This one featured offense from... well, just about everybody: Doug Mientkiewicz, Adam LaRoche, Nyjer Morgan, the trainer, the batboy, the vendor behind the backstop with the rad retro threads... Still, it was a minor miracle that the Yankees weren't able to make a game of this one, since Tom Gorzelanny seemed to give them every possible opportunity. Yet again, he had little in the way of velocity and no real idea where the ball was going, and he racked up walks. The Yankees just weren't able to come through with men on base early in the game.
A minor point: Tyler Yates entered the game at the beginning of the seventh inning with the score of 7-3 and Derek Jeter, Bobby Abreu, and Alex Rodriguez due up. I get that Yates hasn't been the easiest guy to hit this year, but I still don't think this is the right way to use him. Yates obviously has big problems with walks, and the greatest gift the Pirates could have given the Yankees in that situation would be for Yates to walk one or both of the first two batters and then have A-Rod come up with men on base. If he hits one out there, the Yankees are right back in the game. Situations like these, in which any smart team will be looking for free passes, are bad situations for Yates. Fortunately, nothing went wrong this time.
Still, I don't mean to complain too much, since this was obviously a great game for the Pirates. PNC was packed, there were several Pittsburgh celebrities visible in the first few rows, Ryan Doumit made a triumphant return (hitting a homer), and the Pirates generally looked like a pretty good baseball team while playing the sport's most storied franchise. I'll take it.