Yankees (16-8) vs. Orioles (7-18) In NY Game 1: Monday 7:05 pm CC Sabathia, LHP (3-1, 3.12) vs. Jeremy Guthrie, RHP (0-3, 4.70) Game 2: Tuesday 7:05 pm A.J. Burnett, RHP (3-0, 2.43) vs. Brian Matusz, LHP (2-1, 4.40) Game 3: Wednesday 1:05 pm Andy Pettitte, LHP (3-0, 2.12) vs. David Hernandez, RHP (0-3, 4.55) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I'm not going to include a pic of a broom this time
arod is back in the lineup tonight, playing 3rd. Vazquez is getting his spot pushed back in the boston series, it will now be Hughes pitching and Vazquez going up against detroit
Swisher hit what might be the hardest hit single I've ever seen. That was smoked. And Gardner just continues to get on base.
we'd like to think so, but if baseball was only played based on statistics, the yankees would be sweeping 90% of the series'
Been offline for a few days, need to catch up. Javy Vazquez can get pushed back off a cliff. I don't give a crap if it's mechanical, when the pussy boy lets Ozzie Guillen get into his head over a freaking baseball glove, he can kiss my ass. Forget skipping him in the rotation, give the job to Mitre. At least I don't expect anything from him. I love the argument that it doesn't matter whether Javy is the 4th or 5th pitcher. In this case it does. As the #4 guy, Hughes follows him. So that leaves a depleted pen for Hughes every game. Phil has been absolutely dominant, but he's throwing a lot of pitches, and winding up handing the ball over by at least the mid-7th. Our pen is craptacular to begin with, never mind making them pitch extra on top of it. If CC were pitching behind Vag-quez there would be far less work on the pen. Health issues are starting to mount. It's killing me that Granderson is out. Sure, he was struggling, but I'd still rather him in the outfield than Winn or Thames. Yes, both of the scrubs...I mean subs...had good games over the past couple days, but realistically, how long is that going to last? Not a month I'm sure. Speaking of the outfield, I have to admit, I've developed a mancrush on Brett Gardner. Wow! His OBP is over .400. I can't ask for more than that from a guy at the bottom of the order who is probably the fastest Yankee in at least a decade. He's completely changing games. I don't have a problem admitting I was wrong, and I was definitely wrong about Gardner. Now Nick Johnson on the other hand, I want that dude to get lost in the Boogie Down on the way to the game. Every day I despise him a little more. So Posada and Mo seem to be okay. I really hope so. I like Cervelli, but I want Jorge's bat in the lineup. And there is no one in the pen I trust at this point who isn't named Mariano.
To the first part I bolded, yay! Considering we generally have similar feelings about players (from what i've noticed over the last few years), i always found it odd how we were complete opposites when it came to Gardner. He had shown that every time he got promoted, he would struggle at first, adjust, then his around .300 and work a good amount of walks. Hopefully he's figured it out and can hover around the .300 mark this season. in no way am i expecting him to keep it up at .350 like he is now. just saw this posted on RAB, wow... "Gardner has yet to swing and miss at the pitch in the strike zone this season, and he’s the only player in the game that can make that claim" as for the 2nd part... the last few games he has been hitting the ball very hard, just right at people. His BABIP is exceptionally low right now (.182), and as that rises back to his career norm, his average should start creeping back up.
See, I think my issue with Gardner was a lot more along the lines of "Oh wonderful! He's a *scrappy* player! Just what we need!" It turns out that he's actually got quite a bit of offensive ability. I don't think he'll stay in the mid-to-upper .300s either, but if he can manage to keep his OBP in the area of .400, he's a very dangerous weapon in the lineup. Speed kills. Truthfully, I'd love to see him get a shot to hit second. While it would stop helping Jeter, I think Gardner would see a significant rise in hittable pitches with Teixeira following him. Plus, with his speed, he'd score even more runs with Tex and ARod following him. (That said, I don't have a big issue with him batting in front of Jeter either. Maybe the answer would be to bat Gardner first and drop Derek to 2?) I still don't like his arm, but when Granderson is healthy and he's in left, it's not really a big deal. And he's really getting a good track on balls, which I like to see. As for Johnson, I can't stand the guy. I don't care how high his OBP gets. He looks like a clown staring at strike three down the middle. When he fills in at first he looks slow. He's slow on the bases. He's a DH that needs to be pinch hit for. He's pretty much everything I don't want in a baseball player. Especially a full-time DH. It's like we purposely brought in David Ortiz, and made sure he didn't even have the potential for power. Plus he's got the mark against him that it could (should) have either been Matsui or Damon in his spot. I may grow to accept him (and I even started a week or two ago) but I'll never like him.