CT photo by Bruce Bishop.

Phillips

SHEFFIELD TWP. — An 18-year-old man has been charged with torching the playground at Vincent Elementary School early Saturday and later calling in a false report that the school itself was on fire.

Ernest Phillips, who lives a few blocks away from the school, is charged with arson, vandalism, breaking and entering, inducing panic, tampering with evidence, making false alarms and obstructing official business.

Lorain County sheriff’s Capt. Jim Drozdowski said Phillips confessed to starting the fire when he was questioned while he was in custody at the county jail this weekend.

Saturday’s fire was the second blaze at the playground in the past two years.

Read Wednesday’s Chronicle for more on this story.

ELYRIA — Rescue squads responded to a three-vehicle accident on East Avenue in front of The Chronicle that sent two people to the hospital on stretchers.

The crash, a little after 9 this morning, appeared to be a chain-reaction rear-ending. It involved a white Dodge Ram 1500 pickup, a beige Chevrolet Avalanche pickup and a white Cadillac DeVille.

The drivers of the Dodge and the Cadillac, both men, had to be removed from their vehicles by rescue squads. The driver of the Dodge could be seen holding his neck. The driver of the Chevrolet pickup, also a man, was unhurt.

The Cadillac sustained heavy damage, and the Dodge and Chevy both had moderate damage.

Several lanes of East Avenue were closed for a time.

NEW YORK — Crazy as it seems, teams still load the bases so they can pitch to Alex Rodriguez. On purpose.

For the second time this season, A-Rod made them pay in the worst way, hitting a grand slam that sparked the Yankees’ six-run seventh inning and turned a pitching duel Andy Pettitte was winning into an 11-2 rout of the Cleveland Indians on Monday.

Both of Rodriguez’s slams this season came after Mark Teixeira was intentionally walked ahead of him, and A-Rod is 5-for-5 with 18 RBIs when teams intentionally pitch around Teixeira.

“I felt it coming, for some reason,” Rodriguez said. “I would appreciate if we keep these numbers to ourselves, and not share them with any other managers.”

Not that it’s any big secret that Rodriguez, whose seventh homer this season gave him 590 in his career, is a tough out — even without the bases loaded.

More photos below.

“The best thing for us to do in that situation, once he got behind 3-1, was to just put him on and try to get a double play,” Indians manager Manny Acta said.

Even better would be avoiding the sort of situation in the first place, something the Indians failed at throughout the series.

The Indians’ top left-handed reliever, Tony Sipp, had been brought in to face Curtis Granderson twice already in the series. Both times, he gave up doubles, so this time Acta called on Rafael Perez with one out, one on and, yep, Granderson due to bat.

Granderson singled, and a wild pitch allowed him and pinch-runner Ramiro Pena take a base, leading to an intentional walk of Teixeira.

“The whole series, basically, turned on three at-bats,” Acta said. “Three times, we couldn’t make pitches to Granderson. Forget about the home runs. He came in hitting .199 against left-handed pitchers and he was 3-for-3 against our guys.”

Cleveland starter Mitch Talbot (6-4) left with the Indians trailing only 2-1. He held down the Yankees’ lineup, but the Indians couldn’t get anything going against Pettitte (7-1), and by the time they came back up again in the top of the eighth, the Indians were seven runs behind.

Talbot was charged with three runs on nine hits. He struck out three without a walk, but hit two batters with pitches.

“At different times of the game, I was really locked in,” Talbot said. “And then the next inning, I’d have to go out and find everything again. I’m happy with the overall performance. I battled and I battled without my best stuff.”

Had the Indians’ volatile bullpen not melted down again, Talbot might have been able to feel better about having hung with Pettitte, who tied Clay Buchholz and David Price for the AL lead in wins and improved his career record to 236-136, 100 games over .500.

Pettitte pitched seven innings, allowing three singles and Jhonny Peralta’s 100th career homer, while striking out five without a walk. He retired his last 14 batters and improved to 6-0 with a 1.12 ERA in six day starts this year.

“I love day games,” Pettitte said. “I’m not much of a night owl.”

Rodriguez worked a 3-1 count before launching a no-doubter to straight away center field off Chris Perez, and, after Rodriguez took a curtain call on a sunny Memorial Day afternoon, Robinson Cano followed with a solo shot. He later added a two-run single that glanced off the heel of first baseman Matt LaPorta.

Rodriguez, who drove in six runs, has 20 grand slams, third in baseball history behind Lou Gehrig (23) and Manny Ramirez (21). He hit an RBI single in the first and added an RBI double in the eighth.

Monday was the 16th time in Rodriguez’s career a batter was intentionally walked to load the bases for him, according to STATS LLC. The last seven occasions have been walks to Teixeira.

Brett Gardner hit a tiebreaking single in the fourth inning. He had three hits and was thrown out twice trying to steal by Cleveland catcher Lou Marson.

The Yankees had a season-high 18 hits, nine off Cleveland’s bullpen.

“This was a very close game until the seventh inning,” Yankees manager Joe Girardi said.

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The Yankees scored 15 runs in the seventh innings of their three wins in the four-game series, while the Indians scored seven runs in the seventh inning of their win.

Mark Grudzielanek’s single with one out in the third gave Cleveland its last baserunner until Travis Hafner worked a full-count walk with two outs in the ninth. Peralta followed with a single and Shelley Duncan drove home Hafner with another one off Chan Ho Park.

Notes

• New York Jets coach Rex Ryan was at the game, wearing a Yankees jersey in the TV booth.
• LaPorta hit a pop foul to first on a 3-0 pitch to end the fourth inning.
• Gardner was caught on a pitchout to end the fourth inning.
• Derek Jeter was lifted for Pena in the seventh, with tightness in his left hamstring. He had been hit earlier there by a pitch.
• Indians lefty-batting outfielder Shin-Soo Choo, hitless in his last 17 at-bats, got his first day off of the year.

NEW YORK – Grady Sizemore will have surgery on his left knee next week and is expected to miss at least six to eight weeks.

Cleveland’s three-time All-Star has a deep bone bruise in the knee he injured May 16, and the condition and stability of the cartilage beneath his kneecap will be assessed during the arthroscopic operation by Dr. Richard Steadman in Vail, Colo.

Steadman pioneered the use of microfracture surgery, which stimulates stem cells to repair and re-grow cartilage. Indians trainer Lonnie Soloff said that neither microfracture, nor anything else, had been ruled out.

“The specifics of the surgery won’t be available until after the procedure takes place, so there’ll be some intra-operative decision-making process that determines what Dr. Steadman will do during surgery,” Soloff said.

The surgery hasn’t been scheduled yet, though it is planned for some time next week.

“The question isn’t how much cartilage is there, it’s the stability of the cartilage,” Soloff said. “We’ll have a specific update after the surgery.”

Cleveland officials consulted several knee specialists about their star center fielder, who would be a key player on any Indians contender in the near future.

He was certainly expected to perform on this edition of the team, which is 18-30 following Sunday’s 7-3 loss to the Yankees and stuck in last place in the AL Central.

“Big blow,” Indians manager Manny Acta said. “He’s such an important part of this ballclub, because even when he’s struggling offensively as he was, he brings so much to the table. Speed never goes into a slump. He’s always played great defense.”

Sizemore missed the final month of 2009 after having surgery on his abdomen and left elbow, injuries that hounded him throughout the worst year of his career.

After averaging 29 homers and 118 runs in his All-Star years, the Gold Glove center fielder batted only .248 with 18 homers and 73 RBIs in 106 games.

Sizemore is one of the few remaining stars on a young roster that is expected to help the small-market Indians eventually contend again, after trading away Cy Young Award winners CC Sabathia and Cliff Lee for prospects.

The last time the Indians overhauled their personnel, they traded away pitcher Bartolo Colon at the deadline for two prospects. One was Lee, who was traded to Philadelphia last season and went on to start Game 1 of the World Series – against, of all people, Sabathia and the New York Yankees. The other player was Sizemore.