A.J. can't get out of 2nd inning in loss

MINNEAPOLIS -- You would need a hit from the objective flask to find even one positive in this A.J. Burnett performance. Burnett, the subject of an impassioned defense from general manager Brian Cashman less than two weeks ago, stunk out Target Field Saturday night, allowing seven runs in 12/3 innings in a 9-4 loss to the Twins.

And after the defeat came more passion, this time from Joe Girardi as the manager showed a side he rarely, if ever, shows the media.

Burnett didn't appear to go quietly after getting pulled, as TV replays seemed to show him muttering an expletive at Girardi on his way off the mound. Girardi said it was a case of Burnett expressing irritation at a bases-loaded, full-count pitch to Joe Mauer in the second that he and Russell Martin thought was a strike. It was called a ball, which forced in a run and was the last batter Burnett faced.

"You can write what you want, you can say what you want," Girardi said, his inflection rising. "But he was ---- about . . . he thought he struck out Joe Mauer."

Burnett went down the dugout steps and Girardi shortly thereafter, he said to watch video of the borderline pitch, which Martin after the game also said he thought was a strike.

The question that he might have been going to talk to Burnett got Girardi more upset.

"This is silly, this is really, really silly," Girardi said before turning sarcastic. "You know what? We had a fistfight is what we had. No, I came and looked at the pitch. Our video room is right there."

Girardi wasn't done.

"Everyone always seems to want to blow up about A.J., A.J., A.J.," Girardi said. "Nothing happened between me and A.J. I went and looked at the pitch. And I'm tired . . . of people looking for something between me and A.J. Me and A.J. have mutual respect for each other. Everyone's always trying to say there's something between me and A.J. What do you want, the pitcher want to come out of the game? This is ridiculous. Case closed."

But there was an air of disingenuousness to Girardi's rant. Burnett said afterward that the manager "two or three innings later" came to him for clarification of the expletive, which Burnett said he used to tell Martin what he thought of the borderline ball call to Mauer.

"He [Girardi] came in and we talked about what was said and I explained it to him," Burnett said. "We talked about it. I made sure and told him, it's not you.

"That guy's taken my back every day I've been here. Last year . . . no matter how boiling I'm going to be, I'm not going to say anything to him. No chance."

So how bad was this outing?

Even during last year's 10-15 season, in which he had a career-worst 5.26 ERA, Burnett didn't have an outing as short as Saturday night's. And he has fallen to 9-10 with a 4.96 ERA.

"If you smoke the objective pipe,'' Cashman said Aug. 12 in defense of Burnett, "I think the coverage on him [Burnett] will be a little bit more accurate.''

In his next outing, Monday in Kansas City, Burnett wasn't great but was good enough to win his first game in August as a Yankee. After Saturday night, his ERA for this month is 10.70, but Burnett, Girardi said, will take his next start Friday in Baltimore. After next Saturday's doubleheader, Girardi wants to get back to a five-man rotation and Burnett has outperformed exactly none of the other five.

"It's a hiccup," Burnett said. "I had a bad night. I'm going to be frustrated and upset about it but I'm going to come ready to work. It's not going to stop me."