ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- Roger Clemens was outpitched, and the New York Yankees fell below .500 again.
Still, manager Joe Torre was convinced last night that the team is headed in the right direction in its bid to climb back into playoff contention.
"I learned through my years of doing this that even though everything is judged on winning and losing, it's the tenacity of the team," Torre said after Scott Kazmir shut down the Yankees for six innings of a 6-4 loss to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
"You really have to let go of the final score because a lot of times you can't control it. You can only control what you can control, and that's all based on effort," Torre added. "I have no trouble sleeping tonight, other than the final score."
Kazmir gave up four hits in six innings to outperform Clemens for the lefthander's first win at home in more than a year.
An All-Star who then missed much of the second half of last year because of an injury, Kazmir (6-6) yielded one unearned run and struck out seven to keep the Yankees (43-44) from gaining ground on the first-place Red Sox in the AL East.
The 23-year-old won at Tropicana Field for the first time since pitching a two-hit, complete game shutout against the Red Sox July 3, 2006. He had been 0-4 in 14 starts during the stretch of futility at home.
Josh Wilson and Dioner Navarro each drove in two runs for Tampa Bay, which won for just the second time in 16 games.
Clemens (2-4), who surrendered five hits and five runs in 5 1/3 innings, threw 89 pitches -- just 44 of them strikes. Reliever Brian Bruney give up a sacrifice fly to the weak-hitting Navarro (.173), whose two RBIs gave him 15 in 214 at-bats this season, for the final run charged to the starter.
Clemens, who pitched eight innings in each of his two previous starts, gave up a sacrifice fly to B.J. Upton and Wilson's two-run triple in the second.
"That was the ballgame to me," Clemens said of Wilson's triple to the gap in left center field.
