June 7, 2007 — The Cardinals may be the cellar dwellers in the Raphael Jackson AA Baseball League, but when they play the second-place Yankees they look like anything but.
For the second encounter in a row, the last-place Cardinals looked like world beaters against the Yankees, crushing them 17-3 Wednesday night in the league's mid-week action. Cardinal ace Irvin Simmonds scattered five hits over six innings in limiting the powerful Yankees to just three runs.
In fact, the Yankees did not plate a run until the fifth inning. It would be the only inning in which they would score in the time-shortened six-inning contest.
The problems that the Yankees had scoring did not carry over to the Cardinals, who scored early and often. They opened their scoring in the bottom of the first with four runs off the Yankees' young starter, Angel Cruz, on a three-run shot by Javier Rodriguez and an RBI single off the bat of Norbert Pickering.
They continued their offensive onslaught in the bottom of the second, plating three runs on RBI singles by Pickering and Kareem Dennis and an RBI double by Clyde Gumbs to lead 7-0 after two innings.
The Cards really put the game out of reach in the bottom of the third when they batted around and exploded for 10 runs off two Yankee relievers to take an insurmountable 17-0 lead. The Cardinals scored in the inning on a two-run shot and a two-run double by Rafael Almonte, two RBI singles by Enrique Soto, a two-run single by Gumbs, an RBI single by Pickering and a bases-loaded walk drawn by Kyron Degrasse. It would also be the end of the Cardinals' scoring for the night, and more than enough to secure the win.
The Yankees finally scored some pride runs in the top of the fifth to avoid a shutout. They scored three runs on an RBI single by Akeem Maynard and two wild pitches to complete the scoring for the game at 17-3, with both teams failing to score the rest of the way.
Simmonds pitched brilliantly to pick up the win for the Cards, while Angel Cruz got the loss for the Yankees. Top hitters for the Cardinals were Pickering, 5 for 5 with three RBIs; Almonte, 2 for 3 with a home run and four RBIs; Rodriguez, 2 for 5 with a home run and three RBIs; and Soto, 2 for 3 with two RBIs. For the Yankees, Ellerton Maynard went 2 for 2.
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