Yanks Sweep The Jays For Their 5th Straight Win

Right now, the New York Yankees might be playing some of their best baseball of the season. Having won four straight coming in, the Yanks sent Andy Pettitte to the mound in hopes that he could help lead them to a four-game sweep of the Toronto Blue Jays.

Pettitte, backed by some timely offensive hits, gave he the Bombers six innings of one-runs ball in one of his best starts in a while, leading the Yankees to a 5-3 victory over the Blue Jays.

Thursday's game in the Bronx was originally scheduled to start at 1pm EST, but a three hour rain delay kept the players off the field until first pitch at 4:37pm EST.

When play finally began, Pettitte and Blue Jays starter J.A. Happ were locked into a good pitchers duel early, with Happ not permitting a Yankees baserunner until Ichiro's double off the third base bag in the 4th inning.

J.P. Arencibia broke the scoreless tie in the top of the 5th inning with a solo homerun to left field off of Pettitte. But that homerun wouldn't do much harm to the Yankees, who would end up scoring the next five runs in the game.

Curtis Granderson tied up the game in the bottom half of the 5th inning when he inflicted his revenge on Happ, the man who broke his forearm in Spring Training, launching his 4th homerun deep into the right field seats.

The Yankees would take the lead later in the inning on an extremely crazy play with the bases loaded. Vernon Wells lined a ball into center field that Rajai Davis appeared to catch on a sliding play, but the umpires ruled no catch, Eduardo Nunez scored from third, and Wells was given a fielders choice.

The Yanks added two more runs off of Happ and the Jays' bullpen in the 6th inning on an RBI single by Nunez, and then Chris Stewart drove in the second run on a groundout to third base, scoring Mark Reynolds.

Shawn "Strikeout" Kelley entered the game to start the 7th inning, replacing Pettitte, who tossed six innings of one-run ball, giving up four hits, while walking three and striking out three on 100 pitches.

Kelley, who's usually very reliable out of the bullpen, didn't have his best stuff this time out, letting the first four Jays hitters he faced reached base on three singles and a walk.

Munenori Kawasaki singled to left field with runners on first and second, scoring a run to make it a 5-2 game. A couple batters later, Edwin Encarnacion grounded into a fielders choice to cut the Yankees lead to 5-3.

Boone Logan came on and struck out Adam Lind with a pair of runners on to end the 7th. Preston Claiborne worked a scoreless 8th inning, and David Robertson tossed a scoreless 1-2-3 inning, with Mariano Rivera shut down for the day, to end the game and give the Yanks their 5th straight victory.

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