The Morning After: Game 6

Rays 1 (3-3), Yankees 6 (4-3)

Highlights

• Gomes ripping a line shout over the left field fence in the third. He absolutely hammered that ball. However, I still probably would have preferred Floyd in there against Mussina. Floyd had already had two days off in the first six days. I am hoping he will be able to play a little more regularly as the season goes on.

• Hinske made a good play on a ball in right early on. He made it look like a great play because he is so damn slow. But really it was a play that every right fielder should make.

• Pena’s defense at first has been excellent all season long. He made a great pick on a throw from Aybar.

Lowlights

• The Rays got three hits. Yes, you read that correctly. And one of them came from the 38 year old catcher the Rays called up two days ago.

• While the Rays announcers seemed pleased with Hammell’s performance, I was not. He gave up four runs in six innings. That is an era of 6.00. That simply is not going to get the job done. He only had two innings where he looked really effective (the fourth and the fifth). Every other inning he either gave up runs or came damn close to giving up runs. It seemed like every time a left hander came up against him they hit the ball hard. Lefties just seem to murder him. Come back soon Kaz.

• Although Hinske made on good play early on he also made an awful play in the 6^th on Abreu’s triple. Just awful. He got back to the wall in time and then did some weird half jump and the ball went under his glove. The ball then proceeded to ricochet off the wall and bounce away from both Hinske and Upton (who was backing the play up). It still seems to me that Upton has no clue how to play a ball of the wall. Can we just send him out to center and have someone throw balls of the wall for a couple hours?

• Dohmann stunk just like he stunk all spring. He gave up two runs in just one inning of work. Not many of the balls were hit that hard against him but they all seemed to drop in.

• I am not sure if Aki is going to hit a homerun this season with the way he is swinging. It looks like he is trying to slap everything for a base hit into left. He can foul pitch off all day long but can he really drive the ball? I remember him driving it last year.

Analysis

Not a great game for the Rays. This is the second game in a row that the hitting has stunk. I’ll give Wang some credit but Mussina simply isn’t good enough anymore to make the Rays look that bad. On the other side the Rays pitching was bad all around with the exception of Glover who looked quite good.

Now the Rays have played two road series and they have split them both. That is acceptable for this team. They are young and young teams tend to not always play that well on the road. In both series they were up and then let the leads slip away. The real test will come will be the upcoming homestand. The Rays need to leave Tampa with an above .500 record.

Tomorrow is Garza against Bedard. I have always been a big admirer of Bedard. He is a really solid pitcher and I think the Mariners were smart to go after him. It will be a tough game, but I think it is one that we can win. Hopefully, Garza will pitch better than he did in his first start against the Orioles. (Anyone else notice that the Orioles have been winning a lot of games? I think we were all counting on the Orioles being the one weak team in the AL East. It may still end up that way, but they have definitely looked good so far).

The Rays announced that the game tonight is a sell out. No one wants all those people to go home disappointed. Let’s go Rays!

Sonny and E-Jack will go on Wednesday and Thursday.

News and Notes

• Mussina is just a right handed version of Glavine. He tries to nibble on the outside corner all day long. He did it quite effectively.

• Kyle Farnsworth looks like an enormous douche. I have always hated him but he seems even more douchey than he used to.

• I’m sure our boy Eric StIgnacious over at Rays Anatomy was thrilled with the game.

PA