Via Chad Jennings, here’s what Joe Girardi said about Alex Rodriguez this afternoon.

[Drawing by Larry Roibal]

Joe Girardi’s father, Jerry, died today. He was 81. Giardi is expected to manage tonight.

Joel Sherman first reported the news on Twitter.

[Photo Credit: Bob Luckey / Greenwich Time]

Freddy Garcia suffered his first loss since July 15th. (Photo Credit / Darren Calabrese - Canadian Press)

Author’s Note / Excuse: Apologies for the delayed post. If you need further proof that the NFL, not Major League Baseball, is the National Pastime, try getting online between 1 and 4 p.m. on a Sunday to access photos from a baseball game to include in a recap. The requisite sites were performing at speeds not seen since 1997.

Threads in this space, elsewhere in the Blogosphere, the Twitterverse, Facebook — basically anywhere you search for Yankees information — have featured criticism of Joe Girardi for managing passively over the past week and a half. That judgment was typically reserved for his bullpen maneuvering, specifically in the one-run losses in Baltimore, Anaheim and Seattle, and then again in the series opener at Rogers Centre Friday night. Not as prevalent in those threads was that the “A” lineup, while physically present on the field, was doing little to help the winning cause.

Then on Sunday, with the Yankees’ magic number to clinch a playoff spot at five, the starting lineup looked more like one you’d see in mid-March than mid-September. Girardi has stated publicly that he’s been looking for places to give the regulars some rest. The counter, “Win the games, win the division, secure the playoff spot and then rest people.” And so it was that the only regulars in the starting lineup were Brett Gardner, Nick Swisher, A-Rod and J Martin.

The result was a feeble, fundamentally unsound 3-0 defeat that left the Yankees 4-6 on this season-long 10-game, four-city road trip. Brandon Morrow dominated the Yankees, striking out seven and walking only one. The Yankees had five hits, only two of which left the infield. Like in the early going Saturday, they ran themselves out of potential scoring opportunities. In the first inning, with Eduardo Nuñez Nuñez on second and Robinson Canó on first, Canó was thrown out on the tail end of a double steal. Later, in the top of the sixth, Nuñez, who Michael Kay and John Flaherty lauded on the YES telecast during his first at-bat, once again incited fans’ ire by inexplicably trying to turn a single into a double. Nuñez hit a clean single to rightfield. Nuñez tried to catch Jose Bautista napping, but it didn’t work. Bautista fired behind the runner to first base, where Edwin Encarnación fired to second to catch Nuñez by a mile. Inning over, potential rally over. Nuñez’s one-out double in the ninth inning marked the only other time in the game the Yankees had a runner in scoring position.

Meanwhile, Freddy Garcia surrendered three runs on five hits and three walks in 4 2/3 innings, and he made a throwing error that contributed to one of the three runs. In short, Garcia did little to pitch himself into consideration for either five-man rotation over the final two weeks of the regular season, or the playoff rotation.

Other things we learned …

* The Ghost of Raul Valdes, who pitched out of a bases-loaded jam in the seventh, may have shown that he could be the Yankees’ LOOGY over the next two weeks and into the postseason.

* The Yankees’ bullpen, in the last two games, pitched 9 1/3 innings of shutout ball. The group allowed just two hits and walked four — three by Scott Proctor — in that span.

* The Rays are white-hot. They beat up the Red Sox again and are surging toward a September comeback to rival the 2007 Colorado Rockies. The Yankees have a six-game edge over the Rays in the loss column, which may seem cushy with only 10 games left, but this week’s series at Yankee Stadium cannot be taken lightly. Depending on Monday’s result against the Minnesota Twins, sweeping the Rays would clinch that coveted playoff spot for the Yankees, leaving next weekend’s series against the Red Sox open for clinching the division.

This week features the games the regulars get paid the big money to play. Let’s see how the manager and the team respond.

Over at Pinstriped Bible, Steve Goldman asks: Why did Joe Girardi play for one run in a two-run game?

In the bottom of the ninth inning of Tuesday night’s game against the A’s at Yankee Stadium, the Yankees trailed 6-3 entering the frame. Jorge Posada led off with a solo home run off of A’s closer Andrew Bailey, closing the deficit to 6-4. Russell Martin followed with a double, and Brett Gardner reached on third baseman Scott Sizemore’s error, putting runners on first and second with no outs and bringing Derek Jeter to the plate.

Jeter is tremendously hot right now. He came into the game hitting .339 since returning from the disabled list and he went 3-for-3 with a walk prior to the ninth-inning plate appearance. Again, the Yankees needed not one run, but two. In baseball this year, teams that have put runners on first and second with no outs have scored an average of 1.4 runs, which is to say the Yankees stood a very good chance of scoring one run there and a solid chance at scoring another. Teams that have runners on second and third with one out see their expected runs go down to 1.3, a fractionally smaller number, but it’s still less of a chance to score. I leave it to you whether eliminating the double play was worth trading that fraction of a run as well as the possibility of having three chances to score those two runs instead of two. Again, we’re talking about old school Derek Jeter here, not April-June Jeter. The formerly ground-ball obsessed GDP expert has hit into just three twin killings in 40 games, the last one coming about two weeks ago. What do you do?

Girardi chose to take the bat out of Jeter’s hands.

Here’s the recap: The Twins beat the Yankees on Saturday night, blitzing through A.J. Burnett and cruising to a comfortable 9-4 win.

Now here’s the interesting part. Burnett was bad. Unspeakably bad. He couldn’t locate either his fastball or his curveball all night long — and by “all night long” I mean an inning and two thirds. Over the course of those five outs he gave up five hits, walked three, and was tagged for seven runs. He had his usual wild pitch to allow the game’s first run in the first, then yielded a sacrifice fly for another run before finally escaping.

He gave up a home run to Danny Valencia to open the second inning, then found more trouble when Luke Hughes doubled with one out, and Ben Revere singled him in an out later. It was 4-0, but it could’ve stopped there were it not for some bad luck. Revere took off for second and Russell Martin threw a dart across the diamond to nail him — except the umpire incorrectly called him safe. After a walk and another wild pitch, Burnett found himself at a crossroads. There were men on first and third and he had worked himself into a full count against one of the three recognizable names in the Minnestoa lineup, Joe Mauer. Burnett’s pitch came in at the knees and started off the plate before darting back towards the corner. It could’ve been called a strike, but it wasn’t. (To Burnett’s credit, he acknowledged afterwards that you shouldn’t expect to get a call on a pitch like that when you’ve had no command of the strike zone all night.)

With the bases now loaded, Joe Girardi made the decision to lift Burnett, and this is where things got interesting. The YES cameras zoomed in on Burnett as he stared hard at something. He could’ve been staring in disbelief at Girardi, or he could’ve been staring at a popcorn vendor in the stands. It was impossible to tell without a wider perspective, but Michael Kay and John Flaherty in the booth told us that he was staring down Girardi, and Kay jumped on the moment, calling all his fellow villagers to light their torches and storm the castle.

“What does Burnett want?” he asked incredulously. I’m just guessing here, but maybe he wanted to pitch better. Maybe he was upset that he had just faced a marginal AAA team and only managed to get five outs.

After he handed the ball to Girardi, Burnett walked towards the dugout but then turned back to the mound and clearly said, “That’s fuckin’ horseshit!” Flaherty then took the kerosene from Kay and said, “Looks like he had some words right there for Joe Girardi.” To which Kay responded, “I don’t know what those words could be that would be legitimate.” (As an English teacher, I cringe at the construction of that sentence, but that’s really what he said.)

Even as I watched it the first time through, I saw the whole exchange in a different light. Girardi looked like he responded to Burnett, but whatever he said was directed towards home plate and seemed to be peppered with the word “pitch,” as if we were telling home plate umpire D.J. Reyburn “That was a good pitch, that was a good pitch” in reference to the 3-2 pitch to Mauer that could’ve ended the inning. More on all this later.

So Burnett walked off the field, into the dugout — and straight into the clubhouse. The YES cameras later caught Girardi hopping off the bench, heading down the tunnel into the clubhouse before returning with Burnett, who dutifully sat on the bench and watched as Ayala allowed all three of his base runners to score.

Michael Kay, John Flaherty, Ken Singleton, and Jack Curry would all interpret these events the same way. Burnett was upset with Girardi and cursed him as he left the mound. He was so angry that he violated baseball protocol and went straight to the clubhouse, hoping never to return. Girardi would have none of this, so he chased him down, scolded him, and dragged him by his ear back into the dugout. Presumably, there would be no dessert for him either.

I don’t think any of this happened. When Jack Curry asked Girardi about what had happened between Burnett and him, Girardi looked legitimately stunned, then became as angry as I’ve seen him in his tenure as manager. “You can write what you want, and you can say what you want. He was pissed because he thought he struck out Joe Mauer.” When asked about the dugout situation, Girardi only got angrier. He explained that he had gone down into the clubhouse to look at the replay of the pitch. Curry kept pressing him, but Girardi finally shut him down.

As for Burnett, he looked just as surprised when asked about the “confrontation,” and his explanation made even more sense. He explained that Martin had said to him that 3-2 pitch had been a strike (Girardi also mentioned this), and that his horseshit statement was simply expressing his agreement with Martin’s assessment of the call. When asked about whether or not those comments might actually have been directed at his manager, “I was not talking to Joe, absolutely not. No matter how mad I get. That guy’s taken my back, every day I’ve been here. No matter how boiling I’m gonna be, I’m not gonna say that towards a manager, not him, not a chance.”

The only two voices that mattered were the only two voices that made any sense.

What doesn’t change, though, is that Burnett isn’t getting people out. There’s been a lot of talk recently about how Burnett’s contract should be separated from any discussion about his effectiveness, but the pressure will only continue to build the closer we get to October. Regardless of how large his paychecks are, can Burnett be trusted to take the ball in Game 2? Only time will tell.

[Photo Credit: Hannah Foslien/Getty Images]

Dictionary.com lists 13 definitions for the adjective form of the word oblique. As it pertains to anatomy, oblique muscles are those that run at an angle, as opposed to transversely (horizontally) or longitudinally (vertically). In the abdominal wall, the obliques are the muscles that form the side cut of a six-pack. They’re the love handles.

Synonyms, as listed within the aforementioned link, include “indirect,” “covert,” or “veiled.” But oblique strains have directly, overtly and obviously affected the Yankees this Spring, with Greg Golson, Sergio Mitre, Joba Chamberlain and now Curtis Granderson all falling victim to the injury. Granderson’s injury may put his Opening Day availability in question. This is no surprise, given that recovery time ranges from 10 days up to 3 weeks, depending on the severity of the strain.

Chamberlain missed 10 days. He returned to action Tuesday and was throwing 95 miles per hour. Golson also returned Tuesday, after missing 15 days of action. Mitre, meanwhile, was making his first appearance since March 14. MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch, in a mid-afternoon post Tuesday, reported that Mitre thought he had a roster spot secured when he arrived in Tampa 6 weeks ago. Tuesday’s start, Mitre’s first since he suffered his oblique strain, may be giving the Yankees pause about adding him to the 25-man roster. The following quotes are priceless.

First, Mitre is confidently unsure:

“I don’t look at it as a setback. I’m hoping they don’t base everything off of one spring start. If that’s the case, then we’ll see what happens, but I don’t think that’s the case — at least toward me. They know I can get people out and they know they can rely on me, I hope.”

Let’s examine this: two home runs yielded, a sinker that didn’t sink, Nova and Colon basically acting in full carpe diem mode. But this wasn’t a setback. Fans have little to no confidence that he can get anyone out. The numbers over the past two seasons prove as much. Plus, he wears the accursed No. 45. From Steve Balboni to Cecil Fielder to Chili Davis to (gulp) Carl Pavano, that number never helped anyone in a Yankee uniform over the last 25 years. And yet I digress …

More from Mitre:

“I don’t think there should be any reason why not. If I still have to worry about that, then I’m probably not doing something right.”

(Insert laugh track here)

Joe Girardi’s reaction was telling. Not usually one to tip his hand, Girardi was non-committal, telling reporters “there are still decisions to be made there,” when asked of Mitre’s current status as a starter, reliever, or roster member.

Given that Boone Logan, Pedro Feliciano, Damaso Marte are injured, Mitre might be in the bullpen. Sunday morning, WFAN’s Sweeny Murti said his belief was that Ivan Nova was definitely in, and in all likelihood, so was Bartolo Colon. Given the choice between Colon, Mitre and Freddy Garcia, Colon has pitched the best and has earned the spot. If given a choice, Garcia could serve as a Ramiro Mendoza type out of the bullpen as a better option than Mitre. Despite Garcia’s recent hiccups, he struck out nearly a batter per inning this Spring, and has a much more positive track record than Mitre.

As for the oblique strains, strength and conditioning coordinator Dana Cavalea may want to examine the program and how the players are responding to the regimen being set forth. Four years ago, after Cavalea and Marty Miller replaced Jeff Mangold, a number of Yankees suffered muscle injuries in March and April, and the Yankees got off to a 9-14 start in April. The following appeared in a Tyler Kepner post at Bats on April 13, 2007:

…General manager Brian Cashman replaced him (Mangold) again before this season. Cashman obviously wants the controversy over Mangold’s replacements — Marty Miller and Dana Cavalea — to go away. But that will only happen if the injured players return and stay healthy when they get back.

Some players don’t participate in the program, including Bobby Abreu, who has a personal trainer and Johnny Damon, who opted out after straining his right calf. Others, such as Mariano Rivera, think it’s fine.

As Kepner alluded to in his post, Mangold was fired in 1989 after a five-year stint as the Yankees’ strength and conditioning coach because upper management believed too many players were injuring themselves. It’s one thing for players to have various muscle injuries in their legs, but should Cavalea be on notice here, with four players in a span of two weeks suffering the same injury?

If it was 1989, he would be.

Batting Leadoff for the Yankees …

… will be Derek Jeter against lefties and Brett Gardner against righties, reports ESPN New York’s Wally Matthews. The lineup, specifically Jeter’s place in it, has been a recurring story this Spring. Jeter batting leadoff — or, more accurately, the push for Gardner to bat leadoff — was a hot topic in the blogosphere for much of the last two months of the 2010 season.

Gardner’s OBP was .380 last year, to Jeter’s .340. His speed and ability to take walks makes him a better fit, just as Johnny Damon’s ability to see anywhere from 4 to 9 pitches per at-bat made him an ideal leadoff man when the Yankees acquired him. (NOTE: At the BBWAA dinner not long after the Yankees signed Damon, Tom Verducci and I discussed this exact subject and agreed Jeter should have batted leadoff, using OBP as the argument.) If the concern for Jeter batting second is to avoid a double play, then hit and run with Gardner to avoid the GIDP, so that a groundout is the equivalent of a sacrifice.

I will call you … Number Two

Yes, we’re referring to AJ Burnett. Anthony McCarron wrote Sunday that the decision was made, in part, because “the mental part of pitching has strained Burnett in the past and the Yanks would take any jolt of confidence this move might bring him.”

Let’s just hope he doesn’t pitch like Number Two.

And in a win for the blogosphere, two of the first four links that appear in a Google search “AJ Burnett Number Two” are from blog posts. One of them, from Bleeding Yankee Blue … Well, I can see I’m late to the Austin Powers joke party. However, some good points in here about the rotation, particularly comparing it to the Opening Day rotation in 2009, which only helped win a World Series title.

What are the odds Burnett strains an oblique between now and next Saturday?

Three weeks into Yankees Spring Training, and we’ve learned this: New York is a Basketball town. Alex has written about this, and I remember Sweeny Murti talking about covering the Yankees while the Knicks made their run to the 1994 Finals. It’s true. The Knicks are the sleeping giant, and now with Carmelo Anthony, they will own the back pages unless something either major or catastrophic happens in Yankeeland.

This is actually a good thing, because Spring Training for the Yankees is basically a time suck. While it’s great to see baseball — hell, grass — after being battered with snow and sub-freezing temperatures for the better part of the last two months, doesn’t seem as cool when the biggest questions year after year are who the 5th man in the rotation will be, and who the 24th and 25th man on the roster will be.

Obvious storylines have been played up like they’re original concepts. For example:

* Derek Jeter reported to spring training and in his press conference intent to prove that last year was an anomaly and that the man who is above statistics is actually going to try to enjoy the moment when he reaches 3,000 hits this summer. In a year or two, he might need a position change.

Snore.

Two thoughts on this: 1) This is EXACTLY why when he broke Lou Gehrig’s team record for hits and the local and national media were swooning and putting his stats against Pete Rose and projecting he could break the all-time hits record by 2018 or 2019, I called B.S. Derek Jeter is human, and while I didn’t get to know him that well in my years covering the team, I observed him quite a bit. He’s intense and he’s competitive, but he’s not selfish. He doesn’t give the impression that he wants to hang on just to break a record. 2) As I write about Jeter’s unselfishness, I write about this, which seems counterintuitive: Steven Goldman, as far back as 2004, when the Yankees signed Alex Rodriguez and it was determined that he would play third base and Jeter would remain the shortstop, wrote that Jeter should have pulled a Robin Yount and moved to center field. This would have made Bernie Williams, whose outfield skills were declining for two consecutive years by then, a full-time DH. But, there wasn’t as much roster flexibility then. There were a lot of DH candidates, namely Jason Giambi, so having Bernie there full-time wasn’t an option. I recall at least 6-12 Pinstriped Bibles where this was a hot topic.

* CC Sabathia lost weight. He’s in the third year of his contract. He can opt out after the season. He’s thinking about this.

Great for him. The dropped weight will help his stamina, because he’s going to have to pitch 300 innings during the regular season when the Yankees eventually settle on a 3-man rotation. Yes, he is. Yes he can. He probably is, but asking him of his plans in February? If the opt-out clause is in there in the first place, he was thinking about it THREE YEARS AGO. The caveat, he’s not A-Rod, so this will probably work out.

* Joba Chamberlain is not going to pitch meaningful innings this season. Not with the Yankees, most likely.

Not to toot my own horn, but I’m tooting. This was predicted four years ago, when they caught lightning in a bottle with him. Not recognizing his rightful ascension to replace Mariano Rivera at that time effectively ruined his career as a Yankee. Perhaps another team can repair him.

* Jorge Posada is going to be a full-time DH.

This is not news.

* Yankees looking for starters.

That slug actually appeared as a link on ESPN.com’s headlines area. It was a story from Buster Olney. This was not news. Does anyone expect the committee of Sergio Meat Tray, the Ghost of Freddy Garcia, and Ivan Nova to carry bottom half of the rotation? Wait, don’t answer that. They’ve started seasons with Tony Womack and Enrique Wilson at second base, at one point were intent on Bubba Crosby as their center fielder, and had Gary Sheffield play first base. This is entirely in the realm of possibility.

The guy to root for in all of this: original Yankees draft pick Mark Prior. Let’s not make a big deal about his having trouble getting his breaking stuff over the plate yesterday. If he makes the team and somehow makes an impact, it could be the story of the year.

* AJ Burnett, after playing winter ball in the California Penal League, beaned a player. During batting practice.

That’s only half true. Burnett did nail Greg Golson in the head. No truth to the rumor that Larry Rothchild is stocking up on cardboard hitters to help Burnett visualize the target. Who’s more of a punchline in New York baseball at this point: Burnett or Oliver Perez?

* Mark Teixeira needs to get off to a fast start.

Again, not news. Bernie Williams used to start off slowly every year, too. By Memorial Day, he’d be hitting .300 or better. However, there was an interesting revelation in the day of Teixeira stories: he admitted that he has taken for granted that his hitting would always be there. That he would turn it around eventually. Great stuff from Tex. Perhaps in his work with Kevin Long, he’ll practice driving the ball to the opposite field.

* The Yankees take Grapefruit League games seriously.

After the second day of games, Joe Girardi was already in midseason form, talking about how “bouncing back” after a loss is a result of “believing in ourselves.” This, with Ivan Nova on the mound, no less.

__________________________________

The thing is, while I know this is a panoramic critique (with no links, I know), and it sounds like I’m the old man on the porch holding a shotgun, if I was on the beat, I’d probably be writing the same stories. There are two stories, though, that I’d like to see:

1) Re: Joba. Is he the second coming of Shane Spencer? Forget the position player vs. pitcher comparison for a second and focus on the “lightning in a bottle” concept. For two months in 1998, Shane Spencer was a revelation. He was kept on as a reserve outfielder and made modest contributions for the next several seasons, but when given the chance to earn the starting lineup in 2002, couldn’t crack it. There was no way he was ever going to live up to that brief stretch. Chamberlain, same thing. We could include Aaron Small in this discussion. Maybe the type of pitcher Joba Chamberlain is now is always what he was, and he peaked immediately.

2) A Rafael Soriano profile, written in the context of “recent Atlanta Braves retreads who had success elsewhere but are bound to not work out.” Look, I would like to see the Yankees turn games into 7-inning affairs. But, history shows us that unless your name is Mike Stanton, it’s likely not going to work out for you in New York if you were previously a closer employed by the Braves. Consider: Steve Karsay — great first year in 2002, got injured in 2003 and was never heard from again. Kyle Farnsworth — just a comedy of errors here. Boone Logan wasn’t a closer, but his ride with the Yankees has been a roller coaster. Maybe he could be a Stanton / Graeme Lloyd type of guy.

Random thought to end … Manny Banuelos: His last name is a mixture of the Spanish words for bathroom (bano) and handkerchief (panuelo). The scouting reports have him pitching better than that odd mixture.

And a final random thought: the Yankees’ issues are much easier to stomach than the Mets’.

[Photo Credit: Brian Rose]

 Check out these spring training pictures by Michael G. Baron.

A Christmas Carol has remained popular and continually adapted for several reasons. The first is that it is a timeless, joyful story with themes that still resonate today; the second is that it’s in the public domain. Dickens’ classic has been reimagined (and sometimes mangled) so many times over by now that I don’t feel too bad about jumping in, with assistance from fellow Banterers/muppets Alex, Diane, Will, Jon, and Matt, with yet another version and a new cast.

Our protagonist this time is no cheapskate Scrooge, but Brian Cashman, an elf/businessman in the middle of a difficult offseason. This Christmas Eve, he’ll undergo a life-altering experience…

STAVE 1: MARLEY’S GHOST

There is no doubt that Marley was dead. This must be distinctly understood, or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to relate. If we were not perfectly convinced that Hamlet’s Father died before the play began, there would be nothing more remarkable in his taking a stroll at night, in an easterly wind, upon his own ramparts, than there would be in any other middle-aged gentleman rashly turning out after dark in a breezy spot — say Saint Paul’s Churchyard for instance — literally to astonish his son’s weak mind.

Scrooge never painted out Old Marley’s name. There it stood, years afterwards, above the warehouse door: Scrooge and Marley. The firm was known as Scrooge and Marley.

Marley: George Steinbrenner, of course.

Bob Cratchit: Joe Girardi, who will have to break it to his family that thanks to his bosss, they won’t be able to have  a Cliff Lee or even a Carl Crawford for dinner this year.

Tiny Tim: head Bleacher Creature Bald Vinny.

‘A merry Christmas, uncle! God save you!’ cried a cheerful voice. It was the voice of Scrooge’s nephew, who came upon him so quickly that this was the first intimation he had of his approach.

‘Bah!’ said Scrooge, ‘Humbug!’

He had so heated himself with rapid walking in the fog and frost, this nephew of Scrooge’s, that he was all in a glow; his face was ruddy and handsome; his eyes sparkled, and his breath smoked again.

‘Christmas a humbug, uncle!’ said Scrooge’s nephew. ‘You don’t mean that, I am sure?’

Scrooge’s nephew Fred: Nick Swisher.

STAVE 2: THE FIRST OF THE THREE SPIRITS

It was a strange figure-like a child: yet not so like a child as like an old man, viewed through some supernatural medium, which gave him the appearance of having receded from the view, and being diminished to a child’s proportions. Its hair, which hung about its neck and down its back, was white as if with age; and yet the face had not a wrinkle in it, and the tenderest bloom was on the skin. The arms were very long and muscular; the hands the same, as if its hold were of uncommon strength. Its legs and feet, most delicately formed, were, like those upper members, bare. It wore a tunic of the purest white; and round its waist was bound a lustrous belt, the sheen of which was beautiful. It held a branch of fresh green holly in its hand; and, in singular contradiction of that wintry emblem, had its dress trimmed with summer flowers. But the strangest thing about it was, that from the crown of its head there sprung a bright clear jet of light, by which all this was visible; and which was doubtless the occasion of its using, in its duller moments, a great extinguisher for a cap, which it now held under its arm….

…’Are you the Spirit, sir, whose coming was foretold to me?’ asked Scrooge.

‘I am.’

The voice was soft and gentle. Singularly low, as if instead of being so close beside him, it were at a distance.

‘Who, and what are you?’ Scrooge demanded.

‘I am the Ghost of Christmas Past.’

‘Long Past?’ inquired Scrooge: observant of its dwarfish stature.

‘No. Your past.’

The Ghost of Christmas Past: This ghost changes its shape as it moves through Ebenezer’s past; at one moment, it looks like Carl Pavano; at another, Mike Mussina; at times, it takes on the ghostly form of Sir Sidney Ponson.

Old Fezziwig (under whom Scrooge apprenticed): Gene Michael.

Belle, Scrooge’s former fiancee, who released him from their contract when he became too concerned with “gain,” and her joyful current family: Cliff Lee and the Phillies.

STAVE 3: THE SECOND OF THE THREE SPIRITS

It was his own room. There was no doubt about that. But it had undergone a surprising transformation. The walls and ceiling were so hung with living green, that it looked a perfect grove; from every part of which, bright gleaming berries glistened. The crisp leaves of holly, mistletoe, and ivy reflected back the light, as if so many little mirrors had been scattered there; and such a mighty blaze went roaring up the chimney, as that dull petrification of a hearth had never known in Scrooge’s time, or Marley’s, or for many and many a winter season gone. Heaped up on the floor, to form a kind of throne, were turkeys, geese, game, poultry, brawn, great joints of meat, sucking-pigs, long wreaths of sausages, mince-pies, plum-puddings, barrels of oysters, red-hot chestnuts, cherry-cheeked apples, juicy oranges, luscious pears, immense twelfth-cakes, and seething bowls of punch, that made the chamber dim with their delicious steam. In easy state upon this couch, there sat a jolly Giant, glorious to see, who bore a glowing torch, in shape not unlike Plenty’s horn, and held it up, high up, to shed its light on Scrooge, as he came peeping round the door.

‘Come in!’ exclaimed the Ghost. ‘Come in! and know me better, man.’

Scrooge entered timidly, and hung his head before this Spirit. He was not the dogged Scrooge he had been; and though the Spirit’s eyes were clear and kind, he did not like to meet them.

‘I am the Ghost of Christmas Present,’ said the Spirit. ‘Look upon me!’

The Ghost of Christmas Present: C.C. Sabathia.

Mankind’s children, Ignorance and Want: Kyle Farnsworth and Kei Igawa.

STAVE 4: THE LAST OF THE SPIRITS

The Phantom slowly, gravely, silently approached. When it came, Scrooge bent down upon his knee; for in the very air through which this Spirit moved it seemed to scatter gloom and mystery.

It was shrouded in a deep black garment, which concealed its head, its face, its form, and left nothing of it visible save one outstretched hand. But for this it would have been difficult to detach its figure from the night, and separate it from the darkness by which it was surrounded.

He felt that it was tall and stately when it came beside him, and that its mysterious presence filled him with a solemn dread. He knew no more, for the Spirit neither spoke nor moved.

‘I am in the presence of the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come?’ said Scrooge.

The Spirit answered not, but pointed onward with its hand.

The Ghost of Christmas Future: Sergio Mitre.

STAVE 5: THE END OF IT

‘A merry Christmas, Bob!’ said Scrooge, with an earnestness that could not be mistaken, as he claped him on the back. ‘A merrier Christmas, Bob, my good fellow, than I have given you for many a year! I’ll raise your salary, and endeavour to assist your struggling family, and we will discuss your affairs this very afternoon, over a Christmas bowl of smoking bishop, Bob! Make up the fires, and buy another coal-scuttle before you dot another i, Bob Cratchit!’

Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who did not die, he was a second father. He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have the malady in less attractive forms. His own heart laughed: and that was quite enough for him.    He had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived upon the Total Abstinence Principle, ever afterwards; and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!

I’m just sayin’…

Looks like Joe Girardi is set to sign a 3-year, $9 million contract to manage the Yankees (Joel Sherman and George King have the scoop in the Post). I can only imagine that this news will be met by mixed reviews from the Banter Crew.

So…have at it.

The Manhattan Bridge is the closest, and the Brooklyn Bridge isn’t far, but such a cliche — the Verrazano, now that’s fairly convenient, bit more interesting, less overdone…

Oh, hi! Sorry, I didn’t see you there. Is it recap time?

That was a hell of a game, and not in the good way. Join me on a journey back through the mists of time to the first inning of Game 4… ah, we were all so young then. A.J. Burnett profoundly surprised me by pitching, under the circumstances, pretty well. Certainly as well as anyone could have expected given that the last time he pitched a good game, pterodactyls soared above the ballpark. The crowd was behind him, but to me it wasn’t heartwarming so much as desperate – c’mon, fella, you can make it! It’s just a flesh wound! You’ll be fine! He was okay, though. He allowed two runs in the second, after walking David Murphy (fatefully, not for the last time), hitting Bengie Molina with a pitch (if only he… no, no, mustn’t think like that); Mitch Moreland bunted and Elvis Andrus grounded out, but then came Michael Young, who hit a softish two-RBI single. Burnett may not have been dominant, but he got out of the inning and held the Rangers there through five innings; going into tonight’s game I would’ve taken that and not complained.

Meanwhile, the Yankees scraped together a few runs: a Robinson Cano homer that just ticked over the right field wall, possibly aided by some fans who made it hard for Nelson Cruz to make a catch – that’s what Cruz argued, anyway. I thought it was out anyhow, but the fans didn’t exactly improve anyone’s image of Yankee supporters. (Although I have to admit they cracked me up). The umpires declined to review it, which seems weird since that’s why instant replay exists, but again: it was out, so no damage done. Later in the inning a Lance Berkman fly to deep right was reviewed and correctly found to be foul. It wasn’t the umpiring tonight… it was just, you know, everything else. Anyway, the Yanks tacked on in the third inning when Derek Jeter tripled (!!!) and Curtis Granderson singled him home, and again in the fourth, when A-Rod was hit by a pitch, singled over by Cano and Berkman, and scored by a Brett Gardner ground out. Paralleling Burnett, this was not exactly Murderer’s Row, but they had a 3-2 lead in the fifth inning.

Which is when the baseball gods started pulling at a loose bit of yarn, and before you knew it, but also in a kind of weird slow motion, the whole sweater unraveled.

I don’t think you can say that Mark Teixeira is underrated or underappreciated – he is an extremely well paid star on a popular team; he’s not under any radars. But I was a little unprepared for what a gut-punch it was to watch him cringe while running hard to first, fall into an awkward slide, and stay down until the Yankee trainers could help him off the field. It was a grade 2 hamstring strain, and the last we’ll see of Mark Teixeira until spring. And while he didn’t have his best year at the plate, I’d sure rather see him up there than Marcus Thames; and you know you’d rather see him manning first base than Nick Swisher. He’s not A-Rod, and these days he’s not Cano, and he’s not one of the remaining 90s Yanks, and hell, he’s probably the blandest star athlete in recent memory… but the Yankees are going to miss him quite a bit, even if they only have one game left in which to do so. It sucked all the air out of the Stadium.

That came during an aborted rally in the bottom of the fifth, after a somewhat shaky Burnett got himself through the top of the inning. Many people were surprised to see Joe Girardi turn to Burnett again in the sixth, and although I didn’t think it was such a clear-cut choice, in retrospect it was clearly not wise: Vladimir Guerrero singled, moved to second on a force out, and then — this, I did have a problem with — Burnett intentionally walked David Murphy, in order to face Bengie Molina.

What did I say about Molinas before this series? Huh? WHAT DID I SAY, A.J.?! JOE? Goddammit, no one ever listens to me.

Molina homered, the Rangers took a 5-3 lead, and while that’s hardly insurmountable, this began the “slow-motion unraveling” portion of the evening. Burnett got out of the 6th, but Josh Hamilton homered off Boone Logan in the 7th, and the Rangers tacked on another run off of Joba Chamberlain. Ron Washington’s love of the bullpen shuffle worked out well for him this time around; the Yankees had chances — they even got the tying run to the plate in the 8th inning — but couldn’t break through. In the ninth Sergio Mitre came in and everything went south (HR Hamilton, HR Cruz), but by then it was all over but the crying, anyway. 10-3 Rangers is your final.

Joe Girardi made a number of questionable moves tonight. I can’t get too worked up about them since I think, ultimately, the Rangers have flat out-hit and out-pitched the Yanks, and different managerial moves probably wouldn’t have made a huge difference. But there’s no way to know that for sure, and it’s still plenty frustrating, which may be part of why tonight’s game got under my skin in an unpleasant way. Tomorrow, the Yankees have to win or go home — and if they win, they need to do it twice more. I’m not optimistic, frankly. But every day in late October that you still have a game to watch is a good day, so here’s hoping C.C. Sabathia pitches like C.C. Sabathia tomorrow, and the Yankees live to see Game 6.

Molinas… why’s it always have to be Molinas?

Ten years later, the Yankees were the ones celebrating. They swept the Blue Jays to complete a 22-6 September and clinch their first playoff berth since 1981. The image of Don Mattingly pounding his fist on the top step of the Rogers Centre dugout, knowing he was finally getting his chance to play in a postseason series, is ingrained in the memories of Yankees fans.

Tuesday night, Toronto was the site of yet another Yankees playoff clincher. Following Monday’s two-and-a-third degree burn from the Purple Pie Man, there was a sense of confidence and calm with CC Sabathia on the mound. CC was back to his ace-level self, powering through the first eight innings, allowing one run on two hits in that span.

Sabathia was pulled in the ninth inning after putting the first two runners on base and retiring Jose Bautista. With a 6-1 lead, manager Joe Girardi could have summoned anyone to get the final two outs — I’ll be honest, I was ready for any combination of Javy Vazquez, the inimitable Chad Gaudin, even the Meat Tray — but he put one over on those of us who thought he was mailing it in since last Wednesday by calling on Mariano Rivera to close it out. Six pitches later, it was done. If corks didn’t pop, sighs of relief were definitely released.

Two thousand miles to the south, the Rays’ ace, David Price, shut out the Orioles to secure Tampa’s spot in the playoffs and keep them a half-game ahead of the Yankees.

Now the Yankees have a decision to make: Be content with just reaching the playoffs and rest the aging veterans prior to the start of the Division Series, or go for the Division crown and home field? Two games separate the Rays, Yankees and Twins. Only two of those teams will open their first-round series at home.

Girardi has said he wants to win the division. He has four games to prove it. At the very least, though, it’s nice to see that “x” next to the Yankees’ place in the standings.

QUICK GOOFY GAME NOTE
The Yankees did a great job of plating runners with less than two outs. And none of those runners scored as a result of a hit. While the Yankees did muster two hits with runners in scoring position, five productive outs — three sacrifice flies and two groundouts — and a bases-loaded walk provided the six Yankee runs.

Over at PB, Steve Goldman writes that Joe Girardi is not to be confused with John McGraw (or even Billy Martin).

Sunday wasn’t Joe Girardi’s best day as Yankee manager.

Things seemed to be going the Yankees’ way in the early innings of their rubber game against the Angels in Anaheim on Sunday afternoon. Angels starter Scott Kazmir seemed oddly determined to hit Robinson Cano leading off the second, missing him with a fastball up and in then hitting him in the rear with the next pitch. Kazmir’s next pitch was also a fastball, and Jorge Posada sent it into the new trees beyond the center field fence to give the Yankees a 2-0 lead. Marcus Thames followed with a ringing double, and the Yankees were in business.

Unfortunately, Thames was starting for the red-hot Brett Gardner (11-for-24 in the team’s last seven games) instead of the ice-cold (1-for-15 over the last six games) and lefty-challenged Curtis Granderson. So, it was Granderson who followed Thames in the lineup with a second-inning sacrifice bunt. Thames did score on a subsequent groundout by Derek Jeter, but (say it with me) when you play for one run, that’s all you get, and that’s all the Yankees got, letting Kazmir and the Angels off the hook with a manageable 3-0 deficit.

Bobby Abreu got the Angels on the board in the third when he homered off Yankee starter Javier Vazquez for the tenth time in his career (tying Manny Ramirez against Jamie Moyer for the most homers by an active batter off a given pitcher). Fair enough. Abreu clearly owns Vazquez, and though the pitch Abreu hit was a flat slider, Vazquez did start to get his fastball up to 91 mph in the third inning after starting out in the high 80s in the first two frames. In fact, Vazquez struck out the side in the third around Abreu’s solo shot, and he experienced a similar increase in velocity in the middle innings of his last start, a win over the A’s.

Unfortunately for Vazquez, he was no longer facing the punchless A’s in their forgiving ballpark, and in the fourth inning, things fell apart. After Hideki Matsui flied out. Kendry Morales singled, Juan Rivera was grazed on the forearm by a pitch, Howie Kendrick singled Morales home, and Mike Napoli worked a walk to load the bases. That brought up Brandon Wood, the Angels third baseman who has looked lost thus far this season and struck out swinging at a pitch that nearly hit him the previous inning. This time, Wood jumped on Vazquez’s first pitch, a hanging curveball, and hit a sinking liner to left field were Thames, again not Gardner, was playing. Thames broke late and made an awkward and unsuccessful dive toward what proved to be a two-RBI double that gave the Angels the lead. A Maicer Izturis grounder then scored Napoli to make it 5-3 Halos, and Vazquez’s day was over after 78 pitches in just 3 2/3 innings.

Pulling Vazquez there and then was the best decision Joe Girardi made all day, as Boone Logan and Alfredo Aceves combined to hold the Angels into the seventh, and Robinson Cano got the Yankees within one by extracting further revenge on Kazmir via a solo homer to left in the sixth (Cano’s third home run off Kazmir this season in just five official at-bats).

Then, with one out and none on in the seventh and Aceves having thrown just 15 pitches (13 of them strikes), Girardi brought in Damaso Marte to face Bobby Abreu. Marte walked Abreu on five pitches, but with David Robertson warm in the pen, Girardi stuck with Marte against righty Torii Hunter, whom Marte hit in the back knee with a slider. That put two men on for Hideki Matsui, a left-handed hitter whom, as Girardi should well know, has had considerable success against lefty pitching. Though he had yet to get an out, Marte stayed in the game and got a check-swing fielder’s choice for the second out, a lucky break that wasn’t quite enough to save the Yankees in this game.

Matsui’s tapper set up the key at-bat in the game. With men on first and second, two out, and the Yankees still just one run behind, switch-hitter Kendry Morales stepped into the right-handed batters box. Girardi initially called for Marte to intentionally walk Morales with the intention of bringing Robertson in to pitch to righty Juan Rivera with the bases loaded, but after one intentional ball, Girardi popped out of the dugout, seemingly to have Robertson issue the walk himself. Two steps out of the dugout, the Yankee manager froze, perhaps called back by one of his coaches, climbed back down into the dugout, called off the walk, then sent catcher Francisco Cervelli out to the mound, seemingly to stall for more time.

Marte’s next two pitches were balls anyway, and with the count 3-0, Girardi later admitted he thought of putting up four fingers again, but instead he, bench coach Tony Peña, and pitching coach Dave Eiland simply reminded Marte and catcher Francisco Cervelli that Morales would indeed swing on 3-0, implying that there would be no gimme strike. Nonetheless, Marte grooved a fastball, and Morales, true to the Yankee coaching staff’s warning, swung, connecting for a game-breaking three-run homer.

And that was that. Facing relievers Fernando Rodney and Scot Shields in the eighth and ninth innings, respectively, the Yankees managed only a leadoff walk by Mark Teixeira in the eighth that was erased by a Cano double play. The 8-4 loss handed the Yankees their first series loss of the young season and sends them back east with a sister-kissing split on their six-game trip to the west coast.

After the game, Girardi took full blame for his indecision in the seventh, uncharacteristically second-guessing himself for not going with his first instinct (the IBB plus Robertson). However, the amateurishness of that sequence of events overshadowed the other poor decisions he made in this game including starting Thames in the field when Nick Johnson was already on the bench with a stiff back leaving the DH spot open (Posada was the DH after a day off Saturday with Cervelli catching for the second day in a row), playing Granderson over Gardner then calling for a second-inning sac bunt from Granderson, pulling a cruising and efficient Aceves from a one-run game, and sticking with Marte at least two batters too long.

As for Marte, his description of the decisive pitch against Morales, delivered in his broken Dominican rasp, summed up this head-slapper of a loss: “Three ball, no strikes, you know. Waiting for a fastball. I throw the fastball in the middle. He hit.”

Yup.

A month into spring training has yielded little in terms of newsworthy occurrences in Yankee camp.

The team announced it would not discuss or negotiate contract extensions for Mariano Rivera, Derek Jeter, or manager Joe Girardi until after the season, which is consistent with recent club policy. Nick Johnson missed time with back stiffness (uh-oh), but then rejoined the lineup (phew!). Indications, per Girardi, are that Johnson will bat second and that speed isn’t important, since Mark Teixeira and Alex Rodriguez are hitting behind him. That means Curtis Granderson, who Girardi hinted would be the team’s starting center fielder, will likely bat seventh or eighth, depending on Nick Swisher’s exploits. Granderson in center, coupled with Brett Gardner’s wet-noodle bat, means Randy Winn, um, win(n)s the left field job.

That brings us to the first of three major subsections of this week’s column.

GARDY HAR HAR

In game threads during last year’s playoffs, I would post how I cringed when Brett Gardner appeared in a game. Since his arrival in spot duty in 2008, he has not proven to be a Major League caliber player. If there’s a place for him on this Yankee roster, it’s in a limited role, but what should that role be?

Michael Kay discussed the Gardner conundrum at length with Daily News beat writer Mark Feinsand on Wednesday’s “New York Baseball Tonight” on 1050 ESPN Radio. Feinsand said that the Yankees view Gardner as a more valuable commodity coming off the bench in the late innings as a defensive replacement and pinch runner. Kay pointed out how Gardner had no bunt base hits last season, which is a travesty for someone whose game is predicated on speed. You know what else was a travesty? His play in the postseason. Speed is fine, but there has to be intelligence to go with it. Gardner had a 33 percent success rate on steals and was picked off twice when inserted as a pinch-runner. A good base stealer has as much guile as speed. Your job as a pinch runner is to NOT get picked off. Gardner was so antsy that he made it easy for the opposition to read him. He was fortunate to have his teammates pick him up so often. His 0-for-10 performance in the World Series with 4 Ks didn’t inspire confidence, either.

I recall so many Pinstriped Bible columns that Steven Goldman would file on Tony Womack where he would lambaste Joe Torre for putting him in the lineup. “Automatic out” was a common phrase. There’s not much more time for Gardner to prove that he has enough dimension to be the weapon Joe Girardi wants him to be.

THE FIFTH STARTER “COMPETITION”

Before pitchers and catchers reported, WFAN’s Sweeny Murti — congratulations on your recent engagement, sir — and Ed Coleman interviewed Yankees pitching coach Dave Eiland and asked him about the fifth starter spot. Eiland said at the time it would be an open competition between Joba Chamberlain, Phil Hughes, Alfredo Aceves, Sergio Meat Tray and Chad Gaudin. The first words that came to mind were “yeah, right.” The reins were off Joba, and Hughes, even though he would have an innings limit this year, was in line to see if he could reclaim the spot in the rotation he squandered a year ago. Operating under the , Murti and Coleman asked a hundred different ways to get Eiland to bite on whether there was a favorite, or a preference, and he wouldn’t.

So, a month later, here we are: Joba has posted a Chien-Ming Wang level ERA of 27.05 while allowing 8 hits and 6 walks in 3 2/3 innings. Worse, he’s shrugged it off like he’s making progress. Hughes hasn’t fared much better. While his ERA is significantly lower than Joba’s (3.85), he’s allowing nearly a hit per inning, and two of the four hits he’s allowed have been home runs. Aceves has pitched the best; he hasn’t allowed a base runner in 6 innings pitched.

If it’s an open competition, then Aceves is the runaway leader at this point, and both Eiland and Girardi should acknowledge as much. Their lack of candor has some writers and broadcasters believing that they’ve known all along who they’re selecting as the fifth starter, and this is all a sham. Feinsand insinuated as much when Kay asked him that very question on Wednesday. If the writers feel like they’re being bullshat, than what are we as fans supposed to think?

A-ROD AND THE SPIN DOCTOR

This section should be qualified by me saying that A-Rod, for all his talent and baseball acumen, does not come off as smart outside the lines. I recall when talking to reporters after the July 1, 2004 game against Boston, in which he moved to shortstop following Jeter’s face-first dive into the stands, he said the amount of ground he had to cover was “like the Miami Ocean.” I immediately looked at him quizzically, as if to say, “Are you effing serious with that quote?” He picked up on my facial contortion as I jotted down that nugget of idiocy, looked at me and gave his trademark smirk.

Is he smirking now? Personally, I don’t care if he was referred to Dr. Tony Galea and flew to Toronto to have the platelet procedure done. And honestly, I don’t care if A-Rod did HGH all of last year while recuperating from the hip surgery. It’s baffling to me, though, that he did this without Brian Cashman or anyone else in the organization finding out. Dr. Galea has said, according to numerous published reports, that he only prescribed anti-inflammatories to A-Rod. Let’s give both the benefit of the doubt and say that’s true. One question could flip this thing completely: Did A-Rod broke team procedure and see Galea without the team’s permission? Who’s covering up? A-Rod stands by his story that he’s OK and that he never took HGH from Galea. Cashman has adamantly stated he had no knowledge of A-Rod’s Canadian spin class. The longer A-Rod waits to talk to federal investigators, the more intense the speculation and conjecture will become.

Maybe this is all immaterial since he hit in the clutch during the playoffs and was integral to the World Series title. Maybe he should get a free pass from us. Or maybe not. If it’s determined A-Rod did break protocol, the Yankees can void his contract.

Now that would be newsworthy.

At the same time, the choice of Joe Girardi to start AJ Burnett was being put under the microscope, run through a centrifuge, and measured by any other number of scientific devices. “Why start Burnett on short rest?” The experts on MLB Network claimed. “With the lineup shaking out, Melky Cabrera being out, Jose Molina catching, this favors the Phillies,” to paraphrase Harold Reynolds. “Chad Gaudin can give five innings and then make it a bullpen game,” said Mitch Williams.

Tim McCarver, pleasantly old school, lauded Girardi’s choice to stick with three starters.

The most sane MLBN analysis came from Dan Plesac, who noted that the Yankees didn’t have a fourth starter as an option due to the way they (mis)handled Joba Chamberlain during the second half of the regular season. Thus, Girardi’s options were limited.

But let’s backtrack a bit, knowing what we know now from Game 5: Burnett was awful, lasting 2+ innings, throwing 53 pitches, walking four, hitting one, and allowing four earned runs. Most notably, he choked in the first inning, immediately giving back the 1-0 lead he was handed.

The following analysis was not given by the “experts”:

Burnett was a better pitcher at home this season than on the road. During the regular season, his ERA was more than a run lower at home. He also allowed 17 fewer hits, 15 fewer runs, struck out 13 more batters and his batting average against was 55 points lower. That trend has held true in the playoffs as well. In his Game 2 starts against the Twins, Angels and Phillies, he allowed just four runs in 19.1 innings with 19 strikeouts and an ERA of 1.86. His only road start, in Anaheim, was the “Bad AJ”: 6 IP, 6 ER, 3 BB, 3 K. That would have been sound reasoning to start him in Game 6 and then have Andy Pettitte on full rest going in Game 7.

But no, the “experts” conveniently avoided those facts. In analyzing his implosion at Citizens Bank Park Monday night, they neglected to mention the home/road splits. Williams harped on the fact that pitching Burnett on three days’ rest, when he hadn’t done it all season, was a recipe for trouble. Al Leiter echoed that sentiment.

Sure, they were proven correct, but it was disappointing that the candid Leiter, who has watched every game this season and called almost half their games on YES, failed to say, “He has pitched this poorly on full rest, too.” If you want to play the “What if?” game, if Gaudin started Game 5 and blew up, then Burnett, with a chance to clinch at home did the same, where would that leave the Yankees in Game 7?

The bottom line was that the Phillies did exactly what the Angels did in their second time seeing Burnett: they jumped on his fastball early in the count, hedging a bet that he’d try to establish the fastball and throw it for strikes and then work in his breaking ball. Their plan worked. Burnett’s first inning ERA in the potential game-clinching starts in Anaheim and Philly was 31.50. If that was said or written anywhere, someone please bring some education in the form of hyperlinks.

Burnett put it best: “I just didn’t throw strikes.” Ding! 53 pitches, 28 strikes. Thirty-six of the pitches were fastballs.

A big deal was made about Burnett’s hitting Shane Victorino on the hand. Garbage. He threw up and in to a batter who was squaring around to bunt. Roger Clemens or Pedro Martinez would have done the same thing.

So for Game 6, the question again becomes a Yankee Pitcher on short rest facing a Phillie Pitcher on full rest. Now, this decade, in such matchups, the pitcher on short rest is 13-36.

Let’s see how the analysis plays out if the Yankees win and those same “experts” are getting champagne sprayed in their eyes.

This week, the Yankees secured a postseason spot, so they won’t be casual observers for a second consecutive October. It’s only right to want to project various playoff scenarios – who they will play, who will pitch, which division series they’ll choose, etc. – because with a week left in the regular season, there’s not much else to talk about.

That is … unless you follow the Yankees regularly and are tuned into the Joba Chamberlain situation. Despite the Nebraskan’s 6-inning, 86-pitch quality start last night, The Joba Situation is no longer at mission critical, but is still serious. Put it this way: there’s no reason to call “The Wolf.”

The commentary and range of quotes coming out of Seattle on Sunday were contradictory. On one hand, there was Joba, Clemens-like in denial that he had good stuff despite being shelled for seven runs int here innings. On another, there was the elephant in the room: the Rules that had the Yankees “building him up” to go six innings, so as not to exceed the limit of 165 innings set for him. Somewhere, Jim Kaat is railing this philosophy and not even icing his shoulder.

Looking at quotes from Joe Girardi and judging from the pundits’ assessment of the Yankees’ view, Joba was put to the coals. The “we want to see what you’re made of” rhetoric seemed to be coming a little late to have any kind of effectiveness. The tone, at least the way I perceived it, was a cover-your-butt for potentially mishandling him. The situation could have been avoided in two ways: 1) the Yankees could have kept him in the bullpen as the lead set-up man and eventual successor to Mariano Rivera, or 2) since making him a starter, unleash him the way Nolan Ryan is managing his young guns in Texas. In other words, let the opponent dictate when your starting pitcher should be removed from the game.

Prior to Friday night, the argument could have been made that Joba was put in a no-win situation, both literally and figuratively. He had either an inning limit or a strict pitch count, so there was no margin for error. Either way, if he was pitching well, he couldn’t lobby to stay in the game if he performed at an ace-caliber level. Jorge Posada’s quote following last Sunday’s debacle in Seattle, was telling, considering the source:

“It’s tough to pitch like that. It’s tough to pitch when you don’t know what’s going on … It’s just tough to pitch like that.”

Joe Girardi had a different take.

“I don’t think he can make that an excuse,” Girardi told the media. “You’re still getting the baseball and you still have a job to do.”

Could Joba have pitched better under those circumstances and restored confidence in the organization and the fan base? Absolutely. But he didn’t, and in so doing, put himself in a position where he was pitching for his future. Girardi made that clear in his pre-game press conference when he said – four times, per Daily News columnist John Harper – that he needed to “see Joba compete” and that there were “no guarantees” as far as Joba’s place on the playoff roster. Calling an athlete’s competitive fire into question is akin to emasculating him. That added more gas to a fire that was already smoldering.

What’s amazing about the Joba situation is that since the current rules were put into place (prior to the August 16th start at Seattle), the Yankees only went 3-4 . Save for the two forgettable outings in Seattle and the Toronto game where he pitched OK but Roy Halladay nearly no-hit the Yankees, they saved face.

So now what? We’re left with more questions, because we’ve seen this type of effort from Joba before. So much has been made about how the Yankees have managed Joba this season that after a while it all sounds like a test from the Emergency Alert System. That’s not to say every opinion offered has been bogus. ESPN Radio’s Don LaGreca made an interesting point Friday, when he noted that this type of procurement of pitchers is rampant among Major League teams, except it’s not seen at the top level. The only comparable example in the Majors, LaGreca said, was the Rays’ careful handling of David Price and the debate whether he should be a starter or a closer, based on his postseason success in 2008.

For now, Joba is a starting pitcher and regardless of what the organization is telling the media, he’s a better option than Chad “I can give you four innings of great stuff but then I’m going to implode” Gaudin. Banter colleague Cliff Corcoran nailed it in his game recap when he wrote:

“He … should be allowed to pitch without limits against the Royals in preparation for potential playoff work. His performance in that game could determine a lot, including which ALDS schedule the Yankees choose. If he’s similarly effective, the Yankees might prefer to let Joba start an ALDS game in order to keep him in the groove.”

We’ll see …

THE PLAYOFFS

The papers salivated over the fact that the Yankees could potentially clinch their first division title in the new stadium with the Red Sox watching. They also highlighted that the Yankees do not want the Red Sox to celebrate a playoff berth in the building. Both possibilities are still in play after the 9-5 Yankee victory, so for the purposes of this column, that topic will be left alone.

Regarding the playoffs, the key, as always will be the pitching. Jayson Stark ranked the Yankees’ starters fourth among the AL playoff teams, and for good reason. Every single pitcher – including CC Sabathia – is “iffy,” as he put it. They could also dominate.

Stark, discussing the column on Michael Kay’s radio show Thursday, did make a good point about Sabathia and his postseason failures: the Indians in 2007 and the Brewers in 2008 rode him into October, having him pitch on short rest in order to get to the postseason. A rested Sabathia is likely a strong Sabathia for the Yankees.

And then what with the lineup? The Yankees have destroyed mediocre pitching this season and while they’ve had spot success against the likes of Josh Beckett, Jon Lester, and Roy Halladay, I disagree with the “this a great hitting team” moniker that’s been heaped upon them simply because they can score runs in bunches. To wit: the Yankees scored three runs on four hits against Scott Kazmir Wednesday afternoon and looked like the Mets lineup in every other inning. Is that the mark of a great hitting team? Granted, the three runs were all they needed, as A.J. Burnett was great and the bullpen held up, but a good hitting team is capable of building off the momentum of such a strong inning. It’s all about the approach. If the Yankees can take the approach they took against Lester last night to every single pitcher they face from here and on into the postseason – force the pitcher to throw a lot of pitches the first time through the order — they have a great chance of advancing.

Now what of the series the Yankees will play? The likely opponent is the AL Central winner, as the Yankees have a comfortable 7.5-game lead over the Angels for the best record in the American League. This Yankee team is probably the best-equipped playoff team since the 2003 edition in terms of balance through the lineup and top-to-bottom through the pitching staff. I don’t see this Yankee team getting complacent as the 2002 team did, nor are there many questions as to what roles certain high-priced players will be filling or about the mettle of certain pitchers. That wreaked havoc on Joe Torre in 2005, ’06 and ’07.If I’m Joe Girardi, I’m not saying this publicly, but I want the Twins to come back and overtake the Tigers. That’s the only scenario that would prompt me to choose the ALDS with two off days. If the Tigers hang on, I’m inclined to agree with those who believe picking the series with two off-days plays into the Tigers’ hands. No way do I want to see both Justin Verlander and Edwin Jackson twice.

One thing I do want to see: how the next two weeks shake out.

It’s nice to be using the words “Yankees” and “playoffs” in the same sentence again. All the discussion of “what if” makes this a whole lot of fun.