ERA and strong strikeout rate.

Nippert goes up against A.J. Burnett, who is coming off his miserable outing in Boston. In August, Burnett has sandwiched three quality starts between two total stinkers in which he’s given up 16 runs in 9 2/3 innings.

Jose Molina catches Burnett this afternoon, but not because of the head-butting A.J. and Jorge Posada were doing in Boston. Molina was scheduled to catch today’s day-game-after-night-game regardless of the pitcher, and the foul ball Posada took off his left ring finger last night cinched it. The rest of the lineup is the usual suspects, with Johnny Damon returning to left field.

When the Yankees first played the Rangers in late May, I took a look at Texas and saw Toronto, at hot team with a strong defense that had yet to be tested by its schedule and thus seemed headed for a fall. The Blue Jays fulfilled that prophecy by going 10-24 (.294) against the Yankees, Red Sox, and Rays and playing at a .429 overall clip after going 15-9 in April. The Rangers, however, have proven me wrong.

Against the Red Sox, Angels, Rays, and White Sox this season, the Rangers have gone 24-9 (.727), and they nearly matched their 20-9 May with a 17-8 July. As a result, Texas enters this week’s three-game series in the Bronx just 1.5 games behind Boston in the Wild Card race, and 11.5 games ahead of the seventh-place Blue Jays.

How have they done it? That great defense, led by rookie shortstop Elvis Andrus and break-out right-field slugger Nelson Cruz, has played a large part, as it has helped the Texas pitching staff (brace yourself) allow the fewest runs per game in the American League. Yes, the Texas Rangers‘ pitching staff.

The Rangers have needed pitching since they arrived from Washington. Even two of their three playoff entries allowed more than the league average of runs per game. This year, however, that’s all changed. Leading the charge has been veteran Kevin Millwood, who starts tonight. Millwood has benefited tremendously from the improved defense behind him. In his first three seasons as a Ranger, Millwood’s BABIPs were .310, .340, and .358. This year, opposing batters are hitting just .274 on balls in play, and Millwood’s ERA has dropped a full run and a half as a result.

Behind Millwood, 26-year-old sophomore starter Scott Feldman has paired a similarly low BABIP with improved peripherals to shave a run and a half off of his own ERA. Toss aside his three ugly relief outings in April and he has gone 13-4 with a 3.46 ERA in his 23 starts. More recently, 22-year-old rookie Tommy Hunter has gone 6-2 with a 2.66 ERA in ten starts since joining the rotation at the end of June, thanks in part to a still-lower BABIP.

One Ranger starter who is not just a product of his team’s defense is 22-year-old rookie Derek Holland. Holland, who starts tomorrow night, has thrived since his mid-July return to the rotation, going 4-2 with a 2.95 ERA over seven starts and 4-1 with a 1.85 ERA, 0.91 WHIP, and 3.5 K/BB over his last five. He’s a legitimate prospect who could pair with recently promoted 21-year-old Neftali Feliz (part of the Mark Teixeira booty) to give the Rangers a legitimate rotation in the years to come. Feliz is working out of the major league pen for now and has struck out 19 men in 14 2/3 innings against just one walk and four hits. Be afraid.

The Rangers’ bullpen has been a large part of their success this year. First-year closer Frank Francisco has been on and off the DL, but has struck out 41 in 35 innings against just 8 walks (10.5 K/9, 5.13 K/BB). Deposed closer and current lefty set-up man C.J. Wilson has done admirably both setting up and closing for Francisco, striking out 61 in 56 innings and allowing just three home runs. Righty Darren O’Day, a mid-season waiver claim from the Mets, has posted a 1.87 ERA with similarly sharp peripherals in 50 games since arriving in Texas and leads the team in the win-expectancy-based WXRL.

The Rangers have pitched so well, in fact, that it’s easy to overlook the fact that they’re not hitting as much as they used to. Josh Hamilton has been hurt and only recently found his stroke (.373/.425/.513 since August 3, .657 OPS before that). Chris Davis struck out 114 times in 77 games and was demoted in early July. Hank Blalock has taken Davis’s place by getting on base at a .274 clip and doing little other than hitting homers. Andrus is hitting (and running) just enough to make his glove valuable, but no more. Prior to his current arm injury, fellow Teixeira-trade product Jarrod Saltalamacchia wasn’t doing that. Ian Kinsler is not repeating his production from last year and was hurt for a while himself. All of that has counteracted Cruz’s breakout, Andruw Jones ultimately half-hearted comeback, and Michael Young’s MVP-quality performance (if not for his stone glove and that Joe Mauer guy, of course). As a result the Rangers are actually a tick below league average in runs scored per game at 4.85. As usual, that gets worse on the road, where they’ve scored just 4.2 runs per game on the season.

Could this Yankees-Rangers series in the hitting-friendly Yankee Stadium yield a series of pitchers’ duels? Don’t be surprised if it does.

Joba Chamberlain goes against Millwood tonight on eight-day’s rest. He had nine days off around the All-Star break and came back looking like and ace, allowing two runs on eight hits over his next three starts. He then had seven days off before facing the Red Sox at the beginning of the month and came back looking like the nibbler we saw in the first half of the season, walking seven in five innings. Which Joba takes the mound tonight is anyone’s guess. It was the nibbler who faced Texas in Arlington back in late May (4 IP, 4 BB).

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