Maybe I should have complained. At least about the one-run losses or something. I should have known anything promising would not last in this crazy season.
The series opener against A Rod, some Wood and a Big Unit at Yankee Stadium turned out to be a pitchers’ duel. Mike Cuellar had his fifth good outing in his past six, battling the hosts’ Wilbur Wood effectively.
Bobby Murcer got Jack Bauer Squared on the board first with his 28th homer in the 2nd, and Cuellar kept it 1-0 until allowing a two-run homer to Rod Carew in the 5th. And then … crickets from the offenses.
JBS got runners the last four innings but couldn’t manage to break through against Wood and the bullpen. The 2-1 loss, the familiar one-run kind, cut the division lead to 2 and moved the host A Rod squad within 4 games as they try to pull off a late comeback, too.
So with the magic number unmoved and still at 6, we headed back out for Game 2. After A Rod took a 1st-inning 1-0 lead, Garry Maddox singled home Murcer to tie it in the 2nd. But A Rod came right back to take a 2-1 lead in the home half.
In the 5th, A Rod struck for another run off Burt Hooton while JBS couldn’t manage anything else off Randy Johnson. It stayed a 3-1 game until the top of the 9th as we tried to rally. With one out, Murcer singled to bring up Maddox, who promptly belted his 9th homer of the season to tie it at 3.
Gary Lucas came out of the pen to pitch the bottom of the 9th and try to extend it to extra innings. Third baseman Bobby Bonilla booted a grounder to start the inning, however, and Carew singled the runner to third. A single by Dan Gladden ended it just like that, 4-3.
The familiar refrain of the one-run loss and missed opportunity results here. That’s now 5 more one-run losses in the past 12 games, putting us 17-26 in such games. At 76-80 we now have just a 1 game lead over Steroids and 3 over A Rod.
The magic number remains frozen at 6, and suddenly we are a loss away from blowing a 3-game lead in just 3 games. We badly need to show up the last two games of this series.
