Sabathia wins 10th as Yankees roll

There's a calmness that a CC Sabathia start brings, an unspoken ease that permeates the Yankees' dugout whenever the big guy is on the mound.

His 6-7, 290-pound frame has remained a soothing presence week after week regardless of the inning or the score.

"Guys like to play behind guys that work quick and get quick outs," manager Joe Girardi said.

Not to mention pitch as effectively as Sabathia, who became the first 10-game winner in the major leagues Saturday in an 8-3 victory over the Rockies at Yankee Stadium.

The Yankees -- who moved into first place Saturday nightwhen the Red Sox lost to the Pirates -- had 15 hits, with Jorge Posada picking up three and Curtis Granderson, Mark Teixeira, Alex Rodriguez, Nick Swisher and Francisco Cervelli getting two each. A-Rod had three RBIs, giving him eight in the past five games, and Teixeira hit his 22nd home run, a two-run shot.

Sabathia (10-4) allowed one run, seven hits and a walk in eight innings and tied his season high with nine strikeouts. He won for the seventh time in his last eight starts and lifted his record as a Yankee to 50-19.

The Yankees had eight hits in the first three innings in taking a 5-0 lead. "These guys scoring runs makes it smooth," said Sabathia, 19-7 in interleague play. "They score runs early and you can just go out and attack the strike zone, and that's what I did."

Sabathia entered the game averaging just over seven innings per outing, and the Yankees were averaging about seven runs in his games. He credited the support to luck, but his teammates had a different answer.

"You definitely can't put it in cruise control, but any time you can get a couple runs for CC, you feel pretty good about your chances," said Brett Gardner, who got the offense going with a bunt single on Aaron Cook's first pitch, stole second and scored on Granderson's single to give the Yankees the lead for good. "He was just his normal self today. He was dominant, and when he allowed guys to get on base, he pitched even better. He's just an ace. There's really nothing else to say about him."

Colorado was 2-for-16 with runners on base against Sabathia. "His stuff was as good as I've seen it all year," Girardi said.

Seth Smith's two-out RBI single broke up Sabathia's shutout in the eighth, but by then, a Yankees victory was all but certain.

"What you try to do is go deep into games and give the bullpen a rest," Sabathia said. "We know these guys have been throwing a lot, [David] Robertson has logged a lot of innings, it obviously took a toll on Joba [Chamberlain], so we want to just go out and take as much pressure off them as you can."

Unlike Sabathia, Cook (0-3) labored through 52/3 innings in which he allowed 12 hits. After Rodriguez's single through the right side gave the Yankees a 2-0 lead in the first, Granderson singled over the outstretched glove of shortstop Troy Tulowitzki to lead off the third and Teixeira doubled off the centerfield wall to put men at second and third. A-Rod doubled to right-center to drive in two runs before scoring on Swisher's short sacrifice fly to left for a 5-0 lead, sliding headfirst and touching the plate with a hand just before the tag.

Despite an ailing right knee that seemed to hinder him on the double but was not a factor on the sacrifice fly, Rodriguez is batting .545 (12-for-22) in his past six games. He was replaced by Ramiro Peña to start the eighth.

The Yankees took a 6-0 lead in the sixth on back-to-back doubles by Swisher and Posada before Teixeira's homer put the Yankees up 8-1. Buddy Carlyle gave up a two-run homer to Ty Wigginton in the ninth.