9-5-12

 We found a way to win a ball game that was badly needed.  Kuroda wasn’t sharp with his control but his stuff was solid.  Overall, he didn’t pitch that well, but was the recipient of some run support and did just enough to hold down TB to 4 runs.  The bullpen did a good job going the final 3 innings shutting down TB.

It was good to see ARod and Martin help us offensively (and Jeter collected 3 hits).  We also were fairly timely only leaving 4 guys on base.   Both ARod and Jeter made nice over the shoulder type of catches (Jeter’s a little harder) and compare that to Tampa where they coughed one up.  TB’s defense hurt them on the play at the plate where their 2^nd baseman (Johnson) threw up the line trying to get Ichiro at the plate.  The catcher gave up on that ball, I guess shying away from contact?

We struck out 15 times, but scored 6 runs even if 2 were unearned.  That is better, but not good enough.  I don’t care as much about the K’s, but we are taking an awful a lot of called 3^rd strikes.  Granderson is just swinging through a lot of pitches and Cano has expanded his strike zone too much.  Swisher struck out 7 times this 3 game series…and had no hits.  BTW, Martin is at .202 now.

We need to beat Baltimore now!  Taking 3 of 4 would be great…a split in minimum.