Yankees defeat Orioles 3-1, head to ALCS

Over 160 commenters so far have joined Stacey in saying goodbye to the best O’s team this century. After avoiding elimination twice already this postseason, the third time wouldn’t be the charm for Baltimore:

Baltimore still found themselves in the game late, scoring one run in the eighth to pull to within 3-1 with the bases still loaded. But those bases stayed loaded, and the O’s ran out of the magic that seemingly propelled them this far. Stacey, for one, seemed grateful the ride lasted as long as it did, as bitter as the end may have been:

The New York Yankees rode their ace CC Sabathia to a complete-game, one-run performance in Game 5 of the ALDS against the Baltimore Orioles at Yankee Stadium. They face the Detroit Tigers in the League Championship Series Saturday night, with first pitch scheduled for 8:05 p.m. ET.

Yankee fans are pretty stoked Sunday morning -- understandably so -- and Sabathia is the main reason why. In his starts in Game 1 and Game 5, he got all but one out. Even when the Yankees’ bats didn’t deliver to their full potential in Game 5, Sabathia was more than enough, holding the Orioles to just one run, even escaping a bases-loaded situation in the eighth inning.

Here’s how the Orioles’ season went in 2012: In the top of the eighth inning, with runners on first and second and one out, announcer Ernie Johnson said:

Which is a ridiculous, anachronism of a sentence. It would have been ridiculous when Ford was in his late-20s, much less in his mid-30s, five years after he was last in the majors. Lew Ford, DH. Goodness.

And for the first time, his jacket was not the loudest, most obnoxious thing in the frame.

Or, “Headlines that would freak people out ten years ago.” With one out in the sixth, Derek Jeter drew a walk against Jason Hammel, bringing up Ichiro Suzuki. On the first pitch, Ichiro drove a liner into the right-center gap that just missed being a home run:

That put the Yankees up 2-0, and it also was the beginning of the end for Hammel. He just got back from an injury, so it’s not like he was going to throw a Verlanderian, 130-pitch game, but it was still an earlier exit that he could have anticipated when he was shutting 16 consecutive Yankees down to start the game. Hammel threw 5⅔ innings, allowing two runs on four hits and two walks, striking out six.

It’s just been one of those series when every inch or three seems to matter.

The umpires looked at the video and it’s possible that the baseball just nicked the fair pole on its way to the stands. But there’s certainly no compelling evidence until someone finds the ball and sees some yellow paint. So a foul ball it was, and McLouth struck out on the very next pitch to end the inning.

Jason Hammel was perfect through the first four innings of Game 5, but in the fifth inning, he allowed a clean single to Mark Teixeira for the first Yankees runner of the game:

That wasn’t all, though. Hammel now had to deal with Teixeira on the bases, which means throw after throw over to first base, worrying about the runner more than the hitter. Or, it might mean no throw at all, and no first baseman playing near the bag, which allows Teixeira to walk halfway to second before Hammel is finished with his windup.

The winner-take-all game will begin right where it started: with a duel between Hammel and Sabathia. During Game 1, Hammel held New York to two runs in 5⅔ innings, while Sabathia hurled 8⅔ innings of two-run ball. New York took that game with an explosive ninth inning, but their bats have run cold since then; the Bombers have managed just six runs and have not been able to convert with runners in scoring position.