Marlins victory sours Johnson's milestone

People naturally get worked up about individual feats in baseball - witness the fuss over Mark McGwire's home run odyssey a couple of years ago - but solo performances only count for so much. If he did not know it already, Randy Johnson of the Arizona Diamondbacks found that out on Sunday night.

People naturally get worked up about individual feats in baseball - witness the fuss over Mark McGwire's home run odyssey a couple of years ago - but solo performances only count for so much. If he did not know it already, Randy Johnson of the Arizona Diamondbacks found that out on Sunday night.

Johnson struck out 14 batters over seven innings to become only the 12th pitcher to record 3,000 career strike-outs, but Preston Wilson stroked an RBI single with two men out in the 12th inning to lift Florida Marlins to a 4-3 victory.

Celebrating his 37th birthday, Johnson began by seeing off Luis Castillo for his 300th strike-out of the season - the fourth time he has reached that mark. He struck out Mike Lowell to end the fourth inning, becoming only the second left-hand pitcher to register 3,000 in his career.

Despite Johnson's feats, the Diamondbacks lost a game they needed to win in the race for the National League wild card. The defeat put them four-and-a-half games behind New York Mets, who beat Philadelphia 3-0 to fend off ideas of another September collapse.

In the American League East, the New York Yankees all but wrapped up their third consecutive title, thanks to their pitcher Randy Keisler, whose efforts on his debut helped them to a 6-2 win over Boston. Keisler allowed one run and four hits in five innings as the Yankees won for the ninth time in 11 games, increasing their AL East lead to eight-and-a-half games, the biggest margin all season.

In Tampa, Darryl Strawberry, the Yankees' outfielder suspended for a year after testing positive for cocaine, was arrested on charges of reckless driving and leaving the scene of an accident. No one was hurt, but his chances of returning to the game must be slim.