Yankees Drop Second Straight Game To Major League’s Worst Team
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KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Emil Brown hit a two-run homer and the Kansas City Royals beat Randy Johnson for the first time in 12 years, handing the Yankees their fourth straight loss with a 3-1 victory last night.
D. J. Carrasco (1-1) threw six shutout innings for his first major league win as a starter and Buddy Bell improved to 2-0 as Royals manager, with both wins coming against the Yankees. The Royals had not won a series against the Yankees since August 11-13, 2003.
Johnson (5-4), who has 251 major league wins, had been 9-0 with one save and a 3.03 ERA in 14 games – all wins by his teams – since he last lost to Kansas City on May 21, 1993.
His lifetime record against the Royals dropped to 12-7 as the Yankees lost their second straight to the worst team in the majors, and their fourth in a row for the third time this year.
Carrasco was replaced starting the seventh by rookie Steve Stemle, who pitched two shutout innings.
Mike MacDougal allowed Bernie Williams’s homer and Robinson Cano’s double in the ninth before striking out Derek Jeter to record his fourth save in six opportunities.
Before then, the Yankees, the second-highest scoring team in the majors, had been held scoreless for 13 straight innings by a Kansas City staff that ranked last entering the game with a 5.60 ERA.
It’s the first time the Royals have won three in a row against the Yankees since August 18-19 and September 7, 1999. Tonight, Bell’s seemingly re-energized team will go for its first home sweep of New York in 15 years.
The Yankees had only two runners reach as far as second base before the ninth – doubles by Gary Sheffield in the third and Jason Giambi in the fourth.
Angel Berroa hit his first of two doubles leading off against Johnson. Brown who has seven multi-hit games in his last 11 outings, drove an 0-1 pitch into the water display behind left field with two outs.
Berroa doubled again in the third and made it 3-0 on David DeJesus’s RBI single.
Typical of the suddenly improved play was Carrasco’s putout of Giambi in the fourth. After Giambi’s one-out double, he was trapped between second and third when Ruben Sierra hit a sharp grounder which Carrasco snared. While Giambi stood motionless, Carrasco ran over and made the tag himself, perfectly executing the sort of play the Royals have struggled with all season.
The Yankees are in a stretch where they’ll play 21 of 27 games away from home.
