Monday, May 20, 2013

Nobody saw this: In the AL East, this season could become a two-team NY-Boston blood feud.

This was supposed to be the year NY and Boston sat out the AL East.

Instead, the season resembles an early 2000's burner - Yanks/Redsocks, and then the East Division tomato cans.

Without Jose Reyes, Toronto looks like - well - Toronto. Over the winter, Baltimore and Tampa flat-lined. After his third year, Showalter's act starts to fray. Worse, the O's didn't improve their pitching (that guy, Miguel Gonzalez, who shut us down last fall, is getting hammered). The Rays might have made their first certifiable bad deal. (That kid, Wil Meyers, whom they obtained for James Shields, is hitting .250 with 4 HR at Triple A.) Both teams are three games over .500. 


For us, it's all pitching, pitching, pitching. We're coaxing great years out of fragile arms. But Andy's gone down twice, and we all secretly wonder how long Mariano can go. In Boston, Clay Bucholtz and John Lackey aren't exactly Iron Man. Everything can change in a week.

And this could be one of those weeks.


We play Baltimore and Tampa - three game sets that could show dominance - or pull out the rug.
Either way, this has been a May unlike any in recent years. Usually, in May, our superstar lineup tanks, losing more than we win, and causing a crisis within the Yankiverse. Likewise, Boston fell apart last May. This year, both teams have thrived.

In two weeks, May 31, we host Boston for three games: Two teams playing above projections. John and Suzyn are already scoreboard watching with Redsock games, talking about our hold on first place. It's way too early to obsess over scoreboards. But this could be another 2003... or, gulp, 2004?

1 comment:

KD said...

At the start of the season i was telling a fellow Yankee fan not to expect too much. But she would buy none of it. They play one game at a time and the Yankees are still the Yankees, she explained. I laughed at the cliches but I'm not laughing now. Not quite yet a believer but I'm getting there.