NEW YORK -- Some described it as a cue shot.
Others thought it was a dying quail.
The manager thought the game-winning hit looked more like a "gork."
Whatever the word, Andy Phillips two-run bloop single was downright ugly and painful to the Blue Jays. It served as the deciding blow as the New York Yankees scored twice in the sixth for a 6-4 win over the Blue Jays in front of 52,993 fans at the big stadium in the Bronx last night.
The Jays are 2-3, five games into their eight-game trip against the Boston Red Sox and the Yanks. They had hoped to make up ground with five or six wins. That's going to be difficult.
On a night of long bombs by two American League East wild-card pretenders, it was a short jab which delivered the knockout blow.
A simple flick of the wrists.
Josh Towers retired the first two Yanks with the score tied 4-4 -- all eight runs the result of home runs -- in the sixth.
Jorge Posada singled to left and Robinson Cano lined a double which almost imbedded itself in the padding of the right-field wall.
Phillips, with seven RBIs in 19 games this season, swung the bat once during his decisive at-bat. After looking at two called strikes from Towers, he sent a 1-2 pitch fluttering into shallow centre for a two-run, single to break the tie.
"Josh made a good pitch off the plate," catcher Gregg Zaun said. "(Phillips) went out and got it."
The other reviews of the game-winner on a night which looked more like the State Farm Home Run Derby with Kei Igawa and Towers each allowing for three homers, accounting for four RBIs.
Centre fielder Vernon Wells: "I hate to lose on a ball like that, you have to give the guy credit for going out and getting a tough pitch."
Manager John Gibbons: "Sometimes you're better off not hitting the ball so hard, Aaron Hill hits a ball to the deepest part of the field with a man on in the seventh and Hideki Matsui makes a great running catch.
"Their guy hits a gork and it decides the game."
Gorks 'R' us. It could be the new slogan for the 2008 season.
Closer Mariano Rivera made Phillips' soft lob the difference for his 14th save.
Rivera surrendered a lead-off triple to Glaus -- his first since April 6, 2005 -- to the 408 sign in centre. He then fanned Frank Thomas and Lyle Overbay and got Hill on a ground ball. Rivera now has one more save than the Jays' Jeremy Accardo.
Glaus had a pair of home runs giving him 14 on the season. Glaus hit a two-run shot in the third tying the score at 2-2 and two innings later he hit a solo homer for the 25th multi-homer game of his career to cut the Yanks lead to 4-3.
Alex Rios went deep in the sixth to tie the game again.
The Jays couldn't go deep and couldn't even buy a gork, stranding 12, including five in the first two innings.
The Yanks managed nine hits off Towers, who allowed a season-equalling high of three homers.
