Teletopez

Surprisingly, Shelley Duncan was sent down again to make room for Hairston and Ransom was kept on the roster. Ransom is probably going to stay on the roster until Gardner comes off the DL.

It seems like all the new guys are impressing. Cliff Lee threw a complete game in his debut, Victor Martinez had a five-hit day today, Orlando Cabrera homered for Minnesota, Freddy Sanchez drove in a few runs and scored, and Jerry Hairston Jr. has been impressing defensively and with his bat.

Well I never read the book so I can't exactly compare the two, but I really liked the movie. They could have done a better job with the later parts of it, but overall, I enjoyed it a lot.

I saw Kite Runner, Gran Torino, The Truman Show, and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford in the last few days. I rented Minority Report for one of these days.

I wonder how Francona's going to use Martinez when Varitek is healthy. If you put him at catcher, you're benching the captain. If you put him at first base, you can't bench Youkilis, so you have to move Youk over to third base. That means you'd have to bench Lowell, who's a .290 hitter. It'll be interesting, Francona usually finds ways to take care of problems.

Shelley Duncan got called up from AAA Scranton/WB yesterday, and Jerry Hairston Jr. will be in uniform today. Jonathon Albaladejo got sent down.

Kenny Williams said he hopes Peavy can quickly get going in September and help the team get to the postseason, which may not be so easy after coming off from a long-term injury.

I really like the Hairston acquisition. He can play all outfield and infield positions, he has speed, and he gives more options for Girardi when it comes to the bench. Now, we have Hinske (power, outfield), Hairston (speed, defensive substituting), Molina (catching), Ransom/Pena (utility infield), and Gardner when he comes back (speed).

Leave it to the umpires to ruin the whole game for us.

George Steinbrenner paid a visit to the Yankees yesterday in St. Petersburg and was happy with the team's standing. The Yanks have acquired RHP Jason Hirsh from Colorado for a player to be named and assigned Hirsh to AAA.

Critics, as expected, aren't happy that there isn't a final rendering of the Barclays Center ready. They're threatening another round of lawsuits. Great.

The Yankees are tied for the best record in the MLB with the Dodgers at 62-39 and have the best home record in baseball.

Last night's game was something else. I couldn't tell Manny made that leaping catch until he threw it into the stands. Then the Cards' hitter missing first base, Manny being thrown out at home, and the game just kept going and going. The Dodgers are on their first 4-game skid of the season.

The only thing is that Longoria is only the second player I am aware of that he's thrown at, and I don't see why he'd intentionally throw at either of their heads. I mean, he does have control problems. On the other hand, it is worth wondering why he's thrown at Youk more than once.

You could go a few ways with the first question, being that we don't know what to expect from Yi after his workouts this summer. I gave it to him because I expect him to be the Yi we saw prior to his injury in 08-09 if not better. I'm also assuming he's a starter. I was also considering CDR with the talent we saw in the summer league, but of course, we need to see how much of that carries over to the NBA games. As for the second question, I chose Lopez based on what we saw from him last season and the fact that he doesn't need to adjust as much as the Lee, the new guy. Lee, also, may not be the Lee we anticipate if he has troubles adjusting from a Finals team to a non-Finals team. Even more, is sharing the backcourt with Harris, and we'll have to see how much he will be able to contribute individually with an other scorer next to him.

Arguably Joba's best pitching performance of his career so far. Only 3 hits given up in 8 innings of scoreless ball. The breaking ball was working, Joba was working quickly, and he made everything look easy. Great offensive support as well. It's a shame that we had to bring Mo in again to get the final two outs. It's also a shame that Bruney hasn't been himself after coming back from injury. He has the velocity, but he's getting hit badly. We're 3.5 games up on Boston! By the way, Dwight Howard threw out the first pitch today.

Yankee pitchers have had a lot of no-hit bids over the past few years, so I've noticed some things repeat.

And today, two of those happened with Ryan Rowland-Smith.

Well it wouldn't have been a perfect game because Smith hit a batter. And now the no-hitter is gone. And whaddaya know, the no-hitter is broken to start the inning.

And one more thing. You hear people say how boring baseball is. One thing that makes it exciting is that the unexpected happens. The first game of this series, the Yankees have no trouble hitting off a pitcher with an ERA below 4, and the next day, they have no answer against a pitcher with an ERA of almost 7.

Why not? He's watched Tim Duncan well before he started playing, and he models his game after Duncan's. He has range as well. You make it seem as if he's not a talented player when he put up great numbers with limited touches this past season. He finished third in ROY voting as a center. And now, he's impressing coaches at the mini-camp.

Lopez and Harris are really opening people's eyes, Lopez especially. Link

He wasn't lying about how much he'd be in the gym this offseason.

He actually wasn't pitching too badly in his last few starts prior to the injury. His sinker was starting to dive more, and his outings may not have been stellar, but they were good enough for us to win games.

A few things: 1) How did J-Bay's average tank that badly? At one point, I saw it hovering around .280, and then a few weeks later, I look and see that it's at about .250. 2) Is David Ortiz hitting the way Boston needs him to or is he just hitting for power at times? 3) Was today just a bad night for Nick Green at SS or is he not that good of a fielding SS? Also, that is a tough loss. Three run lead to start the ninth, Boston lets the runner move to second on defensive indifference, one out away with an unimportant runner on third, two errors, and the lead is gone. Then Boston was so close to tying it in the eleventh but couldn't.