"It's great to be young and a Yankee."

I feel like we JUST came back from the West Coast...and alas, we find ourselves at the onset of another week of 10pm starts. I'm still recovering from the last batch, not to mention recuperating from the weekend.

But that's really the only thing a Yankee fan has to complain about today, seeing as Javy has a ridiculously good start. And you know how I hate statistics and absolute values when it comes to baseball (and pretty much ONLY when it comes to baseball), so I'm gonna go by what I saw during the game, which was that his pitches have a striking (no pun intended. Seriously.) level of control that keep everything tightly beating within the nether regions of the K-Zone.

I realize that what I just wrote my be a BIT overly dramatic, but let's call it even, since I think he deserves a degree of overcompensation, on account of his teammates categorically refusing to offer any kind of run support.

I think I've figured it out. When you look at the run support rankings for our starters, Phil Hughes and CC top the list, then Andy, AJ, and Javy. CC burns through innings as quick as he tears through a bag of Ruffles. The offense doesn't have much time to marinate in the field before batting again.

It's like the Hit Away thing I use to practice my swing with. When I have more time to think about the ball coming in (a la slow pitch softball), I drop my shoulder and screw everything up. With the Hit Away, the ball's coming at you too fast to even have time to drop your elbow or shoulder.

Javy's not a bad pitcher, but I think he probably keeps the defense on the field for longer, on account of shaking off pitches a lot and just generally taking his time between pitches. Of course, never to an annoying extent. But, you know, like more so than the Left-Armed Giant Pinstriped Inning Eater.

Anyways, so our boy improved to 7-7 today (which isn't unlike medications that don't actually improve anything, but just slow the decline more. I always think it's sad when "improvement" brings you to baseline. Kind of like filling the car up with gas. You have to spend a shitload of money just to get the car back to baseline. One of life's evils I can avoid by living carless in the city, I guess.)

Grandy, Tex, and Cervelli had the team's RBIs, and dare I say it, but maybe, just maybe Tex has finally learned his lines for the "How Teixeira Got His Groove Back" production? I don't want to jinx it.

So what I'm gonna do is revisit one of my favorite posts from one of my favorite blogs. If you're a frequent CBS 880 listener, then you'll love this.

SPEAKING OF INCREDIBLE, how about those catches from Grandy and Colin Curtis? Man I hope they keep the latter on board. A catch like that when you've only played like 4 games in your pro career? Unbelievable.

Also unbelievable was the fact Joba didn't give up any runs (his fast ball was actually nearing his old form, 96s and 97s. Promising. But relying on Joba is as wise as relying on my hamster to guard my bedroom against intruders.)

Mo came in and got his 19th save in 21 tries, and honestly, I just think that eventually Mo's just gonna do what I do when I'm frustrated at work, and your options are relying on a report to get everything done right, or taking on the extra work yourself to ensure it's done the way you want it done.

"Hey, Joe? You know that whole bridge to Mo thing you're always promising me?"
"Yeah..."
"Well, I was wondering , if I could just be the bridge to me. Seriously. Whatever, I'll just learn to pitch 2 innings at a time. You could even make up some inane pitch count rules thing for me, you like those. Everyone wins. What do you say?"

The Yanks win and after the game, the whole team was all just really interested in saying how we're getting better, and there's room for improvement, etc.

"Trust me, I'm happy with the way we're playing and how hard our guys are playing, but I still think we can get better," Girardi said.

Well, duh. There's always room for improvement. That's why the expression is just that, and not, "Sell improvement somewhere else, we're all full here!"

In other news, the Sox lose, TB wins, and the Yanks are 2.5 ahead of the former, 2 ahead of the latter.

Andy Pettitte replaces Bucholz on the ASG roster, which is good, because I think the guy realllly wanted to get picked, probably more so than he lets on even. He said something a few days ago that makes me think this...

"In years past, I thought I might have had a chance to go and I didn't," Pettitte said. "There's a lot of guys deserving of it, and it's out of my hands."

This is also the last west coast trip of the year.

The second half of the season is going to be awesome already.

Oh yeah, and then there's this.

Braden's pissed off about the shirts. You can't win with some people, I swear.