Yankees/Jays Weekend Wrap-Up

Greetings everyone. I hope you all had a great weekend. Mine, as it usually is with 3 kids in tow, was very busy. I realized that 4pm games are a horrible time for me to watch Yankees games. When it's a 1pm start, I can usually fit most of it in as that's when my kids nap. With a 7pm start I might miss the 1st hour as it's the kids' bed time. I can usually though pay half-attention to it as I get them ready. 4pm games are not my friend. The kids usually wake up from their naps around then and I can't justify ignoring them for 2.5+ hours. I sneak in little breaks and make sure to check my phone for updates but it's tough to catch it for a large chunk of time.

I didn't see much of Saturday's game which is why I didn't blog about it yesterday. I figured I'd save it for a "weekend wrap-up" post. I did catch most of the game today. I did though miss the last 2 innings as I made a trek to Best Buy to see if they could help at all with my dying laptop. They couldn't. I am though in process of hopefully fixing it. I had recovery disks and they appear to have solved the problem. So far so good. Unfortunately using recovery disks meant I wiped out the hard drive so everything on it is gone. Right now I'm installing 2 years of windows updates. I've been doing that for 2+ hours and it's on #68 of 94. Wait. why am I blogging about that? I don't write a tech support blog and that's not why you're here. My apologies. Let's talk Yankees, shall we? I am though going to keep it brief as I've got a lot to do still before calling it a day. And we're off:


Very pleased with how the series with the Jays turned out. It was nice to see the Yankees come back to win two straight to take another series. The Jays are a pesky team and always give the Yanks fits. I will never complain when the Yankees take a series.
Great start today by Ivan Nova. i don't know if it was the bad weather but he's been pretty good since the weather has gotten better. The only gripe I had was with the walks. He walked 4 and threw 60% of his pitches for strikes, which in my book is a so-so strike-to-ball ratio. But as long as he can keep the runners on base from scoring, I'm cool with it. The Jays went 0-9 with RISP today. Kudos to Nova for keeping them from scoring. But, that's a dangerous way to live. He needs to reduce the # of baserunners he allows.
It was nice to see the Yankees win Saturday without hitting any HRs.
I hope A.J. Burnett can continue pitching well now that we're out of April. As a Yankee, A.J. has made 16 starts in April and has a 9-1 record to show for it. He's 18-24 after April. I think he's going to continue to pitch well.
Curtis Granderson hit his 8th HR and I now owe him $120. Way to go Curtis.
Robbie Cano bruised his hand and left Sunday's game early. I don't think it's serious. at least I hope it's not.
Rafael Soriano hasn't given up a run in two, count 'em two, straight games. Yay.
After blowing 2 straight saves Mariano Rivers has saved 3 straight and hasn't given up a run. He's the GOAT.
Pretty good series for the bullpen. They've pitched 8.2 scoreless innings since D-Rob's little fielding snafu.
A-Rod has been struggling since missing a few games with his injury. He's 3 for his last 27 which has dropped his average 96 percentage points. Uh oh.
That about sums it up. I'm sure I'm missing something. I'm tired and I'm not 100% focused. The wife has been asking me to help her put some stuff away and I've been ignoring her to do this. Gotta run.
Peace, love and Pinstripes,
J-Boogie

Ivan Nova Shines, Rafael Soriano Doesn't, And The Yankees Bats Don't Help Anybody Out

Like last night, I don't feel like blogging much after that loss. I could cut and paste yesterday's blog into this one, change a few things, and it would work, but that would be lazy. It was a tough loss and there a plenty of things you can point to as contributing factors but the bottom line is when you don't hit you shouldn't win. Four hits isn't getting the job done. The Yankees could have won a game tonight they shouldn't have but alas, it wasn't meant to be.

I didn't get to see much of Ivan Nova's outing but I saw a little bit here and there in between doing some things around the house. I didn't need to see it to know it was the best start of his career. He looked good and for once the wheels didn't fall off in the middle innings. It was actually the longest start of his career. I'm very encouraged by it. It's too bad he didn't pick up the W.

I did find it curious that Joe Girardi left him in to pitch the 7th. Now don't take that the wrong way. I'm glad he did. It was the right call. But I'm curious why he left him in and not Freddy Garcia a few days earlier. The two had very similar outings through the first 6 innings. Here's what we know: Garcia had thrown 90 pitches thru 6, Nova 85. Nova had pitched 1 inning in the last 11 days. Garcia was virtually unhittable and was pulled with a 3-0 lead. Nova had good stuff and was left in with a 2-1 lead. Garcia is an experienced pitcher who's been there before. It was Nova's deepest start of his career. I thought that Joe should have left Garcia in to start the 7th like he did with Nova tonight. I'm curious why the change in philosophy because if anything, Garcia's situation was a little better. The only thing I can think of is age. Anybody have any thoughts?

Girardi made another curious move in the 9th when he had Curtis Granderson give himself up with no outs and Jeter, they tying run, on 1st. Based on my Twitter timeline there were very few people that were OK with the move. I was one of those OK with it. Now that's not to say I wasn't a staunch supporter of the bunt. I hate giving away outs and am not a huge fan of sac bunts to begin with. All I'm saying is I get the logic behind it. Here's my take on it: It was a lefty-lefty matchup. Granderson is his career was 2-15 vs. Thornton. Granted, Granderson has done much better vs. LHPs since last year and Thornton is struggling, but that matchup still favors Thornton in my opinion. I get why you'd want to put the tying run at 2nd with your 3, 4, and 5 hitters waiting to drive them home. There's no way to know what would have happened had Curtis had the green light to swing away. It could have been a double play. Nobody knows. If not for two unbelievable catches by Brent Lillibridge the move would have worked. Hindsight is 20-20. Bunting may not have been the right move but it wasn't a wrong move, if that makes sense. Damn you Brent Lillibridge.

Who would have guessed that the Yankees starting rotation would be a positive and the bullpen would be a negative? The Yankees rotation has been awesome over the last 5 games. Over the last 5 games the 5 SPs have combined to throw 35 innings, allowing 21 hits and 9 walks, while striking out 26 and allowing 7 ER. That works out to an ERA of 1.80 and a WHIP of 0.86. That's outstanding.

The bullpen, specifically the major players, have been scuffling over the last 3 games. We've seen 2 blown saves by Mariano Rivera. We've seen Joba gave up a 2-run HR. We've seen Rafael Soriano pitch in the last 2 games and absolutely stink up the joint. In those 2 innings he's allowed 4 hits, 2 walks, a HBP, a HR and 3 runs. Simply put that's terrible. And that's putting it nicely. Soriano has been a sore spot in the pen but I'm not ready to give up on him yet. I have some faith but it's wavering.

I was planning on writing a little more but I've been having laptop issues and I'm on a backup computer. I wasted about 20 minutes tinkering with that and in addition to being tired I've grown agitated, and I still have to iron clothes for tomorrow. So I'll leave you with this: As I mentioned above you shouldn't win if you don't hit the ball. The Yankees offense has been non-existent these last few games. Talk about no run support. You can blame the bullpen. You can blame Girardi. But none of that matters in you don't hit the ball.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

Brian Cashman: How You Like Him Now?

In my postgame post from last night I talked a little bit about Brian Cashman and what I dubbed his "scrap heap rejects," aka Eric Chavez, Andruw Jones, Bartolo Colon and Freddy Garcia. Missed it? Yeah, not surprised. Anyway, I wanted to hit on it again, so here it is, slightly edited:

How smart does Brian Cashman look right now? All of his "scrap heap rejects" are doing rather well for the Yankees. And the "rejects" I'm referring to are Eric Chavez, Andruw Jones, Bartolo Colon and Freddy Garcia. Yesterday it was Chavez's turn to do his part. He made a few slick plays at 3rd but the big moment came in the 8th when he singled home the game-winner. EC is swinging a sweet stick so far. His 2 hits last night raised his average to .467. Granted 15 ABs a small sample size but he's already paying dividends, on both sides of the field.

I want to give a little praise to Brian Cashman. Eric Chavez is hitting .467. Andruw Jones is hitting .333. Freddy Garcia pitched 6 shutout innings in his first start. Bartolo Colon has been more than effective on the hill. Heck, if you want, add in Russell Martin. Russell Russ has been a huge surprise for the Bombers. He's now hitting .289, has 4 HRs and 11 RBI. Boom. Let's even take this one step further. Cashman spoke publicly about not wanting to sign Rafael Soriano. Sori isn't exactly lighting the world on fire. Point Cashman.

I know we're only 14 games into the season but step off his nuts haters. Show the man some love.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

The Bronx Bombing Continues As The Yankees Down The Rangers 6-5

I'm having some serious writer's block right now. I don't know if it's caused by lack of sleep or what, but I'm blanking on how to open this post. I just let out a huge yawn so it's probably due to a need for sleep. I'm going to try and keep this post short and sweet. Whenever I say that I end up writing a book. Let's see how this goes. Hope it's coherent.

It was a great come from behind win tonight against the Rangers. CC Sabathia wasn't sharp but he pitched well enough to leave with the lead. He battled his way through 6.1 IP and was in line to pick up his 1st win of the season when Joba blew the save. I wrote yesterday that my confidence in Joba was increasing. Today he took 2 steps backwards in that department.

Despite blowing the lead, the "formula" of using Joba, Rafael Soriano, and Mariano Rivera to close the game worked out. Those 3 make up quite the tandem, don't they? Just imagine if Joba and Soriano could be more consistent like Mo.

Man, how good is Mo? It truly is a gift to watch him pitch, isn't it? I have never laughed out loud watching Mo strike out a hitter but I did tonight. He made Ian Kinsler look absolutely stupid. And when I say stupid, I mean stoopid. That was unreal. Vintage Mo. Now in case you didn't know this, Mo's 1-2-3 inning tonight dropped his career WHIP to 0.9997. It's unreal to think that Mo has a career WHIP below 1. It seems like he's getting better and better as he gets older. If only he'd sign a lifetime contract. Somebody make that happen.

This year's offense is definitely worthy of the Bronx Bombers moniker. Three more HRs tonight, which puts the team total at 27 thru 13 games. There was a stat flashed during the ESPN broadcast that the Yankees have scored 61.1% of their runs via the longball. Five of the six runs tonight came off the HR so that percentage went up. The crazy thing about that stat is that it's almost double the league average. Unreal. Now, I don't know why people make such a big deal about them scoring so many runs via the HR. Last time I checked HRs were a part of baseball. Who cares how the runs score as long as they score?

Curtis Granderson is going to ruin me financially. I pledged to donate $15 to his charity for every HR he hit. Curtis is on pace to hit about 50 HRs. That'll cost me about $750. I'd be happy to pay it.

How smart does Brian Cashman look right now? All of his "scrap heap rejects" are doing rather well for the Yankees. And the "rejects" I'm referring to are Eric Chavez, Andruw Jones, Bartolo Colon and Freddy Garcia. Tonight it was Chavez's turn to do his part. He made a few slick plays at 3rd but the big moment came in the 8th when he singled home the game-winner. EC is swinging a sweet stick so far. His 2 hits tonight raised his average to .467. Granted 15 ABs a small sample size but he's already paying dividends, on both sides of the field.

I'd end the post here but I again want to give a little praise to Brian Cashman. Eric Chavez is hitting .467. Andruw Jones is hitting .333. Freddy Garcia pitched 6 shutout innings in his first start. Bartolo Colon has been more than effective on the hill. Heck, if you want, add in Russell Martin. Russell Russ has been a huge surprise for the Bombers. He's now hitting .289, has 4 HRs and 11 RBI. Boom. Let's even take this one step further. Cashman spoke publicly about not wanting to sign Rafael Soriano. Sori isn't exactly lighting the world on fire. Point Cashman. Show him some love haters. He deserves it.

Off day tomorrow. Correction, the clock just flipped to midnight so off day today. Next stop, Toronto. Toronto is basically in my backyard. I've got something going on Tuesday so I won't be making it up there for the series opener but as of now, I'm going to Wednesday. Can't. Freaking. Wait.

That was not short and sweet.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

Freddy Garcia Exceptional As Yankees Beat Rangers 5-2

Take that Texas Rangers. Freddy Garcia just shut you down. Yankees win. Thuhhh Yankees win.

Freddy Garcia made his first start of the season and he was exceptional. He went 6 scoreless innings, giving up only 2 hits and 1 walk, on only 84 pitches. And he did all that against arguably the best performing offense in MLB. Not bad for your first start since March 29. Freddy wasn't overpowering by any means but he did what he needed to do to pitch well. I don't think he even hit 90 (could be wrong) and he only struck out one. But he hit his spots. He mixed his pitches and his pitches had movement. Phil Hughes needs to take note of this. You don't have to have a blazing fastball to pitch effectively. Just ask Mike Mussina. (Throwback call: Moooooooooooooooooooose!)

Garcia's outing goes to show that it's more important to do the 3 things I mentioned above more than anything else. There's a big difference between pitching and throwing. Garcia was definitely a pitcher today. I think it's safe to say that he's the Yankees "3rd starter" behind Sabathia and Burnett. At this point in time he has to be, right. It would be nice if Bartolo Colon could make a push for that. It'll just mean the rotation is stabalizing. I hope that Freddy keeps it up and that Bartolo matches him when he makes his first start.

Despite a semi-meltdown by Rafael Soriano I love the back-end of the Yankees bullpen. The formula of Joba in the 7th, Soriano in the 8th, and Mo in the 9th is working well. Soriano has definitely been a little hit and miss but I think he was a little better today than his final line. The Rangers didn't hit him terribly hard. Soriano, or as he's affectionately called, MFIKY, has definitely been the least stable to the trio, but for the most part his shakiness was confined to one outing, not counting today. Prior to today he's MFIKY has appeared in 5 games. Four of those went off without a hitch. I'd be lying if I didn't say I'm a little concerned about him, but I think he'll be fine long term.

Joba continues to impress me. When Girardi first unveiled Joba as the "7th inning guy" in his bullpen formula I was understandably worried. Those worries are decreasing with each outing. If the Yankees hit the 7th inning with a lead the game is pretty much over. Joba, Soriano and Rivera have been that good. Rivera of course the best of them all. Mo is not showing any signs of ineffectiveness. In fact it's the opposite. He's still vintage Mariano. God bless the man.

I didn't catch any of the postgame show so I'm not sure if this was mentioned but A-Rod got pulled early with lower back and oblique stiffness. Uh oh. The Yankees aren't planning tests so it doesn't strike me as serious and I really hope it's not. Fingers are crossed because Alex has been the team's biggest offensive threat. Coming into today's game Alex ranked 2nd in AVG, 1st in OBP, and 1st in SLG. He's off to one of the best starts of his career. If he misses any time it could be a big blow to the Yankees.

The Yankees continue with the power stroke. They've tied the record for most HRs by a Yankees team thru 13 games. Two more longballs today. Mark Teixeira went deep for his 5th and Robbie Cano hit his 3rd. Cano's HR was big as it put the lead back to 3 and gave Mariano cushion headed into the 9th, not that it was needed. Teixeira had a nice day at the plate with 2 hits. His April AVG is up to .234. Not great but considering how poorly he's historically been in April, I'll take it.

Nick Swisher is swinging a hot bat. He's gone 2-4 in back-to-back games and he's got his AVG up to .261. Prior to the start of the Texas series Nick was hitting .211. I guess it doesn't take much to raise your AVG 50 points, eh? Hopefully, this little hot streak comes along with some power. Swish is till homerless. That's surprising to me considering how many HRs the Yankees have hit as a team. You'd think he'd have run into one or two dingers by now. I just took a look at Swish's splits and situational stats and I don't really like what I see. He's hitting only .107 versus RHPs and he's hitting only .188 with RISP. There's a lot of room for improvement here. I hope 2011 is not the "Return of the Rally Killer."

The Yankees now get a pseudo day-off. Well, not really. They play tomorrow night at 8:05 on ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball. It'll be nice to get a few hours of extra rest before a big game. OK, maybe it's not a big game but right now the Rangers are top dog in the AL and taking two out of three from them would be pretty big. CC Sabathia vs. Alexi Ogando. This game has pitcher's duel written all over it, which probably means it'll be a blowout. Hopefully it's not a repeat of last Sunday when Josh Beckett shut down the Yanks. They haven't seen a whole lot of Ogando and he's off to a hot start. Should be a good game.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

Joe Girardi Done Messed Up, Costs Yankees Game #5

Yeah, I'm all kind of pissed right now. Freaking Joe Girardi. What the heck are you doing my man? His bullpen management cost the Yankees the game tonight! And I don't want to hear from anyone that it's only April, or that it's the 5th game of the season, or that it's only one game or only one loss. Divisions are lost and playoffs are missed because of one loss. Every game matters and every loss counts, regardless of when the game is played. Tonight's loss didn't need to happen. If the Yankees miss the playoffs by one game this will be one of the losses that could have changed their fate.

I'm putting this loss on Girardi's bullpen management because he made a move that shouldn't have been made and it came back to bite him in the ass. Joe never should have opened the 8th inning with Rafael Soriano on the mound. The right play was open with David Robertson and go to Soriano if Robertson gets into trouble. That's how I would have managed it. Here's why: The Yankees were up 4-0. Soriano had just pitched the day before. Freddy Garcia is starting tomorrow and who knows what you'll need from your bullpen. I would have tried to save his arm as much as I could. David Robertson is a quality RP and has the stuff to get hitters out. Girardi should have let him take a shot.

The thing that makes me the most annoyed is how Girardi responded to questions in his post game press conference? When asked why he went to Soriano he responded because Soriano is "our 8th inning guy." Umm, what? Last time I checked every game has an 8th inning. What are you going to do Joe? Use him every game? You've got to be smart and pick your spots. Tonight wasn't the right spot. Many factors need to be taken into account. The biggest factors: What's the lead? (4 runs) When did he pitch last? (yesterday) When will he be needed again? (possibly tomorrow). Add all that up and your answer should be: open the 8th with another pitcher. Girardi also comment that he didn't want to bring Soriano in during the middle of an inning? Why not Joe? Soriano is a closer by nature, not a set-up guy. Everybody knows that closers do better when something is on the line? We've all seen Mariano Rivera falter in non-save situations. Maybe bringing Soriano in with a 4-run lead isn't a good idea. I'm sure he'd do better with a little pressure. Who knows? One last question for Joe: who's your 8th inning guy tomorrow?

Aargh. It's late and my brain is fried. I want to blog a little more but I still have some stuff to do before bed and in addition to being pissed I'm dead tired. Here are the rest of my game thoughts in quick-hit fashion:

• Great outing by CC. He was in mid-season form. He'll only get better. Too bad the pen couldn't hold it. CC deserved the win.


• Mark Teixeira hit another 3-run HR. Doesn't look like he'll struggle this spring. He's locked in.


• Andruw Jones. Welcome to NY. Nice first AB. He hits LHPs rather well. Keep it up.


• I hate lefty specialists. I've said it for years. Boone Logan didn't get it done tonight. He's there to get out Denard Span and Joe Mauer, not issue leadoff walks and singles. Shape up or you're getting shipped out.

After ranting about Girardi, let me add this: I know it's not all his fault. Players still need to execute. It was Rafael Soriano's job to get those guys out, He failed in that. But again, he shouldn't have been in the game to implode like that. Aargh.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

Nova And The Bullpen Carry Yankees To 4-3 Win Over The Twins

I'm coming to find that having 3 kids makes it very hard to watch night games. The whole putting to bed process takes roughly 1.5 hours from start to finish, beginning around 7pm and ending around 8:30. It starts with baths, then some TV, followed by books, then bed. It's a tough schedule for a die-hard Yankees fan. I try to sneak in as much of the game as I can. I throw a little PIP action up on the TV during some kids show when the wife isn't looking. When that's not working I've got the audio feed playing on my Droid using the MLB At-Bat App. It's not the most ideal way to follow the games but it works. Kind of. If push came to shove and I could only do one or the other I've got to hang with the kids. I love those guys. But as long as I can pull off some double duty, I'm going to.

Great job by Ivan Nova tonight. 6 strong quality innings for his 2nd career win. Unlike last year he didn't seem to run out of gas at any point during the game. Remember last season? It always seemed like he hit the wall around the 5th inning. Tonight was his 8th career start and only the 2nd time he made it through 6 innings. Overall, great job. Nova has shown signs of being a great pitcher. If he can build on his outing tonight I have no doubt that he will be.

Hats off to the bullpen. It's apparent that Joba Chamberlain is Joe Girardi's lead-in to the Soriano and Mo show. I'm not 100% sold on that. Joba makes me nervous. Whenever he pitches it's as if I have to watch the game through my fingers. I rarely feel comfortable watching JC pitch late in games when the Yankees have a 1-2 run lead. Apparently, Girardi has confidence in him. I don't not yet anyway. I do feel confident about Rafael Soriano and Mo finishing off games. That level of confidence is off the charts. Odds are if the Yankees take a lead into the 8th the game is over. Soriano came up huge today, Retiring both Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau is no easy task. Soriano did it no problem. I really like that signing. Not a fan of the contract but love the player. Mariano Rivera = game over. 'Nuff said.

The Yankees have been living off the long ball this season. Two more slam-a-lama-ding-dongs today. Posada hit his 3rd and A-Rod his 2nd. As I wrote yesterday, being a full-time DH is going to be huge for Posada. He's always had a good bat. Without the added wear-and-tear on the legs it could be great. So far it's looking like it will be. Alex is locked in and is poised to have a MONSTER year. He's healthy and it's showing. He was my pre-season MVP pick and I'm feeling really good about it.

It seems like every post I write has a "Russell Martin is awesome" section in it. It seems that way because it's true. He had another one of those nights tonight. Who knew he had that much speed? In 4 games he has 2 stolen bases. I didn't think at any point in the season Russell Russ would be among the league leader in SBs. I don't expect him to keep it up but that doesn't mean it can't be fun while it lasts. A catcher with speed. I dig it.

The Yankees are currently 3-1 and their 1-2 hitters aren't hitting. Gardner and Jeter are a combined 4 for 29 (.138). If you told me after 4 games that those two would be hitting so poorly I wouldn't have guessed the team would be 3-1. That .750 winning percentage won't last for long if those 2 don't start setting the table. I'm not overly concerned. It has been a very small sample size. It's just painful to see them both doing so poorly at the same time. I don't think Brett the Jet will do as well as he did last year. I'm still not 100% sold on him being an everyday OF. Don't get me wrong, I really like BG and think he deserves the starts. I'm just not feeling him all the time. Most of the time? Yes. All of the time? Nope. It'll be nice if those two can get it going by the weekend.

CC back on the bump tomorrow. I always feel good when he's on the hill. Hopefully, if I'm lucky, I can pull off seeing most of his start. I need to find a way to get my kids to bed by 7:05 every night. Suggestions anyone?

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

Curtis Granderson's Bat And Glove Propel Yankees To Opening Day Win

Happy Opening Day Yankees fans! I'm sure I can speak for all of us when I say that today was a truly awesome day. Baseball is back. The Yankees won. All is right with the world.

As I do every year I took time off from work to watch the opener. I got together with a couple of buddies at a local watering hole for the game. You can't go wrong with beer, burgers and baseball.

The Yankees didn't play their best baseball today and quite frankly I didn't expect them to. I was pleased with what I saw and what I saw was good enough for the win. CC Sabathia was far from mid-season form but he was effective. Things could have got real bad real fast there in the 2nd inning when CC loaded the bases with no outs. But like a good pitcher does he got out of the jam with little damage. Overall a very solid 1st outing for CC. The big man usually gets better as the weather gets better. If that holds true, based on today's start he's going to have one heck of a year.

Great job by the Yankee bullpen. I guess we know now how Girardi is going to play it. It looks like the blueprint is Joba or David Robertson in the 6th/7th, Soriano in the 8th, and the great one to bring it home. My buddies and I were a little nervous when Joba took the mound. He kind of looks like a fat Sergio Mitre, doesn't he? Am I the only one who thinks that? Anyway, he had a solid inning. Half of us were expecting a meltdown. Joba has a lot of work to do to earn back our faith in him. Today was a step in that direction. I think Rafael Soriano is going to have a lights out year. He looked pretty sharp today. He could represent the most solid bridge to Mariano Rivera that we've seen in awhile. Speaking of the great one he's still the man. As if there was any doubt. I can't think of a better way to end the home opener than with Mo picking up the save.

It was good to see Mark Teixeira get off to a good start. Hopefully he can keep it up. I'm cautiously optimistic that he can. Pretty good day for A-Rod. On base 3 of 4 times and he came a few feet from going to deep. You know things are working for Alex when he hits the ball with power to right CF. I thought for sure that ball was gone and on a better day weather-wise it probably would have been. My only criticism of A-Rod is that he should have been busting it out of the box on that shot. He should have been standing on 3rd.

I think the biggest surprise today was the play of Russell Martin. I was shocked when he stole 3rd. I was more shocked when he scored from 3rd on a shallow sac fly. Who knew the dude had such wheels? He was quite the catalyst today.

Player of the game honors goes to Curtis Granderson. He came through with the big swing and picked up $20 for his charity. Allow me to explain: like I did last year with Nick Swisher's charity, I'm donating $ to Granderson's Grand Kids Foundation every time he goes deep. $15 per HR. Others have joined in to donate as well. You can check our progress in the upper left and if you want to chip in you're more than welcome. CG was also pretty slick in the field too. I thought there was no way that he was getting that ball that was hit over his head. He definitely had the best day in my opinion. Looks like his oblique is fine. Thank God and knock on wood.

Overall a great day. A great win. 1 down, 161 to go. I really wish there was a game tomorrow. I'm kind of bummed there's not. Oh well. There's a lot more baseball left to be played. Giggedy giggedy giggedy.

Did I just write my 3rd post in 3 days? Yeah, I think I did. Wow.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie

Yankees Reportedly Sign Rafael Soriano, Call Me A Fan Of That

Greetings and salutations everyone. As usual, it's been awhile since my last post. It's been a pretty quiet offseason so I've been spending it with the fam. There are some things I could have blogged about but I don't want my blog to be a news source. There are enough of those sites around and I don't need to be one of those that just blogs what someone else reported on. If I have opinions and whatnot about the news, you can count on me to pop in and blog about it. Blogs, specifically fan blogs, in my opinion, should be much more than reporting news. Leave that to the pros. Having said that....

SI's Jon Heyman is reporting that the Yankees and Rafael Soriano have agreed to a 3 year deal with a reported $35 million. Based on my Twitter timeline (follow me here if you'd like) the signing comes with mixed feelings from Yankee fans. Some like the signing and some don't. I'm not overly crazy about it but I have no complaints.

Soriano gives the Yankees arguably the best back of the bullpen in baseball. Last year, Soriano and Mariano, or the "Iano Brothers" as someone, I forget who, dubbed them on Twitter, combined for 78 saves and a 1.77 ERA. Their combined line was 122.1 IP, 75 hits, 25 BB, 102 K, 0.82 WHIP and an opponents batting average around .170. Add that up and it equals lights out. If the Yankees take a lead into the late 7th/early 8th inning the game is over. It's kind of reminiscent of the Rivera/Wetteland tandem from back in the day.

They were each pretty darn good in 2009 also: 71 saves on 142 IP, 101 hits, 39 walks, 0.99 whip, OBA around .195, and an ERA of 2.41. The Yankees basically have two top of the line closers, one being the greatest of all-time, closing out their games. How could anyone dislike that?

As of now the Yankees need their bullpen to be a huge strength. Their starting rotation is in shambles and will be in shambles if Sergio Mitre is penciled in as the 4th starter. The Yanks are going to need all the help they can get in closing out games and strengthening the pen was the right move.

One of the biggest gripes I saw was about the money and the loss of the Yankees 1st round draft pick, which would have been pick #31. I have no idea why any Yankee fan would ever complain about the team spending money. It's been their M.O. for quite some time now. How can you complain about your team doing everything they can to win, including losing money year after year? And it's not like the team is broke or strapped for cash. According to a tweet from Heyman they still have about $20 million or so left in the budget. That's quite a bit to have left to spend this late in the game. Did they Yankees overpay for Soriano? Probably. But for the reasons stated above, no big deal to me.

As for the draft pick, I see the value in having it, but let's be real, a lot of first round draft picks are complete busts. Soriano is a proven talent. The undrafted prospect at #31 is just that, a prospect. It could turn out to be some bum that never sees the majors. It's been known to happen. I'll always go with the proven talent over the picks.

The most perplexing thing about this deal is the comments Brian Cashman made earlier this month about not losing the draft pick. That comment basically meant the team wasn't interested in Soriano. So the question is what happened and why did the story change? Was it a ruse by Cashman as to not tip his hand? Was he pressured into making the deal happen by Hal Steinbrenner or another high ranking official? Did Cashman finally awake from a long winter's nap and realize it was time to make a move? I'm not sure we'll ever now but I'm sure someone in the media is going to ask that question. Perhaps will know more about that in the coming days.

Another back-and-forth going on in the Twitterverse as a result of this signing is what to do with Joba Chamberlain? Some are advocating a return to the rotation. Others want him left where he is as a middle reliever. Some want him traded. I kind of fall across all 3 of those. If you read my blog frequently, and why would you when I post something once every 4-5 weeks, you know I'm not a Joba fan at all. But I'll take him over Sergio Mitre. I'm all for them swapping roles if that's the only option. If Mitre somehow gets squeezed out of the rotation by someone else (please Andy, come back) I'm all for leaving him as a middle RP or dealing him for someone with a better track record. If I had to pick one of the options I'd try and trade him. I'm just not a fan.

I'm really hoping that Andy Pettitte doesn't retire. My gut tells me he's not going to. If Heyman is right, and the Yankees really do have $20 million left to spend, who better to give it to the Andy? Come on Andy. It's yours for the taking. Please reach out and grab it. The team needs you.

Peace, love and Pinstripes,

J-Boogie