Blast Back

I hear a lot of people freaking out because the Yankees are currently hanging out in last place. Actually, I think I hear a lot more freaking out by Mets fans, but whatever.

Anyway, as I type this, the Yankees record is 24-25. Yeah, no one wants to be under .500, but hey it is what it is. Yeah, no one wants to be in last place, but that also is what it is.

However, the Yankees are only 5.5 games behind Boston.

Isn't it better to be in last place and 5.5 games behind the first place team, than in second place and 10.5 games behind the first place team as was the case on May 25, 2007?

On another note, is the AL East the best division in baseball at the moment? If both the Yankees and Orioles win today, the AL East will be the only division in baseball where every team is at least .500.

Lazy Blogger

I have been a very lazy blogger.

I let a 10 game span without doing a 10 Game Rewind, and I haven't really done any other posts either.

I have a couple ideas for some, I am just not in the mood to do them.

There are just 20 school days left though. After that, I will be back to my regular blogging self.

In the mean time, enjoy the return of Alex Rodriguez, and what is hopefully a very long winning streak. I am mucho tiredo of the whole being in last place thing.

Central Central

Yep, another chunk of schedule is behind us. Ultimately, I wanted to go 12-7 during this time frame, but the Yankees only managed to go 9-9. Yes, one of the games was rained out.

I think a lot of the disappointment during this stretch is related to both Arod and Posada being on the DL...not to mention both Hughes and Kennedy sucking hard.

Anyway, the next chunk of schedule will span roughly a month. It includes one interleague series with the Mets, but otherwise it is a prelude to the true interleague portion of the schedule.

Intermission:

Yankees	Record	H/R Record	Red Sox	Record	H/R Record
@ TB	21-16	13-7	@ MIN	19-17	13-7
@ TB	21-16	13-7	@ BAL	19-19	10-6
@ TB	21-16	13-7	@ BAL	19-19	10-6
@ TB	21-16	13-7	DAY OFF	--	--
vs. NYM	19-16	8-10	vs. MIL	18-19	9-12
vs. NYM	19-16	8-10	vs. MIL	18-19	9-12
vs. NYM	19-16	8-10	vs. MIL	18-19	9-12
DAY OFF	--	--	vs. KC	16-21	9-9
vs. BAL	19-19	9-13	vs. KC	16-21	9-9
vs. BAL	19-19	9-13	vs. KC	16-21	9-9
vs. BAL	19-19	9-13	vs. KC	16-21	9-9
vs. SEA	15-24	6-12	@ OAK	23-16	12-9
vs. SEA	15-24	6-12	@ OAK	23-16	12-9
vs. SEA	15-24	6-12	@ OAK	23-16	12-9
@ BAL	19-19	10-6	@ SEA	15-24	9-12
@ BAL	19-19	10-6	@ SEA	15-24	9-12
@ BAL	19-19	10-6	@ SEA	15-24	9-12
DAY OFF	--	--	DAY OFF	--	--
@ MIN	19-17	13-7	@ BAL	19-19	10-6
@ MIN	19-17	13-7	@ BAL	19-19	10-6
@ MIN	19-17	13-7	@ BAL	19-19	10-6
@ MIN	19-17	13-7	@ BAL	19-19	10-6
vs. TOR	17-21	7-12	vs. TB	21-16	13-7
vs. TOR	17-21	7-12	vs. TB	21-16	13-7
vs. TOR	17-21	7-12	vs. TB	21-16	13-7
vs. KC	16-21	9-9	vs. SEA	15-24	6-12
vs. KC	16-21	9-9	vs. SEA	15-24	6-12
vs. KC	16-21	9-9	vs. SEA	15-24	6-12
vs. KC	16-21	9-9	DAY OFF	--	--
@ OAK	23-16	12-9	vs. BAL	19-19	9-13
@OAK	23-16	12-9	vs. BAL	19-19	9-13
@ OAK	23-16	12-9	vs. BAL	19-19	9-13
Win %	.491	.516	Win %	.482	.508

During this time, the Yankees are playing 30 games. Once again, my goal is to get above the .500 mark and to stay there. Is 18-12 over this stretch asking too much?

The Art of Being a .500 Team

The Yankees have this being a .500 team to an art at this point in the season.

As noted by Peter Abraham:

Not only are they 17-17, but:

• they are 8-8 at home.
• they are 9-9 on the road.
• they are 7-7 in games decided by 2 runs or less.
• they are 4-4 in games started against lefties.
  
• they are 13-13 in games started against righties.
  

Also, they have scored 151 runs and have allowed 150. This works out to a pythagoreon record of 17-17 as well.

At this very moment, the Yankees are a true .500 team. It would be nice if something improves. Pitching, offense, something.

10 Game Rewind

Season Record: 14-16

10 Game Record: 4-6

Standings: Tampa Bay (16-12), Boston (17-13), Baltimore (15-13), New York (14-16), Toronto (12-17) (I wonder if Tampa Bay was ever in first place this late in the season.)

Opponents: @ CWS (3; 2-1), @ CLE (4; 2-2), vs. DET (3; 0-3)

Pitching:
Team ERA: 4.68 (12th in AL) (Last time: 4.60; 12th)

The Good:

• Mike Mussina: Apparently people were too quick to bury Mussina at the start of the season. Against the White Sox, he went 7 innings and only allowed 2 earned runs. There was also an amusing situation of miscommunication during the 7th inning when Girardi thought Posada was telling him to get Mussina out of the game. Overall, he has a 3.00 ERA over those two games and is 2-0. His next start is tomorrow against Seattle. Hopefully this can continue.
• Chien-Ming Wang: He has been our only consistent starter this season. He has made 6 starts, and all but one of them were of the quality variety. He is the only Yankee pitcher who can claim as many as 4 quality starts. Over his last 2 starts, he is 2-0 with a 2.08 ERA. This includes a 1-0 victory over the Indians on April 27.
  
• Mariano Rivera: Yes, we are into May and Rivera has still not allowed a run, earned or otherwise. He pitched in 3 games over the last 10 days and got 3 saves as a result.

The Bad:

• Phil Hughes: Well, it looked like his start in Chicago would have been good, but a large rain delay stopped it after only 2 innings. Two good innings to be sure, but only two innings. His start against the Tigers was much worse. He only went 3.2 innings and allowed 6 earned runs. The worst part is he didn't mention anything about a pain in his side which turned out to be a stress fracture of his 9th rib. Mr. Hughes is out 6-8 weeks.
• Ian Kennedy: It looks like has improved a bit, but he is still not up to par. I wouldn't so much care about the 6.52 ERA over the last 2 starts if it meant he was pitching deeper into the games. 5 innings and 4.2 innings are just not enough. He seems to be getting better though. Now, it looks like he only has one inning per start where he throws a lot of pitches and gives up a bunch of runs. If he could limit the damage, or at least the pitches thrown in those innings, he could do a bit better.

The Buzz:

• Phil Hughes is on the DL. Yeah, stress fracture of the 9th rib. He isn't allowed to do any baseball activities for 4 weeks. At which point he will be reevaluated and it will be determined if he can start a throwing program to get him back to the majors. Interestingly, it was May 1 last season when Hughes injured himself and was out for several weeks.
  
• Darrell Rasner is joining the rotation. With Hughes on the shelf, Rasner will be taking over the spot in the rotation. In Scranton, Rasner has been pitching to a 0.86 ERA and was recently named Independent League Pitcher of the Week. It is easy to forget that Rasner is only 27 years old.
• Brian Bruney tore a ligament in his foot. He went to three different doctors for a course of action. Two recommended surgery, one said surgery wasn't a certainty. He has decided to try and rehab it for 6 weeks using a walking boot first. If nothing has changed in those 6 weeks, then he'll get surgery no harm done. If he gets the surgery now he is out for the season and ready for spring training. If he gets the surgery in 6 weeks he is out for the season and ready for spring training, but he'll have the possibility of pitching again in 2008. No harm in his course of action.
• Billy Traber was sent down. I seriously didn't know about that until I saw that Sean Henn was activated off the DL and then designated for assignment. He was doing a pretty good job, but with Hughes and Kennedy and to a lesser extent Mussina getting knocked out of games early, having a lefty specialist was a bit of a luxury.
• Jonathan Alabaladejo is back with the team. He has been pitching well. I have no qualms with him being on the roster.
• Edwar Ramirez is back on the team. I'm not sure how long this will last, but I am ok with this as well.
• Chris Britton is back with the team. I'm sure he will be sent back down quickly. I'm not sure why the Yankees even traded for him if they weren't going to let him pitch at any point ever.

The Offense:
Team OPS: .735 (6th in the AL) (Last time: .759; T3rd)

The Good:

• Johnny Damon: Damon started out the season rather slowly, but he has really started heating up over the last 10 games. Since April 21, he is .378/.465/.622. I'm really digging those extra base hits. He has a respectable .865 OPS for the season, and it looks like his numbers could keep going up for a while.
  
• Jason Giambi: Well, Giambi's batting average isn't exactly lighting it up. Over the last 10 games (of which Giambi played 8), he is only batting .259. However, his OBP is the respectable .364 and he is slugging the very, very good .630.

The Bad:

• Derek Jeter: .256/.283/.279 since April 21. Yeah, I'm not too keen on the slugging being below the OBP. He really needs to start heating up now that Posada and Arod are on the DL. The Yankees can't afford to carry this many dead bats with 2 to 4 fifths of the rotation struggling at any given point.
• Robinson Cano: Cano is still sucking ass. For the entire season he is .155/.212/.236. I believe he has the lowest batting average of all qualifying players. That can't be good. For the last 10 games he is .135/.238/.243. Although, the guys over at River Ave. Blues note that Cano has been the unluckiest batter this season. This hopefully means that soon those hard hit balls will start falling in for some hits.

The Buzz:

• Jorge Posada is on the DL for the first time in his career. His shoulder just wasn't healing and he wasn't able to catch. He was doing ok as a DH, but it wasn't possible to keep him on the roster as a pure DH. He has never been on the DL in his career. He is expected to be back on the roster in 4-6 weeks and possibly earlier if he returns as the DH for a week or two first. Luckily, his injury does not require surgery.
• Alex Rodriguez is on the DL with a grade 2 strained quad. He first strained it against Baltimore, he sat out a few games and then returned to action. He was then promptly DLed. It is possible that he worsened the injury by playing earlier than he should have; however, we will never know because he did not receive an MRI after the initial injury.
• Chad Moeller is back with the team. He was originally designated for assignment, to clear a roster spot, but then Posada was put on the DL. Unfortunately, the Yankees had to wait the 10 days and hope he cleared waivers before they could add him to the roster. Luckily no other team wanted him.

Miscellaneous:

• Highlight: April 27, 2008. Behind the excellent effort from Ching-Ming Wang, the Yankees defeated the Cleveland Indians by a score of 1-0. I like being on the winning side of a pitcher's dual.
• Lowlight: May 1, 2008. I'll go with the game in which the Yankees gave up the most amount of runs (8) as the lowlight of the 10 games. Though, there were 5 other equally lowlightable games.
• Central Central: So far the Yankees are 4-6 in their games against the largely AL Central opponents. I wanted the team to go 12-7 during this time frame. It isn't looking like they will be able to do that. A nice long winning streak would sure be fun.

Fast Forward: Tonight the Yankees are taking their only steps away from AL Central opponents for a while. They are playing the Seattle Mariners. Chien-Ming Wang is up against Erik Bedard.

25-Man Roster

There seems to have been a zillion roster changes this season so far. I can't even keep up with them. I was shocked SHOCKED when I saw yesterday that Billy Traber was sent down even though he was sent down a few days earlier.

Injuries aren't fun.

Anyway, the current 25-man roster is:

1. Chien-Ming Wang
2. Andy Pettitte
3. Mike Mussina
4. Ian Kennedy
5. Mariano Rivera
6. Joba Chamberlain
7. LaTroy Hawkins
8. Kyle Farnsworth
9. Ross Ohlendorf
10. Edwar Ramirez
11. Chris Britton
12. Jonathan Albaladejo
13. Jose Molina
14. Chad Moeller
15. Jason Giambi
16. Robinson Cano
17. Derek Jeter
18. Morgan Ensberg
19. Alberto Gonzalez
20. Shelley Duncan
21. Johnny Damon
22. Melky Cabrera
23. Bobby Abreu
24. Hideki Matsui

I believe the 25th man is Darrel Rasner, but he isn't listed as on the active roster at the moment, and perhaps there will be someone else up for tonight, Friday and Saturday before we need Rasner to take Hughes' spot in the rotation.

Oh, and evidently, Hughes' DL stint is apparently a real injury.

The Yankees seriously need Giambi and Cano to start hitting to make up for the lack of Alex Rodriguez and Jorge Posada in the lineup. The Yankees are currently surviving, but if they keep this up they will be left in the dust.

At A Loss

Yeah, losing sucks.

Yeah, I don't like being 14-14 after 28 games.

However, all things considered, I think the Yankees are doing pretty well; they are in pretty good shape.

1. Remember, in 2007, the Yankees were still a .500 team on July 13. They didn't eclipse that plateau for good until July 14. On April 30, 2007, the Yankees were 9-14. At least we are doing better there.
2. The Yankees are only 2 games out of first place at this exact moment. That's it. Two games. Not that big of a deal.
3. The Yankees played their first 20 games in 20 days. Usually April is good for 3 or 4 days off. This year, the Yankees had 1.
4. The Yankees just finished a stretch that included 18 of 20 games on the road. Yeah, all that traveling and one day off. Also, their "getaway" days were rarely, if ever, an afternoon game. The team regularly got to their hotel rooms at 3, 4, or 5 in the morning.
5. Injuries, injuries, injuries. At various points this season, the following people have missed games (varying amounts) due to injury: Andy Pettitte, Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Jorge Posada, Jose Molina, and Wilson Betemit.

Yes, I want things to be better for the Yankees, but hey, they could be way worse. At the moment I am content with where things are.

Tonight, Pettitte will get the start against the Tigers as the Yankees look to climb above .500 again.