The Return Of The Mack

It's been about a week or so since my last post. The trip back from St. Louis went fine, but when I got back home I had to deal with the fact that my home PC was dead and my only option to access the Internet is at work. Now normally I don't mind sneaking online at work. But when you return from vacation, it normally takes about 2 days to catch yourself back up to where you were before you left. I'm not quite to that point yet, which really irritates me because I really detest working. It's just not something I'm cut out for. Too bad I can't get paid to blog all day. I'm actually at work now, killing time before my Wednesday night softball game. The good news is that I've replaced my home PC and I'll return to blogging regularly, as well as getting back to commenting on the regular blogs I comment on, as well as some new ones I was perusing. On to the Yankees....
I am very encouraged as to the Yankees place in baseball right now. It's crazy when you realize that the Yankees are the second best team in baseball right now in terms of winning percentage. And they aren't even running on all cylinders. Cano was missing for over a month. Sheffield and Matsui have missed almost the entire year. Can you imagine where'd they'd be if those guys were healthy? They'd probably have a record similar to, if not better than, the Tigers. The Yanks have a series record of 17-3-1 in their last 21 series. Over their last 15 series they are 12-2-1. And they've won their last 4. If I did my math right, they are 24-8-3 for the year. That's impressive. That equals October baseball.
The Yanks have been playing great baseball as of late. It wasn't long ago that they were hovering about 4 games back of Boston. I had a post a while back about how the Yanks would catch and pass Boston in the standings, and right now it's playing out like I thought. Things right now look good if you're a Yankee fan. knock on wood.
The acquisition of Bobby Abreu is looking great right now. He may not be hitting for power, but with a .414 average, I won't complain. Cano comes off the DL and racks up 3 hits. Jeter is in a "mini-slump" if you can even call it that, as he's 4 for his last 22. I'm still waiting for A-Rod to just get buckwild on everybody. August is supposed to be his best playing month of his career. 9 for 28 to start the month isn't bad. I just want to see some more extra base hits from him.
Boston is struggling right now. The loss of Varitek is huge to that franchise. Flashback to their Sunday loss in Tampa Bay. Timlin, Papelbon, and Tavarez each give up bombs and the Sox drop the game to the D-Rays. Is this possibly because the Sox backups aren't the best at calling games? I think Greg Maddux had an issue with Javy Lopez as a catcher when they were in Atlanta if I'm not mistaken. Someone correct me if I'm thinking of someone else. Varitek was a leader on that team and he is remarkable when it comes to handling pitchers. I don't think we're going to see that kind of value from Lopez. Regardless of who is behind the plate right now, the Sox aren't playing well right now. There's still plenty of time for them to turn things around, but the Yanks don't show any signs of slowing. It's going to be an interesting 2 months. It's funny how around this time of year to start to root for 1 team 1 day, and root against them the next depending on what suits your team's needs. Hopefully, the point doesn't come where I have to root for the Red Sox. When the White Sox visit Boston in September, I'm curious to see what the standings look like and who I'll want to win those games.
I hope to get up some pictures of our trip in the next day or so. I'll also update my autograph ball collection. Randy is on the hill tonight. I hope the real Randy shows up. Unless the real Randy is the new Randy and that means that I want the old Randy to show up. Go Yankees!!
Peace, love and pinstripes.
J-Boogie