CC, Yanks beat O's 4-1

CC Sabathia tossing eight innings of one-run ball while using only 106 pitches? Yes please. Is anyone else starting to get nervous about that mostly forgotten opt-out clause CC has after the 2011 season? Assuming he continues to pitch like this and decides to re-test the market, Brian Cashman better do whatever it takes to keep the big man in pinstripes. In addition to being an absolute joy to watch pitch, I fully expect the team to win every single time he starts. That's an awesome feeling.

Anyway, the Yanks took care of the O's 4-1 last night on the strength of CC's aforementioned beast start along with a big three-run home run from Randy Winn of all people. I suppose I owe Randy something of an apology, but this was only his second hit of the season and he's going to have to hit better than .125/.125/.313 to continue justifying a spot on the roster, even with Curtis Granderson out.

Outside of that completely unexpected Winn home run, Baltimore starter Jeremy Guthrie pitched a solid game, but not as solid as Sabathia did. Joba Chamberlain worked the ninth -- Mariano was apparently experiencing some soreness during the last few days, but he didn't sound too concerned on the postgame -- and picked up his second career save.

Jorge Posada also left the game with a calf strain and had an MRI. This is obviously a pretty big concern, as it's the second time Posada's been removed from a game in the past week. Thankfully it sounds like whatever he's dealing isn't too severe; we all saw what happened to the team in 2008 when Jorgie missed a large chunk of the season.

Other than Winn and Nick Swisher (three more hits), the offense was fairly quiet. Not to give the mainstream media any more credence than necessary, but it looks like A-Rod's power outage is unfortunately getting some notice.

Here's the slump watch:







Man, those are some rough wOBAs from our 2-3-4 hitters. Alex's OBP and SLG continue to concern me.


And here's our pleasantly surprised watch:





Raise your hand if you had Brett Gardner with the second-best wOBA on the team (among starters) on May 4. Didn't think so.