We're so bad against lefties that we're hapless against Happ?

It's a good thing A-Rod didn't start this way last year. The star of our batting order is hitting .136 in Small Sample April. It's way too soon to sniff the glue factory, but if this were spring of 2015, the back page homeys would be demanding a Bronx en-enactment of the Game of Thrones' Red Wedding. This year, he's been Saint Alex of Fox, and he has strode to the plate 22 times, across a media-flung path of rose pedals. Trouble is, he's hiked back eight times with his bat still on his shoulder.

With Alex MIA, against lefty pitchers, the Yankees turn into the Iraqi Army. Tex isn't such a force from the right side, Austin Romine is no Brian McCann, and thus far, Aaron Hicks - (.091) - is a switch-hitting version of Bubba Crosby, or Bubba Trammell. (For whatever it's worth - both John Ryan Murphy in Minnesota, and Chris Young in Boston are hitting a Bubba-esque .125.) And Ronald Torreyes as our backup SS would be a great Cinderella story, except the ball turns into a pumpkin when he throws to first.

It was acceptable for the Yankees to go knock-kneed against Dallas Keuchel. Hell, that's what we do. But J.A. Happ... seriously? For seven years, the guy has been kicked around like Ralph Nader. Happ has pitched for Phily, then Houston, then Toronto, then Seattle, then Pittsburgh, and now Toronto again. He's like the Babadook, following the book wherever it goes. Last night, John and Suzyn were using the "hard-hit-balls" excuse, lamenting the cruel fates, but the Yankees still looked like their 2015 team, a bunch of lifeless drones against lefties.

And a team that goes only as far as its senior citizens can take it. The heart of the line-up remains A-Rod, Tex and Beltran - three guys the owner would decapitate, if we were living under ISIS. And the rotation still needs 250 innings from the combustible combo of CC and Ivan Nova. The cavalry is not necessarily coming.

We know now that Slade Heathcott will not be Josh Hamilton... that Rob Refsnyder is hopelessly cursed... and with Greg Bird gone, there is hole in our future the size of Aaron Judge. Now, he might be ready in August, if he can stop striking out twice a game. Gary Sanchez might be a RH hitting catcher. And James Kaprielian is a long-shot, if you want to believe a guy can virtually vault from college into MLB, without issues. Last spring, we told ourselves Jacob Lindgren could do it. That was simply not true.

So here we go. Help us, Saint Alex. It's 2016. It's time to wake up.