Blue Jays beat Yankees in 14th, 3-2

TORONTO - Chad Gaudin beat himself up over his four-pitch walk to No. 9 hitter Edwin Encarnacion to start the 14th inning. Andy Pettitte still was kicking himself for allowing a tying homer more than an hour earlier.

But the Yankees' 3-2 loss to the Blue Jays Saturday had little to do with the failure of Gaudin, Pettitte or any other pitcher.

"It's not our pitching why we lost the game," manager Joe Girardi said. "When you look at this game, we just didn't hit well enough to win."

Ricky Romero stifled the Yankees, allowing only Derek Jeter's two-run homer in his eight innings, and four relievers took care of the other six innings. That allowed Aaron Hill to win it with a one-out single off Gaudin that drove in Encarnacion.

"You have guys battling out there for 14 innings,'' Gaudin said, "and to let the team down like that hurts."

But as Girardi and others in the clubhouse repeatedly said, the culprits were the Yankees trying to hit the ball, not the ones throwing it. The hitting woes were especially pronounced in the middle of the order, as Mark Teixeira, Alex Rodriguez, Robinson Cano and Jorge Posada combined to go 2-for-24 with 10 of the Yankees' 14 strikeouts.

The Yankees, who have scored three runs in 23 innings in two games here, were 1-for-9 with runners in scoring position.

"It just wasn't a good day offensively for us," Teixeira said. For him in particular. He went 0-for-6 with five strikeouts, dropping his average to .215. "Just not seeing the ball today," he said. "When you don't see the ball, lefthanded and righthanded . . . like I said, it just wasn't my day."

Girardi said his confidence in Teixeira hasn't wavered and that "we have to go a lot longer than this" before that happens or he considers moving him in the order. "It's going to click," Girardi said. "It is going to click, and when it does, it's going to be fun."

After a horrid April, Teixeira had a pretty good May, hitting .280 with a .366 OBP, six homers and 25 RBIs. But he's gone 3-for-20 with eight strikeouts in five games in June.

"The last few days I swung the bat real well. Today was a bad day," Teixeira said. "If you took one bad day and said I'm going to quit the season, I mean, c'mon. You have one bad day, throw it away and try to win the game tomorrow."

The Yankees had a good scoring opportunity in the seventh as Francisco Cervelli reached on an infield single, Brett Gardner walked and Kevin Russo sacrificed to put runners on second and third with one out. But with the infield in, Jeter lined to second baseman Hill, who threw to third to double off Cervelli.

Pettitte allowed two runs and five hits with a season-high 10 strikeouts in 72/3 innings. In nine of his 11 outings, he has given up two or fewer runs. But Pettitte, always his own harshest critic, was irritated about giving up a leadoff homer in the seventh by Alex Gonzalez that tied the score at 2. "Late in the game where I have a one-run lead, those are the ones that keep you up at night, that's for sure," he said.

Pettitte didn't looked pleased, and said he wasn't, when he was pulled for Joba Chamberlain with two outs in the eighth. Chamberlain, Damaso Marte, David Robertson and Chan Ho Park combined to pitch 51/3 scoreless innings to take it to the 14th, but the bats never broke through.

"Any time we had a guy on second, it was like, c'mon, let's get a bleeder, anything to get a run across and get Mo [Rivera] into this game," Pettitte said. "Unfortunately, it didn't happen. We'll come out tomorrow and hopefully have a good game and get out of here with a win."