You gotta love the All Star break. Whatever it did, it helped. The defending world champs flew into town for a three game set and left with their tails between their legs. To make it even more sweet, the Oakland A’s took three of four against the Red Sox. At the end of the week, the Yankees are now a half game back of the Red Sox and they’re three games back of the White Sox for the Wild Card (only two back in the loss column).
On Friday, the Yankees beat the unbeatable. Jose Contreras’ 17 game winning streak came to an end and if not for a two run ninth by the White Sox, this one would have looked even worse. Six different Yankees drove in the six runs and six different Yankees scored. Randy Johnson threw seven decent innings, but it was Kyle Farnsworth who picked up the win. Mariano Rivera saved his 20th game but made things interesting by giving up two runs in the ninth.
Yesterday, we laid the wood down on the White Sox. Mark Buehrle lasted only three innings and some Yankees put up some big time lines in the box score. Derek Jeter and Bernie Williams each drove in three runs and Johnny Damon scored three times. Mike Mussina picked up his eleventh win of the season and he gave up three runs on eight hits and a walk with five strikeouts in six innings.
This afternoon, the Yankees jumped out to a 6-2 lead but the White Sox slowly picked away at it and eventually made it 6-4. The Sox also out hit the Yankees 14-9 but we got the runs when we needed them. Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez both homered and Jaret Wright picked up his sixth win of the season. Mariano Rivera got into trouble in the ninth, but he buckled down and saved his 400th career game.
Next up is a three game series against the Mariners who have had a tough stretch of late. Hopefully the Yanks will be able to keep that bad stretch going.
