Sabathia, Martin defeat the Orioles in the 9th.

Everyone knew it was gone (Rob Carr/Getty)

Despite the final score of 7-2 this was a nail bitter for 8 innings and I don't think anybody thought that the Yankees were gonna hang 5 runs on Jim Johnson, but they did. If it had gone to extras you know they never would have shut up about the Orioles record in extra innings.
CC Sabathia was ridiculous last night and was so close to a Complete game but it probably was responsible of Girardi to take him out after Ford's hit because he was at 120 pitches. Either way CC pitched a fantastic game, got the win and preserved the bullpen. His stuff was nasty all night with the exception of the bad slider he threw to Nate McClouth that scored two runs. After last nights game CC owns a 3.36 ERA in 69.2 innings in the postseason as a Yankee. The Yankees have also won nine of his eleven playoff starts now, with the two exceptions being Game One of the 2009 World Series (offense got Cliff Lee’d) and Game Three of the 2011 ALDS, in which he left in a tie game. As good as he was he does owe alot to his Catcher, Russel Martin who not only hit the go ahead home run but had a great game behind the plate in terms of blocking pitches and pitch framing. He made a great play in the fifth to get the out at first on Lew Ford and look at how good he was at pitch framing last night:

Speaking of Russel Martin, how subdued were the TBS announcing crew on Russel Martins home run? I knew it was going out, so did McClouth and everybody in that park and they act like there is nothing interesting about the flyball whatsoever. I know the crew featured Cal Ripken jr, but seriously at least try to pretend your not rooting for the Orioles.

The Yankees did not have the best four innings on the base paths as Ichiro for some reason decided to try and steal third and got gunned down by Matt Wieters. Then Mark Teixeira got thrown out trying to stretch a single into a double against Chris Davis, you shouldn't do that he has a cannon. But despite missing some great opportunities the offense made up for it by saving the best for last and sucking the life out of Camden Yards in the 9th. Now the Yankees need to win the game tonight as they send out Andy Pettitte to take on the gassed Wei-Yin Chen before heading to the Bronx.