Divisional Realignment Is Not The Answer

As you've likely noticed, even though Spring Training is in full swing, there still isn't an awful lot to talk about just yet. Traditional media always has the "best-shape-of-his-life" or new pitch story lines to fall back on. We've resorted to filling space by making fun of Kevin Youkilis, writing about hockey, or just not writing much at all.

The indefatigable Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports filled his column inches last week with a radical divisional realignment proposal. Beyond the fact that involves Rosenthal, realignment talk is something that gets under my skin. I realize that it's extremely difficult for teams like Baltimore and Toronto to share a division with the Yankees, Red Sox, and Rays, and play nearly sixty games a year against those three teams thanks to the unbalanced schedule. But rather than making reactionary realignment proposals that would be rendered moot when the balance of power inevitably shifts, there are more fundamental changes that baseball could undertake to level the playing field.

Consider that all else being equal, a team in the AL West has a one in four chance of winning the division, plus a one in fourteen chance of earning the Wild Card spot, for an overall 32.1% chance of reaching the playoffs. Meanwhile, a team in the NL Central has just a one in six chance of winning the division, plus a one in sixteen chance of earning the Wild Card spot, for an overall 22.9% chance of making the playoffs. Sure, the Pirates have been an extremely poorly run franchise for nearly twenty years. But compared to a club in the AL West, they have a nine percent handicap before the first pitch of the season is even thrown.

Beyond the disparity in league and division sizes, certain teams are also at a disadvantage when it comes to the gimmick of interleague play. Given the haphazard rotation of interleague matchups on a yearly basis, some teams luck into a cupcake schedule, while others have a more difficult row to hoe. Additionally, the designation of interleague rivals mean teams get an additional series against a predetermined opponent, usually geography based, regardless of the quality of that opponent. Yet all these things count equally in determining division and Wild Card winners.

The Wild Card presents another problem. All teams in a given league compete for a single Wild Card spot, yet all teams do not play equitable schedules. Aside from the inequities of interleague play, the unbalanced schedule makes it tougher for the second place team in say the AL East to win the Wild Card than it is for the second place team in the AL Central.

Lastly, the fact that division winners are guaranteed playoff spots creates the potential that more deserving teams miss the post-season. Last year, San Francisco, Texas, Florida, and Atlanta finished the regular season with records better than or equal to the Twins and Tigers. While the latter two clubs battled it out in an exciting play in game for the AL Central title, the other four clubs were off making tee times. Similar scenarios have the potential to play out every year. Before the '94 strike, the Rangers were on pace to take the AL West with a sub .500 record.

When divisional play was instituted in 1969, it made sense. Over the course of that decade, both leagues had expanded from eight to twelve teams. The fifty percent increase in size made another post-season berth worthwhile, and splitting the leagues into divisions was a natural way to identify two division champions as the post-season worthy teams. But moving to four playoff spots starting in '94 actually made the divisional system obsolete. Making those divisions unbalanced and awarding a playoff spot to a second place team was a less than ideal way of going about things. As laid out above, there are several systemic disadvantages to that system.

Baseball should do away with divisions. They should do away with interleague play. They should do away with the unbalanced schedule. Go back to the pre-1969 format. No divisions, just two leagues. The top four teams in each league make the playoffs. The top seed plays the number four seed in the first round, no more stupid rules that the Wild Card team can't play a divisional opponent in the Division Series. Having the best record in the league should have a reward, and it should be the path of least resistance to the World Series. Changes like that would do far more to increase competitive balance than changing around the divisions every time the balance of power changes.

Back From A Boring Weekend

Good morning, Fackers. On Friday afternoon, Joe called this past weekend the best one in sports. There are some other candidates, namely the first weekend of the NCAA tournament, but I would probably give my vote to the Divisional Round of the NFL playoffs. There are four games on, which start late Saturday afternoon and end at a reasonable time on Sunday giving you a healthy amount of meaningful, intense football to consume. Well, on paper anyway.

Just like the games Wildcard Round, there were three unwatchable tilts that were decided before the first half was over and the one game that was close featured only 10 points in the first three quarters. The average margin of victory through the first 8 games of the playoffs this season has been 17.1 points with only the two aforementioned match-ups being decided by less than one touchdown. Four games have been decided by 30 points or more. Last year, no playoff games were that lopsided.

According to this study, we've watched roughly 88 minutes of postseason football action thus far and I've venture to guess that about 10 of those have been worth paying attention to.

I'm not sure if other Yankee fans can relate, but I've felt detached from the NFL season this year. It was quite the opposite from 2008, the Giants had started off the defense of their Super Bowl victory 4-0 when the Yankees were clearing out their lockers. There was real excitement surrounding that team and although they bumbled a Monday night game against the Browns, they cruised to 11-1 before things fell apart. And when the Giants lost to the Eagles in the Divisional Round, it really hurt.

When the Yanks won the World Series this year, the Giants were already halfway through their season. At that point, their stock had already risen and fell. They were 5-3 after losing 3 in a row and ended up closing out the season a meager 3-5 including two disgraceful losses by more than 30 points in Weeks 16 & 17. They had been eliminated from the playoffs for three weeks so at that point, it didn't really matter.

Now that were halfway through a forgettable postseason and I couldn't care less about how the rest of it turns out. I just hope the Vikings lose this Sunday so we are spared the agony of the two week festival that will be known as "Favreganza" leading up to the Super Bowl.

There's good news, however. It's hard to believe, but pitchers and catchers report exactly one month from today. The Yankees' full squad will join six days later. It's more symbolic than anything since workouts in Tampa don't offer much entertainment to fans - even ones who attend them in person - but there's a light at the end of the tunnel.

Wild Card Weekend

Last year before Fack Youk went approximately 99% Bronx-centric, a relatively large amount of our coverage was geared towards the NFL Playoffs. This post, linked to by Deadspin and shamelessly sampled without attribution by Kissing Suzy Kolber (#22), was our first big hit.

Well, the 2010 NFL Playoffs are here. Despite the fact that second favorite team of the blog, the Giants, aren't in the Tournament of Twelve, there are certainly some Jets and Pats fans out there at the very least. Even if you don't follow any of the teams partaking in the postseason, the NFL Playoffs are undoubtedly the greatest four weekends in sports. They also mark the last significant sporting events until Pitchers and Catchers report to George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, Florida on February 17, 2010.

Here is my take on the 2010 Wild Card Weekend featuring three Week 17 "rematches" (the 10th, 11th and 12th times this has happened since 1990 - previously, one team won both games four times and the teams split five times). Let's see if watching 10 games a weekend for 17 weeks via NFL Sunday Ticket actually did anything for me:

New York Jets (+3), at Cincinnati Bengals, Saturday 4:30 EST, NBC.

Some say that the Jets "backed in" by virtue of Jim Caldwell and Bill Polian being smart and realizing that Super Bowl championships and not perfect (or 18-1) seasons are what you play for. Well, sometimes it's better to be lucky than good. This first game of Wild Card Weekend is also the first Week 17 rematch - when the 9-7 Jets trounced the Bengals 37-0. Interestingly enough, the 2001 Jets beat the Raiders in Week 17 but lost to the Raiders in the Wild Card game (the Raiders subsequently lost to the Patriots in the infamous Tuck Rule game).

Back to Week 17, the Jets were playing for their proverbial playoff lives and the Bengals weren't playing for anything, sat Cedric Benson and called 11 total pass plays for Carson Palmer. The pumped-up Jets relied upon their NFL-leading rushing attack which overpowered the 7th ranked Cincy run defense.

How the Jets Can Win: Keep it on the ground and limit the throws of rookie Mark Sanchez, Palmer's fellow USC alum. Rookie QBs + Playoffs = Golf. Darrelle Revis also needs to shut down Ochocinco like he did in Week 17.

How the Bengals Can Win: On offense, the Bengals need to be able to sneak a few big plays past the NFL leading Jets pass defense. On defense, they will have to play like the defense that ranked 7th in the NFL against the run.

Injury Notes: Chad Ochocinco injured his knee in pregame warmups but it appears that he will play. Bengals DT Pat Sims suffered a broken forearm on Sunday and was placed on IR, but fellow DT Domata Peko is expected to be back from knee surgery, bolstering the Bengals Run D that gave up 257 Yards to the Jets.

Random: I expect many Jets fans to call the Bengals Jerk Line at 513-381-JERK (5375).

My Prediction: Given that the Jets ranked 8th against the run and 1st against the pass, and that the Bengals finished 7th and 6th in those respective categories, I expect this be one hell of a low-scoring affair. I say that the Jets prevail with a Thomas Jones score and a couple of FGs from Jay Feely.

Jets: 13
Bengals: 10

Philadelphia Eagles (+4) at Dallas Cowboys, Saturday 8:00 EST, NBC:

This is also a rematch of the Week 17 game in Dallas in which Tony Romo and the Cowboys completed the exorcism of their December demons and shut out the Iggles and their chance for a First Round Bye 24-0. The Eagles had to fly out to Philly after the game and fly in to Dallas again this week despite not staying in nearby Mexico on the dime of a certain quarterback on their roster with the name of Ron Mexico.

In the regular season, the Cowboys defeated the Eagles twice on their way to the NFC East title. Can they beat them a third time? You know what they say about beating a team thrice - it is nearly impossible. Or is it? Twelve of the 19 times the team who swept the regular season, won the 3rd game.

As for Dallas, the last team they had a chance to beat a team three times in the same season was in 1998. They ultimately lost to the Arizona Cardinals in the Wild Card Round after besting them twice in the regular season. And of course, in 2007-2008, they beat a Giants team twice in the regular season before losing in the NFC Divisional Round and were but a speed bump on Big Blue's way to Super Bowl glory.

Cowboys Can Win If: Tony Romo can exorcise his playoff demons and the 19th-ranked pass defense can avoid the big play from Donovan McNabb to DeSean Jackson, like they did on Sunday. They will also need to avoid costly Flozell Adams penalties and kicker Shaun Suisham will need to avoid imploding.

Philadelphia Can Win If: DeSean Jackson and Jeremy Maclin can make the simple catches that they missed last week and the secondary makes the tackles that they missed. A healthy dosage of blitzing from every angle like the Jim Johnson defense of yesteryear will also be needed to disrupt and frustrate Romo. Without the heavy blitzing, Romo will beat you, as evidenced on Sunday.

My Prediction: This game will be closer to the 20-16 Week 9 affair than Week 17's game. I liked Philly's game plan on Sunday but they just couldn't execute. There is no way that this poor execution will be replicated. They are too good of a team. Romo will have 2 TDs but also throw 3 INTs. McNabb will throw for one, Westbrook run for one, and Jackson will run back the other. The difference will be a seemingly innocuous first half field goal.

Philly: 24
Dallas: 21

Baltimore Ravens (+3.5) at New England Patriots, Sunday, 1PM EST, CBS:

The Patriots were my preseason pick to win the Super Bowl. And they were my pick to win the Super Bowl at 12:59 EST on Sunday of Week 17. But then the hahhts of Bawston were-ah broken when Wes Welkah had his knee blown out and my picks were facked. In regular American English, the genius Bill Belichick decided to play Wes Welker, in a meaningless game against the Texans and Welker, Brady's favorite receiver and the yang to Randy Moss's yin, subsequently tore his ACL and MCL on the Pats' first drive of the game. I guess I could put it in a simpler and more vulgar manner--the Patriots are fucked and the downward spiral of Boston athletics continues.

If the Pats don't lose against Baltimore, they surely will lose in the Divisional Round. Julian Edelman is no Welker. Teams will double Moss on every play. The Patriots did have the 12th ranked run offense in the league, but that was with Welker. And Baltimore's Run D, at #5 in the NFL ain't too shabby.

Patriots Can Win If: Edelman turns into Welker and Randy Moss has 3 TDs. Or Moss has 2 TDs and the Pats score multiple Defensive TDs. Big Ben Watson must also pick up some of Welker's possession catches.

Ravens Can Win If: 2nd Year QB Joe "Skinny" Flacco limits his INTs while playing at the hostile Razor and Ray Rice runs rabidly. Also, WRs Mason and Clayton will have to come up with a key catch sooner or later - surely not the most dependable WR duo in football. On defense, double team Moss most plays. When he isn't doubled, triple team him. Hit him early and hard and he will probably give up.

My Prediction: In front of the cold, hostile Bawstonians, Flacco, Rice and Ray Lewis tell the Patriots "Nevermore." Brady plays like Brady with 2 TDs, but ultimately the absence of Welker is too much for them to overcome as the Ravens D shuts down any modicum of a Patriots rush attack.

Ravens: 20
Patriots: 17

Green Bay Packers (+1.5) at Arizona Cardinals, Sunday, 4:40PM EST, FOX:

Another Week 17 rematch--last week the 5th-seeded Packers crushed the 4th seeded Cardinals 33-7 with Matt Leinart and my fellow BC alum Brian St. Pierre (who may have the best job in the world) at the helm in Glendale. Cardinals coach Ken Whisenhunt decided to go with a plain gameplan so as not to tip the hand of this week's gameplan.

Last year, as a Falcons fan, I salivated at playing the Cardinals on Wild Card weekend. Well, the Cardinals won the game. Next up, the Carolina Panthers were booking their flights for the NFC Championship. The Cardinals couldn't possibly win a fucking playoff game on the road, could they? Of course they could. Shame on everyone for thinking elsewise. And from there they continued to defy football fans across the globe by adding to Andy McNabb's NFC Championship Game losses and coming within a miraculous Roethlisberger to Santanio Holmes touchdown from becoming Super Bowl XLIII champions.

Will this year's Cardinals team also begin a Super Bowl run by beating a 5th seeded team, who many believe are better, and with a talented young QB making his first ever playoffs start (Aaron Rodgers)? While it may seem like fate dictates such, the Cardinals injury list may defeat such.

Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie, the standout Cardinals CB, bruised his left knee in Week 17 and is questionable. The Cardinals leader in INTs will be needed to shut down the prolific Packers passing attack; so too will defensive end Calais Campbell who broke his thumb and is expected to play with a cast. WR Anquan Boldin, who surpassed 1,000 receiving yards for the fifth time in his career during the game, was injured in the 3rd Quarter after Cardinals coach Ken Whisenhunt inexplicably left him in, sprained his left ankle. Boldin, a true gamer, expects to be ready to go. The Cardinals need all of their receiving corps to spread thin the Packers pass defense that ranked 5th in the NFL (their rush D led the league).

Cardinals Can Win If: Boldin plays, thereby enabling Larry Fitzgerald to does his best impression of the 2009 Playoffs. The absence of Boldin will also make it that much easier for the Packers to stop the Cardinals' anemic 28th-ranked ground game. Rodgers-Cromartie will also need to play as the Cardinals will need multiple turnovers.

Packers Can Win If: Aaron Rodgers doesn't have 3+ turnovers.

My Prediction: Rodgers doesn't have 3+ turnovers and the Packers 2nd ranked overall defense shuts down the Cardinals offense.

Packers: 24
Cardinals: 10

Enjoy the games with family and friends and good luck with all of your betting! If I have any credibility left, look out for my Divisional Round previews.

Partial Postseason Prognostication

With only a week remaining in the MLB regular season and only two races still undecided - the AL Central and NL Wild Card - we're seeing more and more articles seeking historical trends that predict postseason success. Last week, we linked to Lisa Swan's article about strong Septembers and Flip Flop Fly Ball's chart displaying the correlation (or lack thereof) between the having the best record during the regular season and winning the World Series.

Well late last week and over the weekend a few more of these pieces popped up and here are three of them (all via BBTF):

Similar to the chart at FFFB, Tom Verducci sorted the last 9 World Series winners by their regular season record and found an almost perfectly even distribution of League Championship pennants and World Series Victories. One championship came from each of the top 7 seeds and two came from teams seeded 8 or higher, such as the 2006 Cardinals who had the 13th best record in the league that year but still won the WS.

It's a pretty rough measure for a couple of reasons. The first, which Verducci points out himself, is that the teams don't play balanced schedules so teams get as much credit for the record in the NL Central as they do in the AL East, and so forth. Secondly, in 2006 for instance, four of the best 5 records came out of the American League. As a result there was an artificially higher chance of a low seed winning a pennant and a World Series (which happened with the Cardinals) since three of them were on one side of the bracket.

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Next up, Dave Cameron wrote a piece for Wall Street Journal's website which showed that over the last 7 years, the teams that won the World Series have had a relatively small amount of meaningless games leading up to the postseason.

Dave quantifies "meaningless" games as ones that were played after their team has locked up a postseason berth either by winning their division or securing the Wild Card, but doesn't count ones that factor in the race for homefield advantage or are played against potential postseason opponents. Those certainly are played with a higher level of effort and urgency that the ones the Yankees are about to play against the Royals, one would assume. As Rob Neyer points out, 7 years is also a pretty small sample size.

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Lastly, we have a piece by Lincoln Mitchell in The Faster Times which would seem to fly directly in the face of the half-baked theory proposed by Jeff Pearlman that we took issue with last week. Mitchell attempts to identify the team with the best two starters each year and concludes that since 1995, that club has won the World Series only twice.

There are problems with this methodology as well. ERA+ is not a bad measure but it certainly is not conclusive in determining the team with the best two starters when the postseason rolled around. Furthermore, if we wanted to do more of a complete assessment, we would rank each team's top two pitchers, or better yet give them a score on a scale of, say, 1-10 which would more accurately display the difference between each duo. In some years the top two hurlers for the best team might get a "9" and the next best team only receives a 6, but a straight ranking wouldn't convey that. Once the scores were determined then we could look at the results and see how they correlated with postseason success. Then we might have a better picture of how having two dominant starters predicts playoff series victories.

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Do you notice a theme developing here? These methodologies are all pretty incomplete. A huge part of the problem is that baseball is littered with variables, there is no control group and you can't just create situations and run them over and over. Of course it's much easier to point out the deficiencies of these findings than take the time to complete the analysis.

All of these writers are admittedly taking a "quick and dirty" type of approach to their analysis and that's completely understandable. At one point, I started a post that was similar to Lisa Swan's about finishing the regular season on a high note (but I wanted to look over the last 10, 15 and 20 games as opposed to the final month) but as soon as I figured out how many tedious calculations I was going to have to do and how much time it would take me to do even a couple years worth of analysis, I scrapped it.

Another factor that makes it difficult to go more in-depth is that, ideally, you want to have a point when you are done with your research. These pieces were written for online outlets where time is always of the essence. You don't want to spend a bunch of time and at the end of the post have to say, "Through all of this research I determined that there is no noticeable correlation in the data."

And this brings me back to a piece that we looked at back at the end of August by Jay Jaffe of Baseball Prospectus. Jaffe brought up the research conducted by Nate Silver and Dayn Perry that lead to the creation of BP's Secret Sauce and applied it to this year's playoff picture. The difference here is that the Silver and Perry went into their research testing all sorts of variables and determined that strong defense, a pitching staff with a high K/9 and strong closer all had high correlation to postseason success. The Secret Sauce is the closest thing we have to a scientific study of what teams are "built for the playoffs" and it's still fairly incomplete.

In all likelihood the Yankees will take the long ALDS, so we still have over nine days before the first postseason pitch is thrown. We're to see more attempts at unlocking the postseason code and they'll probably be pretty interesting. But I highly doubt any of them are going to take the time to shift our thinking with a truly in-depth study of what October baseball really comes down to. Let's just try to enjoy the fact that the Yanks can coast home, throw out their B and C line ups and take things as they come.

Thursday Night News And Links

It's Thursday, and the Yankees once again have the night off. Former Yankees General Manager and Hall of Famer George M. Weiss has some suggestions to keep you occupied in the meantime.

The Red Sox play the Royals out in Kansas City tonight, which means they will be making a pretty late arrival to NYC tomorrow morning. The magic number is currently at 5 after a Sox win last night, but it could drop to 4 if they lose tonight. This means that the Yanks would have to take just two out of three to clinch the division at home against Boston. Something called Anthony Lerew would have to out pitch Clay Bucholz for that to happen, however.

The Twins and Angels are off, but Tigers are playing the Indians tonight and sending Justin Verlander to the hill. Detroit still holds a 2.5 game lead over Minnesota but those teams have 4 head to head games remaining against reach other, so anything could happen.

In college football, #4 Ole Miss (the highest ranking the school has had since Archie Manning played there) takes on South Carolina.

Peter Gammons has sure elicited some strong reaction after suggesting the MLB might want to "think" about adding one Wild Card team to each league. Craig Calcaterra thinks the system is fine the way it is. Kevin Kaduk concurs. Jason thinks it ain't broke neither. Joe from RAB would actually prefer the playoffs to be scaled down before they are expanded.

Joel Sherman is just about the only person I've heard agree with Gammons, citing the fact that it's nearly impossible for a team other than the Yankees and the Red Sox to make the postseason in the current format.

In related news, since the Blue Jays won't be contending any time soon, Joe from RAB suggests that the Jays trade Roy Halladay and get some value for him while they still can.

Fangraphs takes a look at A-Rod in the postseason since he's joined the Yankees and points out that over the same span, Derek Jeter hasn't been any great shakes either. An astute commenter points out that saying A-Rod "doesn't" hit well in the playoffs (like the post did) is much different that saying he "hasn't" which implies that he still could.

Speaking of FanGraphs, they released their iPhone app today. For $2.99, you get live WPA and most everything you'd expect to be available from the website. Yes, I've already downloaded it.

Jayson Stark ranks the playoff rotations.

Jon from Subway Squawkers wonders if the Yankees are a leading economic indicator.

Via Baseball Musings, Rays Index points out that before the Daily News crowns the Yankees' infield the best ever, they might want to take into consideration that the Rays' IF put up better numbers this year.

Jim Rice: Still an ass.

Our boy HowFresh calls out Plaxico Burress for the last meal he ate before he went to prison and shows him how it's done.

Terrible news for Giants fans.

And finally, this is pretty damn cool. (via Schiff on Google Reader)

Game 138: Working Class Hero

It might be Labor Day but unlike most of you, the Yankees will be putting in extra work today with a day/night double header against the Rays. The Yankees haven't seen the Rays since the end of July and as a result they still have 7 games remaining against them in the season series, the next four at home and a three game set to close out the regular season in Tampa from October 2nd - 4th. The Yankees hold the edge in the season set 6-5 as of now but it could tip pretty heavily either way depending on how these last 7 match ups go.

The Rays are quite unlikely to make the postseason at this point, trailing the Red Sox by 7 in the Wild Card standings with 26 games remaining and only 3 head to head meetings with the Sox. It would seem they are resigned to their fate, given that they shipped Scott Kazmir to the Angels for minor leaguers just before the waiver trade deadline hit. Despite numerous pundits picking the Rays to finished ahead of either the Yanks or the Sox or both this year, they never lead the AL East and currently trail the Yanks by 14.5 games.

Former Twin and consummate asshole Matt Garza takes the hill for the Rays today. He started against Joba Chamberlain in the last game contested between the two teams and was fined after he admitted that he intentionally hit Mark Teixeira in the shoulder with a 94 MPH fastball in retaliation for Evan Longoria being brushed back earlier in the game and hit earlier in the series. Garza is sporting a pretty solid 4.01 ERA but has won only one game in his past 11 starts watching his record fall to 7-9.

CC Sabathia will toe the rubber first for the Yanks today. Over his last 6 starts he's been everything the Yanks could ask for and then some, rocking a 1.83 ERA, striking out 53(!), walking just 7(!!) and averaging over 7 1/3 innings per start. He's picked up 5 decisions during that time and has put himself in position to chase 20 wins as the season winds down. He better get going those because he needs 4 more and probably has six more starts to go. The big man's ERA is about a run and a half higher during daytime starts this year, but September is has been his best month throughout his career.

Making his triumphant return to the Yankees after hitting the DL with a broken thumb and making the line up 11.1111% hustle-y-er in the process, is the one and only, the gritty and gutty, the scrappy and feisty... Brett Gardner, ladies and gentlemen! He'll be making the start in CF for the first game, getting his jersey dirty and doing the little things that help the team win. (Otherwise known as being short and white.)

While most people celebrate Labor Day by not working, the Yanks will be rolling up their sleeves twice as high and their getting hands twice as dirty, in the city where the very first Labor Day in the States was ever celebrated. Heroic, I say.

There's room at the top they are telling you still,
But first you must learn how to smile as you kill,
If you want to be like the folks on the hill.

A working class hero is something to be.

Yanks Slug Their Way To Another Victory

A.J. Burnett's sub-par August bled over into September last night but the Yankees' offense launched 5 home runs in his defense and the bullpen provided a scoreless 3 2/3 innings to allow the Yankees to take the victory in Camden Yards.

Three of those homers came off of long ball machine David Martinez, two of which were courtesy of Jorge Posada. He and A.J. Burnett clearly didn't combine for a very good outing as battery mates and Jorge twice forgot the count in his at bats. In the second inning he stood the plate waiting for a pitch after ball four was called, and then three innings later he started walking towards the dugout after strike two was called, only to return to the plate to take Hernandez yard two pitches later. He also was nicked with a foul ball in the eighth inning but told Kim Jones he was okay in the postgame interview.

Nick Swisher and Eric Hinkse went back to back in the 7th, the former breaking a 6-6 tie and the latter putting the Yanks up by 3, which turned out to be the decisive margin. Amazingly, Swisher has hit more homers at Camden Yards this year (4) than he has at Yankee Stadium. He was 13 round-trippers at Oriole Park, the most of any park he hasn't called home.

Damaso Marte was the first to come out of the bullpen, throwing a perfect inning spanning from the 6th to the 7th before being replaced by David Robertson. D-Rob is working his way up the bullpen ladder, and has been used more often in high leverage situations as of late. He didn't disappoint tonight, but was lifted after giving up a double to Brian Roberts in the 8th. Phil Coke closed out the frame and Mariano Rivera picked up his second save in as many days, giving him the Major League lead with 38.

I'm sure the Yankees would have preferred a better start from Burnett but the bottom line is that they got away with it. He gave up six runs in 5 1/3 IP, but a whopping 11 of the 25 balls hit in play against Burnett dropped for hits (.423 BABIP). Hopefully he was just unlucky once again. I wouldn't point to Posada's game calling this time around as the cause for the poor performance. It seemed as if they weren't on the same page again but even if that's true, Jorgie more than compensated for it with his bat.

The Red Sox beat the Rays tonight, and the Rangers topped the Blue Jays. With the Rays sitting six games back, it's starting to look more and more like the Wild Card will come down to the Rangers and Sox with 3.5 games currently separating them.

Don't Count Your Chickens...

Good morning Fackers. And a good morning it is. The Yanks have just completed their longest road trip of the year, 10 games and 11 days worth of a pretty unfriendly travel schedule, and they have a 7-3 record to show for it. Not a bad trip.

While we usually bemoan off days in these parts, I'm alright with this one. It was a long trip, and as it always is, the three game set with Boston was likely as physically draining for the players as it was emotionally draining for the fans. Despite having had an off day just last Thursday, I'm sure this one is welcomed and well-earned.

I have two rules of thumb that I follow as it pertains to baseball standings. First, I don't pay much attention to the them until about mid-June. This gives the season some time to develop so one can get an idea of who's for real, and who isn't. Second, I don't consider a team to be in trouble until there are fewer weeks left in the season than they are games back in the standings.

The regular season ends six weeks from yesterday. The Red Sox are now 7.5 games back in the AL East (seven in the loss column). Given the history between the two teams and given what we've seen occur in Flushing the last two years, I'm by no means ready to declare the AL East race over. But despite the overall run differential for the series being zero, the Yanks went in and took two of three, accomplishing what they wanted to. While this series wasn't an emphatic sweep like the September 8-10, 2000 series or the August 18-21, 2006 series or even the fabled Boston Massacre of Septmber 1978, it should be enough to ensure that the Red Sox spend September more concerned about the Rangers and Rays than the Yankees. Baseball Prospectus puts the Yankees' chances of winning the division at 95.73%.

That said, the Sox are still a formidable team, as their offensive outputs Friday and Saturday illustrated. So before we go kicking dirt on their grave, let's remember that the weekend series against them in late September may not be the last the Yankees see of them in 2009. Until then though, we can't be anything but happy about how the last two plus weeks have played out.

Game 99: The Road And The Sky

The Yanks departed last night for Tampa after an incredibly successful homestand, but are now staring down one of the tougher stretches of their season. They embark on a 9 game road trip tonight against the Rays, White Sox and Jays come back for a 7 game homestand (four of which are against the Red Sox) and then are sent on a 10 game swing that takes them through Seattle, Oakland and then back cross-country to Beantown. This means that 19 out of their next 26 will be away from the Bronx and 18 will be against teams with winning records.

They've been solid on the road so far this year, going 25-21, but this stretch comes on the heels of the news that that Brett Gardner is out with a broken thumb and Chien Ming Wang is likely done for the season.

It seems a little early to say this, but the series that kicks off tonight in Tampa is a pretty important one in the context of the season. The Rays are 4 games out of the Wild Card and 6.5 back in the division, and losing 3 straight to the Yanks might turn them from buyers to sellers at the trading deadline. On the other hand, if the Yanks drop three to Tampa, they could relinquish their grip on first place and the Rays would appear much larger in their rearview mirror.

Luckily, the Yanks are summoning their three best starters in terms of ERA for this series (A.J., CC & Joba), while the Rays counter with their three best by reputation, James Sheilds, Scott Kazmir and Matt Garza.

Sheilds' ERA is a touch lower than A.J. Burnett's on the season (3.70 to 3.74), but he's been unlucky with his won-lost record, currently at 6-6. He's made 8 quality starts that haven't resulted in a win, including taking a loss despite holding the Mariners to just 1 run over 7 1/3 IP in April and getting a no-decision after throwing 8 1/3 innings of shutout ball against Oakland back in May. He hasn't faced the Yankees yet this year, but in 3 outings against the Bombers in 2008, he held them to 4 runs over 19 innings and struck out 17 while walking only 3.

A.J. Burnett remained hot in his last start against Baltimore, picking up his 9th win on the strength of 7 innings of two run ball. He's nailed down 7 quality starts in a row and watched his record go from 5-3 to 9-4 in the process.

The lineup returns to full strength with A-Rod back at 3rd and Matsui DH'ing as the Yanks look to start this 9 game, 10 day adventure off on the right foot despite some ominous signs above.

Now can you see those dark clouds gathering up ahead?
They're going to wash this planet clean like the Bible said,
Now you can hold on steady and try to be ready,
But everybody's gonna get wet,
Don't think it wont happen just because it hasn't happened yet.