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

Woot woot! Yanks take the first of the series with the BIGGEST RIVAL IN THE HISTORY OF SPORTS, thanks to an absolutely sterling performance from Michael Pineda. Is it weird his first name is Michael and not Miguel? Yes. Yes, I think it is. That's a totally normal, not offensive comment, seriously.

Well, I guess it depends on who you ask. And I mean that in reference to the "sterling performance" comment, since from where I was sitting, it looked pretty badass. From the visitors' dugout, on the other hand, it look pretty "dark."

"Not Miguel" has pine tar on his hand. Or dirt. Or a fundamental demonstration of the shadow and light principles. Or sweat with dirt. I can't really tell. The old pine tar accusation gag, eh. Ha. Red Socks will do anything, ANYTHING I tell you, to win the Who Can Pantomime the Yankees Best? Contest.

Well, nothing really came of the pine tar shit, as far as I can tell, which means ESPN will probably escalate it to cinematic proportions, because how else can a pitcher have a good outing? I mean, just look at this schmuck who spent his career completely irrelevant and then magically has a good outing?

In the aggressive campaign to completely ruin the game of baseball, the ESPN ESPublicRelations are just doing their part, because it's not fair for the instant replay and plate collision rules to do ALL the heavy lifting.

Anyways, the Yankees prevailed despite Not Miguel's insidious crime, not BECAUSE of it. Of course. The Yanks' bullpen didn't implode, which was cute--thank you Cesar Cabral and Phelps. Tomorrow we may hear that John Farrell played the game under protest after accusing the relievers of zapping magic spells on the baseballs.

See, Farrell never even brought up the pine tar. It's basically ESPN being like the bitchy Trouble-Stirrer-Upper in high school who says shit like, "I mean, I don't know if I should say anything, but Tommy looked a little TOO friendly with Kelly last night."

In actual baseball performance news, Nava hit a homerun for the Bean Team, which meant the announcers fell over themselves to relay the apropos stat about Nava being only 1 of 2 players ever to hit a grand slam on his first pitch in the majors ever. Not for nothing, but that IS a pretty ridiculous stat. Even more ridiculous is the fact it's happened more than once.

Continuing along the lines of being magnanimous in victory, I'll give credit again to the Red Socks for a) a couple of sick catches in the outfield and b) for Cheekbones' pitching performance. I don't know why--because his pitches are unassailably filthy--but he just doesn't scare me. You know, there's pitchers like Halladay. Or Lee. Or Darvis. At some point all those guys struck fear into my heart like the sight of Mo struck fear into the hearts of opposing fans in the 9th inning.

But Cheekbones doesn't do that. Probably because I can't get past how his bone structure could cut through glass.

HEY! UMP! LET'S GO AHEAD AND CHECK THAT SHIT OUT, YEAH?

That's it with niceties about the BIGGEST RIVAL IN THE HISTORY OF SPORTS. Did anyone think Ortiz was dangerously close to pulling a drop-your-bat-and-pause-like-an-asshole-after-going-yard move...when he hit a ground rule double? Asshole. Also, moron. Furthermore, faulty depth perception. Yeah, you heard me, Papi. Your visual acuity's so fat, when it sits around the house, it sits AROUND the house, na wuh im sayin? Yeah, me neiter.

Dear Anna hit a homerun, but unfortunately he didn't grin in wild exuberance when running around the bases. He must have a dad who told him not to celebrate in the end zone and to act like he's been there before.

Yangervis didn't have another 2934 for 2934 game, but had a broken bat shot that culminated in a pretty good play by Nava. Whatever. Sorry, I was too distracted by the weirdass move Yangervis made to like 2nd base which I guess was some kind of lefty shift? But at first I thought our neophyte just forgot what position he played (which would be understandable considering how erratic this whole musical infielders thing has been.)

Also, the Yankees won, so there. And we got your boy Jacoby, who brought in a run. A-So brought in a run, too, in a very A-So way, ie by grounding into a double play.

Fatso starts against Jon "The Red Socks were a bad influence on me. I'd look better in Pinstripes" Lester. The Yanks win. Boston doesn't do well. And their flag remains at the end of the AL East section of the Yankee Stadium façade.