Depressed Fan

The sky must be falling. Joba Chamberlain was saddled with his first regular season loss tonight in Chicago. A double off the wall over Matsui's head by Carlos Quentin and a single over Jeter's head by Joe Crede provided the fateful run in the bottom of the ninth for a 7-6 ChiSox winner.

Joba looked untouchable in the 8th, but hung a few sliders in his second inning of work. Pierzynski almost took him deep and then final two batters made solid contact. Not much to read into Joba's performance. He wasn't wild, he seemed to have his good stuff, he just hung a couple of sliders, that's going to happen.

Phil Hughes' bad luck continues. Tonight was the sharpest I've seen him all season long. If I was a betting man, I'd put money on work between starts with Dave Eiland on his curve. The yakker had more movement than I'd seen since last year, and a different kind of movement. It wasn't the pure 12-6 break we're used to seeing, it had more side-to-side sweep to go along with the huge drop. He worked ahead of the hitters and was coming off a five-pitch second inning when the skies opened up and his night was cut short by a 50-minute rain delay.

Hughes probably feels cheated, but to be honest with you, I'm not too bummed out about this turn of events. For once, he won't have to spend 4 days thinking about a horrible performance. He may feel cheated, but his confidence should be much higher going into his next start.

Two hitting stars tonight. First and foremost, the Melk Man, who deposited his 4th bomb of the year in the right field seats. The home run was an absolute laser, he also added a line-drive single to right, a walk, he scored two runs and knocked in two more. The second star is Morgan Ensberg (with the bat only, his defense was a big reason for the Sox 5-run 4th inning). I was scratching my head when I saw Ensberg penciled in as the #5 hitter in the lineup, but he came through with a big single to tie the game up in the top of the seventh off the $19M dollar man, Scott Linebrink.

I'm starting to wonder if we're ever going to see the same lineup two days in a row from Joe Girardi.

It's a tough loss, but I'll take my chances on Joba in that situation any day of the week. The Yanks still took the series and head into Cleveland tomorrow to take on an Indians team who swept a double header from the Royals tonight.

Player of The Game: The Melk Man (.309/.380/.515, if you're interested)
Team Record: 12-11
Damon: Taunting me with that black bat day after day after day...0.