Yankees’ Hiroki Kuroda sharp in no-decision

Hiroki Kuroda hasn’t won in five starts, but Brian McCann loved what he saw in the Yankees’ 5-3 win over the Orioles on Friday.

“What’s going to get lost is Kuroda’s performance,” the Yankees catcher said. “He was awesome.”

Kuroda retired the first eight batters he faced until Derek Jeter’s errant throw allowed Nick Hundley to reach with two outs in the third. Kuroda didn’t allow a hit until Hundley led off the sixth with a double.

Kuroda went downhill fast, as he wound up allowing four hits — and two runs — in the frame.

“It wasn’t like he got tattooed all over the place,” manager Joe Girardi said of the sixth. “They just found a way to get some hits.”

Kuroda managed to get Nelson Cruz and J.J. Hardy to fly out to end the inning.

“He was keeping ball down,” McCann said.


Michael Pineda had an MRI exam Friday on his strained right shoulder blade that was necessary before the Yankees can give him the go-ahead to play catch Saturday.

After the Yankees’ dramatic win, Girardi said he was unsure of the results of the scan and whether Pineda would be able to start his throwing program. Prior to the game, the manager was optimistic.

“We had him do the MRI to make sure it is healed because he is scheduled to throw fairly shortly here,” Girardi said. “He feels good, but he hasn’t thrown.”

Pineda first suffered the injury on April 28 and then felt soreness after pitching two-innings in an extended spring training game in Tampa last month. The team decided to shut him down for at least 20 days following the most recent setback and that deadline just ended.

Like CC Sabathia, who is also in the early stages of a throwing program, the Yankees aren’t planning on seeing Pineda back in The Bronx before early August.


Kelly Johnson sat out of the starting lineup after bruising his middle three fingers in a bunt attempt Thursday, but entered Friday’s game as a pinch-runner in the ninth inning.

Both Johnson and Girardi were confident he would be able to start Saturday.

Johnson’s injury forced Yangervis Solarte back into action. He went 0-for-2 and is now hitless in his last 24 at-bats.


Orioles manager Buck Showalter, asked if he thought trade-deadline acquisitions would decide the winner of the AL East, used the question as an opportunity to tweak the Yankees and their bloated finances, a favorite topic of the long-ago Yankees skipper.

“God bless New York for what they can do,” Showalter said. “I’d do the same thing if I were them. But we’re going to continue doing things the way we have to do them to hopefully be consistently competitive.”

Showalter also was passive-aggressive in criticizing Major League Baseball’s new instant-replay system while covering it in a compliment.

“It’s definitely better than it was,” Showalter said. However, he added, the time it took to rule on the replays concerned him: “When you get one that you think is pretty simple and then you get into that second minute, [it isn’t good].”