Gotta love coming home 10 minutes before the game, flipping on ESPN only to see a 10–minute (literally) hatchet job on ESPN about how much the Yankees suck, and how this weekend was the beginning of the end.
Matsui and Posada are back in the lineup tonight (which means Melky is probably out so it’s a good news/bad news situation), Wang is back tomorrow. And, are you ready for this?
PHIL HUGHES WILL START FOR THE YANKS ON THURSDAY. If it’s a day game I may play hookey, err take a personal day.
Anyway, all you sharp minds in Bristol, why don’t you at least wait until the Yanks put their starting lineup and full rotation on the field before you play taps on the Yanks season. It is only April after all.
I caught the tail end of that ESPN thing, and yeah, they were all over the Yanks.
But this isn't spring training anymore. So until the Yanks actually do get the full team on the field, I think it's only fair to judge them based on what they've done thus far this season.
At the same time, it's early in the season and it is a little ridiculous to write them off just yet. I feel like that's been done the last few years, and every time, the Yankees are first in the AL East at the end of the year.
ESPN loves the early season Yankee slump.
I've been saying there are troubling signs for the Yanks all year, namely their rotation. But writing them off because of three games (and it is just three games, the Yanks came into that series off of sweeping the Indians)is ridiculous. Especially when the Yanks didn't exactly play badly in the three games. They led each one.
Anyway, it's a long season, and even next weekend, the Sox are going to face a much different team, although they will miss Phil Hughes.
And those three games against the Red Sox were against their best three pitchers; if they hadn't swept, I would think it Red Sox would have to had considered a failure.
That having been said, it's way too early to give it to the Sox. They got rocked by the Jays tonight (also missing some key players - Glaus and BJ Ryan), and that was against Okha. Expect Halladay to finish the two-game sweep for the Jays tomorrow.
Does anyone else think Papelbon looks like he has Down's Syndrome?
Anyway, as bleak as things look right now, I expect the Yanks to finish this week off strong. Wang starts tomorrow, and he's an inning-eater. Hopefully he can throw about 20 ground balls and go 8 strong.
I'm not giving it to the Sox, as I pretty much said in my first comment above. I agree that it's early in the season. So you can't write off the Sox just like I can't write off the Yankees, right? It goes both ways.
The definition of "rocked" might also be giving up ten runs to the Devil Rays (who, for some reason, the Red Sox don't play until July).
And Halladay held the Sox down last week, but they found a way to come back. I'm actually not that worried about that game. Or about the Orioles. Or, frankly, about the "improved" Yankees of this weekend.
I don't think that about Papelbon, but maybe we should try to stay away from disparaging the physical characteristics of players on these teams. With some of the Yankees players I've seen in the last few years, I don't think that's a road you want to go down.
Fair enough, I'll give you a current Yankee to mock...
http://freecolterbean.com/images/Bean.jpg
Then we're even, and I promise not to say anything about Manny's hair or Lowell's testicle. (OK, that may have been hitting below the belt)
We need to get a Sox blogger so our Dodgers' blogger isn't all alone in defending them.
Yes, it's hard out here all alone in the wilderness. Send me a reinforcement.