To say again that the Yankees are floundering is to say that the War in Iraq isn't going well. It  dramatically understates the case, and it has been repeated so often (here as well as elsewhere, and rightly so) that such repetition has rendered the observation platitudinous. I've tried my best to break down various reasons, tangible and some possible intangibles, why the stumbles of April occurred. I feel I've been correct to have expressed misgivings about certain aspects of this team.

That said, I've been divided between head and heart to some degree by the beginning of the season, and by more than the awful Yankees start. As someone who recently started blogging just over a month ago, I've tried to step back somewhat from what I've felt, and how I am, as a fan to talk about the Yankees. That's resulted to some degree in miring my analysis often in the present. Some bloggers and commenters have argued that this team's recent history should have people thinking optimistically, that they're due for a bounce, which is probably most true for the offense as a whole (acknowledging that parts have been hot), the bullpen, and a couple starters like Wang. If the team musters a repeat of 2005 and to a lesser extent 2006, it may be because the team isn't as bad as it's shown so far. It may be that, like 2005, the Yankees get unforeseen contributions from role players and afterthought acquisitions. Likelier, to me, a comeback will occur because the team, whoever is on the field for the duration (and I say this not to anticipate trades or releases as much as injuries, which have ranged from the nagging--Damon--to the long-term--Karstens--to the semi-comical--Pavano) plays both up to their collective abilities and with a fire that the team sorely lacked in April.

More and more, as I reflect on the first, bad month of Yankees baseball--and there is no doubt it was bad, whether or not it was anomalous--the Yanks show signs of pressing, of doing things outside of their strengths and tendencies. Nowhere was this more glaringly evident than at the plate, with Abreu flailing at pitches that he was not a week prior, and Matsui often failing to offer his normally level swing. I usually don't like to speculate about such things, because I'm not in the locker room and obviously have no way of knowing, but yesterday's game saw many players appearing to try to tie the game or give the Yankees the lead on one swing. The team, especially while losing 8 of the last 9, has lacked patience, one of the core strengths of this crop of players. I could be wrong about that; they might be approaching their at-bats just as they have been all along, but my hunch is that isn't so.

That may be what losing the way they have has done to the 2007 Yankees in the first month. I don't buy that losing is somehow habit for them. Instead, I think that losing might have caused them to get away from what they know best, maybe feeling that after trailing in games on a nearly continuous basis, they need to do it all at once, dramatically. If so, they would be better served getting back to basics--having good smart at-bats, recognizing garbage at the plate and laying off to get ahead in counts, hitting the ball hard every time and not hacking away, and mounting rallies by stringing together hits and walks. In sum, the Yankees when on their game are better than anyone at wringing pitchers out like used dishrags.

Texas is not a slouch team, but it is a team that the Yankees, with a fresh start, can exploit. The Rangers are second-last in team ERA in the AL, have given up the second-most walks in the AL, have given up the second-most home runs in the AL, and have yielded the highest opponents batting average. Let's hope that the Yankees are facing the right opponent at the right time, when their confidence is at a low point, against a team whose weaknesses thus far mesh well with the Yankees' strengths. Taking advantage of that will mean getting back to what the Yankees do well--hit, and during patient at-bats.

Returning to my original intent of posting, I don't see being a partisan and analytical as mutually exclusive but two sides of the same coin, so to speak. Letting a little more out of how I am as a fan, and blending it into how I've been writing as a blogging fan, I'm going to make a fresh start myself. To reiterate something from a few days ago, I don't believe that history repeats itself simply because people wish it so, or even that people face similar problems and circumstances that others did before them. If and when the Yankees bounce back, new players will do it with the more familiar faces and in new, exciting, and probably stomach-churning ways. But for me, going back to 2005 to relive some of that amazing year is intended to personally exhale all this past month's junk out, and to remind myself that great things, great plays, and great memories can and did come even after head-shaking misery.

This is by no means an all-inclusive list of the great memories and accomplishments from 2005--I don't have time for that now, but will add others later tonight. But a few came to mind as I drove in the gorgeous sunshine of a hot Midwestern Spring day:

1.) A-Rod's monstrous blast against Texas on August 13 in the third inning.  Saying it went to deep left-center would be grossly underestimating what might be the longest home run in Yankee Stadium I've ever seen. This ball went so far out, it sailed over everything in left-center, bounced once, and hit the loading bay doors as far back as it could travel. Bernie pasted the game-winning home run in the 11th and though the Yankees blew a late 5-1 lead, they won, 7-5 in 11.

2.) The look of sheer glee on Aaron Small's face as he struck out Eric Chaves looking to end a complete-game gem against Oakland on September 3, tossing a five-hit shutout as the Yankees won 7-0. Someone who seemed like a thoroughly decent man, Small was an amazing 10-0 that year, a career minor-league journeyman with occasional stints in the bigs. He earned everything he got in 2005, and the Yankees needed all his unexpected success. He deserved it as much as anyone.

3.) The great hug that Derek Jeter gave Joe Torre after the Yankees beat Boston 8-4 on October 1 to clinch the AL East for the eighth-straight time, and seeing Torre's tears of joy and no doubt relief. A great win capping off a great run, and a better moment.

4.) The Yankees came from way behind against their season-long nemesis, the Devil Rays, on June 21, scoring 13 runs in the bottom of the 8th to win 20-11, after trailing 10-2. Greatly assisting the comeback were the Yankees' 23 hits, an astounding total.  Among all the great moments in that game, my favorite was Bernie's bases-clearing triple to make it 13-11 Yankees. When the Rays intentionally walked Giambi before Bernie, the crowd started chanting "Bernie! Bernie! Bernie" during the intentional walk. When Bernie blasted the ball to deep center, the place erupted as did John Sterling who had to yell just to call the play over the screaming crowd, and probably couldn't help himself anyhow. Who could blame him? The crowd showered Bernie with adoring chants as he stood on third. Classic.

5.) A-Rod's game-winning home run to deep center off Curt Schilling on July 14, to win the game in Boston 8-6. Huge, and started a tremendous second half for A-Rod, the 2005 MVP.

6.) Al Leiter coming up with a clutch start, his first back with the Yankees, against Boston on July 17, striking out 8 as he allowed the Yankees to take 3 of 4 in Boston, winning 5-3.

7.) Jason Giambi's gigantic walk-off blast into the upper deck in right field off Jose Mesa to beat Pittsburgh in the tenth, 7-5 on June 15. Though the turnaround for Giambi was slow in coming, this helped to start him on a hot streak for the last four months.

Enough for now, and more to come tonight. Feel free to add any 2005 moments of your own. Let's start May hot, Yanks. Good karma comes to those who do good things. Let's pile on the good things from here on out.

In a terrible version of a home stand, the Yankees dropped the finale of the home stand and the Boston series, 7-4, again struggling. It's sad when your primary offensive production comes from Doug Mientkiewicz, who hit a three-run home run to briefly remind people that he can actually hit occasionally. After an off-day tomorrow, the Yankees limp into Texas for three before returning to the Bronx to face Seattle in a four-game set, then three against Texas again.

It was a woeful April for several reasons--the injuries, the inconsistent pitching and, later, offensive production, the haggard bullpen, shoddy defense at least for the first half of the month. The Yankees ended this wretched April 9-14, with several key players slumping--Abreu, Cano, Cabrera, Matsui (though he returned only a week ago), and Damon (who is hobbled with a multitude of ailments). Abreu is 2 for his last 33, beyond unacceptable for a three-hole hitter, and was awful against Boston, going 1 for 12, grounding into 2 double plays, striking out three times, and walking twice. Don't be at all surprised to see him get dropped for A-Rod or Giambi if this continues. Matsui had a terrible series against Boston, gathering 1 hit in 10 at-bats, drawing 2 walks and grounding into a double play. Pavano is again injured, and though he finally threw off the mound Sunday, he'll need more work and at least one rehab start before returning, probably at best in a couple weeks. The starting staff has been relying on call-ups, more so now with injuries to Pavano, Wang, and now Karstens who is out with a broken leg.

On top of everything, this miserable stretch has fueled speculation that Torre may be fired. While Torre has made some questionable decisions, it is very hard to pin this situation on him. Injuries have decimated a team that was flawed to begin with, and Cashman seemed to admit that recently when defending Torre. The bullpen, seemingly a strength to begin the season, has been overworked and left hung out to dry. Mariano has received only sporadic work, often in mop-up situations to try to stay sharp, and has blown two rare save chances as a result. Some players have plainly slumped at the plate, with Abreu mired in a very bad spell. He and Cano have been confused and impatient lately, and Melky is without question experiencing a sophomore slump. Today's home run aside, the 1B/DH hyrda-headed platoon hasn't worked well at all, sponging a roster spot that could be used to shore up an anemic bench. The bottom of the lineup has been unproductive at best this season, depriving Damon and Jeter of RBI opportunities in most games. Were it not for A-Rod's historically sizzling April, this team might have accumulated about five wins. Let me repeat that: were it not for A-Rod's historically sizzling April, this team might have accumulated about five wins. That's beyond horrible, and that counter-factual scenario, as well as this team's current tailspin, are unacceptable regardless of the spate of injuries. Thank goodness April is over, and that whoever makes the decisions about rescheduling games had the good sense to defer for now. Hopefully the games will be replayed when the team is healthier, playing far better, and has a little fire in the belly, unlike this currently simpering lot.

I mentioned at the outset that the 2007 Yankees needed three primary things to be successful, and they for the most part still hold: good pitching, health, and smart at-bats. Ample doses of those three in the weeks and months to come would still dramatically improve this team's fortunes, and despite the difficulties showered upon the Yankees this April, there is reason to believe that May might bring better fortunes. I stand by that initial assessment, but I also fear that without even one of those three, as we have seen this team lack one, two, or even three of those key elements in the first month, the Yankees will not be good enough to seriously contend in the East. Clearly, the good pitching and health are intricately connected to this team's early-season swoon, but not entirely so. Injuries forced certain players into roles they may not have been prepared to perform, or added pressure to everyone. Yet the number of unproven commodities upon whom the Yankees were relying to start the season, even if all were healthy, was a serious risk that has not played out well thus far. Inconsistency was the norm for April among the arms, the initially strong bullpen included. Injuries have hobbled more than the pitchers, but key hitters also, with Matsui missing significant time and Damon's back and neck ailing. Given the dearth of quality bench players, the Yankees can ill afford any more long-term injuries to their everyday lineup. One would think that smart at-bats with this team would be a given, but that's clearly not been true. Abreu still works counts, but seems to be pressing in his prolonged slump. Cano, though blessed with great talent, is an all-day, everyday ****** for inside sliders and curves from right-handed pitchers, change-ups from lefties, and the high fastball (particularly with two strikes) from everyone. Melky's poor start has me and no doubt others wondering if last year was either a fluke, or likelier near the high end of what we can expect from him offensively. The bottom of the lineup has been woefully unproductive, ending countless rallies and failing to roll over pitchers into long innings and the far better top of the lineup.

Thank goodness April is over.  Though I know I already said that, the cathartic value alone makes it well worth repeating. The Yankees, in last place in the East, face a Texas team that is certainly not setting the baseball world afire. Unlike Texas teams of previous years, this one is in the middle of the pack of AL teams offensively, and is one of only two AL teams with a worse ERA than the Yankees, with their pitchers prone to coughing up the long ball. After April, who knows what to expect from the Yankees in this series or any other in the near future. But this series against Texas is nonetheless a chance to win games, to touch up sub-par pitching, and just as importantly to see what they're made of. This team has a lot to play for, not the least of which is their manager's job. Mediocre though Torre has been in some key situations, and in my mind too phlegmatic about the team's swoon, the current malaise rests more squarely on the shoulders of the injury bug, the Yankees players and Cashman, who assembled this team. It remains to be seen who will pay for this early-season nosedive should it continue, but someone undoubtedly will and it would likely, and  rather unfairly, be Torre.

On to Texas. Go Yankees!

Before getting to the crux of this post, I want to touch on a couple things. Cardinals pitcher Josh Hancock was killed in a car accident in St. Louis. This is terrible news, and from a distance I'd like to extend all of our thoughts and prayers to his family and to the Cardinals organization.

I wanted to mention this yesterday, but I genuinely had a feeling that yesterday was going to be a good day, and was all around (except for a minor but recurring, and rather frustrating, plumbing issue that reared its ugly head around the second inning, about which I blew a gasket. Thankfully my wife brought me back down to a sane place.) right from the get-go. I took the little guy to soccer and brought along GLG for some catch on the side. We had almost a half-hour of catch, long toss, grounders and fly balls, a great time all around. GLG has a good arm, and gets down on grounders like a champ. She also judges flies very well. She's coming into her own in many respects, not the least of which is playing ball. As we were throwing the pill, a man came along with his two kids, dropped off his younger one for soccer, then moved alongside GLG and me. I noticed that he too had mitts and a ball. "Good morning. How are ya'?" I asked. "Great, this is a great day," he responded jovially. (And it was, sunny and warm, with a light breeze, aside from being in it and the Yankees-Rod Sox game to follow.) "Yep. I see you're ready for a toss yourself," I noted. "Oh yeah. You too. There's soccer, and that's good, but then there's The Game," he declared. I couldn't agree more, and it was a great way to say it. The Game. There's nothing like it. I grew up playing all sports, and still play around with the kids in a variety of things--soccer, hockey in the driveway, football tosses, hoops (my first and an enduring love), but there is truly nothing like a good catch. "Hucking the Hoss" is how Frank the Sage puts it.  A great game, the great game. My wife made some terrific egg rolls for dinner, with shrimp for us and vegetarian style for GLG, the young but dedicated vegetarian. Very delicious, and I swiftly destroyed a half-dozen. All was topped off by sleeping the sleep of angels, the kind of good, solid sleep when you wake up early in the morning, after several hours of sleep and realize you've just awakened in practically the same position in which you fell asleep. Aaaahhh.

Anyway, I'm interested to see what people are reading, and what people are watching. I'd prefer to start with the books, but talking about what is piquing people's interests as a whole, as a way of getting to know different things about people, would be great. I see that some of you have book links in your sidebars, which I think is great, and when I get motivated to do some blog housekeeping I'll add some of my own. Mike has been one who has mentioned reading The Summer of '49, a classic sports book and great tome all around from the late, great David Halberstam. I read it for the first time two years ago, and it was a great and informative read.

I'd just love it if people would talk, briefly or at length, about what you're reading now, have read recently or a while back, that you enjoyed. Also, talk about why you enjoyed these books--writing style, informational value, great anecdotes and big stories, previously unknown or under-appreciated people and events--whatever hooked you. I wouldn't mind picking up some books I have never read, and plan to get through a few things this summer--Robert Creamer's biography of Babe Ruth, Steven Goldman's biography of Casey Stengel to name just a couple non-dissertation related books I'll read.  Let me know what you like and why. I'd like to read about your own reading. If you haven't read much of value but have watched something great, discuss that too. I just watched "Bill Moyers Journal," when he examined the run-up to the War in Iraq and the obsequious, craven, unprofessional job that the so-called mainstream media and others did in abdicated their jobs in the process of "covering" the run-up and war itself. Great stuff.

Carry on, and have a great day.

It's about time. The most unlikely of heroes, Kei Igawa, came through huge today. On the first pitch of the game,  Julio Lugo plugged  Jeff Karstens with a liner on the knee. Though Karstens stayed in the game, he left after surrendering a second consecutive single to Youkilis, leaving a jam to his successor, Mighty Kei Igawa.

These FAUX day games infuriate me to no end. These clowns highlight these "nationally televised games" including the Yankees-Red Sox, yet since I'm stuck here in the Midwest (as the Blog describes), I'm left with the scraps of the Cubs-Cards and, since the game started before 7 EST, it isn't shown even out-of-market on MLB.TV. in the words of Plankton from Spongebob Squarepants, as the enormous Bubble Bass sat on him, "Thanks for that, friend." Yet all was not lost. For the second Saturday in a row, I was able to listen to John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman on WCBS via the Internet and my MLB subscription. It was far better than listening to Captain Nepotism Joe Buck and Minutiae McCarver, or whoever called the game, any day. For a couple different reasons, I preferred the radio broadcast with the Gameday window.

Igawa had apparently worked with Gator Guidry in the bullpen to work out his lousiness. According to Louisiana Lightning, all this transmitted through Sterling-Waldman, Igawa had discussed the differences between Guidry's approach towards batters vis-a-vis Japanese coaches. Apparently, Igawa said that in Japan coaches teach you to miss hitters' bats, while Gator emphasized attacking the strike zone, bat or no. The difference according to Gator was aggressiveness, and it showed in neon tonight. Igawa, who entered with 2 on and 0 out in the first, induced the first of two Ortiz double-play balls then, after walking Manjaya, fanned Drew to escape the jam. He did the same in the third to Ortiz, this time ending the inning. He was as sharp as he had been all year, allowing two hits and four walks, with no runs and six strikeouts, in six full innings. Though it technically counts as more bullpen innings, Igawa in effect and by accident/injury threw the best start for the Yankees
this year.

Posada lined a homer to right in the fourth to make it 2-0 Yankees. Melky added a fluke bloop to shallow left that popped into the near left-field stands [close to Geoff's Bleeding Pinstripes territory] for a grounds-rule double to make it 3-0. Though all the runs were earned, who would have thought that Red Sox third-baseman Mike Lowell would have committed two errors in one game? Unbeknown to me before today, those comprised the 7th and 8th errors for the normally reliable Lowell. Amazing. Problematically, the Yankees stranded a dozen runners, and Abreu and Cano are still cold. (Incidentally, A-Rod has not surprisingly cooled this past week, likely from a sore back from carrying the Yankees through the first three weeks.) But oddly enough, and hopefully a sign of rest and improvement, the bullpen held the lead. Though Nuke LaFarnsworth threw 26 pitches in the 8th and allowed a run on two hits and a walk, he fanned Coco Crisp/Booberry/Fruity Pebbles looking, precipitating what sounded like a first-class hissy-fit complete with a tossed helmet and bat, resulting in his prompt ejection. Though Mariano is still working out kinks, he allowed only one hit in the 9th to close out the game. At long last, the Yankees win, 3-1, and it couldn't have come at a better time. The seven-game losing streak is finally over.

Igawa was tough and efficient, throwing only 93 pitches, just a clutch performance, and hopefully his session with Gator worked out some mechanical and  philosophical problems on the mound. Some bats are still cold, especially Abreu and Cano. A-Rod has cooled, and the middle of the lineup went 0-9. Yet Abreu and Giambi eached worked two walks, and Giambi's were especially tough at-bats to add wear on Wakefield. Jeter again went three for five, upping his already healthy average to a brisk .348. Not to be overlooked, Matsui looked good at the plate, hitting a single and drawing a walk.  It was a good win just because it was finally a win and one that broke a horrendous losing streak, but also because this was amazingly the first save the Yankees have earned this year, in the 22nd game, and Mariano's first save. 

What problems the Yankees still need to iron out--and there are a few--are much better dealt with after a win. Wang goes tomorrow against Tavares, who is awkward and sometimes erratic, but might keep the Yankees off-balance with his pitches that typically move a lot. Thanks for restoring some faith, boys.

Well folks, while there are several adjectives and/or expletives that I could use to describe tonight's, 11-4 loss, the seventh in a row, the only phrase/word/expression that I could think of that the MLBlog Central Scrutinizer would allow me to publish was "sulfur bomb." Horrible doesn't do justice to the pathetic showing that the Yankees put on tonight. Sadly, right now, they're a deeply flawed, dare I say bad baseball team. Not playing bad baseball, not in a funk, but playing as a bad baseball team would.

Reason number one is without question the pitching. When I did my two-week analysis almost two weeks ago, pitching and defense were in my mind tied for the top reason why the Yankees struggled to that point. Defense has been remedied and substantially better, with far fewer errors since then. What has not changed, but has in fact regressed, is the pitching. The team just does not have the arms now, and may very well not in the near future. Pettite didn't pitch well, allowing a Youkilis home run in the third to make it 2-0. Yet the Yankees, who again made Matsuzaka look decent at best, earned a 4-2 lead with a four-run fourth, their only runs of the night. Matsuzaka walked A-Rod, Giambi, and Matsui consecutively, then Posada singled in A-Rod.  After this, Cano and Mientkiewicz wasted their at-bats with a strikeout (one of three for Cano tonight, pathetic) and a pop up, respectively. JD then awoke from his recent slumber to single in Giambi and Matsui, and Jeter obliged with a single of his own (going three for five, one of very few to show up tonight) to drive in Jorge. 4-2 Yankees.

Yet no Yankees lead is safe these days, and yet again, after being provided with a two-run lead against the Red Sox, the Yankees pitchers blew it the next inning, again. Pettite caught the give-back-the-lead bug, collapsing in the fifth. Lugo singled and stole second, Youkilis singled, Ortiz singled to drive in Lugo, Manjaya walked and, after fanning Drew to again raise hopes that the Yankees might actually hold a lead for an inning or more, Pettite walked in Lowell to tie the game, then threw a wild pitch to Varitek to allow the lead, and as it sadly turned out winning, run. 5-4 Red Sox, and the wheels came off from there. Proctology gave up a home run to Lugo, 6-4. Consecutive doubles by Pedroia (who can't hit anybody but the Yankees, it seems) and Lugo (who killed Yankees pitching tonight) made it 7-4, and Mariano got into the fun and generosity, allowing four ninth-inning cherries on top to make it an 11-4 sundae of home-field embarrassment. Et tu, Mariano?

Again the Yankees handled and wore out Matsuzaka, despite the fact that he relegated the run-scoring damage to one inning. His final line was decent (6 innings, five hits, four runs, four walks, seven Ks, 117 pitches), but not a quality start. Yet again, the primary weakness of the Yankees showed itself. Pitching is going to kill this team, and has already sunk it into an early-season hole. No one can keep a lead on this team.

This is not just a bad stretch. This is not just attributable to injuries. The team has flaws, and pitching is far and away at the top. Pete Abraham of the Journal News has a good blog entry taking Cashman to task for assembling the pitching staff as he did, relying on Pavano and an aging staff for quality starts. That isn't going to work for the near future, if at all this season. Pavano has continued pain but no discernible structural damage in his arm. The team is relying on minor-league call-ups for the back of the rotation, Igawa has been poor thus far. It's been a band-aid rotation and honestly would have been to some degree even if Wang and Mussina had been healthy. Sure injuries have played a part, but this organization was relying on unproven commodities from the beginning, and some of them have proven themselves to be duds thus far.  Panic or not (I won't), but no one can say that there isn't cause for concern. I am concerned. It's impossible not to be. Not admitting that is living in denial. The team is playing poorly and lacks fire. Period.

Tonight's game should have been rained out as well, for it would have prevented the Yankees from suffering another loss during this dreadful six-game losing streak, the first such skid since 2005,  dropping a lackluster 6-0 game to the improved, and themselves depleted, Blue Jays. Much of the credit for shutting the Yankees out for the first time this season should go to A. J. Burnett, who stifled the Yankees offense, holding them to 4 hits, while walking four and striking out five on 113 pitches. The uninspired loss spoiled Philip Hughes's starting debut with the Yankees. Hughes wasn't bad, mainly encountering trouble in the first and fifth innings, his first and last. His final line was 4 1/3, seven hits, four runs, one walk and five strikeouts. He got into some trouble in the first, allowing two runs, but settled in thereafter until the fifth, retiring the next seven batters after one out in the first. He showed pretty good command, better than Wright did in either start, showed off a pretty good fastball (mainly low 90s, a couple time reaching 93), and worked in his change-up well. All in all, a decent start, not amazing, but fairly good for a twenty-year-old kid.

The offense was locked down. Torre fielded a weird, poorly conceived lineup.  Jeter, who was apparently penciled in for Wednesday night's rainout, felt sore and sat tonight in favor of the weak-hitting Cairo, and the results were predictable.  Strangely, Torre had Mientkiewicz hitting second. Though this was probably intended to avoid a dead inning every two or three innings, the effect with Cairo hitting 9th was to deaden an additional inning with Mientkiewicz's bat at the top. Torre probably also figured that he would benefit from hitting between people who, unlike him, can actually hit, but for that reason, Torre could have just as easily hit Mientkiewicz 7th and moved Cano, in Jeter's absence, to second, or even Matsui. Is there some stretch in Mientkiewicz's recent history, or his overall history for that matter, to have justified hitting him second? Terrible move, Torre. My understanding about baseball has always been that the best hitters hit atop the lineup. Then again, what do I know?

The team also looked lethargic regardless of being dominated by Burnett. Giambi was thrown out by several feet at second in the 4th inning when trying to "leg out" yet another bloop single into shallow left, failing miserably when Giambi, despite his vast expertise in base-running (right up there with his fielding prowess), erred on the side of foolishness trying for second, belly-flopping into a tag out. Stupid. But the dense play didn't end there. The Yankees fell asleep on the field, the second time in recent games, when they allowed Wells to delayed-steal second, with no one communicating this to the others, and Posada's missed throw at second allowed Wells to go to third. Hilarity ensued in the 7th, when Henn and Proctor took turns impersonating Wild Thing Vaughn by walking three Blue Jays, two on four pitches. Proctor added a wild pitch to allow a run to score from 3rd to add to the ribald comedy. Cano did his usual favor to a tiring pitcher, retiring himself in the 7th, when Burnett was well above 100 pitches, on one feeble swing. Way to work the count, Cano. Putrid.

Complaining about the moving-window strike zone that home plate Magoo Ed Montague provided tonight would give entirely too much credit for the loss to an umpire (though he was bad, as a strike call on A-Rod on a change-up floating high and outside in the 6th, and a ball that Proctor threw to Aaron Hill that was a far better pitch than the strike to A-Rod, would attest), when the blame clearly rests squarely on the Yankees for playing poorly, and Burnett for pitching great. The team is listless and at entirely the wrong time. Boston heads into town for three, and there are far fewer excuses this weekend than the Yankees had last weekend, when several key players were hurt. Most of them are back, including Wang, and there should be no lack of motivation given the 5 1/2-game hole the Yankees are in, the rivalry against Boston, and the generally poor pitching and play they've performed lately.

I guess this is what blogging in April and May of 2005 would have been like. This first twenty games have been too painful, too self-flagellating, and not enough a labor of love, when blogging about the Yankees. These stretches happen, but they've recurred way too much lately in new and gruesome forms. It's seriously time to wake up, Yankees, before there are significant shake-ups. We can't rule that out because Steinbrenner has ceded so much control to Cashman. This team is playing poorly, and it's extending well beyond injuries. Tonight went beyond excellent pitching for the Jays. The team was listless, and there is no excuse for that kind of laziness on a major-league diamond ever.

Apparently Crash Davis and his merry gang of do-gooders surreptitiously started the sprinkler system at Yankee Stadium because tonight's game against the Blue Jays is postponed, with no make-up date yet announced. This is good news for a few reasons. It bumps Pettite's start back to Friday against the Red Sox. It also gives the grossly overworked bullpen an extra day's rest that it sorely (the pun was accidental) needs. Additionally, this gives Jeter an extra day to heal from the beaning last night, and hopefully be full steam tomorrow. I sincerely hope that Torre keeps Wang slated to pitch Sunday, for it makes a stronger set of starters' arms with him and Pettite together.

Philip Hughes goes tomorrow. The Stadium should be palpably abuzz for that. Give 'em grief, Hughes!

More later.

After last night, another challenging one for Yankees fans (and even more the team), I failed to mention that A-Rod's hitting streak came to an unfortunate end. Since I try to maintain a glass-half-full attitude, it is well worth making brief mention of what A-Rod has done in the first 19 games--14 home runs, 34 RBIs, a .385 average, .444 OBP, 1.013 Slugging, dramatic walk-off home runs against the Orioles and Indians, pasting two shots against Curt Schilling, two more Monday night, while also playing a solid third base.

This goes well beyond player-of-the-month status for A-Rod, but easily qualifies as one of the greatest months of hitting in the history of the game without exception, and it's not yet done. He's simply carried an excellent hitting team on his back, and thank goodness, because they've needed all his heroic exploits so far as they've struggled through a nasty spate of injuries and shoddy pitching. The 20 strikeouts in 19 games are thus far more than acceptable given the massive offensive return, but A-Rod can't afford to be anxious (if he was at all last night when he struck out in the 8th, chasing a ball low and away) to try to do things single-handedly. It would be an understandable urge, given the team's state and his blistering hot streak. He just needs to be patient, keep letting the game come to him, and trust his skills and where best to apply them, as he has repeatedly done this April.

Hats off to you A-Rod for your brilliant hitting display so far. Thanks and congratulations are hardly sufficient acknowledgment for what you've served up this month.

In what is becoming my nightly three-hour exercise of pain and self-abuse, the Yankees dropped their fifth straight, losing 6-4 to the Devil Rays and getting swept in the two-game series. The Yankees bats were cold for much of the night against Scott Kazmir, who battled fever and flu-like symptoms recently, didn't have his normal low-to-mid 90s fastball yet still kept the Yankees off-balance through much of his stint. Down 2-1 in the 7th, with one out, Hideki Matsui (who absolutely pasted one of the longest home-run balls to right-center in the second that I've ever seen hit in that putt-putt-style park) dribbled one back to Kazmir, who promptly threw it in the dirt to first, allowing Matsui to reach on an E-1. Jorge Posada then smacked an RBI double to the wall in right-center. Robinson Cano then tapped back to the mound and, since Kazmir never turned to check Posada at second, the weak grounder to the absent-minded Kazmir allowed Posada to go easily to third. Phelps then continued to make his case for some playing time, or at least some at-bats, by singling in Posada, giving the Yankees a 3-2 lead that would, as is their wont lately, prove temporary.

Wang pitched well tonight, throwing 72 pitches through the first six innings and facing little trouble to that point other than the fourth and sixth.  After fanning Johnny Gomes, Navarro (who seems to hit the Yankees and almost no other teams as some protracted thank you--or some other blank you--to the Yankees), singled to center, after which newly minted Yankee-killer B.J. Upton smoked a double to right-center that should have scored Navarro, but he was held up before a series of Keystone-Cops relay-throw attempts by Cabrera and Cairo, who entered in the second for Jeter (more on that later). Vizcaino entered and intentionally walked Baldelli, and Harris screamed a liner that a leaping Cairo snagged for the second out. Just when I thought that the Yankees would get out of it, bringing Myers in to face Carl (The Truth) Crawford, Myers hung a fastball/slider--a typically slow pitch serving as a fastball that Crawford reached down and pulled into the right-field seats for a grand slam, 6-3 TB. The Yankees added a run in the 8th when a Matsui RBI single scored Abreu, but the Yankees would mount no more serious threat. A-Rod struck out in the 8th on a low pitch, probably trying too hard to make something happen, which is too bad, since he should have laid off that pitch, and so much has been coming so naturally that forcing the issue is exactly not what he should be doing right now. Yet watching the team struggle, it would be unfortunate but understandable if that was his mindset.

Wang's final stats mask a fairly impressive return--6 1/3 innings, nine hits, four runs (two from the 7th-inning Rays rally), no walks and 3 Ks. He threw hard all the way into the 7th, with a few of his fastballs reaching 97 mph. He was sharp and efficient, and avoided serious trouble except for the 4th and 7th. It was very good to see him back, and though the Yankees lost, Wang's return should portend good things for the team, the staff, and hopefully the team's morale. The bullpen just couldn't hold it, or hold it close. Matsui's return was equally welcome for me. He went 2 for 4, drilling that monstrous home run in the second and plating Abreu in the 8th with the single. The lineup still has dead wood at the bottom, probably exacerbated in the short term with the likely absence of Jeter for a couple days (we'll see, but I'd be surprised if Torre didn't hold him out at least tomorrow), after Kazmir drilled him above the left knee in the 1st. The Devil Rays lineup is significantly improved, and they have players from 1-9 who can make pitchers pay for mistakes, or even worse can handle good pitches. Navarro's single to start the 7th-inning was not a bad pitch by any means, unless Navarro is a dead-on low-ball hitter, which he might be, but Wang threw a good hard sinker that Navarro reached down and cleanly singled. Hard to blame Wang for that, and Upton is turning into an excellent young hitter. Crawford is starting to bloom, and is scary hitting third when he also possesses lead-off skills. It's a pretty good lineup Tampa Bay has, hard to deny it.

Kazmir was most efficient against the heart of the Yankees order, holding Abreu, A-Rod and Giambi 0-10 for the night, big key to the loss. As a side note to Devil Rays fans at the game tonight--all 98 of you with your cowbells--that the Yankees have won 26 World Series championships and have been perennially competitive or better for the past fifteen years has nothing to do with the fact that your franchise has stunk out loud since its sorry inception. So when you begin your "Yankees S*ck!" chants, like so many undignified fans around the country do when their teams play the Yankees, you look and sound pathetically foolish. That you lack any reasonably successful history, vis-a-vis anybody, is nobody's fault but that of your sad-sack, greedy, sorry team's management through its history--not developing pitching or dealing it away (with the one exception of Scott Kazmir in a classic rip-off of the Mets; what were they thinking?!), only recently honing and promoting young talent, and holding games in what is by far the worst sports venue in major American sports. So when you shout such chants, or are backed into a corner of booing to stifle the "Let's Go Yankees!" chants (the only positive ones emanating from your own sorry ballpark), you look terrible as fans and even worse as a franchise and meager fan base. Way to comport yourselves.

The team is floundering right now. When they get good run production, the pitching fails either at the beginning or later. When the pitching is good, as it was for the most part from Wang, the Yankees find themselves in a rare pitchers' duel and key hitters get shut down, a rarity lately. The team hasn't clicked as a whole in six games. While firing on all, or most, cylinders can be a lot to ask when the Yankees have suffered one injury after another, they're still unable to cobble it all together lately, or they implode at the end after playing most of a good game. That's unfortunate, given that the Yankees start a perilous stretch of their schedule. From tomorrow until early June, 27 of their next 40 games will be against above-.500 teams in 2006, and the other 13 against Texas and Seattle, just below .500 last year. They need to do more than tread water through this stretch, they need to play their best ball, get good starts, and pound mistake-prone pitching at every turn. Most of the teams they will face can score plenty of runs, and if the Yankees don't do the same, which is admittedly asking a lot given what the offense has done thus far, this 40-game stretch might place the Yankees in a deep deficit like they faced in 2005.

I love history--am working on another degree in it, actually--but I'm not a believer that history repeats itself simply because similar circumstances for similar people manifest themselves again. Every situation, even if it appears to resemble another in history, is different in numerous ways, and this Yankees team has some key differences from 2005. Tino went crazy in May 2005 yet cooled off precipitously afterwards, but his hot stretch helped keep the Yankees afloat after they struggled. Others can get similarly hot, other than A-Rod that is, but it in all likelihood won't come from the Yankees' first basemen. Tino also kept the Yankees clubhouse in order during his years there, in both stints as a Yankee. Who will be that kind of at-times vocal leader, urging the players to keep their heads high and battle? We'll see. Perhaps Pettite, perhaps Damon, but this team will need more than a spark but a series of sparks. A-Rod has carried a good-hitting, bad-pitching team through most of April. It's high time for others to step it up and play with passion and emotion on their sleeves. The time demands it.

Moments like these are challenging for me when writing about the current swoon in which the Yankees find themselves. This is not because I necessarily lack the vocabulary with which to express myself, or that useful thoughts fail to come to mind, but rather because it is becoming increasingly difficult trying to find new ways of saying some of the same-old things. After losing 10-8 tonight to a Devil Rays team that slapped around lousy Yankees pitching, the Yankees are now 8-10 for the year. In the last four games--the first three of which the Yankees won in a sweep of Cleveland, the last four which they've lost to Boston (3) and now Tampa--the Yankees have outscored their opponents 52-42, having scored at least five runs in every game and averaging 7.4 runs/game. Yet they're 3-4.

Bad pitching is killing this team. It now goes beyond just saying starting pitching, since the poor starting pitching has had obvious ripple effects on a bullpen that had been pitching well until the last game of the Cleveland series. The Yankees' pitching is careening off the embankments of the highway to ignominy. Igawa was simply terrible--inefficient in 4 1/3, allowing eight hits, seven runs, three walks, three Ks, and 2 home runs (Baldelli and Upton). His errant arm (more on this below, and word is there is reason for concern) failed to get pitches down in the zone, resulting in a good pummeling from a significantly improved Devil Rays lineup. So much for his realizing that he had some things to iron out. How about striding fully, Kei, in order to get your pitches down? Just a thought.  After the game, medical staff diagnosed Igawa with Errant Arm Syndrome (EAS), a fleeting viral infection afflicting pitchers, rendering them wildly unreliable, ineffective, and prone to bludgeoning in and around the strike zone. The contagion of EAS has now spread to Brian Bruney, who allowed three runs on two hits and two walks in 1/3 inning. Doctors at the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta have recently released a report detailing how EAS forms and is spread. Apparently the virus forms in the bodies of starting pitchers incapable of pitching their way either into the sixth inning, out of a wet paper bag, or both. From such weak endeavors, it can spread to other pitchers on the team, whom they have clinically and ironically termed "relief pitchers," when these "relief pitchers" either succumb to overwork from the onset of EAS among starting pitchers, or themselves display the inability to retire even a single batter when it matters. The good news from the CDC is that the symptoms of EAS can come and go, making previously afflicted pitchers appear normal, "perhaps even effective," according to the CDC, for days or even weeks at a time. The bad news is that it can return without warning, can spread like wildfire among a team's pitchers, and can last approximately six months. The CDC warns people affiliated with such an afflicted team to wear protective masks at all times, keep copious alcoholic libations available for mind-numbing pain relief, and to never hold their breath. [My point, said in this goofy fashion is simply this: things likely won't stay this bad, but they will likely return with this current crop of starters. Inconsistency with them may be the norm.]

As bad as the pitching was tonight (172 pitches in 8 innings of work, 15 hits and 10 runs allowed, six walks issued), it was doubly bad because the Yankees bats again sparkled tonight in a wasted effort. Though they hit into four killer double-plays, the team still banged out 8 runs on 13 hits and 5 walks. A-Rod is plain unconscious right now, creaming two more home runs for 14 total and an equally ridiculous 34 RBI, with his average an amazing .400. It's a foregone conclusion that he's the player of the month for April. The real question is whether he'll eclipse Albert Pujols's record of 14 home runs for April set last year. I don't know how anyone sober would bet against him.  Not to be overlooked, Jason Giambi's average has climbed to .310 after going 3 for 4 tonight, and a total of 17 RBI (but with a lot of bloop hits of which he, ironically, was so critical of A-Rod in that atrocious Sports Illustrated article last year; how things have changed). The Yankees have no fewer than six regulars hitting .300 or better, seven if you include Phelps, and yet the team is 8 and 10.

If they don't improve the starting pitching and soon, they're on the verge of being a more offensively potent version of the 2000-2003 Texas Rangers, who scored a lot and gave up even more. Yes, Wang is coming back tomorrow, thank goodness, and Mussina should be back against Texas around the beginning of May. They should obviously help to stabilize the staff. But Pavano is still experiencing forearm pain, has not been cleared to throw, and has no timetable for return. Even if Phil Hughes, who is scheduled to start Thursday against the Blue Jays (no slouches by any means), pitches well, the Yankees still need at least one more effective starter. Under normal circumstances, I would expect the Yankees to consider sending Igawa down for some fine-tuning, but at this point, would any replacement necessarily be more effective? I know Torre has tried to portion out the work in the bullpen, and has done a decent job with some and a poor job with others (Proctor, Bruney, Vizcaino especially), but under conditions when starters simply can't get into later innings without risking putting games out of reach, there's only so much criticism I'm willing to put on Torre. He's trying right now to manage wear--a lot for a couple relievers at a time but less frequently with long outings, or a little wear for a lot of relievers more frequently, with the hopes that they can handle lots of shorter stints.

Needless to say, it's not working. Overwork is overwork. Pettite did yeoman's work for this team Friday, pitching well into the 7th, and they blew it.  Igawa went six last in a victory Wednesday, Pettite went seven last weekend against the A's (again, blown), and Pavano went seven when they won against the Twins. That's it, four starts in which pitchers went into the 7th in 18 games. Repulsive.

I'm genuinely unsure about the Hughes call-up. It shows no faith in or patience with Wright, which sends a tough message to young pitchers of there's no patience, do it now or good-bye. It's also understandable, since Wright got cuffed around last night in Boston. It also accelerates Hughes, regardless of how many outings he has, well ahead of what the Yankees had intended for him. Yet at the same time, he can't be worse than what Wright, Karstens, and Igawa have given recently, and the Yankees simply have too many pitchers of the same cloth--good off-speed stuff, mediocre fastballs, therefore needing tight control that they too often lack. Hughes throws excellent heat, has good off-speed stuff when on, and, though it's the minor leagues, has been known to have pretty good control in the past. I have no idea what the Yankees will get, but the buzz at the Stadium will be palpable Thursday.

Things are becoming more precarious for the Yankees. More than being two games under .500, the hopes they pinned on their starters have been flushed down the toiled from injuries and ineffectiveness. The bullpen, once a strength, has its collective tongue hanging out right now.  Wang, who is pitching tomorrow, is not slated to go past six innings since it's first start, unless he's typically efficient (60-70 pitches in six innings). As the CDC has warned, don't hold your breath.

Edit: According to Pete Abraham's blog, Carl Pavano does in fact have a throwing session scheduled. When that is, I don't know, nor do I know if it is off flat ground or the mound. Mark Feinsand blogged April 20 that Pavano was scheduled to throw off flat ground Saturday.  Who knows, maybe he'll be back in a couple to a few weeks, but again, I'm not holding my breath.
HP

For those who may not have heard, Pulitzer-Prize winning author David Halberstam died in a car accident within the last hour in Menlo Park, CA. He was 73. Halberstam was the author of many books, including classics The Making of a Quagmire, The Best and the Brightest (one of my favorites), The Powers That Be (another favorite), The Fifties (which has some excellent chapters), The Teammates, and The Summer of '49, a terrific book about the back-and-forth Yankees-Red Sox battles that year that came down to the end of the season, when the Yankees took the last two games at home to win the pennant, and also about how marketing and advertising changed the game.  Well worth the read for those who haven't already had the privilege.

Halberstam had what one former history professor of mine termed "verbal diarrhea," since he was exceedingly long-winded. His style was to detail things that many a reader probably considered tangential, but for Halberstam, these details told important parts of stories about people, the problems they faced, how they changed their times and how their era changed them in turn.  To me, it exemplified that Halberstam approached his history writing with the idea that people, many people, made history (strangely but truly overlooked among many historians, especially those with a top-down view of historical change), and that important ideas and events altered peoples lives in myriad ways. These important events and ideas could be trends that seemed important at the time, but whose effects manifested themselves well down the road, well after their initial occurrence. Halberstam got at that in his own, inimitably loquacious way.

The access he was able to gain to people of power and influence, famous athletes, politicians, military brass, and media power brokers, was incredible, almost unmatched.  You will be missed, David.

"Sometimes you'll find your sense is all disjointed by
the lines and wires of salesmen, cheats, and liars."
--"Salesmen, Cheats, and Liars," The Lowest of the Low

After that stinker of a series, I have to say that I just don't feel that morose about it. It's definitely disappointing that the Yankees got swept, and blew leads in every game to boot, but as I've said before and will again, I'm convinced that some components on this team in April are not the same ones we'll see in the late summer. It was almost hilarious to see the graphic that ESPN posted late in the game last night, with the five current Yankees starters and their career starts. Pettite had 363, and the other Fantastic Four (Karstens, Wright, Igawa, and Rasner), had about 15-20 combined. It would have been naive to have pinned too much hope on them, Rather, it was hoped that Wright and Karstens could have given the Yankees several decent innings apiece, that Boston's not having seen that might help throw them off a bit, and that the Yankees could win by out-hitting Boston. That some of these, especially the last part, nearly happened without the services of Posada for the last two games (except for a pinch-hitting stint), Matsui for the series, and JD for game 2 is reason to take heart as fans. Combined with the career minor-leaguers the Yankees had going in games 2 and 3, this was about 2/3 of the Yankees regular lineup. That's not an excuse, it's just reality. You go with what you have, and that the Yankees lost three games by a total of four runs with a very weak bottom third of the lineup, and with two subpar starts and starters, is not the worst thing in the world by any stretch.

Equally valuable, the Yankees exposed Boston's vaunted staff of aces for being pretty good, but far from great, pitchers. Schilling got hit a lot, as did Beckett. One could say that Matsuzaka's start was the best of the three, but that would be splitting hairs.  None of the three dominated, all were hit and at times hit hard, by a lineup missing key parts. Losses stink for certain, especially sweeps. But this is April, it's 10% of the way into a very long season. Key players are coming back and will be back for next weekend's rematch, including Wang, Matsui, Posada, with Mussina soon to follow later.  No tears here.  We'll see where things shake out down the road a couple months. The Yankees have started slowly the last three years now, and yet still won the division in 2005 and 2006. There is a ton of baseball left, so early-season panic would be premature to say the least. I've said it before and I'll say it again, the Yankees need good pitching and health, and they've not had either to start the season, with the two overlapping recently and unfortunately. 

The biggest disappointment I take from the series is that the Yankees wasted a terrific start from Pettite, who threw very well and kept Boston's lineup under control. I'm not quite worried about Mariano, who has just not had regular work and it unfortunately has showed.  That will change soon enough.

I vented a bit over at Yankees Chick, mainly because a Boston fan was trolling for trouble in typically classless fashion, crowing over a series sweep but worse, failing to understand the posts that, like this has tried to do, put the series sweep into a broader context in which there were some positives. What rankles me as much as anything is that most of the people on the Yankees blogs on which I comment would have had a thousand better things to do than to rub Red Sox fans' noses in it if the Yankees had swept, such as in the infinitely more significant Boston Massacre III. We're too busy speaking about the game in a more intelligent manner, generally more decent than that or at least respectful enough not to act like a fool in someone else's cyber-backyard, and equally importantly, more interested in rooting for our favorite team and fashioning our fan identity in a positive way, rather than accentuating the negative by trying to elevate ourselves by ridiculing others. It speaks to something really pathetic about so many Red Sox fans when they would just as soon hate on the Yankees as they would root for Boston. Those two sides are far more intertwined in Janus-faced Red Sox fans I've encountered than in Yankees fans. Take for example the "Yankees SUck" chant emanating from the so-called Fenway faithful in the 8th inning of Friday night's game, not "Let's go Red Sox" to try to stir their team, but a cheap knee-jerk reflex to demean a team that has historically been better and classier, period. They couldn't root for their own in a key moment of the game, but had to resort to acting like idiots. Whatever, Red Sox fans can keep that nonsense. I'll stick to my Yankees any time and for all time, without needing to resort to mass debasement for self-aggrandizement.  I'm perfectly comfortable with my fan identity in its own right and on the Yankees' historically rich treasure-trove of positive accomplishments. Enough said.

No more worries about Boston for now. The Yankees have two key two-game series against Tampa, then at home against Toronto, before a three-game set against Boston in the Bronx.  It's time to make some hay against these teams, take three or four of them, and make sure they don't face a large, but early deficit.  Though Casey Fossum occasionally gives the Yankees fits, his 6.11 ERA should have the Yankees hitters salivating in a ballpark/putt-putt park in which the Yankees usually play very well. If Igawa can continue to do what he has in the last two starts--keep the ball down, throw a really curve--they'll be well served, and need some quality starts for a change.  Wang goes Tuesday against Scott Kazmir, a very good pitching match up, and hopefully Wang will be sharp in his first start. The Yankees really need it. The bullpen is far overused. It's time for starters to begin going 6 or more innings of quality routinely, not occasionally.

As always, GO YANKEES!!

In a small way, I'm just glad to have finally signed on after more than an hour of waiting, and wading, through the MLBlogs.com website. Who's issuing hall passes into MLBlogs, anyway?  It started off as a good day all around. GLG and the little guy had soccer, and both played hard and well on a day that was finally warm and sunny. Later, I grabbed some fine beverages for the game today, a four-pack of Sprecher Winter Brew, a big bottle of Avery Brewing Company's The Reverend, and Avery's Thirteen, an outstanding giant Dopplebock. Entirely too much for the game, for certain, but too much is better than not enough. Since the family is gone to my sister-in-law's for the night, I grabbed a pizza just the way I like it--extra cheese, pepperoni, and double anchovies. Rail in disgust all you like, I shan't back down on that, ever. I stick by my anchovies as I stick by my Yankees, family, and friends--always and to the end.

Yet these delicious perks were not enough, nor were five runs today as the Yankees fell to Boston, 7-5. Jeff Karstens was way off, struggling throughout against the Red Sox lineup. The Yankees' bats did well against Ol' 36 Beckett, touching him up for nine hits, five runs (four earned) in 6 2/3 innings. Not bad at all, especially since they were fielding 2/3 of their regular lineup. JD has back and hamstring soreness but is expected to play tomorrow. Jorge has a bruised thumb from yesterday's game, and will likely not play tomorrow, and Matsui is due back in a couple days, and not soon enough. Though Melky has stepped it up recently, he's in somewhat of a sophomore slump, batting .210.

Karstens was bad from the get-go, and I'm not convinced that this was just rust from a few weeks off from injury. He failed to get the Red Sox hitters to bite on his off-speed stuff, and his fastball is less than intimidating, to be kind.  I have to say that I'm looking more and more forward to Wang's return, and Moose's to a lesser extent, because they're more reliable and just plain better pitchers. The Yankees lost today while playing with a short lineup, staff, and bench. If all goes to plan, that won;t be the case next weekend, and I expect the results to be quite different.

People, we're going to be fine, regardless of whatever happens tomorrow. I feel that even more so after chin-wagging with Frank The Sage, which I'll continue in a few minutes but wanted to finish this post. We're talking about a staff, and have been to some degree from the get-go, that has had question marks, and more recently has had to rely on call-ups and unproven commodities. That's fine to some degree, but it isn't a long-term substitute for the regular-but-injured players, or for others we might see during the year. Without wanting to be too self-referential, I said in one of my previous posts that the Yankees right now are likely quite different from what we'll see in the next few months. I love Mientkiewicz's glove--part of the reason why I write out his whole name, out of respect for his leather--but let's face it, the first-base triumvirate/DH platoon is not panning out at the plate, and is costing way too many roster spots. Melky, it is fair to say, is in a sophomore slump. The bench is weak, and Nieves, while a good defensive catcher, has minimal offensive skills. The Yankees need to solve these outstanding issues as much as they need to get excellent players back to good health, and this will take time to do.

Let's be a little patient. I hate losing to the Red Sox as much as the next fan, but I firmly believe that we'll be fine soon enough, health and roster improvements coming assuredly.

As always, Go Yankees!!

7-6 Red Sox, after the Yankees were up 6-2, and in full control of the game. This one is tough to take, obviously because losing to the Red Sox is anyway. But given that Vizcaino, then Mariano especially, opened the floodgates for the Sox to score 5 in the bottom of the 8th, is rare in any other circumstance except for this series. For the record, I don't buy the ESPN pap that the Red Sox came back against Mariano because they've seen him so much. Perhaps in other games and other years that has mattered, but I would chalk it up to a dearth of work for Mariano. He just wasn't sharp, he threw pitches up to Varitek and failed to run the ball in sufficiently to Crisp. He needs more work, and while blowouts and dramatic come-from-behind wins are great for morale, they're tough when Mariano hasn't pitched in several days. The rest is good when you've pitched a lot, not when you've sat. The Yankees have not played in enough close games with the lead for Mariano to come in save situations. It showed tonight.

It's doubly unfortunate because A-Rod again was insane at the plate, belting two home runs off Schilling, who looked ragged most of the night, wasn't throwing very hard, and threw a ton of off-speed pitches.  A-Rod went 3 for 5, upping his average to .371, with 12 HR and 30 RBI. Two RBI a game for the first 15 games is just unheard of, and the 12 home runs in 15 games is the fastest ever. Just amazing, still amazing despite the bad loss. The Yankees also squandered a good start from Pettite with the blown lead. Pettite threw 6 1/3, allowing 8 hits, 2 runs (both earned), two walks and struck out three. He was muttering to himself as he left the mound, probably wanting to stay in the game which in retrospect may have made a difference, but who knew?

Giambi was 2 for 4, picking up his average to .271 and driving in A-Rod, who doubled, in the top of the 8th to make it 6-2. But again, Torre sent in a pinch-runner for him, taking his bat out of the game against a team who is not out of it until the game is over. For the illogic of this, I'd refer you to Geoff's excellent post at Bleeding Pinstripes, April 14. This move has cost the Yankees every time, and it was especially stupid tonight. How could Torre consider the game over at this point? What is the value of one run in that inning, when against the Red Sox, you have to always consider the possibility of a comeback, and you might need his bat later? Using the pinch-runner presumed way too much, in this of all series, even if they had won. Just stupid, as Geoff has already stated.

I'm also going to take some time to get on Robinson Cano. I love Cano's bat, his fielding has been strong, he has multiple skills, and he seems like a good kid, but he sometimes plays with his head up his rear end, and tonight did so on two occasions in the 8th. He failed to run hard out of the box (for the second time in two games, I might add) when he ripped the ball high off the Monster, and Man-Ram (for all his idiocy and foibles), who actually plays the ball well off the Monster, did so, held Cano to a single, making it first and third, with one out. Melky then chased a high fastball like he's never seen one before to strike out, Mientkiewicz walked, but JD wasted it with a weak grounder to end the bases-loaded threat. But if Cano had legged out a double, which he certainly could have done if he hustled out of the box, it would have made second and third, perhaps Boston may walked Cabrera to both set up the DP and to face the cold-hitting Mientkiewicz, and who knows? Maybe he gets walked with the bases loaded (as he did with 1st and 3rd), perhaps he actually hits a sac fly, gets a hit, whatever. Even if none of that comes to pass, hustle out of the stinking box!! In the bottom of the 8th, as Ortiz hit one to the Monster, JD actually made a decent throw in, and Ortiz clumsily stumbled in an uncertain slide/roll, falling onto then over the bag slightly. Yet there's Cano, waiting like a simpleton standing straight up, not too close to the bag presuming Ortiz would go in standing up which he didn't, then applied a late tag when Ortiz was back on the base. A prompt tag, hustling in the field, might have picked Ortiz off the bag. Either way, hustle your stinking rear end to the base to make a play!! Jeter would have, and always does!! Presume nothing in baseball!! Horrible. I'd consider sitting RC but these games mean too much, and the Yankees need his bat in the lineup, especially as a lefty, and he's starting to swing better. At the very least, I'd sic Bowa on him to chew RC out. The lack of hustle reminds me of Soriano's occasional stupidity and has no place either on the Yankees or in baseball.

Hopefully Posada's bruised thumb is well enough for him to play tomorrow, because though Nieves is a good defensive catcher, and threw out Alex Cora nicely, he's as ineffective at the plate as Mientkiewicz. 

A bad loss for sure. But the Yankees will rebound tomorrow with good effort. Let's hope Karstens follows up on Pettite's solid start. A-Rod is still the man, and thank goodness for his bat. More home runs that the rest of the team combined, and more than eight other teams. Ridiculous. Oh, and Karl Ravech, whom I generally like, up yours for that crack in the middle of the game during some sponsored game summary, saying, "You would never really associate delivering with A-Rod." Way to dismiss one of the greatest players in the history of the game, you hack. Go back to the studio with Steve "The Yankees should trade Alex Rodriguez because of what playing in New York has done to him"/"Faux Stand-Up GM" Phillips, you pip-squeak. Way to bite the hand that feeds your increasingly idiotic network, selling A-Rod's exploits for future games and present dramatic and great moments, while back-handing him and continually regurgitating unflattering parts of his history.  ESPN will be the first to over-dramatize and generalize if some fools boo A-Rod in the future, saying  "Look how New York is turning on him, and what he does is never good enough,"  but hypes his current hot streak to sell their televised games. Whatever Ravech and ESPN.

Yankees-Red Sox series are always huge rushes of adrenaline, emotional roller-coasters, and just plain grand events. Even if I find myself mired in other things--work, family, political news and issues--the inherent allure of this series always draws my steadfast attention. Though this is the first of several series the two teams will play, and though it's just late April, where the two teams stand, and what their relative strengths are right now, make this particular series at this particular time especially compelling.

The match-up between the Yankees' bats and the Red Sox starters, given their respective hot starts, provides this series with a certain irresistible-force-versus-immovable-object quality to it that will go far in determining the outcome of the series. Will the old adage, that good pitching shuts down good hitting, hold this weekend? Will Yankee hitters push Boston's pitchers into more deep counts, more frequently behind in counts, than other teams have thus far? Will Boston's arms keep Yankees hitters on their heels, mixing confusing off-speed pitches with good, moving fastballs that all three (Schilling, Beckett, and Matsuzaka) sport when on their games? It's literally power versus power. I'm inclined to think that old adage won't prove quite true this weekend. Though it will be far from a pushover, the Yankees have so many hot bats working right now, are so deep, and are so patient at the plate, that that adage is rendered tenuous this weekend. Abreu, Posada, Jeter, and JD are playing great right now, and Giambi is warming up also. That we have good, hot-hitting lefties going against three right-handers is potentially huge.

Yet of equal if overlooked importance is how the Yankees pitchers will fare against a really good Red Sox lineup. Key to this aspect will be limiting Boston's big three of Ortiz, Ramirez, and Drew, while also shutting down the rest of the lineup enough to minimize the amount of damage those three do should they be hitting well. Tying those two match-ups together, if the Yankees can give Pettite, Wright, and Karstens early leads, and hopefully relax them a bit, obviously it will make life easier instead of playing catch-up. The Yankees bullpen is stronger overall and well-rested. Each team has played well recently, each coming off clutch wins, though the Yankees' yesterday came with the rare drama of a six-run rally, and the all-too-hot A-Rod, all so frequently lately, capping it off.

Obviously I always wish, and believe, that the Yankees can win all the games, but two out of three wouldn't be bad by any stretch, especially given that this current team will change significantly when injured pitchers Wang and Mussina return (note the absence, yet again, of Pav-oh-no, which I'll discuss after the series), and when Matsui, who always plays well against Boston comes back. His absence has unfortunately/fortunately been overlooked lately because the hitters are so hot, and especially because of A-Rod's heroics, but Matsui makes the bottom half of this lineup go, makes it even deeper, not to mention the advantage of having a terrific left-handed bat against three Boston right-handers. He's an outstanding player, and his bat will make this lineup even scarier.

Key for me will be just being patient as a fan, which has taken time to learn and implement, when the Yankees and Red Sox play. So much happens, the games are so huge and hyped up, and momentum swings so frequently that staying on an even keel as the games proceed is a genuine challenge, especially since I'll be home with the kids tonight. I tend not to swear much at all around them, and try to keep it down even when things are good (though that's much harder to do than to temper the temper when things are bad because I let the positive excitement always show on my sleeve, and my propensity for boisterous celebrations can be easily confused for anger just from the sheer volume of my cheering), but I'm going to be extra careful tonight to be in check, and to enjoy it. That's something I've come to appreciate more and more about these contests, they're so unique that getting wrapped up in the negative, in the bile that some hold in this rivalry, can blur how great these games, these events, truly are. Not much compares--Duke-NC basketball, Michigan-Ohio State football, Montreal-Toronto hockey maybe come close, but this is different in so many ways that unique is almost an understatement.

I hope you all enjoy it as much as I will.
With froth, GO YANKEES!!!

Unbelievable! Un-bleeping-believable! The last I saw, it was 5-2 in the bottom of the 8th, one out, and Abreu was down 0-2 in the count. I had to pick up GLG from school and, as she and the little guy romped in the playground (since it was a nice day, who am I to deny some outdoor time?), I pondered if we would have another late-innings rally. As we got home, I figured I'd check the box of a final, or hopefully find the game in extra innings.  Way Better. WAAAAAAAAAAY BETTER!!! 8-6 Yankees win, again abusing Joe ("Here's your first grand slam, Jeter") Borowski for an amazing come-from-behind momentum builder heading into Boston for three this weekend.  I can barely type, I'm so giddy.

With two out and no one on in the 9th, Josh Phelps homered to left to make it 6-3. Posada, again having to pinch-hit and not get his scheduled day off, singled, JD walked, Jeter drove in Posada with a single to left, Abreu did the same, scoring JD to make it 6-5, with A-Rod looming. Borowski s*#t his drawers and threw a wild pitch, moving Jeter and Abreu to 3rd and 2nd respectively, then A-Rod nailed the next pitch to deep left-center. Ballgame over, Yankees win! The-e-e-e-e-e-e-e Yankees WIN!

It's impossible to say enough about A-Rod now. He's the last guy people want to see up now. 10 home runs and 26 RBIs in the first 14 games? Beyond ridiculous. Oddly enough, it was a pitcher's duel for most of the game, and Borowski blew an excellent start from Dr. Fausto Carmona. Giambi gave the Yankees a 2-1 lead with a solo homer in the 6th, and Luis Vizcaino, in his worst Yankees outing, promptly gave it back by allowing 4 in the 7th, including a three-run blast by Victor Martinez. Nuke LaFarnsworth in retrospect did a good job keeping it at 5-2 and, though Sean Henn allowed a run in the 9th, it wasn't enough for the vaunted Indians bullpen, on which I've not been sold at all this year, to contain the Yankees. Major kudos to Phelps for getting his first Yankees home run and for starting the rally.

I'll post more later. GLG has a soccer game, and I've got lots to do before and after then. Just Awesome!! For the time being, I can overlook Torre's quick hook of Rasner, who was excellent for the first three innings, but struggled in the fourth.  Many key components of the bullpen (Mariano, Bruney, Proctor) got to rest. More on this later. Giambi's fourth home run shows he's coming around, and Abreu had a huge series against Cleveland, going 4 for 5 today and upping his average from .261 before the series to .345 by the end of it. Awesome, and couldn't come at a better time.

luckyleftie, drinks are on me!! Great call on the sweep!

9-2 Yankees against an Indians team that has been absolutely over-matched the first two games of the series. Kei Igawa earned his first major-league win by pitching six strong innings, only surrendering 5 hits (three to Travis Hafner), 2 runs both earned, one walk with 5 K's. Impressive, and on 92 pitches. When his curve is sharp he's quite tough. Many of his breaking pitches--curve, slider, and change--have late break, and they're proving tough on right-handed batters such as Cleveland's when on the money. One more tomorrow afternoon for the chance to sweep.

The Yankees again had a huge early inning to blow a close game wide open, doing it with singles and doubles tonight rather than the long ball in the third. Jeter led off with a double, followed by an Abreu RBI single. After A-Rod forced Abreu at second, Giambi doubled A-Rod home to take the lead they would never surrender again. Posada, RC and Josh Phelps hit three consecutive singles, with RC and Phelps driving in runs, and JD added another RBI single to close the 5-run 3rd, with the Yankees batting around. A huge inning, again taking the pressure off a new(-er) Yankees starter allowing Igawa, like Wright, to pitch with a big cushion.

The Yankees capped off the scoring in the 6th, when A-Rod hit yet another home run, a two-run shot to left, and Giambi went back-to-back ("and a belly-to-belly," as John Sterling no doubt called. Jeez I miss listening to radio broadcasts with him, as I have almost solely the past three years) to make it 9-2. A-Rod went down to get a really good pitch from Mastny, a mid-shin pitch on the outside corner, yanking it four rows deep into the left-field seats. Just amazing to watch him now, 9 HR, 23 RBI, .365 BA.  Abreu went 2 for 3 to raise his average to .302, Jeter 3 for 5 for a .333 clip to start the year, Giambi 2 for 4, including his line-drive shot to right-center, to increase his average to a more respectable .255, and Josh Phelps 2 for 4 with his first Yankee RBI.  A fantastic offensive display against a pitcher Jeremy Sowers, who had started very well with a 2.08 ERA coming into tonight's game.

Again the bullpen shut things down, pitching three innings of no-hit ball. Proctor, Henn, and Britton each had one K, Proctor and Britton each walked one, but allowed no threat on the base paths to make the win assured.  Henn is proving Torre's decision to keep him over Villone to be a no-brainer thus far, though it's early and stiffer tests are coming, including this weekend against the Red Sox. Again, a really good start from Igawa and ladles full of runs allow the top-shelf relievers (Mariano, Vizcaino, and Bruney) to rest, and the depth of the bullpen right now, and the game situations the Yankees thankfully find themselves in, are allowing Torre to almost have "A" and "B" bullpen teams. Proctor and Bruney can trade off, Henn can do an inning well thus far, and Britton has been good in these two games to sit Nuke LaFarnsworth. It's worked ideally in this series and the arms, barring some extra-innings nightmare, should be fresh and rested for the series with Boston.

Again the Yankees played good defense, committing no errors. Jeter was solid in the field. The bats are rolling out runs and rallies--14 hits is real punishment for a staff to endure, especially after the waxing the Yankees inflicted on them last night. I'd be surprised if Nieves didn't start tomorrow, having caught, I believe, for Rasner for his two starts already. It would also leave Posada fresh for the weekend.

Lastly, Phil Hughes pitched a gem against Syracuse in AAA, allowing 2 hits and no walks or runs while striking out 10 in six innings. That will get some attention from the Yankees brass, and it's a marked improvement from his first two starts. Good to see the young arms sharp. Let's keep it going.

luckyleftie, get your drinks order ready. I have a feeling you're on the money with your pre-series sweep call. We'll find out starting in about 14 hours.

10-3 Yankees, and in nearly all facets, the Yankees got just what they needed (it felt pretty good as a fan too). Chase Wright earned his first major-league win in his initial start, pitching fairly well if inefficiently by throwing 104 pitches in 5 innings of work.  Yet except for some first inning trouble, when he walked the first two batters, he settled down to get Hafner on a grounder, and allowed a run on a grounder to Jeter.  He gave up a blast to Hafner in the third to make it 8-2 (more on the offense below, but I wanted to give the kid his due), and Casey Blake worked Wright over a bit with two hits and scoring the Indians third and final run. But overall Wright did the job--3 runs, 3 walks (two to start the game), and 3 strikeouts, including Sizemore--not bad at all, kid. The bullpen continues to be magnificent, as strong a part of this team as any facet right now for certain. In four innings, the combination of Bruney (1 1/3), Myers (1 2/3) and Chris Britton (9th) allowed no hits, no runs, no walks, and struck out two.  Amazing, and darn near impossible to ask for anything more.

The bats did the right thing by taking pressure off Wright immediately, working Westbrook over in the first and chasing him to the showers in the second. Damon led off the game with a walk, and Jeter for the second time this year executed a perfect hit-and-run single through the hole into right to send JD to third. After Abreu struck out, A-Rod crisply singled to left to score JD and tie the game, after which Giambi walked and Posada drove in the go-ahead run with a sacrifice fly to center. 2-1 Yankees, who would never relinquish the lead.  The Yankees broke it wide open in the second. With one out, Doug Mientkiewicz ripped his first home run as a Yankee to right (and I missed it while picking up GLG from soccer), 3-1 Yanks. JD doubled, Jeter grounded out to move JD to third, Abreu singled to make it 4-1, then stole second, and A-Rod homered for the 8th time in 12 games (Ahem!), 6-1 Yankees. After Giambi singled, Posada hit his 200th career home run, 8-1 Bombers, with five of the six scored in the second coming with two outs--clutch, timely hitting.  The Yankees tacked on two in the 7th, when Josh Barfield double-clutched a slow relay from Peralta and launched it seven rows deep into the box seats behind first base--classic. 10-3 Yankees.  The best part of that was that a teenage kid with a glove caught it cleanly on the fly and got a rousing hand from what fans remained. That kid will be the king tomorrow at school.

Importantly, the extra two runs allowed Joe to sit Vizcaino who was warming up in the bullpen and let Myers pitch the 8th and Britton the 9th, giving Mariano, Vizcaino, Proctor, Nuke, and Henn all an extra night off. If the team could keep most of those guys rested through another two wins for Boston this weekend, that would be ideal, but relieving their need to relieve yet again, especially after an off day, was terrific. It's almost impossible to overpraise the bullpen and the job they've done through the first dozen games. Just outstanding.

Jeter looked good in the field, and did a great job on a pop up in the top of the 6th, moving a good 30 feet from SS to around second to catch a pop-up in the swirling winds. On the next at-bat, JD made a fantastic running catch at the wall in Death Valley on a ball Peralta crushed. Mientkiewicz made a great play at first in the 8th; after A-Rod nicely timed a hot two-hopper from Martinez, he threw it way off line, into the first-base line. Mientkiewicz went about six feet off the bag, was on his knees, snagged the ball on a hop and tagged Martinez. Just sensational, particularly to put the play before his body. Beautiful.

Some side notes: A-Rod is hitting .421 (16 for 38) against right-handed pitching this year, and has 8 HR, 21 RBI while batting .375. Jeez-Is. The Indians, not the Yankees, had three errors tonight. RC has five walks already this year. People with under ten in the Robinson Cano walks total pool are in trouble. Jorge hit his 200th career home run. A hearty congratulations, Jorge. He also has 11 RBI and is batting a stout .364. Though striking out twice, Abreu's 2-for-4 night brings his average from .261 to .280, and 9 RBI in 12 games is not too shabby, BA.

luckyleftie, 1/3 of the way there, buddy! Let's hope they get the other two for the sweep, and the rounds are on me.

"Gonna open up my doors and windows and let the cool fresh air in,
and I go walking out on the green grass, and let my new day begin."
                                                                                                                ---FB & C

Days like today in the Midwest more than make up for some of the other things I don't enjoy about living in the Midwest.  The weather is gorgeous--70 degrees, not a cloud in the sky. The kids are out of school early today for some conference, which is fine--we'll go to a big wooden playground, probably play some hockey in the drive way, then GLG has soccer in the late afternoon, so I'll probably pick up the Yankees game around the 3rd or 4th.

The Yankees have interesting pitching match-ups in the series with the Indians.  Chase Wright debuts tonight against Jake Westbrook, Kei Igawa versus Jeremy Sowers tomorrow, and Darrell Rasner against Fausto Carmona in the finale Thursday. Sowers has pitched well this year with nothing to show for it, though he did give up five walks with one hit against the White Sox.  The Yankees avoid C.C. Sabathia, but have had good fortune against him in the past. These are winnable games, though the Indians lineup should definitely challenge the young Yankees pitchers.  I'm especially interested to see how Wright handles lefties such as Sizemore and Hafner. We also have a definite edge in the bullpen, with the Indians trotting out the unimpressive duo of Borowski and the ancient Hernandez.

Time to get some momentum back, even if it's only three at home.

P.S. I miss Matsui, no offense whatsoever to Melky. Matsui makes the bottom half of the lineup go when he's on, and he's a great teammate. Apologizing to his team last year for getting hurt? Most impressive, and highly unselfish.

In my previous post today I mentioned some simple analysis of the first few months of the Yankees' schedule, mainly April, May, and June.  I stressed the upcoming stretch of games that will do much to determine what kind of team the Yankees have in 2007.  I'll leave it as originally posted below:

As I mentioned briefly in the previous post, the Yankees would serve themselves well with a quick start to the season, not only because it's always the right way to begin any season, but also because from the end of April through the first week of June, the Yankees will face a stretch of tough teams that will go far in telling us what kind of team the 2007 Yankees will be. Broken down briefly, April starts with with the home-stand against the Devil Rays and Orioles, then shifts to the road and Minnesota and Oakland (the first of four West Coast trips in 2007).  After a day off, the Bombers return home for three games against Cleveland, then hit the road again for a weekend series with Boston (for which I'll assemble my ten--or more--favorite moments in the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry), then two-game series against Tampa Bay and at home against Toronto, with three to end the month against Boston. 

Before assessing May, I have to say that I find the day off between the opener and the second game of the series (Wednesday) to be nothing short of idiotic.  Is there a scheduling conflict with a Papal visit that I overlooked? Is Billy Joel playing the Stadium? WHY THE STINKING DAY OFF?!? Also, even though I cannot stand the two-game series, at least one in April is done right.  Since Tampa is a dome team, there is no chance of a rain out, ensuring the games will be played and spare the Yankees a scheduling juggling act later in the season. Let's hope the two against Toronto go off without a hitch.  Although we couldn't have done better than we did in August against Boston (Boston Massacre III, an ***-kicking any which way you could wish it, which looks great and feels better when written) last year, needing to pile together games because of rain outs is a colossal pain to be avoided, especially when one stems from a pointless two-game series.

Again, the end of April through the first week of June could catapult the Yankees or leave them in an early-season scramble.  After the home series against Boston, NY travels to Texas for three, then comes home for four against Seattle and three versus Texas.  The Yankees immediately head to Seattle for the second of four West Coast swings, then stop on the way back in Chicago for three against the White Sox, then three against the Mets, which at least gets them in their own beds. Then Boston looms again, followed by the Angels, then on the road to Toronto to close May, then three more in Boston followed by four, again in Chicago, against the other Sox. Apparently they couldn't make the 1,000 mile trip to the East Coast in the few weeks between series...

In sum, from April 25 through June 7, 27 of the 40 games the Yankees will play will be against teams with records above .500 in 2006, with the other 13 against Texas and Seattle, teams just below .500 last year. No picnic, with 22 of the 40 on the road and a second early-season trip out West factored in. But that's a good stretch to keep our eyes on, a good barometer for the Yankees.  If we could win at least 24 of those games, we'd stand to be in good shape. Of course, this assumes we have a good April, which I feel in my bones we will. The rest of June, while no cupcake, seems considerably easier on paper, with Pittsburgh, Arizona, the Mets again, Colorado then San Francisco in our third of four West Coast trips, then Oakland to end June.

I won't bore you with any more blow-by-blow listings of the rest of the schedule.  I think I made my point.

Yeah yeah, I know.  It's an off day so I should be doing something else--don't I know it. But this is a good time to summarize where we are and why we're here, most of which regular readers and bloggers already know. But hopefully this will help to wash some of the nasty taste out of our mouths, for there is good to focus on as well as the bad, and we all know what ugly.

On the positive side, there really have been some good things happening for the Yankees despite the 5-6 start.  The bullpen for the most part has been terrific. Luis Vizcaino has been well worth the trade for Randy Johnson, posting a 1-1 record, 1.08 ERA and as importantly as anything allowing 2 hits in 8 1/3 innings.  Outstanding. Brian Bruney has helped save Yankee bacon big-time thus far, going 1-1 with a 1.29 ERA in 6 appearances this April. Incredibly, he leads the Yankees with 11 strikeouts in 7 innings. His outing Saturday night, after working late relief late Friday night, was massive and clutch. Mariano has the hiccup yesterday, his only blemish so far, resulting in grossly inflated Brad-Lidge-like numbers that don't come close to justifying Mariano's historic and recent greatness. Proctor has been good, posting a 3.24 ERA in 8 games (he's pitched in 8 of the Yankees' 11 games!!), and was very good against Oakland. Despite the implosions against the Twins and A's in back-to-back games, Nuke LaFarnsworth was good Saturday night, and equally meaningful to me, has done two things: he has admitted to having some mechanical flaws to work out (such as having too short a stride causing his pitches to sail high), and he ****** it up when he got demoted, saying he didn't care in what innings he pitches. That's being a man, and I respect that. He didn't pull a Brad Lidge, whose implosions have been a long string of depth charges over the past season-plus for the Astros, and tell everyone about how "ticked" he is to lose his closer job when his ERA was over 6.  Kudos, Nuke.

The starters, or those presently known as Yankee starters, have been better in the last two series than in the first two, so the improvement is hopefully a trend.  Yet this remains to be seen given the recent nasty spate of injuries. Pettite has been excellent overall, pitching a whale of a game yesterday when the Yankees, and especially the bullpen, really needed it. That's what clutch performance is--doing it when there is no choice but to, when you must. Rasner, Igawa, and Glass *** [fn YC] were all better in their second starts than their first, making Pav-oh-no's 42nd injury while in a Yankees' uniform all the more frustrating. He's been gone far more than he's been here and, without wanting to sound like a bean-counting corporate flak, the Yankees are just not getting any return on a very expensive investment.  While Wang and Karstens have been hurt with relatively minor injuries, they're due back within about a week if all progresses well (jeez it's hard to type with all these fingers crossed...). Wang will be good as soon as he gets regular work in. That sinker is just trouble to deal with. They have just not had any type of regular rotation. More than the high hopes for the 2007 rotation, their plans for the first few weeks have been completely inverted. Instead of banking on using a fifth starter occasionally in the first few weeks because of the off days, injuries and early-season inconsistencies have forced a revolving-door of starters in.  Irregularity has unfortunately been the norm.

As bad as our starting pitching has at times been this year, better recent starts against the Twins and A's--no slouches--and excellent relief pitching has the Yankees in the middle of the team ERA pack at 3.76. That's not bad at all, and is likely to get better for the starters when Wang returns. What we'll get from Karstens and Rasner on a regular basis is anyone's guess.  The Yankees' staff is 6th in the AL in home runs allowed (9), but is tied for 10th in walks allowed (41), too many.

For the bats, the start has been quite good, but the A's series brought some players' and the team's stats down to earth a bit.  The team is second in runs scored with 64 (Toronto has 67), and third in average, batting .270.  The Bombers are tied for 4th in home runs with 12, are sixth in walks worked, and tied with Boston for third in on-base-percentage. [By the way, Toronto has hit an incredible 36 doubles to start the season--three a game. Amazing.] A-Rod has been a monster, carrying the Yankees for the first two weeks and certainly their MVP during this stretch. Both at the plate (.372 BA, 7 HR, 18 RBI, but 10 strikeouts) and in the field, he's been much more relaxed, and he's creaming the ball in many clutch at-bats, yesterday's sacrifice fly a prime example of making productive outs.  BTW, as the excellent Geoff has posted at his sterling Bleeding Pinstripes blog about how one play, one nuance can make a significant difference in a game, think about what would have happened yesterday if A-Rod had hit a home run instead of that productive sacrifice fly to the wall. This would have been a very different conversation, but that's not his fault, just a matter of inches in that case. Despite his defensive woes, Jeter has had a good start, hitting .319 (OBP .407), and will get more RBI opportunities when the bottom of the order shapes up. Cano has hit .311 (OBP .360, which for him is real progress, having actually drawn four walks this year), and Posada is hitting an excellent .366. This lineup will pick up when Abreu isn't hitting .261 and Giambi .205.  After starting out blistering hot, JD has cooled to .290, which isn't bad.

For the bad news, which is old news for the most part. The defense has been terrible and is tied for reason number one for the 5-6 start.  The Yankees have allowed nine unearned runs, tied with slovenly Texas and Tampa Bay for highest in the AL, and those two teams have far and away the highest ERA. That's what happens when YOU'RE DEAD LAST IN FIELDING PERCENTAGE, as the Yankees are thus far.  This is bound to improve, Jeter won't fulfill the pace of 89 errors for the season that he's on, and Abreu is highly unlikely to drop two balls the rest of the season, much less in one series as against the A's. But jeez, 14 errors? Terrible. Starting pitching is reason #1A. Though improved against the Twins and A's, the first two series against Tampa Bay and Baltimore were awful in their own right and the deleterious ramifications for overtaxing the bullpen. Hideous, and it remains to be seen exactly when it will steady itself with this nasty rash of injuries. People that we as fans have deemed role players (Rasner, Karstens, Igawa, now Chase Wright) will loom large in keeping the Yankees where they are, or better with luck, in this early stretch. I wouldn't be nearly as mad about the Pav-oh-no injury if it weren't for how last year was, when he simply let everyone down not only by the weird and irresponsible injuries but his abject failure to report them.  That we should be glad that he decided to speak up and admit to some stiffness is a pittance for progress indeed. Figures, just when he threw an excellent start, which it was against the Twins, this happens.  Mussina is bound to be better than he's thrown thus far.

As for Mientkiewicz, I don't know what we'll do. His glove is dandy and has helped out a ton thus far, but his bat has just been dead weight. I don't know if Phelps would be better, but we just might see Phelps playing more to start the game with Mientkiewicz coming in later, or Cairo playing more.  His glove isn't bad, and even his bat would have outshone Mientkiewicz's thus far.

What has me worried somewhat is that these Yankees starters lack overwhelming stuff, with the possible exception of Wang who though not a strikeout pitcher, overpowers hitters with a sinker they can't control, just as effective when it's 14 ground outs as a power pitcher striking out 12 a game, and with far fewer pitches. There are simply too many guys who throw in the mid-to-high 80s, who need to rely on control, who lack the power to blow people away. Though it's a nice contrast to a rather hard-throwing bullpen, it's still not what the Yankees have had in other years such as the late '90s (ah, pardon me for a moment whilst I daydream of Cone when he could still throw 94-95, when El Duque burst onto the scene, when Clemens was back to being overwhelming after 1999...). Ugh, back.

After all this, and though rightly quizzical about the first two weeks, there are certainly some positives to take from what we've seen.  Also, it might be worth thinking about as we wonder what we'll see with Boston and a really tough part of the schedule looming (I'll re-post my brief analysis of the early season schedule) with 27 of the 40 games coming against above-.500 teams in 2006, and Texas and Seattle just below that--since we've far from seen this team's best baseball, better times might be ahead as long as defense and starting pitching improve.  We'll get Wang back, a big plus, some players are bound to hit better, the bottom of the lineup will likely pick it up and allow JD and Jeter to drive in runs, and we have a lot of pluses in the bullpen. 

Let's hope better things are to come. This is a very tough stretch ahead.

In the words of that immortal late twentieth-century thinker, Butthead, "Uuuuuuuh, Huh?" Just when I thought I could count on something this season, it turns out that in the first eleven games this year, the one thing we can certainly count on is that you can't count on anything thus far this year.  Mariano got Chavez Chavez and Crosby out quickly, allowed a single to left from Todd Walker, walked Jason Kendall showing bad control in the process, and though ahead of Marco Bleeping Scutaro, allowed a three-run, walk-off home run to that light-hitting, weak scrub. Horrible. 5-4 A's.

There were several shameful parts of this, not the least of which is that it was to the Yankees' benefit that they faced the bottom of the A's order, yet got burned by sub-par hitters. Scutaro? Please. Also, the Yankees wasted a gem of a pitching performance by Andy Pettite, who pitched seven very good innings, threw 101 pitches, and gave the bullpen much-needed rest. The Yankees wasted a good comeback as well, with three of the four Yankees runs coming from sacrifice fly balls. They got next to nothing off Rich Harden, who apparently experienced shoulder tightness and left in the 7th, not good. Proctor pitched a good 8th, restoring some confidence in him this series with solid work overall.  The bottom of the lineup finally came through, though Mientkiewicz made a questionable decision trying unsuccessfully to score from third on a wild pitch in the top of the 6th with two outs, especially since the one place in the A's home park where there isn't a lot of foul territory is immediately behind the plate. Ugh. Jeter committed another error, looking ragged in the field at times and good other times. Damon had a terrible series at the plate, and Abreu struck out three times today.

Some positives, but not many. A-Rod has hit safely in every game this year, and is still mashing the ball. Posada has also had a good start to the season. Proctor has been good lately.  The bullpen got some rest, and will get more on the off day, which couldn't come at a better time.

For myself as well, I'm glad for the off day, just to get away from feeling the compunction to watch and write about a team that despite all its talent, is playing inconsistent, mediocre baseball. I did that after the game today, enjoying some barbecued burgers, and reading with my son, always good therapy after such a bad loss.

Word is that Pavano and Mussina are on the DL, and Wang and Karstens aren't due back for about a week more. The rotation needs to weather this stretch, as does the whole team. I'm not surprised by the Pavano injury, and question whether he'll be back anytime soon.  He sounds pessimistic about his forearm, almost as pessimistic as fans are about his body of work thus far for the Yankees.

Bizarre, very bizarre, reminding me way too much of 2005 so far. Nothing is coming easy, the team looks sluggish, and it's impossible to know what to count on day to day with this team.  Let's get things turned around, boys. You've already blown too many games.

Good Morning Everyone. Our special this morning is three scrambled eggs, three pancakes, two pieces of toast, two innings from Brian Bruney, and a heaping side order of extra innings home-run drama from Jason Giambi.  Would you like coffee or orange juice with that? Yes, I know my legs are hairy and the peach uniform is not my color, but what do you expect well after midnight?

Back to reality, this was a big, and hopefully not Pyrrhic, victory for the Yankees, 4-3 in 13 innings. This win saw a lot happen. As a disclaimer, we got back from our day of fun and revelry at about 9 locally, and after putting the kids to bed, I didn't get to the game until the bottom of the 6th. My understanding is that A-Rod hit yet another home run to finally jump-start the offense.  Good, especially for the helpings of crow that his detractors are cramming down (despite his three strikeouts tonight, because that happens sometimes with power hitters who carry teams in the first two weeks, Ahem.). The top of the 7th saw Cano work a walk complete with some close and thankfully favorable calls a home plate then, brilliantly timed with RC running on the play, Jorge Posada pinch-hit for Wil Nieves and scorched a 1-2 pitch down the right-field line, easily scoring RC to tie the game at 3, the penultimate scoring play until Giambi's blast (more on that in a paragraph or three).

The bullpen held its ground very well, with Proctor pitching 1 2/3 innings of excellent ball. Relieving Henn in the 7th, he got Kendall to pop up his weak bunt attempt , catching it on the run for the first out with two already on, and Kendall's sad-sack bunt the first out. After Marco Scutaro flew out deep to right to advance Crosby to third, Proctor got Shannon Stewart to weakly tap to A-Rod for the third out. Additionally, A-Rod detractors (and yes, as part of self-critique, I realize I gloat a bit over A-Rod's exploits after a win, but he deserves it, especially with all the nonsense he's had to endure), A-Rod has played a very good third base this year thus far. Admit it.

After the Yankees squandered an Abreu single, or more aptly, Abreu squandered his own single by failing to properly read Embree's pickoff move and getting caught stealing, Proctor worked 2 outs in the Bottom of the 8th, and Myers slowly mopped up in his own inimitable way, walking and getting behind batters but avoiding the worst of trouble.  RC worked a walk in the 9th but got caught stealing to end the threat.  In the bottom of the 9th, Abreu provided a brief heart attack by dropping a pop-up that wasn't easy, especially with the deep no-doubles defense the outfield was playing, but one he should have made on Kendall, giving the A's 1st and 2nd with 1 out. Yet Everyday Vizcaino worked out of the jam well, getting the Scutaro to pop out and Stewart to weakly tap out to end the threat. On to the extras again.

The Yankees worked the bases loaded in the 10th, after Posada singled and the Captain hit the ball into the hole, and Crosby threw it away to make it 2nd and 3rd, 2 out. After Abreu was walked, A-Rod popped out, getting a bit ahead in his stride on a high pitch.  Nuke LaFarnsworth achieved some redemption in the 10th, working around an infield hit by Nick Swisher to retire the rest of the side. Torre broke down crying, but eventually succumbed to reason, to use Mariano in the 11th, and the Sandman pitched efficiently, getting some defensive help from the Captain, who otherwise committed two more errors tonight in maybe the roughest defensive start to his career (I say this without doing the quantitative analysis, but it's probably a safe hunch).

The real guts came from Brian Bruney, who pitched 29 pitches tonight to earn the win and the save (one real, the other metaphorical) after throwing 36 pitches last night, to earn the next three days off, some cold Anchor Steam beers, and a ton of ice on the limb. At long last, to come to the wished-for shot, I said immediately before Giambi's home run in the top of the 13th off a 3-1 pitch, "Come on, Giambi, skull one out of the park." Ask, and ye shall receive, mon frer, for the Giambi delivereth, a long, perfectly timed blast just to right-center to make it 4-3. Bruney gamely worked through the 13th, after walking Chavez Chavez on four straight, getting Walker and Crosby on deep fly outs, and whiffing the impressive rookie Buck looking.

We needed this one, but my immediate concern is in what shape is our bullpen?  Some guys could probably give an inning tomorrow if very like necessary. But some guys, such as Vizcaino, Proctor, and Bruney will likely not see action.  Henn might be available, as might Mariano, but this series has worked us over a ton.  It's a product of more than just extra innings.  It's obviously impossible to time it, but the brief injuries to Mussina and "Glass ***" [footnote Yankees Chick] shortened the pen considerably, precluding call-ups, though who knows how well they could have pitched.  This will likely shake out soon enough, but jeez, the bullpen has had its tongue hanging out lately, either by late innings or inefficient starting pitching. Something has got to give eventually.

But these problems are better dealt with after a big win.  Thanks for providing dramatic, and seemingly personal, timing Giambi.  Let's play better defense for the next month, please, and let's hope Pettite throws a 67-pitch complete game heading out of town.

I know I won't be the only one, but I'm staying up for this one, too.  Some redemption for Nuke LaFarnsworth, Mariano appears in the 11th, and Posada, JD and the Captain against DiNardo. Smells like runs.  See you in a bit.

I'd like to say that the sun always comes up after such difficult evenings, when time seems wasted, but that would presume a lot h