Yankees 4, Rangers 2: Brandon McCarthy sharp again in Yanks' series finale win

Having taken two of the first three games against the Texas Rangers this week, the Yankees sent right-hander Brandon McCarthy to the mound against Colby Lewis in the finale of a four-game set at Yankee Stadium. Making just his third start in pinstripes, McCarthy looked sharp again, giving up just one run over six innings, as the Yankees beat the Rangers, 4-2, on Thursday afternoon.

Neither team put a runner on base until the 3rd inning, when Texas opened the scoring with their only run against McCarthy. Rounged Odor and Shin-Soo Choo hit back-to-back singles to put runners on the corners with two outs. Then a batter later, Elvis Andrus singled home Odor to put the Rangers up 1-0.

As I mentioned above, the Rangers didn't get another run off of McCarthy, who looked sharp yet again after giving up one run and striking out nine in his last start, against the Reds on Saturday. He only gave up four hits, walked two and struck out five on 109 pitches.

His pitch count ran a little high earlier than you would have liked, but his cutter, which he recently started throwing again, and his sinker were working well for him, helping him work through Rangers' lineup. The Yankees, so far, have turned Vidal Nuno into a pretty good replacement in the rotation.

A couple days after the walk-off single in his Yankee debut, Chase Headley tied up the game in 4th inning with a long single off of the right field wall, scoring Brett Gardner, who double to open the inning, tying the game at 1-1.

The Yankees tacked on two more runs an inning later, putting them up 2-1. Ichiro Suzuki led off the bottom of the 4th with a walk off of Lewis, then Francisco Cervelli doubled into the left field corner, scoring Ichiro all the way from first base for the go-ahead run. Brendan Ryan, a batter later, sacrificed Cervelli over to third base, then after Jacoby Ellsbury worked a walk, Gardner drove in Cervy with a sac-fly to deep left field.

Adam Warren took over on the mound in the 7th inning and was greeted by JP Arencibia, who blasted a solo homerun into the right field seats -- 4th homerun of the year -- to pull the Rangers within a run.

Warren retired the next two hitters before Matt Thornton was brought on the get the final out of the inning. Dellin Betances worked a scoreless nine-pitch 8th inning, with a strikeout.

The Yankees added on an insurance in the 8th when Carlos Beltran singled to start the inning, then Brian McCann doubled him home a batter later to push the Yankees' lead to 4-2.

David Robertson came on the shut the door in the 9th inning. He issued a one-out walk to Jim Adduci, but struck out the next two batters to end the game, sealing his 25th save of the season the Yankees' sixth win since the All-Star break, pushing their recording to 6-1 in the second half.

The Yankees will now welcome the Toronto Blue Jays to town for a three-game series that starts Friday night with Hiroki Kuroda facing off with Mark Buehrle at 7:05 p.m. ET.

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