After being punched by Sawx this season, Yanks looking to swing back
NEW YORK – The Yankees have played the Red Sox this season.
Five times, they have lost.
Five different ways, the Red Sox showed to the Yankees that they were the better team.
After awhile, it begins to gets into your head and you wonder if the team from The Bronx can beat the team from The Hub.
So here we are, “The Rivalry” back on again at Fenway Park starting Tuesday night, meeting for the last time before they take two months away from each to further shape their season.
This much is clear right now:
The Yankees and Red Sox are the two best teams in the American League.
If you want to take Texas and Detroit and count them in as legitimate contenders, do so at your own risk. Tampa Bay has played better than their record, but with a conga line of players on the disabled list and a bullpen that does not resemble their 2008 version.
After that, everyone else is no better than average at best.
This leaves the Yankees with only one true opponent for the season. While anything may happen in a short series with one of those other teams, the long range view is that this season is shaping to have a “real” October for the first time since 2004.
New York and Boston appear to be on a clear path to facing each other for a chance to go to the World Series.
However, there is still this lingering doubt as to whether the Yankees are better than the Red Sox. The first five games and subsequent losses have a left not only a stigma, but a bad taste. Losing four of five games would have not been tolerable, but going laying a “donut?”
Unacceptable.
Granted, Alex Rodriguez was not in the lineup, CC Sabathia did not pitch and both Josh Beckett and Jon Lester started four of the five games, but two, if not three of the games were there for the Yankees to win had they gotten either a big hit, big pitch or final out.
Since May 5, the Yankees have been a different team. Their starting rotation has slowly taken shape and it is clear that their lineup is the best in the league when fully healthy (which it is now). Cody Ransom, and Jose Molina are not in the lineup to take up space and add (lack of) mass. Replacing the two with Rodriguez and Posada and adding a now healthy and hot Mark Teixeira changes the entire equation.
It is in these three games the message has to be sent to Boston that the Yankees are going to be in their ass all season. The Red Sox may respect their long time rivals, but they know they can beat them at any time, in any place, anywhere.
For the last month, New York has been playing what would amount to “tune up” games in order to prepare themselves for this. They were struggling back then, had no direction as to where the season was going, and the “Girardi Watch” looked as if it was ready to make its return.
Of course, there was that part about me referring to the team as “bums” as well, but we will not get into that.
They have righted themselves and have shown themselves to be a tough, resilient group that has come from behind to win 20 times this season. All the pieces appear to be in place for a championship run except for the situation that exists in the bullpen where every night it appears Joe Girardi is playing a dangerous game of “Bullpen Roulette” whenever the pitcher’s name is calling for is not named “Aceves” or “Rivera”.
The bullpen is the only thing that separates these two teams and it appears that will be what decides these games between the Yankees and the Red Sox.
Starting tomorrow night, the pitchers have to make the Boston hitters uncomfortable. No more of watching the like of Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis and Jason Bay digging in at the plate and taking their hacks.
So far, the Yanks haven’t found a way to get these guys out, with Bay becoming the new Manny Ramirez. While David Ortiz battles what is either a slump or him just being finished, the confidence that he used to come to the plate with has been passed on the other players.
At some point, this has to end. If that means backing them up and putting them on the ground, so be it.
If the Red Sox hitters and their teammates get upset? So be it.
If crowd gets rowdy and desperately begins to break out “Yankees Suck,” feel free.
The tenor of this rivalry has to change. Boston has in essence, “punked us,” and the response by the Yankees has been that of Boy Scouts, unwilling to fight back and get dirty if needed.
Here is where the genesis of this season starts.
This is where we see AJ Burnett atone for his bad game in Fenway in April when he was given a 6-0 lead and gagged it up.
This is where we see if CC Sabathia can let the Red Sox know that he is an official part of “The Rivalry”.
This is where we see this maligned bullpen finally step up to the challenge of getting big outs against the Red Sox big hitters late in these games.
Phil Coke, Alfredo Aceves, David Robertson and Phil Hughes, that message is for you.
This is where we also see the full composition of this lineup, finally intact, grind, wear down the Boston pitching, and force their starters out of the game and into the bullpen early.
Make no mistake; it is a big series for the Yankees.
This is their exam for the first half of the season. Pass it, and they can move on.
Fail it, and the Bombers will be looked at as paper tigers, able to beat up on those beneath them, but unable to handle the biggest boys on the block.
Let’s see which one they are.
NEW YORK – The Yankees have played the Red Sox this season.
Five times, they have lost.
Five different ways, the Red Sox showed to the Yankees that they were the better team.
After awhile, it begins to gets into your head and you wonder if the team from The Bronx can beat the team from The Hub.
So here we are, “The Rivalry” back on again at Fenway Park starting Tuesday night, meeting for the last time before they take two months away from each to further shape their season.
This much is clear right now:
The Yankees and Red Sox are the two best teams in the American League.
If you want to take Texas and Detroit and count them in as legitimate contenders, do so at your own risk. Tampa Bay has played better than their record, but with a conga line of players on the disabled list and a bullpen that does not resemble their 2008 version.
After that, everyone else is no better than average at best.
This leaves the Yankees with only one true opponent for the season. While anything may happen in a short series with one of those other teams, the long range view is that this season is shaping to have a “real” October for the first time since 2004.
New York and Boston appear to be on a clear path to facing each other for a chance to go to the World Series.
However, there is still this lingering doubt as to whether the Yankees are better than the Red Sox. The first five games and subsequent losses have a left not only a stigma, but a bad taste. Losing four of five games would have not been tolerable, but going laying a “donut?”
Unacceptable.
Granted, Alex Rodriguez was not in the lineup, CC Sabathia did not pitch and both Josh Beckett and Jon Lester started four of the five games, but two, if not three of the games were there for the Yankees to win had they gotten either a big hit, big pitch or final out.
Since May 5, the Yankees have been a different team. Their starting rotation has slowly taken shape and it is clear that their lineup is the best in the league when fully healthy (which it is now). Cody Ransom, and Jose Molina are not in the lineup to take up space and add (lack of) mass. Replacing the two with Rodriguez and Posada and adding a now healthy and hot Mark Teixeira changes the entire equation.
It is in these three games the message has to be sent to Boston that the Yankees are going to be in their ass all season. The Red Sox may respect their long time rivals, but they know they can beat them at any time, in any place, anywhere.
For the last month, New York has been playing what would amount to “tune up” games in order to prepare themselves for this. They were struggling back then, had no direction as to where the season was going, and the “Girardi Watch” looked as if it was ready to make its return.
Of course, there was that part about me referring to the team as “bums” as well, but we will not get into that.
They have righted themselves and have shown themselves to be a tough, resilient group that has come from behind to win 20 times this season. All the pieces appear to be in place for a championship run except for the situation that exists in the bullpen where every night it appears Joe Girardi is playing a dangerous game of “Bullpen Roulette” whenever the pitcher’s name is calling for is not named “Aceves” or “Rivera”.
The bullpen is the only thing that separates these two teams and it appears that will be what decides these games between the Yankees and the Red Sox.
Starting tomorrow night, the pitchers have to make the Boston hitters uncomfortable. No more of watching the like of Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis and Jason Bay digging in at the plate and taking their hacks.
So far, the Yanks haven’t found a way to get these guys out, with Bay becoming the new Manny Ramirez. While David Ortiz battles what is either a slump or him just being finished, the confidence that he used to come to the plate with has been passed on the other players.
At some point, this has to end. If that means backing them up and putting them on the ground, so be it.
If the Red Sox hitters and their teammates get upset? So be it.
If crowd gets rowdy and desperately begins to break out “Yankees Suck,” feel free.
The tenor of this rivalry has to change. Boston has in essence, “punked us,” and the response by the Yankees has been that of Boy Scouts, unwilling to fight back and get dirty if needed.
Here is where the genesis of this season starts.
This is where we see AJ Burnett atone for his bad game in Fenway in April when he was given a 6-0 lead and gagged it up.
This is where we see if CC Sabathia can let the Red Sox know that he is an official part of “The Rivalry”.
This is where we see this maligned bullpen finally step up to the challenge of getting big outs against the Red Sox big hitters late in these games.
Phil Coke, Alfredo Aceves, David Robertson and Phil Hughes, that message is for you.
This is where we also see the full composition of this lineup, finally intact, grind, wear down the Boston pitching, and force their starters out of the game and into the bullpen early.
Make no mistake; it is a big series for the Yankees.
This is their exam for the first half of the season. Pass it, and they can move on.
Fail it, and the Bombers will be looked at as paper tigers, able to beat up on those beneath them, but unable to handle the biggest boys on the block.
Let’s see which one they are.
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