ANAHEIM - What a difference a week makes, doesn’t it?
Back on Thursday night, I took one look at the standings and noticed that the Yankees were tied statistically side-by side with the Red Sox, relaxing in the Lazy Boy seat in the American League East with identical 51-34 records.
At the time, it was easy to take in these games each night and there was no need to break out the bottle of Pepto that is usually reserved for the Boston games.
Things were going so well during the months span. Where once I awaited the latest daily drama in the reality show As the Yankees Turn, the games on the field were not as compelling. This happens when you have a very good team capable of bullying inferior competition to where losing streaks were the only thing that would get the ears perked up much like Alfalfa in The Little Rascals.
Then the trip to Anaheim came this past weekend where the Ducks reclaimed their status by turning in an Oscar winning performance in their yearly movie Trip from Hell: A Yankees Visit to Angel Stadium.
You would have thought the Angels were playing with real life halos out there. They could do no wrong. Any mistake they made was corrected in quick order. Four run leads built up were erased as Joba Chamberlain and Andy Pettitte were made to look like two guys, one that should be in AAA and the other in retirement.
There was the stretch against the Generals, Fish and into the fifth inning against the Braves where the team seemed to resemble the Bad News Bears. All of that was nothing compared to this.
Surely, a well-pitched game, a few timely hits and shut down relief will make any team look like the ’98 Yankees. Performing to that level though takes one hell of a team.
With the Angels, they seem to always do it. Why they can never seem to put together this type of effort against the Red Sox is anyone’s guess.
So in suffering a bigger ass whipping than the one Lesnar gave Mir at UFC 100, they have once again been relegated to Duck status. Once again they showed that they have no problem winning these games that we have come to expect against the Trailer Trash of the American League. Yet, when adversity and a potential playoff opponent happens to show up on the schedule, they cower into the corner and take their beating before the towel can be thrown in.
If you think the 2-12 record against the Red Sox and Angels (3-14 if you want to add the world champion Phillies), is still nothing more than a fluke, go right ahead. At a point, it no longer becomes flukish.
Here’s the scenario is the Ducks and their fans have put themselves into:
Scenario 1: If they lose to either the Angels or Red Sox in the playoffs, many will point to the fact (more like “use the excuse”) they lost to them in the regular season as badly as they have and call it a continuance of such.
Scenario 2: If they somehow beat either team in the postseason, those same people will then tell you that the regular season means nothing.
Certainly appears to be a nice no-lose situation to be in, isn’t it?
Lose, and just say that they couldn’t beat them the whole year anyway. Win, and they can easily dismiss the losses.
I asked weeks ago how do we judge this team. Should they be given high marks for being Paper Tiger Champions? Or should we consider their record inflated by just beating up on mediocre teams who are only being held afloat because everyone else in the league stinks.
For instance, it was said that the Mariners were an improved club by the Drive by Media when they came to Yankee Stadium two weeks ago, but you sure could have fooled me.
This is what happens when you have a bunch of these sad sacks masquerading around as if they are realistic contenders, when in reality their ceiling is somewhere around 84 wins.
They hold up the trade market because in reality, they should be shipping players out. Instead, they hold serve and stupidly add under the odd impression that they can make the playoffs.
The same goes for those Twinkies, who the Yankees administered a clean 7-0 season sweep too.
Now I see how their fans must feel whenever they see their team consistently getting their ass whipped.
How does this team stay competitive? They are not any good! That pitching staff is nothing more than bunch of number three and four starters masking around out there. They are so lucky that they are members of the Parity Central, that allows them to sneak into the playoffs with less than 90 wins and consider that a success.
It is the equivalent of being the tallest midget.
Don’t tell that to Commissioner Bud though. He loves this.
He enjoys that most baseball has become unwatchable these days because now everyone is "competitive". This allows members of Bud's Mafia out into the public and promote such nonsense.
If he wants to go ahead and do that, fine. In the meantime, I can proceed to watch the Yankees turn these Junior Varsity opponents into mush as they storm their way to 100 wins at the end of the season.
My mind has been mentally set on seeing Yankees vs. Red Sox in the ALCS in October. However, the Halos are again attempting to put a dent into my October dream to escape the NFL for a few weeks.
Looks like I am going to be distracted this September and maybe even early October.
Now for some real thoughts….
Too bad Ramiro Pena and Francisco Cervelli got sent down to the minors to make room for Jose Molina and the newly acquired Erik Hinske.
These guys were doing so well and I rooted for them to succeed. Nice to have a couple of young players that were able to come in, contribute and now get upset that they have to leave.
But look at Hinske! Three homeruns in part time work since joining the team last week.
He is only one team away from having played with every AL East team, which probably should garner some type of an award.
We’re not talking about Angel Berroa here.
Speaking of Berroa, I didn’t even know he was finally given the Pink Slip a few weeks ago and subsequently picked up by the Mets of all teams.
Hey, when you need offense, you’ll go after just about anyone I guess.
Maybe they think they are getting the 2003 Berroa. Certainly, the last six years of ineptitude wasn’t enough of a sample size for them to see he was worst than Ben Affleck in Gigli.
His ultimate highlight came in a game against the Fish where he rocked an RBI double into the gap to help the Yankees win. It made me wonder if he had received any suspicious packages from UPS or FedEx.
Johnny Damon continues to be the benefit of Pinball Machine Stadium cheap homeruns.
This newest egregious moment came last Saturday when he lofted a Roy Halladay pitch into the first row of the right field seats. Damon put his head down, shook it in sadness off the bat, and suddenly found it s way out to tie the game at five.
Just don’t ask him to play any defense.
I’m sure Molina could probably go 1st-to-3rd on him without any trouble.
Combining him and Nick Swisher in the outfield is the equivalent of putting Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder out there.
I was upset at A-Rod’s performance when I wrote (link to story). The Yankees were running him into the ground and his performance suffered tremendously. Since that day, he is only hitting a cool .370 and playing his best baseball, including three more home runs against the Angels.
Can you believe that in 167 games against them in his career, he has hit 67 homeruns against them?
Unreal.
The shot he hit on Friday night where it appeared to be swinging half way, one handed, and still launched it over the centerfield fence was one of the most unreal homers I have seen.
Any criticism given here is out of love and has no malicious intent. (NOTE – We forgive the double play in the seventh inning of Sunday’s game. I blame that on Angel Stadium again.)
I usually save the malicious stuff for Berroa. Now that he is no longer on the roster, I need a new whipping boy.
With a homerun on Thursday in Minnesota, Teixeira broke a streak of 95 at bats without a homerun.
He had been struggling lately and wondering what was going on. I’ll even forgive his outright no show in Anaheim this weekend.
Did you know that the centerfield position has combined for nearly an .800 OPS this season? All the talk about how that spot would be a hold has been quelled big time.
When one guy is hot, he stays in there. When he is slumping, the other player takes over and he plays until he stops hitting.
Perfect formula for me.
Ok, I know I said Hideki Matsui is done about two months, and he still is despite the run of good hitting he has been on.
Again, I blame That Damn Stadium for taking away his potential grand slam on Friday.
At least he will be able to leave the team on a good note if he continues.
Robinson Cano was 0 for 22 with runners in scoring position until Tuesday night shattered bat blooper into right center that brought in two runs in a 10-2 win, but his discipline at the plate is still atrocious.
He is still the one player on the team I would bet money that if the game were on the line and he would not get a hit. Cano would be better off going to the plate with a blindfold on and try his luck that way. It certain is better than what he is doing now.
It’s amazing how similar CC Sabathia’s numbers are to Randy Johnson’s in their first seasons here.
Johnson in 2005: 9-6, 4.16 ERA, 127.2 IP, 24 BBs, 117 Ks
Sabathia in 2009: 8-6, 3.86, 128.1, 38 BBs, 95 Ks
The only difference between CC and The Big Prickly Unit is age. Otherwise, if we are judging this based on the expectations of performance, perhaps CC has not pitched up to his capability considering his paycheck and his waistline clock in around the same size.
People are wondering what is wrong with Andy Pettitte.
I’ll give you the answer right now:
He is an old man.
That’s it. You do not need any other advanced psychoanalysis to figure this. His time is running short and with the other pitchers having injuries and ineffectiveness, what was supposed to be a number five starter has been elevated.
He can no longer control games like he used to, far more hittable then he was previously, and even then he was hittable.
Pettitte will put together a good effort every few starts. But he will get knocked out before the fifth and will have to depart. Unfortunately, Pinball Machine Stadium has spooked him too.
Add Chien Ming Wang’s injury and the team is short one starting pitcher and has two inconsistent ones who cannot pitch deep enough into games.
Now the Yankees suddenly have starting rotation issues. This is the only reason why Roy Halladay’s name is being thrown around as some possibility.
Make no mistake, if everything was going smooth, the talk about acquiring him would be lessened. But because they can only legitimately count on two pitchers every five days for the time being, winning enough games is going to be a problem.
Wang’s year has been so bad that to expect anything that resembles quality would be an upset.
Pettitte is going to have his good and bad days. You just hope that you get lucky.
Chamberlain is an enigma. He is not going to intimidate anyone with that 91 MPH fastball. Add in the hardheadedness not being too predictable and you have a recipe for disaster as has been shown the last two starts.
Thank goodness they don’t have to field a playoff rotation until October.
Phil Hughes’ numbers since coming to the bullpen:
18 1/3 IP, 7 H, 2 ER, 5 BB, 19 K, 0.99 ERA, 0.66 WHIP, 9.44 K/9
Absolutely sensational. One day his future should be in the rotation. For now, this is a nice fallback option.
For all the money spent, now the Yankees, who were supposed to have one of the deepest rotations in the league now needs help – unless you count Sergio Mitre as help. Even members of the Yankee Thought Police cannot justify that.
Queue up the laugh track.
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