Yankees beat Astros in Tight Game

Adam Warren notched his first career win as a starting pitcher which may be a sign of things to come as the Yankees gear up for a new-look team in 2014. There is no doubt that Adam Warren will play some type of role with the Yankees in New York but the question is whether the Yankees want to keep him as a long reliever or if they want to try him out as a starter with Andy Pettitte retiring, Phil Hughes' free agency and Kuroda's return still unknown. Warren fired five scoreless innings against the weak hitting Astros whose lineup look like a minor league set-up. You can make a case for two of their hitters to be in the lineup, but if they released Carlos Pena, this team must be desperate for something out of their system. The rest of the Yankee bullpen did their job as David Robertson, not Mariano Rivera, got the save. Mariano Rivera was not available tonight, but I wonder whether he will be available at all this weekend. Girardi probably wants to keep Mo out of any pitching duties because of the way he went out in New York on Thursday with the emotional outpouring of support from teammates and Yankee faithful.

The offense was able to score three runs off a starting pitcher they have never faced before, which is a victory in my book. Whenever your 6-9 hitters consist of Adams, Almonte, Ryan and Murphy, you probably don't expect to score many runs from that part of the order. However, David Adams got the big hit, a two-run double of the top of the right field wall as the second run that scored was all the Yankees needed to win the game. Mark Reynolds also chipped in with an RBI single. The rest of the lineup had three hits combined. If the Yankees were playing any other team tonight it would have been a loss. Thankfully, the Yankees played the Astros who are playing historically bad this year.

Andy Pettitte makes his final career start tomorrow against his former team where he wore #21 for three seasons. If the Yankees send him out with a win and a save by Mariano Rivera, it would be a perfect ending for two perfect ball players.