Bird Bash?

Games 128-130
@ Baltimore Orioles

Pitching Match-ups

Tonight, Friday August 22
Mike Mussina (16-7, 3.35) vs. Radhames Liz (4-3, 7.47)

Saturday, August 23
Carl Pavano (0-0, 0.00) vs. Jeremy Guthrie (10-6, 3.15)

Sunday, August 24
Darrell Rasner (5-9, 4.93) vs. Daniel Cabrera (8-8, 4.98)

Series Analysis

So now the Yankees are in the precarious position of absolutely having to sweep the Baltimore Orioles this weekend in order to stay afloat. In New York, the Yankees have vanished from the back pages of the tabloids, which have mostly buried the team and turned their attention towards the Olympics and the Mets. The Post has engraved the tombstone and started the countdown until the Yankees are eliminated from playoff contention. And so the season has come and gone for the Yankees in the eyes of the daily papers and their lowest common denominator pandering. Still, there is a lot yet to be determined, and one of those things is if the Yankees are really totally dead or not. They have 1 and three-quarters feet in the grave, no doubt about it, but I think the series coming up against Boston, and what position the team is in when they start that series, is when you decide if the season is dead or not.

But, like I said, they pretty much need a sweep this weekend in Baltimore. They have to face two pitchers that have absolutely shut their offense down this year in Jeremy Guthrie and Daniel Cabrera, and they are subjecting themselves to a circus-like atmosphere by starting Carl Pavano on Saturday night. A sweep is not going to be easy to come by because of those factors. Any mis-steps by Yankees starting pitching will mean sure doom considering their offense has a glass jaw on par with a terrible team completely out of the race and playing out the stretch run in September. Meaning, they pack it in as soon as they fall behind by more than a run or two. Any four or five run deficit is insurmountable for this group of overpaid, underachieving, and aging one-time superstars.

So the weight of the “Yankees Universe” will fall on the shoulders of The Moose tonight in the park where he made his name. He’ll need to provide some sanity, and the offense will have to tattoo an erratic rookie, in order to set the stage for the return of the Plastic Pitcher.

My prediction for Saturday, I mean, I can’t even begin to predict that game. Pavano could come out and completely lay an egg and I wouldn’t be one bit surprised. He could throw a game like he threw on Opening Day 2007 when he gave up some runs but kept the game close into the 5th inning and gave way to the bullpen. He could also throw 6 or 7 shutout innings, and I wouldn’t be surprised. Nothing can ever surprise a Yankees fans anymore when it comes to Carl Pavano—he has re-written the book on surprising a fan base. And Guthrie is the Orioles’ best starter hands down, and he has pitched well against the Yankees in each of his starts against them this year. This to me is the hardest game of the series to predict a Yankees victory in. But, this year has been so bizarre that anything is possible—it’s not like the Orioles are a great team, but they have killed Yankees pitching all year, and I don’t see Pavano bucking that trend.

Sunday’s game could potentially be a high scoring one if the Yankees figure out how to hit Daniel Cabrera, a secret that the 13 other teams in the AL have picked up on this year. That combined with Rasner coming off an out-of-his-mind start against the Jays that I doubt he will recreate, means there should be some runs scored. The Yankees have not won many slugfests, but Camden Yards has been a friendly confines to them for many years, so I am guessing they end up taking 2 out of 3 in this series, winning tonight and Sunday.

Some random notes before I sign off for tonight.

--I am actually going to the Mets/Astros game tonight, in an effort to get there one last time before they turn the place into a parking lot, and because I need to see an actual baseball team that plays in New York in person (joking). It’s a great pitching match-up between Johan and Roy Oswalt, so I’m hoping for a great game. I still don’t regret not trading for and signing Santana, even as more and more fans clamor that the Yankees will end up paying more for Sabathia this offseason than they would have ended up paying for Santana. Those idiot fans don’t realize that they won’t have to both trade for AND sign Sabathia, though. Those same fans, however, have already decided that Phil Hughes is washed up and will never amount to anything so they should have just traded him last year.

--Speaking of the much-maligned Phil Hughes, he pitches again for Scranton/Wilkes Barre tonight. I will be curious to see if he overcomes his self-described dead arm and pitches more like he was in his first few rehab starts, as opposed to his outing last Sunday. A good performance by Phil and a poor one by Pavano on Saturday would increase some pressure to pull the plug on Carl’s starting gig and give Phil a shot. No concept of what the team’s leash will be like with Pavano, and I would be appalled if they gave him respect and actually ran him out there regardless of if he stinks it up or not.

I’ll be watching the out of town scoreboard from my seats at Shea tonight and hoping to see some crooked numbers next to NYY. Hopefully, there won’t be any crooked numbers popping up next to the BAL portion of the scoreboard.

Left-Handed and Losing

The Subway Series got off to a predictably rocky start for the Bronx participants, who threw their lefty-laden lineup before King Johan for sacrifice yesterday afternoon. When I reluctantly turned on John Sterling's butchered rendition of the game in the 4th inning, I was shocked to hear that the Yankees actually had a lead. That it was 2-0 was an expected, unimpressive lead; that Andy Pettitte squandered it swiftly with one poor inning of work was also expected on my part; and that the offense failed to muster another scoring threat before the game slipped out of the tenuous grasp of Kyle Farnsworth was even less surprising.

A typical effort for this incarnation of the antithesis of the Bronx Bombers nickname, Saturday's affair featured the classic elements of the still-young but seemingly forever downhill 2008 season: early success both offensively and on the hill, followed by pitching futility without any response from the offense, save for a few last-gasp moments that look like a rally, but are quashed before reaching full comeback status.

The team looks as flat as it ever did during The Joe Torre Era, specifically the 2nd, championship-starved half. The idea that Joe Girardi would bring more fire and a day-in, day-out attitude to the team that Torre lacked seems now like a complete fallacy. The roster is still overrun with complacent veteran personalities, so any potential fire seems extinguished by the weight of their paychecks and the size of their egos. No one has stepped up to fill the voids created by A-Rod and Posada in the lineup. Take your pick out of Shelley Duncan, Morgan Ensberg, Jose Molina, Alberto Gonzalez, Wilson Betemit...none of them have hit even close to a level covering for the missing run producers.

The rotation's problems now stem from Andy Pettitte not winning in 4 starts, an extremely problematic development considering The 5th Starter (once Kei Igawa, now Ian Kennedy again) has still yet to notch a victory on the season.

Hope might be found in Jason Giambi starting to heat up at the plate little by little, and Robinson Cano pulling his average off the interstate. Johnny Damon, however, has crawled back into his early-season shell, sending a ripple of missing productivity through the rest of the lineup.

The team still can't beat left handed starting pitching. A-Rod's return on Tuesday may or may not fix that. Another lefty starts tonight, albeit an erratic one in the Mets' Oliver Perez. Still, he dominated the Yankees last season and it's hard to expect the offense to send Perez to an early shower.

I don't know what it is going to take to turn this season around. It's clear to me that a shakeup is needed for the offense more than for the rotation: Pettitte is too much of a veteran to go winless much longer, and Wang and Mussina have been steadily successful all season. Rasner has shown signs, and Kennedy, even though his first start back saw him take the loss, seems closer to turning the corner than he did before his demotion.

Joe Girardi looks less capable of righting the ship by the game. He seems without answers, content to try a different lineup every game and chalk the team's failures up to veteran players performing under their capabilities. Never does he give a hint that the veterans need to start performing or their will be consequences; that would be too bold for someone that graduated from the Joe Torre "trust your guys" school of thought. Apparently, he's more willing to be a watered-down facsimile of Torre than a tougher manager that puts winning above loyalty.

It remains to be seen if this will change at some point, or if Joe will just wait patiently as the failure builds and the pressure from the front office mounts. I look forward to some panic trades at the deadline, sending Ian Kennedy packing for some mediocre offensive performers that won't solve anything. This season seems destined for the panic button being smashed by Brian Cashman, in a last-ditch effort to keep his job and prove that he's still a front-office genius.

It will undoubtedly end badly in every way, is the vibe that I'm now getting from the 2008 season.