Pettitte The Stopper Again as Yanks Beat Reds, 4-1

After the Yankees lost the first two games, 4-2, and, 6-0, of a three-game weekend series against the Cincinnati Reds, Andy Pettitte once again pitched a big game when the Yankees really needed one. He threw 97 pitches over 6 scoreless innings, allowing only 4 hits and 2 walks, while striking out 4, in route to his eight win this season.

Pettitte (8-5) has not allowed a run over the last 19 innings he has pitched, and has only allowed one run in his last three starts. Andy might have pitched one more inning, but there was a 56 minute rain-delay after the 6th inning, that ended Pettitte's day. Ramirez replaced Andy Pettitte when the game resumed in the 7th, and pitched a scoreless inning to hold the Yankees 4-0 lead at the time.

The shutout was broken when Kyle Farnsworth gave up an eight inning homerun to Ken Griffey, Jr.

The Reds starter, Johnny Cueto (5-8) also pitched a great game, the third great start of the series for Cincinnati. He threw 5 innings, and gave up one earned run, on 4 hits, no walks, and 7 strikeouts. 

The one run the Yankees scored off Cueto came in the 5th inning. Jason Giambi (3 for 3), with 2 runs scored, and 2 RBI's, led off the inning with a single, and advanced to third on a double by Jorge Posada. Giambi then scored the run on a sacrifice fly by Robinson Cano.

After the rain-delay the Yankees scored three runs in the bottom of the 6th, on a two-run double by Giambi, who was then driven home by another double by Posada, scoring the Yanks fourth and final run of the game. 

Mariano Rivera, gave up two hits in the scoreless 9th, and closed out the game to record his 21th save. The "Great Mariano" now has a 0.76 ERA.

Reds startrer, Edinson Volquez (10-2), out-pitched, Mike Mussina (10-5), in the 4-2 win by Cincinnati in game one of this series.

In the second game against the Reds, the Yankees 31-year old rookie, Dan Giese was pitching a gem throughout the first 6 innings, but made a costly throwing error in the top of the 7th, that opened the flood-gates for the Reds, as they scored 4 unearned runs that turned out to be the winning runs in the Reds 6-0 victory.

Ken Griffey, Jr. led off the 7th with a single. Then, the next batter, Brandon Phillips, hit an easy grounder back to Giese, that was a perfect double play ball; but, Giese made a bad throw to second base that pulled Cano off the base. This error by Dan Giese opened the door for the Reds to keep the inning going.

Now first and second, with no outs, the Reds first baseman, Joey Votto hit another easy infield grounder, this time to Alex Rodriguez at third. A-Rod tried to tag Griffey, but was too far back to make the tag, so he made the throw to first for the first out. Giese got a big strikeout of Adam Dunn, for out number two. Then, Edwin Encarnacion got a big, two-strike, two-run, single, to give the Reds a 3-1 lead.

Dan Giese was replaced by Jose Veras, who gave up a homerun to the first batter he faced, Corey Patterson, that upped the Reds lead to, 4-1. Cincinnati scored two more runs off Billy Traber in the top of the 8th, but the game was really over in the 7th.

The Yankees are now, 41-35, still five games behind the Red Sox, who also lost 2 out of 3 over the weekend - to the St. Louis Cardinals. Boston leads the AL East with a record of, 47-31.