This was supposed to be a pitching duel. CC Sabathia and Roy Halladay were set to square off on a cool evening at Yankee Stadium. If each pitcher pitched 8 innings of shut out ball, nobody would be surprised. But as the final out was recorded, only one pitcher would live up to the billing. And it wasn't Halladay. Instead, the good Doctor was unequivocally smacked around for 6 runs in what was certainly one of his worst starts of this season (he was also touched for 6 in a start against Boston a few weeks back). Sabathia, on the other hand, pitched great for 7 innings giving up 3 runs and striking out 7.
Although I wasn't able to actually watch this game (I was in the city for a film critique class), I was told by MLB.com's lovely wrap up that Sabathia dominated for the three four innings before being struck by a come backer on his pitching hand by Sabathia-killer Chase Utley. After that he allowed 3 runs in that frame, but he settled down the rest of the way.
Offensively, the Bombers hit three homers, including a solo shot from the struggling Mark Teixera. But the story here has to be Doc's terrible outing. So far, his two worst starts have come against hard hitting AL teams. Normally you would chalk this down to the old AL is better than the NL cliche, but we have to remember that Halladay was on the Blue Jays his entire career until this season. And he has historically dominated the Yankees. He just obviously didn't have it tonight. Not seeing the game I can't comment on his stuff. But from the highlights I saw, it just looked like had terrible location. His ball to strike ratio seemed pretty good (100 pitches 68 strikes) but it seemed to me there were a lot of breaking balls in the middle of the plate. And according to hitting coach Kevin Long, the Yanks only chased four pitches out of the strike zone. Since they weren't chasing, it seems Doc was forced to be in the strike zone, for the most part. And that's why they had the success they had tonight, it seems.
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