In Honor of Memorial Day

I almost always stick to baseball, but as someone who has not served in the military, I have tremendous respect for those who have.  Today serves as a day to remember the brave Americans who have lost their lives for the freedom we cherish.  The freedom to write this blog, the freedom for you to read it and your freedom to critique it!

I know the difference between Veteran's Day and Memorial Day, but I still want to thank everyone who has served and especially the people who have given the ultimate sacrifice!

Memorial day makes losing to the lowly Royals not important, but we are here to read about our beloved Yankees.  Taking 3 of 4 should be a good thing, but when you have won the first 3 games and are playing a weak team with your most successful pitcher on the mound; you get greedy.

German did not look good from the beginning.  His fastball was more like 92-93 than 95 and his sharp break in his pitches was not there.  The positive was that he didn't walk anyone, but the negative to that was too many pitches that were very hittable.  He allowed a 3 run HR with 2 outs in the 2nd inning, he allowed a solo HR with 2 outs in teh 4th inning and then the crushing blow of a 3 run HR with 2 outs in the 5th inning.  All with 2 outs and we were down 7-1 going into the 6th inning.  Torres got back one of the HR's with a 3 run HR with 2 outs himself.  It stayed that way until the 9th inning where we were down 7-4 because Cortes Jr held the Royals in check for 3 innings.

In the 9th, Morales weakly grounded out, Frazier singled and Urshela singled.  Brett Gardner pinch hit for Maybin and struck out in a foul tip where the ball deflected off the catcher's glove (popped up) and the catcher went and caught it.  I have seen a catcher double clutch, but it is rare to see what I just described.  Anyway, down to our last out (2 out theme), DJ singled to knock in Frazier and we were down 2 with 1st and 2nd.  Ian Kennedy appeared to want no part of Voit and walked him to load the bases for the struggling Hicks.  Hicks took 4 pitches and had a 3-1 count in his favor before hitting a hard ground ball to RF tying the game.  Sanchez had a chance to get us the lead, but flew out to RF.

Here is where I was surprised at Boone.  Tie game and he left our last pitcher out there?  Cortes Jr had pitched well putting up zeroes, but there is no chance I would have left him out there.  It worked because Cortes got through the bottom of the 9th, but the bases were loaded when we got out of the inning.

We went down in the top of the 10th and I expected Ottavino to come in as he was warming up, but Boone went with Holder.  I don't get going with our weaker relievers in a time like this and perhaps Ottavino didn't feel well when he got up, but I would have had Britton up before I went to Holder.  Holder got the 1st out and then committed the costly mistake of walking speedster Billy Hamilton on 5 pitches (after going 3-0).

Then the most important play of the game happened when Hamilton stole 2nd base and Sanchez got rid of it quickly and the ball beat Hamilton but Torres was not able to catch the throw that did tail away from him a little.  Torres was a little late but got there and because the throw was slightly on the 2nd base side, the ball tipped off the end of his glove.  His arm was not fully extended and it was in the middle of the chest of the incoming Hamilton, but Torres could have taken the throw just to the catcher's side of the runner and he didn't.  The throw had Hamilton easily out, but Gleyber couldn't make the play.  The next ball was hit down the line where Urshela made a game-saving backhand and somehow still looked the runner back and made the throw to first base.  The throw was straight but bounced before Morales who made a nice scoop.  Now with 2 outs things were more promising, but once again with 2 outs the run scored on a ground ball that was an in-between hop for Urshela and the ball took a crazy hop over his head for the winning run.  Urshela could have tried to charge and smother the ball just to keep it in the infield, but as great as he was playing, I think he expected to make the play and unfortunately, it took a bad hop.

Not sure why Boone allowed our two weakest pitchers to go in those final two innings, but I didn't like those moves, especially after the 6 run come back.

SD at home today at 1:05

Enjoy our freedom today!