Yankees Putting Hurt on Orioles’ Chances

It’s time for the Orioles to forget about the AL East and start watching the race out West.

Kenny Rogers pitched 5 2/3 shutout innings and Wade Boggs went 4-for-4 Thursday as the New York Yankees opened a five-game lead over Baltimore with an 9-3 victory over the Orioles in the opener of a twi-night doubleheader.

New York chased Mike Mussina (19-11) in two innings for its fifth straight win against Baltimore. The Yankees, 10-2 against the second-place Orioles, sent David Cone to the mound in the second game against David Wells.

“Having won the first game, especially with Mussina out of the way, we’ve got a good chance to put them away,” Rogers said.

Baltimore, which had made up nine games in the standings since late July, came to New York down three games and with designs on catching the Yankees. But after dropping the first two games of the hyped showdown series, the Orioles’ lead in the wild-card race slipped to just 1 1/2 games over Seattle and rendered the series finale anticlimactic.

“We were looking forward to playing this series,” New York manager Joe Torre said. “Not that we thought we’d win the first two games, but it was all that you heard about.”