As our man Hank Waddles pointed out in his recap of last night’s game, the Yankees on Friday night began a stretch in which they will play 13 of 16 games against the three worst teams in baseball: the Indians (four games in this current wrap-around Memorial Day weekend series), the Orioles (six games, three home, three away), and the Astros (three games at home to end the stretch). Of those 13 games, ten of them come at home, and the only winning team the Yankees will face during that 16-game stretch is the overachieving, third-place Blue Jays.

This is the time for the Yankees to fatten up, and they did exactly that Friday night.

Phil Hughes opened the game by striking out the first five men in the Indians order. In the bottom of the second, Nick Swisher launched a two-run home run off Tribe starter Fausto Carmona that hit the right-field foul pole maybe a foot from the top. Clinging to a 2-1 lead in the 6th, the Yankees added another couple of runs via a bases-loaded, no-out rally that was cut short by the feeble bottom of the order on a day that Joe Girardi opted to rest Alex Rodriguez and Francisco Cervelli, both of whom needed it. Then in the seventh, Robinson Cano, who went 3-for-4 with a walk while batting cleanup for the first time in his career, launched a grand slam off lefty reliever Tony Sipp that iced the game.

Hughes gave up a second run in the seventh on a Russell Branyan solo homer that got out so quickly that Michael Kay’s only description of the action as it was in progress was “there that went”, but that was the extent of the damage in Hughes’ seven innings of work as he struck out eight in total against just one walk. Sergio Mitre and Chan Ho Park wrapped things up without incident, and the Yankees won 8-2.

Heading into Friday night’s game, Hughes needed a good start, and the Yankee offense needed to put a big number on the board. Both ate well. Here’s hoping the Yankees continue to feast for the next couple of weeks.

There are four basic steps to rebuilding a ballclub. First, trade your marketable stars and veterans for prospects, retaining only the core, team-controlled players around which you plan to build. Second, evaluate your new assets to determine which will hit, which will miss, which might benefit from a position or role change or a particular mechanical or coaching fix, and identify what holes are likely to remain on your roster once those players have graduated to the majors. Third, once those players are established at the major league level, compliment them with one or two big free agent signings and perhaps another trade that target the remaining holes. Step four: win.

It’s not that easy (not that it sounds easy), but that’s the plan. The Indians are currently in Stage Two. Beginning with the trade that sent CC Sabathia to the Brewers in July 2008, Cleveland has traded CC Sabathia, Cliff Lee, Victor Martinez, Casey Blake, Franklin Gutierrez, Rafael Betancourt, Ryan Garko, Kelly Shoppach, Ben Francisco, and Mark DeRosa. That’s a pair of Cy Young award winners, more than half of their 2008 starting lineup, an ace set-up man, a productive back-up catcher, and their 2009 Opening Day third baseman.

That has left them with a core of center fielder Grady Sizemore, 27, middle infielder Asdrubal Cabrera, 24, (both, cruelly, on the disabled list at the moment with injuries that could keep them out for a significant portion of the season), right fielder Shin-Soo Choo, 27 and the team’s best hitter for the last two seasons, and right-handed starter Fausto Carmona, 26. Travis Hafner, Jhonny Peralta, and Jake Westbrook are still around, but Hafner is tied down by a bad contract, the market for Peralta dried up last year when he moved to third base and stopped hitting, and Westbrook was frozen in place by his June 2008 Tommy John surgery.

To that core, the Indians have added these young players and prospects via trade:

2B – Luis Valbuena (from Seattle for Gutierrez)
SS – Jason Donald (from Philadelphia for Lee)
C – Lou Marson (also for Lee)
C – Carlos Santana (from the Dodgers for Blake)
OF/1B – Matt LaPorta (from Milwaukee for Sabathia)
OF – Michael Brantley (also for Sabathia)
RHP – Mitch Talbot (from Tampa Bay for Shoppach)
RHP – Justin Masterson (from Boston for Martinez)
RHP – Chris Perez (from St. Louis for DeRosa)
RHP – Jess Todd (also for DeRosa)
RHP – Carlos Carrasco (also for Lee)
LHP – Scott Barnes (from San Francisco for Garko)
RHP – Nick Hagadone (also for Martinez)
RHP – Bryan Price (also for Martinez)
RHP – Rob Bryson (also for Sabathia)
RHP – Jason Knapp (also for Lee)
RHP – Connor Graham (from Colorado for Betancourt)
RHP – Joe Smith (from the Mets in the Gutierrez deal)
LHP – Zach Jackson (also for Sabathia)
RHP – Jon Meloan (also for Blake)

Valbuena, Marson, LaPorta, and Brantley were in the Indians Opening Day lineup at second, catcher, first, and left, respectively. Talbot and Masterson are in their rotation. Perez was their closer while Kerry Wood was on the disabled list. Donald is now their starting shortstop with Cabrera on the DL. Santana is expected to be called up in June to push Marson into a backup role. Of those 20 players, only relievers Jackson and Meloan are no longer with the organization (both were throw-ins that yielded no lasting value for the team).

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Our man Hank Waddles has a good interview with Norman Ollestad. Nice job, once again, Hendree.

Dig.

[Photo Credit: Quicksilver]

With Bill Madden’s new book on George Steinbrenner topping many of the sports bestsellers lists, it’s an appropriate time to look back on the first year of “The Boss’” reign as the game‘s most recognizable owner. That would be 1973, when the Yankees were in the midst of a 12-year absence from postseason play. Still three years removed from ending their lengthy playoff drought, the Yankees embarked on a new era not fully aware of how life would change under the thumb of “Big George.”

Coming only weeks after he purchased the franchise for less than $10 million, Steinbrenner’s first spring would not pass without major controversy, though it had nothing to do with his ability to rant and rave. The flames were instead fanned by two unconventional left-handers, Mike Kekich and Fritz Peterson, who decided the time was right to announce that they had swapped wives, children, and family pets. One could not have blamed Steinbrenner for questioning his new investment right then and there, what with 40 per cent of his projected starting rotation daring to do something that much of the civilian population would never even have considered.

The Yankees had other personnel problems, too. Their middle infielders, Horace Clarke and Gene “Stick” Michael, carried lightweight bats that would have made them utility players in today‘s game. The Yankees lacked a quality all-around right fielder, a position that featured the over-the-hill talents of Matty Alou and Johnny Callison. Their first baseman, the 38-year-old Felipe Alou (Matty’s older brother), had not been a premium player since the late sixties, when he played the outfield for the Atlanta Braves. The pitching staff, though featuring top-tier talents like Mel Stottlemyre and Sparky Lyle, lacked the depth of some of the other elite staffs in the American League and could not carry an offense that ranked tenth among 12 teams in runs scored.

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On Monday, as I was continuing to gather research for the column I thought I’d be writing this week, Alex Belth sent me an e-mail with a topic idea that I found so intriguing, I had to put my other one on the back burner.

Why has Mark Teixeira received a free pass from the NYY fans and the NY media?

Interesting question, no? He hasn’t really gotten a free pass from the Bronx Banter community. We don’t apologize for anybody. Hell, I was still killing Brett Gardner when he was catalyzing the offense. But the question is warranted. It got me thinking.

Naturally, on my way home from work that night, I threw on WFAN and Steve Sommers had the recently engaged Sweeny Murti on to schmooze, and Sommers immediately asked him about, among other things, when Teixeira would start hitting. I wondered if Alex’s question had merit. When the Yankees arrived in Minny, Tex’s line was .209/.327/.378. Thanks to his efforts of the last couple of games, Teixeira is over the .215 mark and a little further away from the Mendoza Line. But the consistency hasn’t been there; he has gone hitless in exactly half of the Yankees’ 46 games. He had the big three-home-run game in Boston and has only four dingers in the other 45. We know Tex a slow starter, but April’s supposed to be the only bad month. We’re nearing Memorial Day, and Mark Teixeira’s numbers look like they should be on the back of Steve Balboni’s baseball card, not his.

(Speaking of the “baseball card” theory, can we put a moratorium on that whole thing? The premise that players off to bad starts will ultimately rise to the stats that appear on their baseball card is just tired. It’s not a real answer to the short term, even if that ultimately will be the case.)

And yet the majority of the local scribes, while maybe not letting him slide, haven’t heaped criticism upon him like the Boston writers have done with David Ortiz both last year and this year. Last season, when Teixeira got off to the slow start, the “he’s a slow starter” refrain was common, and he was still taking a lot of walks and getting on base, which helped deflect some of the criticism that could have come his way.

In all my years of Yankee fandom and in the time I covered the team, the only person I can recall who got similar treatment during this bout of adversity was Bernie Williams. Bernie would routinely hover near .200, .225 or .250 for the first six weeks of the season (in 2002, he was a .236 at the end of April and ended up hitting .333), and then when Memorial Day came around, find his stroke, usually from the right side of the plate, and go through long stretches when he’d carry the offense.

Alex offered up a list of reasons why he thought Tex was getting off easy:

1. The Yankees are winning.
2. He’s a good fielder.
3. He’s good with the media.
4. The Yankees are winning.
5. He plays with A-Rod.
6. The Yankees are winning.

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Okay, let’s start with the good news.  At 28-19, the Yankees have the second-best record in all of baseball, tied with the San Diego Padres, if you can believe it.

Now for the bad news, which will take a bit more than one sentence to describe.  On Wednesday the Yankees made like bullies, calmly taking the Twins’ lunch money yet again as they swept a makeshift double header.  Just a day later, though, things don’t look quite as good.

Problem number one is that this team suddenly can’t score any runs.  Derek Jeter led off the game with a single, then dashed to third on Mark Teixeira’s single two batters later.  You could make the argument that even though we were only ten minutes into the action, this was the biggest moment of the game.  With Javier Vazquez on the mound, a pitcher who has been, shall we say, less than dominant this year, it was probably important to get off to a quick start.  It didn’t even need to be a big inning; just a 1-0 lead would have done wonders.  And with Alex Rodríguez coming up with runners at first and third and only one out, even a lazy sac fly would do.  Instead, A-Rod tapped weakly to short and produced a 6-3 double play to end the inning.

When presented with the exact same scenario in the bottom half of the inning — first and third and one out — Justin Morneau did his job and lofted a fly ball to centerfield, easily scoring Orlando Hudson to give the Twins a 1-0 lead.

The game was essentially over right then and there, but since they played eight more innings, I’ll give you the highlights — or lowlights, as the case may be.  The first thing you need to know is that Javy Vazquez was awful, as you might guess from this line: 5.2 IP, 8H, 5 ER, 3 BB, 2K.  The second thing you need to know is that he was actually worse than that.  Included in those eight hits were four doubles, a triple, and a home run, and there wasn’t a cheapie in the bunch.  It seemed like every ball the Twins hit off Vazquez was a rocket, even the outs.  As shaky as his confidence already seemed to be, it will be interesting to see how he bounces back from this.

Jason Kubel, who had already driven in a run with a second-inning double, led off the sixth inning with a monstrous home run to right, stretching the Minnesota lead to 5-2.  Vazquez lasted another two batters, but he was a dead man walking at that point.  Joe Girardi brought in Chan Ho Park with two outs, and was just as effective as you might think, giving up a harmless single before closing out the sixth but then starting the seventh by walking Joe Mauer and giving up a single to Morneau before Girardi lifted him for Damaso Marte.  Marte got his man (Jim Thome), and Girardi brought in our old friend Chad Gaudin with two on and one out, hoping to keep the game close.

It didn’t work.  After Michael Cuddyer struck out, That Man Kubel came up and rocked a home run into the Land of Pork Chops on Sticks.  8-2, Twins.

So now that it’s all said and done, I’m left with three burning questions, and I’d appreciate some answers.

1. Why is that when I watch televised games from Target Field, it still looks like the games are being played indoors?

2. When will the Yankees start scoring runs again?

3. Exactly how many beers does it take to convince someone that it would be a good idea to sneak up and take a bite out of a pork chop in Kim Jones’s hand while she is using it as a prop during a live shot?

As we wrap this up, let’s end with something positive.  Take a look at the next sixteen games:

4 games vs. Cleveland (17-28)
3 games vs. Baltimore (15-33)
3 games @ Toronto (27-22)
3 games @ Baltimore (15-33)
3 games vs. Houston (16-31)

Yanks go for the quick sweep of the Twins. Minnie won the last game in the New York series and now try to save face at home. Nice-looking new ball park out there, too. There were some gorgeous shots of the sunset and the moon against the city skyline on the YES broadcast last night.

We’ll see if Javy’s finger is a problem. Or anything else for that matter. But he’s had a couple of decent starts. Hope he builds on it.

Be nice to have have the Score Truck show up and take ’em back home to the BX in style.

Whadda ya say, boys?

[Picture by Bags]

The Yankees limped into this series, but it hasn’t mattered much; if the Twins didn’t have bad luck against the Yankees, they wouldn’t have no luck at all. Minnesota lost two one-run games in the space of an evening – the second half of last night’s suspended Scoreless Wonder, which ended up a 1-0 Yanks win thanks to Derek Jeter’s solo home run (and lead-preserving nifty defensive play), and then tonight’s 3-2 duel, which saw Andy Pettitte prevail over Francisco Liriano. Mariano Rivera saved both games, and if he didn’t quite radiate moonbeams and rose petals and ride off the field on a pegasus like he normally does, it was at least a step in the right direction.

I figured on the bullpen being a minefield today (as just getting through nine innings has proved plenty tough enough for those guys recently), but David Robertson, Joba Chamberlain, and Mo staggered through to the end of the first game unscathed, and Andy Pettitte gave everyone a break tonight by throwing 72 of his 94 pitches for strikes — “attack-tastic,” as my friend put it — powering through eight relatively smooth innings with a little help from his good friend the DP grounder. Safe to say he’s showing no ill effects from his recent elbow issue (…well, safe to say, but I’m knocking on wood anyway, just in case). He hit a few speed bumps: in the first inning, when my guy Denard Span doubled, stole third, and was delivered to home plate by Joe Mauer; and in the seventh, with Delmon Young’s RBI double. Beyond that, though Pettitte allowed eight hits, he walked no one, struck out four, and was generally able to keep his anguished, muttered self-criticism on the mound to a minimum. When he induced Joe Mauer to hit into the Twins’ third DP of the night and end the eighth inning, his fist pump was downright Joba-esque.

With the Yankees still staging their community theater adaptation of Waiting For Godot, starring Mark Teixeira’s offense (“We are all born mad. Some remain so”), they patched together a few runs from the bottom of the lineup. In the fourth Francisco Cervelli went all speed-demon on the Twins, beat out a potential double play throw, and scored from first on Kevin “Strong Island” Russo’s double; Russo himself scored in the seventh inning when Brett Gardner tripled. (“Let us do something, while we have the chance! It is not every day that we are needed. But at this place, at this moment of time, all mankind is us, whether we like it or not. Let us make the most of it, before it is too late!”).

Each team had two runs and eight hits when Nick Swisher came to the plate in the top of the ninth to face Jon Rauch and his neck tattoos. The third pitch of the at-bat was a ripe fastball, and we can only hope its violent death was quick and painless, as Swisher absolutely creamed it. It soared over the right field wall and gave them a 3-2 lead that they held onto, thanks to a much more Mariano-like Rivera appearance than we saw in the first game. Take a deep breath, the Yankees won another series.

Here’s a Game Thread for the conclusion of last night’s game and then for Liriano and Pettitte in the regularly-scheduled game. Red Sox are surging–time for the Yanks to get it in gear.

Let’s Go Score-Truck!

[Picture by Bags]

The opening game of the Yankees’ first series at the new outdoor stadium in Minneapolis was suspended after the fifth inning Tuesday night due to the increased intensity of a storm that brought steady rain beginning in the bottom of the second inning. The game, which remained scoreless when lightening strikes and heavier rains forced the umpires to call out the tarp after the bottom of the fifth, will be made up at 4:05 central time, 5:05 eastern on Wednesday afternoon with the regularly scheduled game between the two teams to follow thirty minutes after the last out, or at 6:10 central/7:10 eastern, whichever is later. The rain delay and eventual suspension of the game was the first weather-related delay of a Twins home game since September 26, 1981, the Twins’ fifth-to-last game at their previous outdoor home, Metropolitan Stadium.

There was very little action in the first five innings as both starters, A.J. Burnett for the Yankees and Scott Baker for the Twins, were sharp, allowing just three hits and no runs. Burnett walked two but struck out five, while Baker walked just one and struck out just two but needed only 50 pitches to get through five innings.

The only batter to reach third base for either team was Denard Span, who led off the bottom of the first with a walk, stole second, and moved to third when Joe Mauer grounded out for the second out. He was stranded when Michael Cuddyer ground out to short after Burnett pitched carefully to Justin Morneau and walked him.

The only Yankee to reach second was Derek Jeter who led off the fourth with a single to center, then moved up on a walk to Brett Gardner, who had singled in the first and thus showed signs of breaking out of his slump by reaching base in both of his plate appearances. Jeter was stranded when a still-struggling Mark Teixeira, who erased Gardner in the first via a double play, popped out, Alex Rodriguez struck out, and Robinson Cano flied out.

Thanks to that double play off the bat of Teixeira, Baker faced the minimum through the first three innings. Burnett countered by retiring eight straight from the third through the fifth, a streak broken when Span took advantage of the soft ground by dropping down a two-out bunt base hit that stopped dead a quarter of the way up the third base line. Span then stole second again, but Burnett struck out Orlando Hudson to strand him. After that, the game was delayed for about an hour and a half before being suspended. No word on who will pitch for either team in the sixth inning tomorrow.

If the regular season ended today, the Yankees and Twins would meet in the Division Series for the second year in a row and fourth time in the last eight years. This week’s three game set in Minneapolis, the Yankees’ first visit to the new Target Field, will conclude the season series between the two teams, but there’s a very good chance that they will meet again come October.

The Yankees took two of three from the Twins in the Bronx the weekend before last, but have gone 2-5 against the Red Sox, Rays, and Mets since. The Twins have gone 3-4, splitting a two-game set with the Blue Jays, dropping two games in Boston, then returning home to take two of three from the Brewers. The Twins scored 31 runs in the three wins, but just nine runs in the four losses.

Target Field has been a happy home for the Twinks thus far as they are 14-7 (.667) at home against just 12-11 on the road. Here are the runs-scored splits for the Twins and their opponents at and away from Target Field:

@MIN: Twins 5.43 R/G; Opp 3.67 R/G; total: 9.10 R/G
Road: Twins 4.60 R/G; Opp 4.39 R/G; total: 8.99 R/G

Baseball-Reference’s park factors list Target Field as a slight hitter’s park (103/102). The total runs per game numbers above, which lack any adjustment for strength of opposition or road park factors, seem to agree with that.

The only change the Twins have made since the Yankees last saw them is that they called up Trevor Plouffe and installed him at shortstop. Plouffe was the Twins’ first round pick in 2004, but he isn’t a great defender and has hit just .259/.321/.391 in the minors. He’s simply a place-holder for the injured J.J. Hardy (wrist), who could return during this series.

Tonight A.J. Burnett, who has pitched poorly in two of his last three starts, the exception being a quality start against the Twins in which he walked four and got a no-decision, goes up against Scott Baker. Baker was the losing pitcher in that game against Burnett despite striking out nine Yankees in six innings against just one walk.

Baker actually left that game with a 4-3 lead in the seventh, but he bequeathed a couple of runners to his bullpen, both of whom scored on Alex Rodriguez’s grand slam off Matt Guerrier later that inning. That game, with those two runners added to Baker’s tally, was the only one of his four starts in May in which he allowed more than three runs. On the month, he has averaged more than 6 2/3 innings per starts and has struck out 27 men in 27 innings against just four walks.

With Baker starting tonight, Francisco Liriano starting Wednesday, and Javy Vazquez testing out his bruised finger on Thursday, all in a ballpark that has been very friendly to its new tenants, the Yankees will be hard pressed to pull out of their current skid this week.

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When I last checked in with this feature, prior to the Yankees last visit to Fenway Park, the Yankees were 19-8, just one game out of first place, and had lost just one series on the season. Since then, they’ve gone 7-10, lost three more series and split a fourth, and fallen a full six games behind the Rays. The upside is that they’re still in second place in the American League East and are tied with the Twins for the second-best record in the AL.

The Yankees arrive in Minnesota tonight in the midst of their first full-blown slump of the season. Over their last 15 games they are 5-10, and they have won just one of their last six contests. Prior to Sunday’s game, Joe Girardi identified a “multitude of problems” that have contributed to the team’s woes, including starting pitching, the bullpen, and clutch hitting. To my eye, the last of those has been less damaging than the first two.

The Yankees’ one win in their last six games came in the game in which they scored the fewest runs, their 2-1 victory over the Mets on Friday. In the five losses over that stretch, the Yankees have scored an average of five runs per game, well above the league average of 4.52, but have allowed an average of 7.2. That’s on the pitching.

When I last checked in, the Yankees were 18-4 in games started by the top four men in their rotation (CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett, Andy Pettitte, and Phil Hughes). Since then, Sabathia has made just one quality start in four appearances, posting a 5.96 ERA, A.J. Burnett has posted an 8.15 ERA in three starts, Phil Hughes has given up nine runs in 10 2/3 innings over his last two starts, and Andy Pettitte had his first bad start of the season, giving up seven runs (six earned) in five innings against the Rays. In the ten games covered in that last sentence, the Yankees have gone 2-8. Six of those losses can be blamed entirely on the starting pitching, while both wins can be credited to the offense, with the bullpen sharing credit on one.

Meanwhile, Javy Vazquez has made two quality starts in as many attempts posting a 1.35 ERA and this line: 13 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 4 BB, 13 K. However, Javy was twice skipped over for Sergio Mitre, who pitched well for a spot-starter, but took the loss in his first start after giving up four runs (three earned) in 4 1/3 innings. That’s an seventh loss that can be blamed on starting pitching.

Of the remaining three losses from the Yankees’ 7-10 stretch, one was the fault of the offense, which failed to score a run for Javy Vazquez in Detroit as the Tigers won 2-0. The other two can be hung on the bullpen. Those two losses came in a three-game stretch a week ago during which Joba Chamberlain and Mariano Rivera both got hit hard in back-t0-back outings.

Chamberlain has made one appearance since then, but it was a dominant one in which he struck out three men in 1 2/3 perfect innings, stranding two inherited runners to boot. Rivera has also made just one appearance since then, but he again gave up a run on a pair of hits, though he still escaped with the save in a 2-1 Yankee win over the Mets. Still, I’m not concerned about those two long-term.

Yes, the Yankees have some hitters who are struggling, specifically two- and three-spot hitters Brett Gardner (1-for-18 with just one walk), and Mark Teixeira (3-for-25), but Teixeira singled in his last two at-bats, and the lineup is slowly returning to health with Curtis Granderson looking good in his rehab assignment with Scranton and likely to be activated when the team returns home to face the Indians this weekend.

Granderson’s return, along with Nick Swisher’s return to action in the Mets series, will put the Yankee outfield back at full strength and allow Marcus Thames and Juan Miranda to settle into a platoon at designated hitter, and Randy Winn to return to his role as a speed-and-defense sub.

Despite being ravaged by injuries (Jorge Posada remains out with a broken foot and Nick Johnson could be lost for the season) and having several late-inning rallies have fall just short, the offense is not the problem. It is, after all, putting together those late-inning rallies in the first place. Rather it’s the need for those rallies, created by poor performances from the starting pitchers, that has been the problem.

I’m not terribly concerned about that either. Phil Hughes was due for some correction, but he has only had two bad starts, and the last against the Mets wasn’t that bad as he struck out seven men in 5 2/3 innings and allowed just four runs, one on the last pitch he threw. CC Sabathia had an unusually strong April, so his May struggles just feel like compensation for that. I have no doubts that he’ll dominate in the second half as he always does. Andy Pettitte has only had one bad outing, and he earned it with his best start to a season ever. Javy Vazquez and A.J. Burnett still have some proving to do, but Vazquez is well on his way and Burnett has always been inconsistent, so he’s not pitching out of character.

It’s not been a lot of fun to watch, but the Yankees recent skid hasn’t hurt them that much and doesn’t seem likely to continue much longer. But as for how it’s going . . . meh, it’s been better.

The below are a collection of photographs that I took from the dugout and the field prior to Sunday night’s game between the Yankees and Mets (roll over for captions, click image to enlarge).

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Give the Yankees this: they’re in a team-wide slump right now, but they’re still not boring. Even in a game in which they look listless, they’re almost a sure bet to put together a late-inning rally that falls just short of the necessary number of runs to qualify as an actual comeback.

They did it again Sunday night. For the third time in his last four starts, CC Sabathia was off his game, his pitches staying up in the zone, two of them leaving the park. Sunday night it was Jason Bay who turned around, in Joe Girardi’s words, “a changeup that cut” and a sinker that was up in the zone, tripling his home run output on the season. Those two blasts, one over the 384 sign in the left-field gap, one more than 400 feet to the opposite-field gap, plated three Mets runs. Prior to Bay’s first shot, in the second inning, a single by lefty Alex Cora, a last-minute sub for the aching Luis Castillo at second base, plated the Mets’ first two runs. After Bay’s second shot in the fifth, rookie lefty Ike Davis singled and was driven in by a David Wright double.

That made it 6-0 Mets and prompted me to comment in my liveblog from the pressbox, “I’m calling another just-short late-inning rally tonight.”

Bingo.

Johan Santana gave up three singles in the first three innings, but only CC Sabathia, who singled to lead off the third, got past first base. From the third through the seventh, Santana retired 13 straight Yankees. Then in the seventh, the Yankees finally broke through when Nick Swisher worked a two-out walk, and Francisco Cervelli hit a ball off the top of the left-field wall, inches below the foul pole for a long single.

Down, 6-1, the Yankees loaded the bases on a pair of walks and a Mark Teixeira slump-busting single in the eighth as Santana passed 100 pitches, but Jerry Manuel brought in side-arming lefty Pedro Feliciano, who got Robinson Cano to pop out to strand all three runners.

Finally, the Yankees put an honest-to-goodness rally together in the ninth against Ryota Igarashi, a first-year Japanese import fresh off the disabled list. Another Swisher walk was followed by a Cervelli single, Kevin Russo fielder’s choice, Juan Miranda pinch-hit RBI single. That forced Manuel to go to his closer, and Derek Jeter greeted old foe Francisco Rodriguez with a big RBI double to make it 6-3. Brett Gardner followed with an RBI groundout to third, failing to get a close call, though replays showed he was out by the tiniest of margins.

Teixeira followed with a flare that dropped in front of Cora for a hit, putting the tying run on and bringing up Alex Rodriguez for a big time confrontation with K-Rod. Rodriguez battled Rodriguez for eight pitches, getting ahead 2-0, then 3-1, fouling off four pitches in the at-bat, two of them with the count full, but once again the Yankees fell short. The third 3-2 pitch in the fourth full count of the inning was a changup in the zone that dipped just below Alex Rodriguez’s swing for strike three.

Mets win the game, 6-4, and the series.

The Yankees take a travel day and head to the new ballpark in Minneapolis. Here’s hoping they don’t run out of gas in St. Paul.

When this series started, I wrote that the Yankees’ problem was pitching. Since then, they’ve scored just five total runs in two games despite the successful return of Nick Swisher to the lineup and are faced with a Sunday night rubber game with Johan Santana taking the hill for the Mets. Santana’s 3.72 ERA may not look all that impressive relative to his 3.14 career mark, but it was inflated by an ugly outing in Philadelphia on May 2. Santana gave up ten runs in 3 2/3 innings in that start, but if you factor it out, his ERA in his other eight starts is a stellar 2.25. Uh-oh. In his last two starts, Santana has combined for this line: 14 IP, 11 H, 3 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 9 K. Amazingly, the Mets lost both games by scores of 2-1 and 3-2.

We could be in for another gem like that tonight with CC Sabathia on the bump to face Santana. It’s a matchup of two of the top lefties in the game and has a nifty backstory. The Yankees, specifically Brian Cashman, refused to trade a package built around Phil Hughes for Santana prior to the 2008 season with an eye toward signing Sabathia as a free agent the following winter. Cashman’s plan worked perfectly, as Sabathia wound up pitching the Yankees to their 27th championship in 2009 with Hughes making a key contribution to that team as a reliever, then emerging as a rotation stalwart in early 2010.

As for CC, he recovered from a rocky outing in Detroit with seven strong innings against the Red Sox his last time out in a game the Yankees nonetheless lost due to the unexpected struggles of Joba Chamberlain and Mariano Rivera. The Yankees, meanwhile, are 5-1 in rubber games this season, but haven’t played one since May 2, when they convincingly took a three-game set from the White Sox via a 12-3 rubber-game victory. Kevin Russo gets the start in left against the lefty Santana tonight, the rest of the lineup is the same as in the previous two games, save for Sabathia, of course.

The Yankees haven’t been playing great baseball of late, but a nationally televised, Sunday night rubber game against the cross-town Mets with Sabathia and Santana facing off is still must-see TV.

I’ll be at the ballpark and in the clubhouse tonight, but Alex reports that the swollen press corps for this series have jammed the CitiField bandwith, rendering our intended liveblogs of this series impossible. If I can break through, I’ll try to have some in-game updates on this post, but more likely I’ll have to save everything for my post-game recap. Stay tuned . . .

Update: Alex Cora is a last-minute replacement for Luis Castillo at second for the Mets.

Update, 6:51pm: Just back from Joe Girardi’s pre-game press conference and batting practice. I have a bunch of photos from BP to upload for you guys, meanwhile, some notes:

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Ah, the Mets. You know, they’re not really that bad of a franchise. They’ve won four pennants while no other expansion team has won more than two. They were the first expansion team to win the World Series, and also the first to win a second (no expansion team has won more). They’ve followed every stretch of losing with a period of winning of similar length, having made four complete cycles in their 48-year history. Their new ballpark, in which they’ll host the Yankees for three games this weekend, is a gem.

Still, they just never seem to get things quite right. They’re baseball’s equivalent of Jerry on Parks & Recreation, a decent, well-meaning, hard-working city employee, who nonetheless botches everything he does and is the subject of merciless ridicule and scorn from his fellow employees.

The Mets have been in full-blown Jerry mode since September 2007, when they suffered a momentous collapse and lost the division to the Phillies on the final day of the season. In 2008 they suffered a similar, though less extreme September collapse, again coughing up the division to the rival Phillies. Then last year everything fell apart. Despite debuting their handsome new ballpark (which bizarrely celebrated the legacy of the Brooklyn Dodgers rather than the Mets’ own history and prompted the creation of the worst sleeve patch in Major League Baseball history), the Mets were a disaster. Everyone got hurt except David Wright, who inexplicably stopped hitting for power, the owners spent the season fending off rumors of Bernie Madoff-induced poverty, and everyone in the front office lost their damn minds.

The Mets 2009 season was such an overwhelming disaster that the team is still feeling shockwaves in 2010. In mid January, Carlos Beltran, who missed half of the 2009 season due to a knee injury opted to have knee surgery against the team’s wishes. The surgery was considered ill-timed because it was going to keep him out of action until May, but it’s almost June and he not only hasn’t returned, but has no timetable to do so and has not yet been cleared to resume working out. Wright, meanwhile, seemed to put 2009 behind him with an Opening Day home run at CitiField and a solid April overall, but when the calendar flipped to May, he started striking out at an alarming rate (29 Ks in 18 games, or once every 2.7 plate appearances) and enters this weekend series on a 4-for-29 (.138) skid.

The Mets season has followed a similar pattern. An eight-game winning streak in April put them in first place in the National League East for five days, but since that streak was snapped, they’ve gone just 6-13 and have fallen all the way to the bottom of the NL East standings, six games behind those blasted Phils.

Buoyed by a strong start from 26-year-old Mike Pelfry, who will face Phil Hughes Saturday night, and good work from their bullpen, the Mets are doing a decent job of keeping their opponents from scoring, but their offense isn’t holding up its end of the bargain. Installing rookie Ike Davis, son of former Yankee set-up man Ron, at first base has helped, but the rest of the lineup is riddled with issues.

Catcher Rod Barajas leads the team with ten homers and a .586 slugging percentage, but he’s only drawn two unintentional walks all season and has a .306 OBP that is over .300 only because he’s been twice hit with a pitch and twice intentionally passed. Big free agent addition Jason Bay is getting on base, but has hit just one home run. Angel Pagan has done a solid job filling in for Beltran in center, but is a league-average bat in place of a superstar. The rest of the lineup, meanwhile, has been a disaster. Jose Reyes is healthy but hitting like Carlos Gomez (.216/.264/.284). Jeff Francoeur continues to prove that his 2008 collapse was not a fluke. Luis Castillo is getting on base but isn’t even slugging .300 having connected for just three extra base hits in 140 plate appearances. All of that places more pressure on Wright, which likely is part of the reason for all of those strikeouts, and thus another Mets cycle of despair begins. Ah, the Mets.

Facing this team could be just what the Yankees need this weekend having gone 3-8 since their two blowout wins in Boston, 1-4 since taking the first two from the Twins last weekend, and having dropped their last three. Despite injuries to half of their lineup, the Yankees problem has been pitching, particularly relief pitching. In the last five games (the ones in which they’ve gone 1-4), the Yankees have allowed an average of eight runs per game.

I don’t imagine Mariano Rivera and Joba Chamberlain will continue to suck, and David Robertson had an encouraging outing Thursday night, striking out four in two perfect innings, so there’s reason to expect improvement. Facing a National League lineup without the designated hitter (particularly this NL lineup, which is backed up by a similarly ineffective bench) should help as well.

It will be up to Javy Vazquez to get things off on the right foot. That’s not an encouraging statement, but Vazquez’s last start was sharp (7 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 BB, 7 K against the Tigers) and he had an extra confidence builder by coming out of the bullpen on Monday to strikeout the only batter he faced (Kevin Youkilis, no less) and pick up an easy win. Besides which, if it really is true that Vazquez is a much better pitcher in the NL, he’s effectively pitching in the NL tonight. Personally, I think he’s better than that, though I am a bit concerned about rust and a potential lack of endurance given that his last start was nine days ago.

Facing Vazquez will be Japanese lefty Hisanori Takahashi, who is coming out of the bullpen to make his first major league start in place of injured rookie Jonathon Niese (strained left hamstring). Takahashi has struck out 11.4 men per nine innings thus far this year, albeit against too many walks (4.8 BB/9). As a starter in Japan, his rates were lower in both categories. In his last appearance, he threw 60 pitches in three innings against the Marlins giving up a pair of runs on four walks and four hits (including the only homer he’s allowed this season).

Kevin Russo gets his first major league start tonight playing left against the lefty Takahashi in place of Marcus Thames and his sprained ankle. Randy Winn is 0-for-11 with four strikeouts against lefties on the season after hitting .158/.184/.200 against them last year, so a good night from Russo could lead to more starts against southpaws given Thames struggles in the field. The lineup above Russo contains all the usual suspects, leaving the Yankees with a bench of lefty Juan Miranda, switch-hitters Winn and Ramiro Peña, and a pair of righties whom Girardi may be reluctant to use in backup catcher Chad Moeller and the day-to-day Thames.

As Alex mentioned, thanks to SNY we’ll be part of the media horde for this series and will be liveblogging all three games, so be on the lookout for Alex’s liveblog/gamethread closer to first pitch tonight. Mets roster below the jump, as always.

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I like the journeymen. Most fans, and understandably so, gravitate toward the stars. They like the Derek Jeters, the Mark Teixeiras, and the Mariano Riveras. I like those guys, too. You don’t win world championships without star players who can carry the load for long stretches during the regular season and at critical moments in the postseason.

But I’ve always taken greater interest in the lesser players on a team, those who fill a specific role, either in a platoon or coming off the bench. That’s because those guys have to struggle, in some cases just to stay in the big leagues. Because of that, some of those players work harder than your average player. I identify with those players–whether it’s an Oscar Gamble in the 1970s and eighties, a Luis Sojo in the 1990s, or a Glenallen Hill in 2000. Just like those players, I feel I have to work hard just to keep up, whether it’s teaching, making a speech in front of strangers, or writing one of these columns. It’s a struggle for me, too. I’m no Roger Angell, but I believe I can be a solid contributor by working harder (and perhaps learning more) than the next writer.

Marcus Thames is also one of those guys. I like Marcus Thames, and not just because he sent the Red Sox home with a crushing home run in the bottom of the ninth inning on Monday night. Thames is a journeyman. He started out in the Yankee system, having to overcome the label of being a non-prospect. Somehow, he climbed to the Bronx. He hit a home run in his first major league at-bat against a tall left-hander named Randy Johnson. Still, there were people who didn’t believe in him. Still, he had to prove himself. The Yankees didn’t believe. They traded him to the Rangers for an aging Ruben Sierra. The Rangers didn’t believe either. They granted him free agency, which paved the way for Thames to travel north and sign with the Tigers.

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I see you out there on the ledge.  You watched Thursday night’s game with the Rays right up to the bitter end, then unfolded your life insurance policy, placed it neatly on the kitchen table, and calmly opened the window and took a seat next to the pigeons.  Or maybe I’m wrong; maybe I’m the only one on that ledge.

I put the TV on about five minutes after Andy Pettitte’s first pitch, and the screen came to life just in time to show me Carl Crawford and Ben Zobrist returning to the Tampa dugout, celebrating Zobrist’s home run and the Rays’ early 3-0 lead.  Pettitte followed that with a walk to Evan Longoria, but bounced back by getting a double-play ball and a strikeout to end the frame.  He made it through the second and third without event, but then gave up another home run to B.J. Upton in the fourth.  He clearly wasn’t sharp.

The Yankee hitters did their best to keep up through the early innings, but even when the score was close it was only a mirage.  Juan Miranda cut the lead to 3-2 with a second-deck two-run blast in the second inning, but the next couple runs were gift-wrapped, one unearned and the other undeserved.  In the third, Derek Jeter followed a Randy Winn single by dropping a sacrifice bunt that rolled untouched between the mound and third base.  Brett Gardner followed that with another bunt (natch), but this one produced a run when James Shields fired it over Peña’s head and down the right field line.  With none out, runners on second and third, and Teixeira, A-Rod, and Canó on the way, it really did look like the game was about to change.  As it turned out, Shields could’ve pulled a Satchel Paige and called his fielders in.  He snagged a tapper back to the mound from Teixeira, struck out A-Rod on a change-up that bounced in front of the plate, and fanned Canó on three pitches.  Move along.

If you were following the game on-line, you probably raised your eyebrows in the fourth inning when you read something like, “J Miranda tripled to deep center.”  The truth of the matter was that Miranda lifted a gentle fly ball that center fielder Upton never saw.  Upton immediately stood with both arms outstretched, asking for help that could never get there in time, as Miranda sprinted around second and slid into third.  Two batters later Randy Winn cashed in Upton’s gift with a sacrifice fly, tying the game at four apiece.

The tie score didn’t last long as a couple Tampa hits and a walk led to two more runs in the fifth, and Carlos Peña finally sent Pettitte to the showers when he led off the sixth with a home run.  If you’re looking for a silver lining in all this, it comes to you in the person of David Robertson, who relieved Pettitte and retired all six batters he faced in the sixth and seventh, striking out four of them.  The bad news, though, is that Chan Ho Park followed Robertson and allowed an eighth Tampa run, making the Yankees’ nightly ninth inning comeback attempt just a bit more difficult.  They could only manage two runs, settling for an 8-6 loss.

So the Rays leave town, surely pleased with themselves, and the Yanks are left with questions.  But it’s not as bad as it looks.  The Mets are up next, and they could be just what the doctor ordered.

The Times on Stoner Cuisine. 

[Picture by Bags]

On my out of my apartment building this morning, I run into an older guy carrying a laundry bag.

“Looks like a beautiful day out there,” he says.

“Sure does.”

“You going to work?”

What am I Jeff Lebowski? “Sure am,” I say.

“That’s a sure way to spoil a good day,” he says. “Or as my father liked to say, ‘Work is the curse of the drinking class.'”

My Old Man would have raised his glass and gotten a chuckle out of that one.

[Picture by Bags]