Colon Outpitched By Hughes; A's Lose To Yanks 4-2
NEW YORK (CBS/AP) -- Bartolo Colon refuses to let bases on balls beat him. Two solo homers and Phil Hughes' fastball took care of that instead.
Hughes fired eight shutout innings of four-hit ball for his first win of the season, leading the New York Yankees past Colon and the Oakland Athletics 4-2 on Saturday.
Chris Stewart and Lyle Overbay went deep against Colon, sending the A's to their only loss in his six starts this year. Hughes (1-2) struck out nine and outpitched his former New York teammate for his first victory since Sept. 20 against Toronto.
"Two homers and a bloop hit, so he didn't pitch poorly," Oakland manager Bob Melvin said about Colon. "For the most part, that'll keep you in a game and give you a chance to win."
Travis Hafner and Brett Gardner each had an RBI single for the Yankees, who bounced back from a 2-0 loss to A.J. Griffin in the series opener and improved to 7-2 on their 10-game homestand.
Oakland has dropped 10 of 15 after opening the season 12-4. The A's, who had won six of eight against New York, are 13-3 against AL West teams and 4-11 vs. everyone else.
Colon (3-1) gave up three runs and six hits over 5 1-3 innings in his shortest start this season. The 2005 AL Cy Young Award winner, who pitched for the Yankees in 2011, has walked only one in 37 1-3 innings.
"His two-seamer was riding pretty good when it was down, but I think it was just a couple of spots missed," catcher John Jaso said. "His off-speed stuff was awesome."
Hughes, hit hard while losing his first two starts of the season, turned in his fourth consecutive strong outing. This one was probably the best of the bunch.
Showing late life and plenty of zip on his heater, Hughes struck out five in the first three innings and induced a double-play grounder in the fourth. He retired Jed Lowrie with two on to end the fifth and fanned Yoenis Cespedes with a 93 mph fastball to begin the sixth.
"He was attacking the zone with his fastball. He was getting ahead with it and he was able to use it to put guys away, too," Stewart said. "We didn't throw too many off-speed pitches. Kind of mixed them in there when we needed to, to get them off balance. But for the most part it was just pounding with the fastball."
Hughes shut down an Oakland offense that began the day leading the majors in runs (164) and extra-base hits (105). The 26-year-old righty walked two against a team that entered with 142 bases on balls -- 25 more than any other team.
"Better fastball than we've seen from him. Had a tough time laying off the high fastballs," Melvin said. "Started working for him, and he stuck with it."
Hughes threw 82 of 118 pitches for strikes. Shawn Kelley gave up a leadoff single in the ninth and Oakland scored twice with Mariano Rivera on the mound in a non-save situation before he finished the six-hitter.
"I feel like I'm kind of clicking right now," said Hughes, who can become a free agent this fall. "I'm just happy that I'm starting to find my stride and hopefully we can maintain what I'm doing throughout the course of the season."
Robinson Cano opened the sixth with his 344th career double, tying Mickey Mantle for eighth place in Yankees history. Cano later scored when Hafner blooped a single well beyond a drawn-in infield.
That made it 3-0 and ended Colon's afternoon. Eduardo Nunez tripled off Chris Resop in the seventh and scored on Gardner's two-out single.
Stewart, batting ninth, led off the third with a drive to left for his sixth major league home run. Overbay sent Colon's first pitch of the fifth into the second deck in right for his fifth of the season and third in six games.
"When hitters know the pitchers throw a lot of strikes, they'll be ready to swing," Colon said through a translator.
One day after Adam Rosales hit a leadoff homer for the A's, Jaso nearly duplicated the feat. His drive was caught by a leaping Ichiro Suzuki at the right-field fence.
Josh Reddick made a similar play for Oakland -- in almost the same spot -- against Gardner in the third.
Reddick went 0 for 3 with a walk and an RBI. He has one hit in his last 22 at-bats and is 0 for 33 in 11 career games at the current Yankee Stadium.
NOTES: Oakland put OF Chris Young (strained left quadriceps) on the 15-day disabled list, retroactive to April 30, and recalled OF Michael Taylor from Triple-A Sacramento. Taylor is likely to get playing time against left-handed pitching, Melvin said. ... LHP Andy Pettitte (3-2, 3.86 ERA) starts Sunday for New York against RHP Dan Straily (1-0, 6.35) in the series finale. The 40-year-old Pettitte was roughed up by last-place Houston in a 9-1 loss Monday. He earned his first major league win against the A's in June 1995 and is 11-6 with a 3.35 ERA in 21 starts against Oakland.
