@Diamondbacks 3, Rockies 2: Jorge De La Rosa tries to bury a 1-2 cutter under the hands, but Goldy locks onto the signal and catches it just right. Watch the side-view replay from the 0:47 mark — then forget about beating him inside with hard stuff. That’s your NL first-base leader in OPS+ & runs created.

• Trevor Cahill was in trouble most of the night and spent 105 pitches on just 5 IP, but the only run he allowed was unearned. With bags full and 1 out in the 5th, he whiffed Michael Cuddyer and rolled out Ryan Wheeler, both of whom doubled earlier.
• Pardon the dirty word, but Josh Collmenter (3 IP, 1 R) is looking like an old-fashioned long man — averaging more than 2 IP in 7 relief games.
• The Snakes are the only NL West team that hasn’t played the Padres yet. (Colorado is 6-0.) Every team Arizona has played is currently over .500 except the Dodgers (10-11).

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@Yankees 5, Blue Jays 3: If you had to face Robinson Cano in a jam, but could pick your spot, 2 outs with men on 1st and 2nd is exactly what you’d want. Of all the bases-occupied situations, men on 1st and 2nd has seen his worst results, a .232 BA and .636 OPS (at least .265/.783 in all others). Two outs and RISP has been another glaring weakness. Into that very landscape, Mark Buehrle came way inside with a 3-1 pitch and a 3-1 lead. How can he hit that ball without bailing out or pulling it foul? When he’s on, Cano has the quickest hands around.

• Despite bruising Buehrle, the Yanks still trail the AL field in BA and OPS against lefty starters, and are 3-5 in those games (9-4 vs. RHSP). Overall (SP and RP), they’re #1 in OPS vs. righties (.858), 14th vs. lefties (.596).
• On the other hand, Buehrle is now 1-9, 6.19 in 14 starts against the Yankees, and has yielded 8 HRs in 4 starts in the new stadium.
• I watched the end of this game, and Mo’s cutter is still amazing. More impressive than the 2 Ks of righties, I thought, was the sawdusting of Colby Rasmus with a 2-2 cutter after two swing-and-misses. Rasmus could have picked his teeth with what was left of the bat after he popped feebly to Cano. The called strike three to Lawrie was his 226th game-ending strikeout and 69th in spectator style, including 3 of his 7 saves this year. You might watch that clip and think, gee, what pitch was Lawrie expecting on 0-and-2? But then you realize that mental preparation is no match for instinct and habit. If Mo hits that spot, you just tip your cap and move on.
• New York’s fill-ins at 1B and SS have hit .200/.563 and .186/.502, respectively. But the team is 4th in AL R/G and OPS+.

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Pirates 6, @Phillies 4: A day after the bullpen blew Roy Halladay’s lead, Cliff Lee led 3-1 in the 7th when Andrew McCutchen singled on his 110th pitch. That put the tying runs on with 2 outs, but Lee stayed in to face RHB Gaby Sanchez, who’d homered earlier. Gaby fisted an RBI flare on a 2-1 count. Next up was Michael McKenry, the RH catcher who was 0-for-6 against Lee with 4 Ks. McKenry stayed with an 0-2 changeup and guided it on a soft arc into CF, tying the game.

The bullpen lost it in the 8th. Interesting situation there: Tie game, bases loaded, 1 out, LHB Garrett Jones announced to hit against RHP Phillippe Aumont, who in his very brief career had allowed about a .400 OBP to LHBs. Jones doesn’t hit southpaws a-tall, which is why he didn’t start against Lee. Philly has 3 lefty relievers, pending recent roster moves; two had worked the day before, but at least one should have been available. Aumont stayed in, Jones scorched a double off the wall, and the Pirates cruised from there.

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@Red Sox 7, Astros 2: Not much to the game story, so let’s get right to the box-score nuggets:

A matchup of first-round picks from consecutive drafts — Clay Buchholz 2005, Philip Humber ’04 — each with a no-hitter to his name, but with current trendlines as antipodal as the north-going/south-going Zax. (Zaxes? Zaxons?) Buchholz (5-0, 1.19 ERA) is the first since 2002 to open with 5 straight “high-quality starts” (my own term for 7+ IP, 2 runs or less), and the first since Roger Clemens in 1991 to win all 5 such starts. He’s also the first Boston twirler to win his first 5 starts (regardless of quality) since Josh Beckett, 2007.

• Humber (0-5, 7.99) is the first Astro to open with 5 straight losing starts in rotation turn since Wade Blasingame, 1969.
• Four straight Buchholz starts in Fenway with no HRs in 7+ IP is the longest since Derek Lowe, 2002. His career HR% is 55% higher on the road (2.9%) than at home (1.9%).
• Houston has fanned 10+ times in 11 of their first 22 games, an all-time record.
• Rick Ankiel continued one of the oddest starts ever. He whiffed in both at-bats, reaching 28 Ks in 45 trips this year, but also drew his first walk. Out of 9 hits, he has 5 HRs and 2 doubles — thus, despite a .222 on-base percentage, his OPS+ is 117, his WPA is +0.333, and he shares the team lead with 11 RBI. He has not scored except on his HRs. He hasn’t started against a southpaw, but has gone down swinging in all 5 PAs against them.
• Bright spots: Houston’s Venezuelan DP tandem, 2B Jose Altuve and SS Marwin Gonzalez, have OPS+ over 140 and just 1 error apiece, and the Astros lead MLB in DP percentage. Gonzalez is 24 years old, and seems to be hitting over his head. But he has a chance to make Houston history: In their 51 seasons, the only Astro SS with 4+ WAR in a season was Dickie Thon, 1982-83. Since 1984, there have been 147 4-WAR years by shortstops for 27 different teams. (The Cubs and Padres share the have-not boat.)
• Mike Napoli leads the majors with 11 doubles. He hit 9 all of last year, in over 400 PAs.
• Stephen Drew is 5 for 42, but he’s made all the plays at SS.
• Bucking the trends: Will Middlebrooks has hit all 5 HRs off righties, and 4 of them on the road. He also has 28 Ks against 3 walks.
• Mike Carp is 8 for 16 with 2 triples, 4 doubles — slugging 1.000 without a HR. He also scored from 2nd on a single for the first time in 5 chances this year.

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@Mariners 6, Angels 0: Let’s see if I have this straight: Brandon Maurer couldn’t get out of the 1st inning against Houston, but he blanks the Trout/Pujols/Hamilton Angels into the 7th, trimming his ERA from 7.45. The visitors managed 7 singles and a walk, but never got more than halfway home. The 6th inning captured the Halos’ futility: Trailing 2-0, Mike Trout led off with a single, tried to steal on the 1-0 pitch to Pujols and was gunned down by Kelly Shoppach. Albert then singled, but Hamilton rolled over an 0-2 changeup for an easy DP, the 2nd of 3 straight inning-enders.

• You know things are breaking against you when … you walk a .194 career hitter to set up Jason Bay for a DP, but he drills a 2-run single.
• The M’s hit into a DP in 5 of their 8 innings. They lead MLB in GIDP, both total and percentage, and Kendrys Morales is the individual leader with 7. That doesn’t mix well with their .296 OBP.
• Angels are 4-9 in their division, and already 6.5 games back in the West race.

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Rangers 2, @Twins 1: Nick Tepesch set down the first 12 and kept the Twins minimized until Josh Willingham’s 7th-inning laser-pointer. He left with 2 outs and 2 on in that frame, and Robbie Ross got the biggest out to that point, working ahead of Ryan Doumit and getting him to ground out. An 8th-inning bags-filling walk to Joe Mauer paid off when Willingham grounded a 3-2 pitch hard to the right of Elvis Andrus, who started a crisp 6-4-3. ‘Twas the first GDP for Willingham in 15 chances this year.

• Ross has stranded all 11 inherited runners this year.
• Tepesch walked 3 in the 2nd inning of his debut, but none since — about 19 straight no-pass innings. He’s the only pick from the 2010 14th or 15th round to reach the majors yet.
• Both teams were born in D.C. and were once managed by Billy Martin. Minnesota leads the all-time series, 360-322, but Texas is ahead 254-250 since heading south.

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Cubs 4, @Marlins 3: You can’t say Carlos Marmol didn’t give the Fish a fightin’ chance, with the obligatory leadoff walk to a guy with no power, followed by a line single that almost assured an AB for Giancarlo. But if Juan Pierre can’t even execute a sac bunt, isn’t it about the end of his line?

• Carlos got his wish.
• It is not true that Joe Mahoney of Albany, NY won a pre-game raffle to be Miami’s cleanup hitter. That raffle was held a week ago. Try to keep up!