Two more CGs last night...one winner, one loser. The current W-L record for CGs is now 45-10 (.818).The winner: Cleveland's Josh Tomlin, who evened his season record (now 5-5) with one of the best CGs thus far, a one-hit, 11-K gem over the Mariners. Tomlin showed some promise in 2010-11, but was sidetracked by injuries over the past two seasons. By virtually all measures, he was at the pinnacle last night.
The loser: Mashairo Tanaka of the Yankees, now with his first actual losing streak in MLB (and you will remember that he was 24-0 in Japan last year) as a result of an ill-considered pitch to Mike Napoli in the ninth inning. The result: a tie-breaking, game-winning homer as the Sox won in the Bronx, 2-1. (The Sox didn't give Jon Lester a chance for a CG last night, turning things over to Koji Uehara... Lester had already thrown 118 pitches through eight last night.)We're sure that the CG was of little consolation to Tanaka or the Yankees...
[EDIT: Sunday night (6/29), Homer Bailey of the Cincinnati Reds joined the CG ranks with a three hit shutout of the (still) reeling Giants. The Reds won, 4-0, but must have been scratching their heads the next night (6/30), when recently reactivated Mat Latos allowed just one hit over seven innings but lost to the Padres 1-0. It's been quite a year for such anomalies...more on that a bit later.]
