Yankees Game 2 Recap

This guy shut down the Yankees...

Today was the most frustrating game of the frustrating Yankees postseason to date. The Yankees lost 3-0, going down 0-2 in the series as they head to Detroit for at least the next two games. If the Yankees manage to win one of the next two games, then a third will be played in Detroit as well, with the series not returning to New York unless the Yankees win two or more in Detroit.

The reason why today was so frustrating, was because the game was a stereotypical 2012 Yankees postseason game. The game might as well have not even been played, it was that predictable. It included no offense, a solid pitching performance with nothing to show for it, a lot of strikeouts, and most importantly a close Yankees loss.

The offense struggled yet again, this time not even managing to score a run. This means that over the first 21 innings of this series, the Yankees have managed to go scoreless in 20 of them. This being all but the 4 run bottom of the 9th rally that they put together in Game 1. That is just terrible. On top of that, the Yanks only had 4 hits the entire night, making Tigers starter Anibal Sanchez look like Sandy Koufax.

The Yankees also earned a beautiful start from another one of their pitchers, but the hitting couldn't provide run support again. Hiroki Kuroda was perfect through 5, literally. Kuroda didn't give up a hit until the 6th inning and struck out 11 over his 7.2 innings of work. The only run the Tigers even got off of Kuroda occurred when Robinson Cano failed to turn a difficult double play. The bullpen allowed the rest of the damage, but it didn't even matter at that point

The last and most irritating part of every game thus far are the strikeouts at the plate. The Yankees have the worst at bats almost every time up and pairing Alex Rodriguez, Curtis Granderson, and Nick Swisher together is like giving the Tigers 3 automatic outs. That group combined for 7 strikeouts out of the team's 10. I don't know what Girardi is going to do to try and stop this trend, but he needs to do something fast, or else he might as well start sending that group up to the plate without a bat because they clearly aren't using them. Robinson Cano's struggles will not go unnoticed either since he is 0-26 in his last 26 at-bats, but at least Cano puts the ball in play.

One Last Thing: A big play in this game came with 2 outs in the top of the 8th during an Austin Jackson single. Omar Infante took too big of a turn and Swisher threw behind him, clearly picking him off for the final out, but umpire Jeff Nelson called him safe and the Tigers knocked in 2 more runs. (see the play in the post below) This was a big part of the game but it isn't something Yankee fans should be upset with. We didn't even score 1 run, and the play just delayed the inevitable.

The Yankees get a much needed day off tomorrow and head into Detroit Tuesday night for Game 3. To add to that, Justin Verlander, last year's AL Cy Young and MVP winner, will be on the mound for the Tigers. This will be a very very very tough game and I won't lie I am not confident. One thing that will help my confidence and is something that Joe Girardi will need to consider is starting CC Sabathia on short rest instead of Phil Hughes. Even though Hughes pitched really well in his start against the Orioles, Sabathia is a big game pitcher and performs in these games.