Yankees 8, Orioles 5: Rain does not delay the offense

If you stuck around through an hour and forty-five minute rain delay, you ended up seeing a pretty great game. The Yankees extended their winning streak to four, downing the Orioles by a score of 8-5.

Despite a clear sky at the original 4:05pm start time, the decision was made to hold off the beginning of the game in order to avoid a rain delay later. Instead, we lost 100 minutes of our collective Saturday for nothing, as half the game was played in a downpour anyway.

The good news is that the rain had no cooling effect on the Yankees’ offense. Fresh off the news that Gleyber Torres was awarded the AL Rookie of the Month for May, Miguel Andujar reminded everyone that he’s not having a bad rookie campaign himself.

That home run gave the Yankees a 2-1 lead and was Miggy’s 25^th extra base hit in 2018 — the most among all the league’s rookies. He added another extra-base hit in the eighth with an RBI double. Giancarlo Stanton and Aaron Hicks also had big days, each with multiple hits and three runs driven in between them.

The game turned into a literal comedy of errors in the top of the sixth. Following a Stanton infield single, the O’s tried to double up Gary Sanchez. The throw to first to complete the double play sailed way over Chris Davis’ head, allowing Gary to move to second. Sanchez scored a batter later, when Didi Gregorius dropped a single into center field that Adam Jones overran. There’s no way Sanchez would have been able to reach the plate without Jones’ miscue, and between that and his mistake on Greg Bird’s triple last night, it has not been a good weekend defensively for the former Gold Glove winner.

As for Didi, he came around to score on Hicks’ single. The Yankees center fielder then advanced to second after, you guessed it, another Orioles misplay. The throw from Jones into the infield wasn’t caught by anyone, and while Jones was charged with the error, everyone on that team shared some responsibility. The third error of the inning ended Gausman’s night to boot.

Masahiro Tanaka was fine, but could have been a lot better. He gave up three home runs, one each to the top three hitters in Baltimore’s lineup. Homers are part of his game, as we all know, and I’ve long gotten over my annoyance that Tanaka gives up too many long balls.

The real issue was that he gave up five other hits and didn’t have a single perfect inning. Seven strikeouts and a double play helped ease some of the tension of the game, but that’s just too much contact and too many high-stress pitches to be successful going forward. It’s okay if Tanaka gives up home runs, if he is able to mitigate all other types of contact and he couldn’t do that tonight.

Jonathan Holder came in in the sixth with two men on and managed to work out of the inning despite allowing an inherited run to score. David Robertson, working in the ninth, also gave up a run on an Adam Jones double. Aside from that, the relief corps worked well, with five strikeouts in 3.2 innings of work to seal the win.

The Yankees go for the sweep tomorrow in Baltimore. Domingo German is scheduled to pitch on his name-day; he will oppose Alex Cobb. You can catch first pitch at 1:05pm EDT.