6-4-2 — an Angels/Dodgers double play blog: Leit-Fingered Yankees No Match: Angels 6, Yankees 3

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Saturday, July 23, 2005

Leit-Fingered Yankees No Match: Angels 6, Yankees 3

Remember Al Leiter's great work against the Red Sox? I figured he was pitching for his life there, and his career (the same thing, really); to come back and have to do that every time was just asking too much for the aging Leiter, whose birth-to-death cycle in pinstripes has gotten far too much press already. Leiter tossed 104 pitches on the night, 64 for strikes. Inning-by-inning:

Inn.  B   S  3-x  BB
=====================
 1    5   9   1
 2   13  16   1    1
 3    9  10        1
 4    7   6   1
 5    4   7
 6    5  13

Where: B=balls, S=strikes, 3-x=3-ball count, BB=walked batter.

Which is to say, only in the fifth and sixth innings was he really very good. As I suggested last Sunday, Al Leiter is a gift to the Red Sox and the other teams (well, the Orioles, really) on the east coast who have hopes of contending. He's essentially done for his career, only the Yanks are too dumb to realize it just yet. Former Dodger product Scott Proctor, on the other hand, had a very good pair of innings, holding the Angels down.

Lackey was actually better than his line showed. Even though he didn't get through six, he gutted it out, and in so doing earned some respect; the 2003 or 2004 version of Lackey would have imploded. Seared in my mind is the opening day game in 2003, when A-Rod and Eric Young knocked John Lackey for a home run each and four RBIs. The 2003 and 2004 versions of Lackey would have just imploded and given up, but this year he's been a lot more resilient, and for that he deserves a good bit of credit.

Home run in Friday's game or no, Vlad's bat remains cold, and Anderson's on-again, off-again offense was limited to a single. But hey, here's to the Yankee fans going home unhappy.

Recap

I assume based on this that Richard intends to be at the park tomorrow.

// posted by Rob @ 3:47 PM link // 1 comments