Yanks Go Yard Radio Rewind: Orioles-Yankees Preview (5/7-5/10)

On last night’s episode of the Yanks Go Yard Radio Show, brought to you by KNODA.com, I started the episode by talking about the New York Yankees (17-11) finally losing a series as they lost two out of three games to the Toronto Blue Jays. Despite losing the series, New York got great starting pitching performances from Chase Whitley and Michael Pineda.

However, the bullpen let Whitley down on Monday and New York could not score any runs for CC Sabathia as he fell to 0-5 on the season and the Yankees lost to Mark Buehrle for the first time since 2004. Nevertheless, the team is still in first base and they head back home for a quick four game series after going 4-2 on the road trip. Their opponent for this series is the Baltimore Orioles (12-13), who have been through a lot over the past week.

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With all the civic unrest in Baltimore, the Orioles have not played a home game since last Wednesday, which took place in front of no fans. They are in the midst of a nine game road trip and are 3-3 in their last six games. That being said, this is a team that has a star player in their lineup in Adam Jones.

Jones, the Baltimore center fielder, is hitting .383 on the season with five home runs and 21 RBI’s. He has been one of the best players in the American League up to this point and is part of an O’s offense that is in the top ten in baseball in runs scored, batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage. Plus, this offense is going to get reinforcements in the near future with J.J Hardy and Ryan Flaherty coming back this weekend.

As for the pitching staff, this is an Orioles rotation that has a combined ERA of 4.54, which is 23^rd in Major League Baseball. One of the surprises in this rotation has been Chris Tillman. Tonight’s starter for the Orioles has a 6.23 ERA thru five games, but he does not get much run support from his team. Baltimore took two out of three from the Yankees in early April at Camden Yards. How will New York respond in this series as Alex Rodriguez heads back to Yankee Stadium one home run away from passing Willie Mays?

To discuss this series and what happened last week in Baltimore, I spoke with Domenic Vadala, the editor of Birds Watcher. Here are some of the topics that Domenic and I discussed on the show:

Baltimore scoring three runs against the Mets in 2 games
What has changed between the last series with the Yankees?
The maturation of Adam Jones
Rehab updates on Hardy, Matt Wieters, and Ryan Flaherty
Pitching Matchups
What has caused Tillman to struggle early?
Joe Girardi allowing Nathan Eovaldi (tonight’s Yankees starter) to throw 111 pitches.
Miguel Gonzalez (Friday’s Orioles starter) becoming the best starter in the rotation?
Adam Warren (Friday’s Yankees starter) having success forcing the opponent to hit ground balls.
Wei Yin-Chen (Saturday’s Orioles starter) has trouble pitching at Yankee Stadium in his career
Chase Whitley (Saturday’s Yankees starter) with 17 of 27 first pitch strikes on Monday.
Bud Norris (Sunday’s Orioles starter) has success vs. New York, but off to a rough start
Michael Pineda (Sunday’s Yankees starter) had his worst outing of the season vs. Baltimore back in April.
Orioles hitters to watch: Caleb Joseph and Jimmy Paredes
Yankees hitters to watch: Jacoby Ellsbury and Mark Teixeira

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