Game 1 and 2 in Tampa

Monday’s win was a HR fest.  5 dingers gave CC enough to go a respectable 7 innings allowing 3 ER and 4 R.  CC had a very good breaking ball and his fastball was about 90-91.  If he can get his changeup down to 82 and get the downward movement he can be effective again, but he is not there yet (and not really effective yet).  CC did win for the first time in his last 10 starts so hopefully that is something he can feed off of.

Tex crushed two balls the other way (one for a HR) and that was very good to see.  He is getting that power the other way again.

Tuesday night:

First game of the year I really hated the way Girardi managed.  Eovaldi was pitching really well.  He was working in his breaking ball as well as his splitter/change (it is really more of a change right now) to offset that 95-98 MPH fastball.  He was in total command for 6 innings before he ran into some trouble in the 7^th.  His pitch count was still good at this point, but he wasn’t throwing high 90’s, it was more 94 or 95 and Longoria singled and after an out moving Longoria to 2^nd, Eovaldi messed up by walking Forsythe on 4 pitches.  It was almost like they intentionally walked him to setup the DP.  Forsythe has been swinging well, but up by 2 runs that is a bad move IMO.  Then a huge play happened where the ball got by McCann for a wild pitch.  Could have been a passed ball but it was a tough catch that he reached for and couldn’t get to.  Regardless it moved both runners up and Dejesus singled them in to tie the score.  Eovaldi did get the next two guys out but his pitch count was somewhere about 94 (about where he came out last game).   I thought he was done, but Girardi brought him out to start the 8^th because a righty started and he had Wilson ready for the lefty up second in the inning and I was OK with that, but I would have just taken him out to start the inning and get Betances in there, especially after struggling last inning and reaching his pitch count.  Girardi was right in that Eovaldi got Rivera to strike out, but then Girardi messed up royally.  He decided to get very greedy and allow Eovaldi to pitch to the lefty…who he walked.  Very bad job by Girardi to let him pitch to the lefty.  But it got crazy stupid when Girardi let Eovaldi stay in to face Souza JR who singled to right on a play that Drew took a weird angle on and he might have been able to get it if he went back a little instead of in a little.  Either way, Girardi then went to Betances, way too late IMO.  Betances allowed a sac fly and then an intentional walk, making it 1^st and 2^nd 2 outs.  On a bad pitch in the dirt McCann did a horrible job of blocking it, literally raising his glove up to cover his groin while exposing the five hole, which allowed both runner to move up again.  Then after another wild pitch (not McCann’s fault at all) another run scored and we lose 4-2.

Now as bad a Girardi was in the 8^th inning and I don’t listen to press conferences because he is always condescending when he gives his reasoning, I would be interested in his explanation.  I am sure it was “I have faith in Eovaldi and he still looked good…:  The manager needs to be smarter than though…anyway, as bad as Girardi was, the Yanks blew this game in the 1^st inning.  After 2 runs had scored, we had bases loaded nobody out and we didn’t score that inning or the rest of the game.  As I mentioned in my blog the other day, the first inning is a golden chance to get the pitcher before he gets into any rhythm and we blew our chance to not only score a few more runs, but we could have knocked him out by the 6^th inning and then you can get into the middle relief of teams and do some damage.

Tough loss!