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After dropping the first game of the series against the Royals in a rain-soaked game last night, the Yankees send CC Sabathia to the mound to try and get back to their winning ways against former AL East foe James Shields.
Tonights lineup: Gardner 8 ichiro 9 Cano 4 hafner dh Almonte 7 Overbay 3 Nunez 6 Cruz 5 Stewart 2 Sabathia 1
— Erik Boland (@eboland11) July 9, 2013
Robinson Cano has easily found the most success off of Shields in his career, with four home runs and a .392/.415/.696 batting line in 79 at-bats. Lyle Overbay has also managed to find his power stroke off the Royals' right-hander with three homers and three doubles in 44 at-bats in his career. Despite only batting .190/.261/.238 off Shields, a struggling Travis Hafner is in the lineup batting cleanup. Not that there are tons of options on this team right now, but it's still pretty disappointing.
Infielder Ty Wigginton was released by the St. Louis Cardinals earlier today and he could end up becoming a target for the Yankees, according to Mike Tanowitz of YES. The Cardinals gave Wigginton a two-year, $5 million deal this offseason, but he's hit only .158/.238/.193 in 47 games this season. The Yankees have been looking for a right-hander that they can platoon with Lyle Overbay at first base, and Wigginton would fit that description. The problem is that adding options that don't hit aren't really helping anything at this point.