Rays take 2-1 series win over Yankees with 8-2 victory

I figured Edwin Jackson would have trouble shutting down New York's offense in the second game of the series. I haven't seen enough of Jason Hammel to make any kind of solid prediction, but Hammel had struggled recently. The righty surprised me--and probably the Yankees--by turning in a solid pitching performance, besting Andy Pettitte to pick up his first major-league victory as a starter.

Carlos Pena hit three homers for the Rays during the series. He now ranks second in the American League with 34, trailing Alex Rodriguez's impressive 45 dingers.

It certainly didn't matter with respect to the final outcome, but Johnny Damon's at-bat in the ninth inning gave me some pause.
Let me state up front that I have no idea how close the MLB "Gameday" graphic comes to representing the actual position of a ball relative to the strike zone. I figure they probably have some "umpire" poking a screen with a pointer or something like that to register the position of balls and strikes. That said, pitch no. 2 is as close to the middle of the plate as I've seen for a pitch called as a ball.

I dig the "Gameday" feature. It's a fast way to get caught up on a game when you're in the midst of doing other things. Not all the ballparks are equipped to simulate the path of the ball from the pitcher to the catcher. That's one of the nice things about the Rays visiting Yankee Stadium.

Anyway, the Rays beat the Yanks convincingly in two of three games, scoring 9, 6 and 8 runs in the three games. The big difference for the Rays since the pounding from the Yankees the last time the teams hooked up for a series was the Rays' bullpen upgrade. The team has shipped off a host of relievers with hideously swollen ERAs. The replacements have been solid, if unspectacular, and "solid" represents a spectacular improvement.