Walk This Way

Despite the offense coming up short again, the culprit in this game was the Yankees pitching collectively. Phil Hughes began the trend by walking five batters in 4.1 innings. Hughes gave up only three runs but with his five walks he was not able to remain in the game due to a high pitch count. Following Hughes, Shawn Kelley pitched another scoreless outing and Joba Chamberlain stunk up the game for the Yankees as he allowed two runs in the bottom of the eighth inning when the Yankees were originally down by one run. Brandon Moss was the difference in tonight's game as he homered twice and drove in three of the A's five runs.

There is no pretty way to put this, but this team is showing its weaknesses. Before tonight the Yankee pitchers handed out the least amount of walks in the Major Leagues and with the nine walks handed out by Yankees pitching they were put into a deep hole which they couldn't get out of because of the walks. Almost everybody in the lineup is slumping collectively. Robinson Cano is just plain pathetic, and most of his outs are soft outs. He told reporters a couple of days ago that he feels great at the plate and that his .277 average is not his fault. When players become complacent it means something wrong is happening at the top of the chain. Joe Girardi is the manager of the Yankees, and some of the blame has to fall upon him. He isn't reaching to the players right now and they are all showing weaknesses right now. If I didn't know any better I would say that they are playing like the Mets right now. The only difference between the Mets and the Yankees is that the Mets are expected to lose. With all the star power on the New York Yankees, there is no reason that they should be scoring two runs a game. When you play good teams, they will score more than two runs a game and when your team scores almost nothing, it doesn't bode well for your team. The Yankees won three of four games against the Mariners who can't score for anything, and they were lucky to win those games. The Athletics are a representative team that knows how to score runs and tack on runs. The Yankees can't afford to walk so many batters in a game when their hitting is not doing anything.

In what should be an interesting game tomorrow afternoon, the Yankees send Hiroki Kuroda to the mound in search of his seventh win. Kuroda unraveled in Seattle for a big inning which cost him the game. With the Yankees offense in a deep slump, Kuroda needs to pitch the game of his life if he wants to sniff a victory.