http://i14.tinypic.com/4m2yg3r.jpg

Jeez, the WSox' lead-off guy has an OBP of .192. Someone should explain this game to Ozzie G.

Ah, the boys are waking up!

I kind of feel like we are in a bar watching a band and everyone is standing in the back and along the walls but us.

go yanks!

48 Good one, seamus.

Yeah, Brackman. I have no idea, none at all.

http://www.mlb.com/mediacenter/#20070607

What's with the sparse attendance on the Banter tonight-- the draft got more chatter than tonight's game?

Meanwhile Moose is at 72 after six. That's CG efficiency! Would that be cool, or what, consecutive CGs after almost a year without getting one??

66 Not in my memory. Uh. Anybody know how to look it up?

Still sucks.

I'd much rather have the Bruney>Britton>MO night.

See also Game 2 of last years ALDS.

Only one player from the pen makes any sense in this situation. Mariano Rivera. 7th inning, no one out, 1st and 3rd, one run game, highest leverage pitching situation you'll probably face, go Mo. Otherwise Moose is still your man.

Seventh inning of a one-run game with the house money line-up, I would err on the side of caution and pull moose too soon rather than too late, and play batter-to-batter late inning baseball. If the score was 4-0, I leave him in.

But with a runner on 3rd and no one out, you're likely to give up the tying run anyway. You're grasping at straws to try and escape that with a K and a GIDP, so I stick with Moose for at least one more batter, unless it's Mo. If it works, you continue with Moose. If not, you go to the pen.

Nice job getting out of that, team.

40-35

Oh well, damage done. Nice job by Scotty. Now let's score. Mighty Wil Nieves leads off, right? Or do we see Jorge?

No sense pushing our luck, and I agree with 96.

I'm glad jeter is getting the opportunity. who is he hitting for though?

I just hope Farnsworth doesn't get near this game.

A leadoff man who can't bunt.

Grrrr.

It will be Farns or Viz unfortunately.

Come Duce!

Now please not Farnsworth.

Farns is up. I'm okay with that.

159 Touché!

Let's go, Farns!

(Positive vibes, guys!)

I love PeteAbe, and his blog is a great service to Yankee fans, but it's important to understand his style.

I think he gets fixated on a particular player or issue at a given time and is slow to re-examine his initial stance. He spends time defending it until the buzz wears off, he's proven wrong by action on the field, or something new comes up.

The only knock I have on his style is that he rarely attempts to pose both sides of a debate by framing the merits and demerits of the argument in question. If he has an opinion, he defends it over and over without exploring what might be worthy in the opposite point of view. The thing is, it's a blog not a newspaper article, so it's more chatter than journalism. Considering the forum is also important.

Nope, poor throw.

The threw that right into the runner.

Jeez, talk about buzzkill. Gritty top half of the 8th, followed by this slop.

and that ain't german ...

Now.

Then we're screwed.

does farnsworth have pictures of torre caught naked with a dead llama and a live midget???

Damnit!

Thome scares me.

Come on, Mo!!

The old Mo!!

That's it, Mo, that's it!!

Wasn't that beautiful?

I'm sorry, I don't see Worthless turning it around and saving our team.

Now I'm backing: Bruney, Proctor, Britton?, to go with Mo. Maybe Henn if he can recover his early April form.

Oh, cripes. Would Cairo have made that play??

Finish him off!

that was awesome!

What is the matter with that schmuck, anyway?

That was pretty funny.

Actually, I have more confidence in Viz than I do in Farns.

It's our old buddy Miggy!

Let's go Miggy!

I was far more concerned with the runs he gave up.

He gave himself a chance to get a hit.

Nice ab.

264 :)

Better on June 8th, 2007
Austin Romine or Wil Nieves?

Discuss

Yanks drafted Romine today with the 94th pick. He's kind of the sleeper catching prospect in this draft.

Ha!

looked like a pop up. man, is he strong!!!

the white sox announcers are dead quiet.

Ha!

What'd I say, eh?

Let'er rip!

Ha!

I really didn't think it was gone, except that I've become accustomed to being fooled in the past, so I began to think...

Somehow I lucked out tonight and have the YES feed on EI...

Let's keep him around next year, if he'll have us.

I think I've made my peace with the man.

Wow, this game turned fun in a big, big hurry.

And now Posada gets his second AB.

Big question: who pitches the ninth for us?????

who's pitching the 9th? britton?

Ah. Well, that extra run does it for me. We can use Britton now.

They look worse than we do!

Ha!

My man Cairo, set up Alex's slam!

That is unreal.

Wind or no wind, my God.

Nice call earlier on the 'karma' thing, by the way!

i call that peteabe will eat a meatball sub before he goes to bed!!!

Eh?

I was mentioning this earlier: what could a manager possibly be thinking when he sticks his .191 OBP guy into the leadoff spot???

miggy, mo. 3 out 4. nice job, boyz!

Wow, have we now won three in a row?

I can't recall.

Dare I ask--is this the corner?

She's so attractive.

It's nice, right?

11 games 11.3 IP 6 H 1 R 1 BB 11 K .79 ERA

i couldnt resist. good win for you guys.. this is the yanks that cash created... suddenly that al east lead is lookin slim.... (fact- not inferiority complex talkin')

If this squad is within 7 by the break, I'm feelin' pretty good...

I'd forgotten this little buzz of a feeling.

It's kind of nice, no?

Alex had to go and upstage him (the bastard) but he's the big story of this game, with Moose and Mo close seconds.

Can Moose continue to have success throwing what seemed to be nothing but breaking balls?

But Mo and Abreu are clearly back, and that (needless to say) is huge news.

How did Jeter score two runs when he didn't even start? That's impressive.

No, technically, we're not, it just feels that way sometimes.

Or maybe it's because I'm so damned sore from playing softball yesterday. I went 3-3 with 3 runs scored, incidentally!

I did have an outfield blunder, though--I overran a ball or something. I ran and ran and somehow the ball managed to hit off my glove. That was unpleasant.

I also stumbled coming around third, being way too aggressive. That felt foolish, but I blame the beer for that one.

:)

Or something like that.

I didn't see the game, so no backseat managing from me. Can't wait to see the highlights!

I practically took the pitcher's head off on one of 'em.

That felt good.

Ha haa!!

I'll miss the ole sourpuss when he's gone.

You pitched a fine game, Mike, cheer up!

"Not one, one doesn't do it. Ten or twelve, that'll do it. We actually look like a baseball team now, last part of this trip...except for the first day here when we were still asleep..."

"Yeah we feel good for him [i.e., Torre] he's been managing a long time..."

Man, he fucking hates talking to the media.

It's kind of fun to watch.

Man, Mike, chill the fuck out!

HA!

Now fo' real,

HA!

If Cash can pull off a 'David Justice' kinda deal for Farnswhackus before the deadline, I just might back burner my personal campaign to have Stick Michael run the show again. Just sayin'...

Warms my heart.

I think he has to do it. He has value above what he is actually worth because even today's GM cant look past the fastball and actually see the frightened misguided creature below. He belonged in Atlanta, where they cannot even sell out playoff games, and the only pressure he will feel will be coming from the barometer.

The last this I want is to se him on the mound in the playoffs.

I like it! Don't need Roger eh'? We'll see.

Footnote: When we traded Rogers to the A's in '97, the 'player to be named later' was the .203 hitting Scott Brosius. That kinda worked out OK, I think...

Our offense is now where we thought it would be and I feel confident with it (knock on wood).

I think Melky should be the full-time centerfielder, period. As a long-term project, I think he's capable of being a .300 hitter, but it'll take a lot of work. His defense is excellent. For this year, if he can hover around .270, I'll be happy.

Cano's being Cano, and if his defensive lapses can be remedied, I'm confident in him.
His defense too, is excellent. We should get about .300 out of him this year, more if he stays hot like he did last year.

Abreu's a career .300 hitter and he seems to figured things out, so he should remain consistent.

First base is a question mark, but that's ok, if these other guys hit, we've more than enough offense to win if the team is otherwise sound.

Which brings us to the bullpen, and square one.

Anyone out there that might help us out? Anyone we can trade for quality relief pitching?

Chien-Ming, Andy, Clemens, Moose and the Yankee Clippard are a quality 1-4.

Moose should now be considered a 5-inning pitcher, like Clemens, but they can each dominate for five innings on any given night.

If we could just find maybe one quality 2-inning guy, we'd be in business.

Post hoc, ergo Proctor hoc will have to suffice as the 8th inning guy but Joe will have to learn to use him in a less formulaic way.

Sometimes we'll have to improvise, but man, Joe's gotta work with us on this one.

Farns mops up.

We need that Brendan Donnely, Mike Timlin kind of guy.

Anyone know where we might find such a man?

That's priority number one, don't you think?

I mean, if we're looking for that sucker, than it shouldn't matter, right, they'll take him anyway because they'll be convinced they (and they alone) can turn him into their closer.

Do you think Alex is playing so well this year because he likes to be the stud?

You think maybe he's glad Sheff is gone?

Or something, I don't know.

It seems to me we're looking at a different player this year.

Right. I just don't like most trades for "quality relief." I mean, everyone needs relief pitching, and most of them are bad. I mean if a team actually has a quality relief pitcher, what the hell could we offer them?

I think Farny for a bat can be done with the Yankees on the better end of it. A trade for relief pitching, I am far more dubious of. Unless we can go out and get someones closer, which we can't, I just don't think we will get value back on a trade like that, unless we give too much up to get what amounts to a mediocre to bad pitcher.

Tampa Bay, for their part, have been outscored 344-273, and yet they're only a half a game behind us.

What does this tell us?

Not Farns, then, you're saying?

Shoot.

:)

Yeah, point taken. How 'bout getting a bat and parlaying that into someone's closer?

Damn.

If we don't get this bullpen situation straightened out, all the bats in China won't get us to where we want to be.

To be honest, I think he has finally become a man while playing in NY. I mean he's only 32, he wouldn't be the first to take a while to reach his conclusions about life. Having a wife and kids doesn't make you a man, and he's learned that.

He is just saying look, this his who I am, I'm not beating my wife, raping young women or driving drunk at 100 MPH, and I really don't give a fuck what any of you think. And more importantly I think he actually believes it to be true. Thanks Reggie!

I think if Melky plays everyday, his hitting will come around and .300+ is on the horizon. On D, his routes have improved, and the arm is there. Johnny just lost his job ;-) I like him at DH. A lot. With this lineup, we don't need a slugger there. Just someone to keep the line movin' — and Damon can do that in a number of ways, including placing one in the cheap seats...

Moose: Yeah. It seems like 4 or 5, then look out!

We need Mendoza II. I don't know who this guy is right now. I don't know if any team has one. Maybe give one of the kids a shot? I dunno.

Yeah, maybe give one of the kids a shot--that's not a bad idea.

Hmmm...

Clippard, maybe?

Might he have more value to us in the pen, much like what the Mets have done with Heilman?

Wow, yeah. Because if Clippard could pitch effectively three or four days a week, he might be a huge asset.

Then we could play with house money, as it were, and get whoever to be the number five guy.

Hmmm...

I'd say if we could get a catcher, that would be great, then we could think about transitioning Jorgie to first, maybe buy us some time until we find the 1B of the future.

Looking up when Ramiro pitched four days a week. Get back to you on that...

Oh, man. I just had this terrible nightmare.

449 If we're moving a starter to the pen... how about Moose? Who's better suited for long relief right now?

I think the best thing to do right now, though, is to work on Quest and Henn. There's a decent chance that one of them can be a serviceable pitcher again.