Pitching is 90% of the Game: Toronto 11 Yanks 5 — Sept 21, 2020

Pitching is 70 to 90% of the game, they say. “Hitting and fielding is the other 1/2“, added Jeter’s Jockstrap on twitter.

This was Yank prospect Michael King‘s possible final chance to stick in Yankee management minds as a potential starter someday. He has not pitched well this year but looked great in this game through 2 innings, on a cold night in Buffalo, striking out 4 and holding a 1-0 lead on a Gio Urshela RBI single in the 2nd.

Gio gets one ☝️ pic.twitter.com/V6SgIzaSdH

— New York Yankees (@Yankees) September 21, 2020

But King couldn’t get out of the 3rd — single, strikeout, walk, RBI single, RBI single, strikeout, RBI single. With the Yanks down 3-1 Jonathan Loaisiga — who has looked good this year as a reliever but did miss a week with injury recently — came in and immediately gave up a 2-RBI double and it was 5-1 Toronto.

Loaisiga got the final out of the 3rd but got even more roughed up than King in the 4th: double, batter reached on catcher’s interference — defense remember, walk, RBI single, RBI single, double play to score a run, walk, RBI double and Loaisiga was gone — not able to get the final out of the inning. The Yanks were down 9-1.

Nick Nelson came in to get the final out and pitched a scoreless 5th before allowing a home run to centerfielder Randal Grichuk in the 6th to make it 10-1 Toronto.

Pitching Makes Yanks Look Disinterested

Scuttlebutt on Yankee Twitter was of the Yankees playing like they didn’t care about this game, the way they were losing — after having clinched the playoffs the night before. Thus the pitching is 90% of the game comment. And the defense and hitting being the other 50%.

Shoemaker’s Great, Great Grandfather’s Occupation

Meanwhile the Yankee offense (part of the other half of the game) was doing nothing further against Toronto starter Matt Shoemaker — although there was a lot of speculation of what his great, great, great grandfather did for a living on Yankee Twitter.

Captain Kirk

T.J. Zeuch relieved Shoemaker after 3 and really gutted the Yanks with 3.1 strong innings. The Yanks got a run in the 7th on a Gio Urshela RBI groundout to make it 10-2, countered by a home run by Toronto catcher Alejandro Kirk — who went 4-4 on the day — causing Yankee Twitter to switch to meme’s of Captain Kirk.

It was that kind of lost evening. The Yanks mounted a 2-out rally in the 9th — two walks to load the bases and then Mike Tauchman pinch-hit a bases-clearing double to make it 11-5. But Giancarlo Stanton struck out to end it.

Mike Tauchman drives in three runs with a double in the 9th.

Watch LIVE: https://t.co/itJIbkHYr6 pic.twitter.com/BXOZ9cLQDs

— YES Network (@YESNetwork) September 22, 2020

Etcetera

The Yanks clinched the playoffs the night before, but are still racing to get home field advantage. They are in 5th place amongst the 8 playoff teams, and have lost 2 in a row in blow out fashion. NY is 31-23; Toronto is 28-26.

The Yanks are 1.5 behind 4th place Minnesota — who they would at this point play in the 1st round — in Minnesota, unless they can jump ahead of them into 4th and get home field advantage. The Yanks lead 6th place Cleveland by 1 game, are 3 ahead of Toronto, and 4 ahead of 8th place Houston.

DJ LeMahieu went 2-4 to raise his average slightly to .365. Chicago’s Tim Anderson is at .355.

Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Aaron Hicks all got 1 hit; Gio Urshela got 2 hits (now batting .289).

The Boxscore

https://www.espn.com/mlb/boxscore?gameId=401226485