Detroit, MI (SportsNetwork.com) – The Detroit Tigers beat CC Sabathia in his
best outing of the season to remain the top team in baseball.
J.D. Martinez and Yoenis Cespedes delivered RBI singles off Sabathia in the
seventh inning and the Tigers turned a key double play to escape with a 2-1
win over the New York Yankees in the opener of a four-game series on Monday.
Sabathia (0-3) allowed four baserunners over the first six innings but faced
the minimum 18 batters because of three double plays and one pickoff.
The Tigers finally put together a rally with three singles in the seventh,
including the RBI hits by Martinez and Cespedes.
Tigers starter Alfredo Simon (3-0) had seven strikeouts but was taken out
after giving up singles to Chase Headley and Didi Gregorius in the eighth,
putting runners at the corners with one out.
Joba Chamberlain, the former Yankees reliever, ended the threat with two
pitches, getting Jacoby Ellsbury to ground into a double play to second base.
Joakim Soria threw a 1-2-3 ninth inning to pick up his fifth save.
A loss would have dropped the Tigers (11-2) into a tie with the New York Mets
for the best record in baseball.
Mark Teixeira homered for the Yankees, who were coming off a three-game sweep
of Tampa Bay.
Simon’s ERA dipped to 1.74 for the season. In his first home start for the
Tigers, he surrendered one run, seven hits and no walks and picked up his
first career win against the Yankees in eight games, including five starts.
Sabathia earned his first complete game since July 9, 2013, but took his third
consecutive loss to start the season. This one was better than the others. The
former Cy Young winner gave up eight earned runs over 12 2/3 innings in losses
to Toronto and Baltimore.
Teixeira led off the second inning with his fourth homer of the season for New
York’s only run, reaching out to pull a low 0-2 pitch over the right-center
field wall.
Game Notes
The teams had seven hits each … Brian McCann’s double two batters after
Teixeira’s homer in the second inning was the only other extra-base hit in the
game … Sabathia is 19-13 in 37 career starts against Detroit — the most he
has faced any team … The game was completed in 2 hours and 20 minutes.
