The Yankees found themselves in a familiar position last night, down in the bottom of the ninth with the winning run at the plate, 2 outs. Unfortuntately, there were no last minute miracles to save the Yankees, who lost and once again fell under .500 for the season.
The unfortunate part is that Darrel Rasner's outing get's less attention and credit than it deserved. Ras pitched 8 solid innings, with 9 hits, 2 runs, 4 strikeouts and 0 walks. His 2.58 ERA is better than Mussina, Pettite, Wang, Hughes, and Kennedy.
Of all the new starters who have come into the rotation, Rasner is the one getting the best results. Where was all they hype about Rasner during the spring when YES network spent hours and hours covering Phil, Ian and Joba? At this point, it's pretty safe to say that just about everyone missed the boat on this kid.
I didn't have him pegged for a spot in the rotation either. I thought he should get the nod as long reliever and would fill in nicely behind the other kids if they had a rocky outing or could spot start when Pettitte's back acted up. Darrel has exceeded just about everyone's expectations. Let's hope he can continue to play at this level.
Edwar Ramirez finished up the 9th inning, and it was reassuring to me to see him settled back down again. He's our set-up man in my book.
The Yankee bats were quiet at the wrong times. There were 10 hits but only 1 run scored with 9 LOB. It wasn't necessarily a bad hitting night, but the team was unable to string together the offense to produce runs.
Someone needs to explain to me why Wilson Betemit is ever called in to pinch hit. Or play any other position for that matter.
Once again the Yankees were unable to keep their heads above water and over .500. It's hard to be overly critical, there wasn't any particular disaster to point out, but the end result wasn't good. Still, Rasner looked good and that's a sign of better days to come.
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