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Banterites continue to marvel/giggle from afar at the plight of Big Papi, who has continued his slide from feared slugger to possibly benched DH by K’ing 12 times in his first 25 plate appearances (23 ABs) this season.

It brings to mind the Yanks’ history of famed, and in some case surprising, whiffers.

Mike Pagliraulo, who struck out once every 5.5 plate appearances in his career, holds the franchise record for most consecutive game starts from the beginning of the season with at least one K, with 9 in 1988.  Ortiz’s worst such streak was the first four games of 1999, when he was still with the Twins.

None other than Alex Rodriguez has the team record for most consecutive starts with at least one strikeout, with 15 in July/August of 2005.  Despite this, A-Rod DID hit .276/.377/.603 during the streak, with 6 homers and 12 ribbies.  Ortiz compiled a ten-game streak during 2006.  If you are wondering, Mickey Mantle’s longest such streak was 11 in 1952.  Reggie Jackson had a 17-game streak in ’82, but he was already with the Angels by then.

Big Papi has K’ed at least twice in his last five starts.  Six different Yankees have compiled streaks of five straight two-K starts, most recently Tony Clark in 2004.

Ortiz’s high-water mark in terms of season’s strikeouts was last year’s 134, when he put up a line of .238/.332/.462.  He also struck out 133 times in 2004, but that year he hit .301/.380/.603.  Alfonso Soriano holds the Yankee season strikeout record with 157 in 2002.

So game number one is in the books.  The anticipation for the start of the season has dissipated.  With but one game’s worth of data to go by, some folks will have nothing better to do but to dissect every piece of the action from Sunday’s game, send up flares and call for the head of  (insert name of your most deserving “goat” here).

So, how much of a difference can the outcome of the first game make?  Prior to this season, the Yankees had gone 62-44-1 in openers.  The average winning percentage in seasons featuring an opening game win was .569, with a range from .331 (1908) to .714 (the magic 1927 season).  In seasons with an opening game loss, the average winning percentage was .563, and ranged from .329 (1912) to .708 (another magic season, 1998).  Six percentage points over 162 games is slightly less than one whole game’s difference in the won-loss record.

Some more numbers to chew on.  There is a mere 4% correlation between a Yankee opening day win and their final record.  In fact, the pythagorean winning percentage for Spring Training games is a much better predictor of regular season success.  As an example, based on the Yanks runs scored and allowed during Spring Training from 2003 through 2009, there was a 67.6% correlation with their regular season record.  This may not bode well for 2010, as the 130 runs scored and 162 allowed during this Spring’s games would project to a .394 winning percentage.  Somehow, despite the opening game loss,  I have a feeling this will be a year with a poor correlation.

As we hit another Opening Day, and CC Sabathia’s second Opening Day start for the Bombers, I decided to take a look at some of the history behind the pitchers who got the nod.

In the franchise’s 107-year history, 57 men have taken the hill on Opening Day.  Whitey Ford, Mel Stottlemyre and Ron Guidry are tied for most Opening Day starts, with seven.

Ford’s seven starts actually took place over a 13-season span, from 1954 to 1966.  He never started more than two openers consecutively.  Don Larsen (2 starts), Bob Turley, Jim Coates (!), Jim Bouton and Ralph Terry got the assignments in the non-Ford years.

Stottlemyre was the ace of the staff during the lean post-dynasty years.  He threw the first pitch every year from ’67 to ’74, except for ’71, when Stan Bahnsen opened things up.

“Gator” started what would be his memorable 25-3 1978 campaign as the Opening Day starter in ’78 (he got a “no decision” that day, as the Yanks lost 2-1 at Texas).  Guidry started six more Openers in the next eight years, missing only 1981 (Tommy John got the assignment) and 1985 (Phil Niekro).

The period from 1987-1992 was muddled to downright depressing, depending on your point of view.  Six different managers, three in-season managerial changes, and four consecutive seasons with winning percentages lower than .470 (which hadn’t happened since 1912-15 . . . and the Yankees were the Highlanders in ’12).  Four of those six years saw the team use at least 20 different pitchers.  So, it should be no surprise than six different men got the Opening Day start during that period (Dennis Rasmussen, Rick Rhoden, Tommy John, Dave LaPoint, Tim Leary and Scott Sanderson).  If you add in Guidry’s final Opener (1986), and Jimmy Key’s first Opener (1993), then there were eight different starters over eight years, the longest streak in franchise history.

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This update is powered by Dick Enberg, who is leaving the NCAA Final Four coverage for good, but joining the Padres broadcast team:

• Our own Cliff Corcoran is part of trio of bloggers asked by the Times to assess the 2010 Yankees

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This update is powered by the outtakes from a DirecTV commercial shoot featuring Girardi and Posada:

• Buster Olney picks the Yanks to win the AL East:

For most of the spring, I thought I’d pick the Rays to win the East. The Red Sox also have made tremendous additions. Eventually there will be a year in which the Yankees’ age will manifest itself; maybe that will be this year. But the Yankees have so much talent, and Curtis Granderson, Nick Johnson and Javier Vazquez are all excellent additions. If holes emerge, we know that the Yankees and Red Sox will have the resources to fill them. For the Rays, that is not the case.

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• Curtis Granderson adjusts to life with contact lenses.
• Joel Sherman on the strategy behind the release of Chad Gaudin:

Instead the key date is March 31 at 2 p.m. That is the deadline to release players with non-guaranteed contracts and owe just 45-day’s pay. So if the Yanks are unable to trade Gaudin between now and then, they almost certainly will release him and pay him that severance, which will be around $720,000.

Since the Yanks are obligated to that amount, I would assume they would be willing to pay at least that much of his salary as part of a trade and, perhaps, a bit more. The one advantage of having Gaudin pass through waivers is that the Yanks can send him to the minors. But there is no chance they would pay him $2.9 million to begin in the minors. After paying the $720,000, they could re-sign him at a lower rate and send him to the minors, but Gaudin probably would not accept that since he likely can find major league work elsewhere if the Yanks outright release him.

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• A rainout calls for some imaginative thinking:

. . . A rainout at George M. Steinbrenner Field on Sunday allowed the Yankees’ players to knock off early, but for the manager, it created — in his words — a mess.

While heavy rains pelted the tarpaulin outside, Girardi and pitching coach Dave Eiland huddled with a head-scratcher of figuring out how to make sure eight pitchers could get into action on Monday thanks to the canceled game.

. . . The solution, it was decided, was to create another game. After checking with other clubs to see if anyone could spare hitters to play an unscheduled split-squad game, the Yankees opted to create their own.

In front of thousands of empty blue seats and few other witnesses, the Yankees will field two teams at their home stadium on Monday morning. Andy Pettitte, Mariano Rivera and Damaso Marte will hurl for one squad, with Joba Chamberlain, Chan Ho Park and Dave Robertson firing for another.

Then in the game that is printed on the schedule, A.J. Burnett will start against the Phillies on MLB.TV at 1:05 p.m. ET in Clearwater, Fla., with Phil Hughes serving in relief.

Problem solved, providing Girardi and company one long morning and afternoon to evaluate Chamberlain and Hughes in the ongoing battle to complete New York’s rotation, a decision Girardi hopes to make by March 25 or 26.

• David Robertson may see more (and more important) action this season:

That baby-faced 24-year-old, Yankees manager Joe Girardi says, might pitch the eighth inning this year. Of course, this is the spring. Of course, this could be just the manager talking. And of course, the team still needs to hammer out it’s starting rotation and see where pitchers like Alfredo Aceves and Joba Chamberlain land.

But Girardi says he has enough confidence in Robertson – four runs in 3 2/3 innings this spring – to use him as a “guy who can pitch for us anywhere now.”

• Catching up with Chien-Ming Wang.
• Meet Kevin Towers.
• A-Rod can’t wait for his World Series ring.

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This update is powered by the late, great Gilda Radner:

• Individual game tickets go on sale at Noon on Friday.
• MLB.com set out to determine the Yanks’ team of the past decade.
• Kevin Towers is the Yanks’ new “Special Assignment Scout”
• Ex-Yankee Chuck Knoblauch is in trouble with the law.

Back on Monday.

This update is powered by . . . my favorite Natalie Merchant song:

• What do some of the Yankee coaches think about Jesus Montero:

(Batting Coach Kevin) Long said Montero reminded him of Robinson Cano — “another kid who can wake up out of bed and hit.” He has already shown a consistent ability to put the barrel of his bat on pitches and hit to the opposite field, and the Yankees are most impressed with his gift for making adjustments from at-bat to at-bat and from pitch to pitch.

Cashman recalled an instance from last Sunday’s game against the Minnesota Twins, when Montero, after falling behind to Jesse Crain, 0-2, sensed that an outside breaking ball was coming. It did, and Montero poked it down the right-field line for a double.

“It’s amazing that at 20 years old he’s a .320 lifetime hitter,” Long said. (Montero’s career average is actually .325.) “But he’s got to get his body in shape and turn from being a soft kid to a hard-nosed man. He’s got to do it in a hurry because he owes it to the organization. He owes it to everybody around him.”

. . . According to the Yankees, Montero usually needs 1.9 to 2.0 seconds to catch and throw the ball to second base, whereas an elite catcher, like Yadier Molina of the St. Louis Cardinals, can do it in about 1.7. Long after his teammates had finished their morning workout Saturday, Montero remained in the Yankees’ bullpen to work on his throwing technique with Girardi.

(Catching instructor Tony) Pena said: “He has a strong arm — a very strong arm — but he can’t rely on that. If he has the proper mechanics, everything else will take over, and then we’ll have what we like.”

• Girardi on Alfredo Aceves:

“He’s just doing what he does,” Girardi said, adding: “What I’m most happy about is he’s ahead in the count all the time. He’s strike one, 1-2, lot of 1-2 counts, 0-1 counts. That’s what you love to see. Guys love to play behind those types of guys, too.”

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This update is powered by a classic Buddy Hackett joke (sorry for the video quality):

• Nick Johnson, pull power hitter?:

As a lefthanded hitter he’s always had a lot more Tony Gwynn in him than Ken Griffey Jr. He’s not exactly a slap hitter, but Johnson has made a career of hitting the ball to all fields, always more comfortable going the other way than pulling the ball.

“My whole life’s been left field,” was the way he put it yesterday.

. . . (Batting coach Kevin) Long took one look at him on tape after the Yankees signed him as a free agent and saw an obvious flaw that was draining his power from his swing. Basically, he wasn’t using his legs to drive the ball.

“When I watched him it was striking that his back foot was sliding out and collapsing,” Long explained. “So that was the first thing we attacked, getting to use his lower half more efficiently and consistently.”

. . . The payoff came quickly, in Johnson’s fifth and sixth at-bats of the spring, and the home runs were enough to make the Yankees salivate over what his new approach might produce this season.

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This update is powered by . . . a trailer for every Academy Award-winning movie ever:

• The ever-quotable Goose Gossage:

Q. You were a starter and reliever before you settled on closing games. What roles do you think Joba Chamberlain and Phil Hughes should have on the Yankees staff?

A. I think Phil Hughes is a starter for sure. He can go deep into games. He’s a power pitcher and he also knows how to pitch, with a nice curveball. He’s got a good head on his shoulders. Personally, I think Joba is a relief pitcher. He’s got that makeup, that aggressiveness. I think that he is more valuable in the bullpen. I think that he would be a great relief pitcher.

Q. Do you think Mariano Rivera is the best closer in baseball history?

A. I think that he is a tremendous relief pitcher. He’s the best current-day, modern reliever. But it’s just like you can’t compare the 500-home-run club today to the old 500-home-run club. When I was inducted into the Hall of Fame, I was told that I had 53 saves with seven-plus outs. I was told that Mariano had one and Trevor Hoffman had two. So I think that says it in a nutshell.

• The story of a one-time Yankee and Rule 5 veteran, Zack Kroenke.
• Lance McCullers (reliever on ’89 and ’90 squads) turns 46 today.
• Mark Salas (p/t catcher on ’87 team) turns 49 today.
• The immortal Jim Bouton turns 71 today.
• Joe DiMaggio died 11 years ago today.

Back on Thursday.

This update is powered by this cool Rube Goldberg-inspired music video:

• Nine facts you may not know about Mo, including:

1. Of the 39 relievers with 200 or more saves, only Mariano Rivera has pitched for one team.

4. For the third straight season, Rivera threw only one wild pitch (this follows four straight seasons of no wild pitches). He has thrown only 12 in his career. Last season, his Yankees teammate A.J. Burnett and the Mariners’ Felix Hernandez each threw 17 to the backstop.

6. For the third straight season, Rivera threw three four-pitch walks (one intentional) to bring his lifetime total of four-pitch walks up to 50, which includes 31 intentional walks.

• Derek Jeter, future part-owner of Yanks?:

The Yankees need to find a way to make Derek Jeter a Yankee for Life. There’s really only one way. At some point the Steinbrenner family would have to take him into the ownership group.

. . . Jeter, of course, is in the final year of his 10-year, $189 million contract. The Yankees and Jeter will come together on a new deal at some point, but Jeter needs to be a Yankee for Life and there is a way to make him one. The Yankees need to work out a deal with Jeter where they allow him to become part of Yankees ownership after his playing days are complete. Players cannot be part of ownership, so this would have to be a separate deal.

. . . Jeter is set on being an owner when his playing days are done. Without specifically talking about the Yankees, Jeter told The Post yesterday that being an owner is “definitely a goal of mine.”

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This update is powered by . . . an all-star performance of  “In the Midnight Hour”

• Joel Sherman warns of the major contracts of the aging Yankee core.
• Ramiro Pena realizes he won’t be playing short on a regular basis anytime soon.
• Brian Cashman, on Robby Cano:

“He’s already one of the premier guys in the game, but that’s the only thing separating him from taking it to a whole other level,” Brian Cashman said. “If he can be more selective at the plate, he could have a Hall of Fame-type career.”

Since Cano debuted in 2005, his .306 average ranks 13th among all active players and fourth among all American Leaguers who have played at least 700 games, trailing only Ichiro Suzuki (.328), Derek Jeter (.322) and Michael Young (.313).

“He’s still young,” Cashman said. “He really has a chance to make a name for himself that would last forever. That’s the type of hitting talent he has.”

Mark Teixeira, who watched Cano from across the field for four years, didn’t gain an appreciation for just how good the 27-year-old is until last season.

“He has so much talent, it would be easy for him to say, ‘I’m going to let my talent play and I’ll have a decent year,'” Teixeira said. “But he wants to be one of the best – and he can be.”

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This update is powered by an amazing mathematician:

• How many records with Jeter and A-Rod set in Yankees unis?:

. . . If he stays healthy, Rodriguez, who turns 35 in July, is an overwhelming favorite to shatter Barry Bonds’s career record of 762 home runs. Sometime near the 2011 All-Star Game break, Jeter, who currently has 2,747 hits, is projected to get his 3,000th.

. . . Only eight players have amassed more than 3,400, and only five have reached the 3,500 mark, beginning with Tris Speaker at 3,514.

Whether ranking in the top five will mean something to Jeter and motivate him to keep playing remains to be seen.  . . .

Rodriguez, meanwhile, begins this season with 583 home runs and should surpass 600 sometime in late June or early July, reach 700 in 2013 and overtake Bonds in late 2015 or early 2016, when he will be 40 years old.

. . . The most crucial variable is health. Rodriguez missed 38 games last season following hip surgery. Jeter is a remarkably durable player — he has played at least 148 games in all but one of his 14 full seasons — but shortstop is a demanding position. If he continues to play there and perform at a high level, he would buck the trend.

• Curtis Granderson, on Jeter possibly NOT retiring as a Yankee:

“It’d be tough,” said Curtis Granderson, the Yankees’ new center fielder. “But it’d kind of be like Ken Griffey Jr. Everybody in here who’s a baseball fan knows Ken Griffey Jr. as a Seattle Mariner. Then he goes to Cincinnati and Chicago and back to Seattle. Jeter’s definitely in that category. If Ken Griffey can move teams, you never know.”

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This update is brought to you by Eddie “The Eagle” Edwards:

• Jorge, (re)meet Javier … Javier, (re)meet Jorge:

Posada caught Vazquez for the first time in more than five years during a bullpen session Sunday.

“I asked him if he remembered the way I pitched,” Vazquez said.

Vazquez, originally scheduled to throw Wednesday, wanted to get in a 30-pitch session because it had been too long (about 10 days) since he last threw, in Puerto Rico.

Like other starters pitching their first session, Vazquez threw only fastballs and changeups. Soon, he will add in a slider that he did not throw during his first tour with the Yankees. Posada said what impressed him most is how Vazquez has adjusted over the years. He specifically mentioned his two best off-speed pitches, his changeup and curve, and how he has a much better feel for increasing and decreasing the velocity of those pitches.

• Jeter (re)worked his body over the past two years.

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This update is powered by the Peanuts gang, cause its still a kid’s game (smile):

• MLBTradeRumors provides a capsule summary of the Yanks off-season.
• Christina Kahrl examines some Spring Training questions:

. . . Will Joba Chamberlain start or relieve? Or will Phil Hughes get the job? Or will both tyros be in the pen, opening up the rotation slot to a more classically defined fifth-starter type like Chad Gaudin or the reliably bad Sergio Mitre? Or will Alfredo Aceves swap places with Hughes and Chamberlain and get the skippable fifth man’s job? . . .  With the decisions to acquire Javier Vazquez and retain Andy Pettitte, the fifth starter’s slot ought to be skippable given an expensive quality front four; a quick run through the Yankees schedule suggests that the they could avoid starting anybody on short rest and reduce the fifth slot to 25 turns on the year. . . .  it also has the nice advantage of having the fifth starter face the Red Sox or Rays just once in 13 September games against their two most likely rivals, and they could easily turn that number into zero if they felt the need.

Of course, any such proposition relies on the front four being healthy and delivering, and I’ve already expressed my doubts about Javier Vazquez. . . .

. . . If the Bombers were to leave Hughes and Chamberlain in the bullpen for a combined 150-160 innings, it isn’t hard to envision a dramatic improvement, and if Aceves ends up manning the middle innings, that might add up to a historically outstanding unit by any flavor of relief metric.

As for the outfield, I don’t really see the contest as that dramatic, since I expect an initial job-sharing arrangement not unlike what happened last year between Gardner and Melky Cabrera. However, Winn’s the sort of hurdle Gardner should be able to beat out over time, and regardless of the outcome both players should get plenty of at-bats, especially once the Yankees decide there’s not much to be done about Curtis Granderson’s issues against lefties.

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I am pleased to announce the second annual “Banter Battle” fantasy baseball league over at Yahoo! Sports.  Can someone dethrone last year’s champs, the “Quadruple A’s“?

It’ll be a 6×6 (the usual 10 categories, plus holds and OPS) non-keeper roto league, with a live straight draft to be held on Tuesday, March 30th at 9:30 pm Eastern time.  (You can pre-rank your selections if you can’t be there live).

In order to join the league,  go to the Yahoo Fantasy Baseball 2010 page and enter the League ID# and password below.

League ID#: 143546
Password: karim

If you were part of last year’s league, you should have received an e-mail to join this year’s contest from me (unless your e-mail was hidden or blocked).

Its free to play, and we won’t be playing for any $.  However, the winner will get his/her (user)name mentioned prominently in a future post of mine. 🙂

The only requirement we insist on is that you not abandon your team in the middle of the season.  So, serious replies only please.

Play ball!

Today’s update is powered by . . . chocolates, and Lucy:

• Tyler Kepner on Jeter’s next contract:

. . . In some ways, Jeter’s performance will affect the size of his next contract. If he has another standout season, churning out hits and moving nimbly from side to side on defense, he is clearly in a stronger position. But unless he pulls a George Costanza and drags the championship trophy around the parking lot from his bumper, Jeter’s legacy is secure. He is the icon of the franchise.

. . . Jeter’s value is different, and the Yankees understand they must treat him as a special case. Parting ways would be devastating to their brand, but no less so to Jeter’s legacy. The Yankees and Jeter need each other, and it is hard to imagine acrimony at the bargaining table.

. . . Jeter’s ability to stay above the fray, easily accessible to the news media yet out of the firing line, is part of his mystique. In Jeter, the Yankees know they have a dependable, well-spoken, maintenance-free front man for a global business. That is part of why they will pay him handsomely after this season.

The question is how much. Jeter has talked about wanting to own a team someday, and his next contract will help in that ambition. The value of the deal will also reveal something about Jeter and his true feelings about Rodriguez.

Will Jeter demand a contract that also takes him through age 42? Will he seek to make more than Rodriguez?

[My take: Give him three years/$60-70M and then a stake in the Yanks.]

• The GM on Damon, Jeter, Mo and Joe:

“The industry the last two free agent markets seems to be going downward and the player’s ages are going upward,” Cashman said. “It makes more sense to be patient. My attitude is if this is the place you want to be, you will make it happen. Johnny Damon professed his love for the Yankees, wanted to be here and was given every chance to be here. He’s not here anymore and I don’t feel that is the Yankees’ fault. They have to reconcile why they are not here, not me. If people want to be here and be a part of something, then find a way to work it out. Of course we want (Jeter, Rivera, and Girardi) back, but we choose to delay that until the end of the year.”

Cashman confirmed reports that Damon wanted the same two-year, $18-million deal that right fielder Bobby Abreu got from the Angels in order to re-sign with the Yankees, who countered with two years and $14 million. Damon reportedly has a two-year, $14-million offer on the table from the Tigers.

“I hope he does not sign for something less than our offer,” Cashman said. “That means he should have been a Yankee and that’s not our fault.

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Today’s update is powered by the ballad of Beaker:

• Its never too early to worry about NEXT year’s Yankee free agents:

The Yankees could be facing a most interesting offseason following the 2010 season. Closer Mariano Rivera and shortstop Derek Jeter, two franchise icons, will become eligible for free agency, and manager Joe Girardi’s three-year contract will expire.

The Yankees have a strict policy of not negotiating contracts until the current one has expired. Thus, questions about the future of all three will hang over the Yankees all season. GM Brian Cashman, though, does not see that as a potential problem.

“Everybody signed those contracts and there is a lot of money being made and people are comfortable,” Cashman told the New York Post‘s irascible George Arthur King III.

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Today’s update is powered by the almighty Nawlins staple, the po’boy:

• MLB.com examines the versatility of the Yankees’ outfielders.
• Might a former Yankee prospect (since traded) be older than advertised?:

His birth certificate and passport say outfielder Jose Tabata was born Aug. 12, 1988, in Anzoategui, Venezuela. Yet, during a recent radio interview, general manager Neal Huntington admitted there are “a lot of rumblings” that Tabata might actually be in his mid-20s.

In Latin America, record-keeping can be spotty, especially when it comes to youngsters with excellent baseball skills. The New York Yankees investigated Tabata’s background in 2005 and, satisfied he truly was 16, signed him as an undrafted free agent.

The Pirates are not publicly disputing Tabata’s age, and yet …

“All of the documentation he has used to obtain his visa from the U.S. government and his passport from the Venezuelan government indicates his reported age is accurate,” Huntington said in an e-mail to the Tribune-Review. “Apart from unfounded speculation, there is nothing to indicate his age any different than reported. My point is that while we have reason to doubt his reported age, it is a non-issue to us.”

• Joba speaks:

Q: How much of a relief is it to you that the “Joba Rules,” which limited your innings, are now a thing of the past?

JC: It means I’m growing up. As a competitor, I definitely got frustrated at times. But at the end of the day, I also understood why they were doing it. And I have the utmost respect for them taking that time and going through the good and the bad with me. Now we’ve done it. We’re better for it. We all learned how to handle the situation, and now I can just go out and play the game and get 200-plus innings in.

• Chase Wright (he of the four consecutive homers allowed in one inning) turns 27 today.
• Fritz Peterson turns 68 today.

Back on Thursday.