When the Yankees scored four runs in the first inning and loaded the bases in the second without an out and Gary Sheffield at the plate, Shawn Chacon appeared to have discovered Pitching Nirvana.
With the Yankees involved in a skin-tight pennant race with the Red Sox, the Yankees had a chance to place Chacon in a rocking chair and enjoy a stress-free victory.
While the Yankees defeated the Blue Jays 5-0 at the Stadium last night, it was far from the laugher many in the huge crowd expected it to be in the second frame.
Chacon’s second straight brilliant shutout effort against the Blue Jays inside a week was the reason the Yankees posted the victory in front of 53,175, because the Yankee bats went cold after the first.
“You hate to think where we would be without him,” Alex Rodriguez said of Chacon, who blanked the Blue Jays across eight innings for the second time inside a week and gave up three hits. “You have to give [GM] Brian Cashman and the front office a whole lot of credit.”
Stolen from Colorado on July 28 for two minor-league arms, Chacon is 6-3 in 12 games (11 starts) for the Yankees, and hasn’t allowed a run in 16 innings.
“I was able to make pitches and stay away from the barrel of the bat,” said Chacon, who required 111 pitches to get through eight innings.
Homers by Derek Jeter (17) and Robinson Cano (13) to start the home first off Ted Lilly (9-11) helped, as did Hideki Matsui’s RBI double and Tino Martinez’ run-scoring single.
But Chacon stayed crisp when the Yankees bats went dead against the Blue Jays’ bullpen.
It was the 16th time Jeter led off a game with a homer and the fourth time this year. Jeter and Cano hitting back-to-back homers to start a game was the fifth time Yankees have done that in team history.
The scintillating performance by Chacon wasn’t only necessary for a win, it gave the exhausted Yankees’ bullpen a rest. Mariano Rivera, who threw casually in the pen in the ninth, received his second straight night off after working the previous three games.
The Yankees’ 11th win in 12 games and fifth straight enabled them to remain one game ahead of the Red Sox in the AL East and reduced their magic number to nine.
“When Brian Cashman told me Shawn Chacon from Colorado I couldn’t give him an opinion because I never saw the kid pitch,” manager Joe Torre said. “[Cashman] certainly pulled the right string.”
Had the Yankees scored in the second, Chacon’s night would have been a little easier. But with the bases loaded, no outs and a 3-0 count on Sheffield, the Yankees couldn’t. Even after the Blue Jays botched a double-play ball.
“Four in the first and having the bases loaded in the second and not scoring it was a little frustrating,” Torre said.
The Yankees added a fifth run in the seventh on pitcher Vinnie Chulk’s throwing error on what should have been an inning-ending double play.
Chacon only faced one serious jam, and that was in the second, when Corey Koskie and Shea Hillenbrand singled to start the inning. But Gregg Zaun’s liner found A-Rod’s glove, Eric Hinske forced Hillenbrand at second and Chacon left two runners on by getting Alex Rios on a soft liner to A-Rod.
When Chacon hit Frank Catalanotto leading off the sixth it could have gotten sticky, with the third, fourth and fifth hitters coming up. But it didn’t because Chacon retired them in order.
“If they don’t adjust to me then I don’t have to adjust [to them],” Chacon said.