Can we do it?

The New York Yankees have never lost 100 games in their history. 

The New York Highlanders did it twice, in 1908 and 1912. The 1912 team (some of them pictured above, including, it seems, Stump) managed to slip under the 1908ers with a winning percentage that was .002 worse. 

To be fair, the '08ers did manage to lose one more game, but this was nullified by their also winning one more game. And the 1912 Stinkeroos' 55 games out of first is simply unbeatable.

1912

New York Highlanders     50-102      .329      55.0 GB

The worst record posted by an officially-named Yankees team?

1990

New York Yankees          67-95        .414      21.0 GB

We might have a shot at that. It depends how inept the front office and Girardi can be and how badly individual players can play.

Of course, the 1966 Yankees (the year when I started to follow baseball and the Yankees) are legendary only because of the precipitous fall from the World Series team of '64.

1966

New York Yankees          70-89       .440      26.5 GB

Pretty bad, but you have to give the edge to 1990 for sheer number of losses and lower winning percentage, even though the 1966 team finished further out.

We definitely have a shot at '66. Maybe '90. And who knows? That .329 from 1912 is tough to beat, but the season is young, the team is old, and the management is floundering.

Like they used to say about the Lottery, ya never know.

What Might Have Been

Those kids down in Miami just love Donnie Baseball.

The worst Yankee decade in history?

As we stand on the bridge, here is Today's Official Yankee Comfort Thought: 

Cheer up, everybody! The Twins, Astros, Braves and Reds still have worse records than we do! 

Of course, three of those teams entered 2016 as tear-downs. The Reds and Braves were manically trading vets such as - hey, anybody want Aroldis Chapman? - for anyone under age 22. Only the bargain basement Astros seem to have flown off the rails, but they remain a work in progress. As for the Twins? What can you say? They're the embodiment of Phil Hughes.

But we - the mighty New York Baseball Yankees of Gotham! - remain baseball's marquee disappointment, the worst professional sports team that old money can buy. Our players are genetically coded to under-achieve or get hurt. Whenever a star gets hot - as A-Rod, CC and Ellsbury recently did - some law of random sequences requires them to tweak a gonad. In this decade, the Yankee way is: Stay cold or get injured.

And standing on the bridge, rest assured that it works! This period - from 2010 to 2020 - could be the most fruitless Yankee decade in history.

Yes, bridgers, the worst Yankee decade in history! 

Think about that. Even the wretched sixties and eighties - rotted as they were - offered glimpses of championship teams. But in our new billion dollar mausoleum, the modern Yankees chase only Wild Cards and tax-threshold payroll caps.

And now, that long-awaited collapse - the one Hal Steinbrenner, in his family's signature hubris, assured Yankee fans simply would not happen - looms on the horizon. A month from now, all that will be left will be the trade deadline. For the first time in this millennium, the Yankees could be selling off their antique livestock and looking to draft high in 2017. (Wait, does Cito Culver have a brother?)

It will be Hal's way of taking vengeance on the high-priced Yankee veterans, the ones he courted and signed. He can blame them for growing old and fragile. But in fact, the players will be rewarded - by moving to teams and organizations that are in the pennant race. Who knows? They might actually see what Mariano and Jeter were denied - the chance to finish their careers in a post-season game.

But while we hold our water on this bridge, here's Today's Official Yankee Sobering Thought: Our owner will not change. He might clean house in the dugout. The front office will stay the same. The monument to nepotism and cronyism that is the modern New York Yankees shall not be impinged by a measly trade deadline or unfortunate collapse into rubble.

Last in the AL East, the fifth worst team in baseball, old and slow... and a distinct feeling that the worst is yet to come.

Fuck it, everybody. I'm ready to jump.

Fan Letter to Mr. Cashman

Dear Mr. Cashman;

I have been a Yankee fan longer than you have been alive.

At each pivotal moment in Yankee history, one feels the need to unburden oneself with respect to  the team which appears on the field.  The team which you have built.

Let's for today,just focus on the player development aspect of your job.  The future prospects, so to speak.  It is a major responsibility of every GM, and I thought the world should get a better sense of how you have performed in this regard.

Earlier this year, we all watched a young Tampa Bay pitcher make his major league debut against the Yankees.  He went 7+ innings, if memory serves, and yielded one run.  Tampa won the game for him.

By contrast;  our best young pitching prospect ( Severino ) is now 0-6, and awaits the surgical magic of Dr. Andrews.  The team is still pretending that he has, a " tricep strain," which s nothing serious and that he need not have any procedure at all.

You still believe in the easter bunny, as well, right?

Even if you are correct for the short term, has psychiatry ever occurred to you?  Luis has to be a head case by now, at minimum. So here is a question we ( fans ) would like you to answer:  Why do our best prospects always seem to underperform versus the top prospects that other teams promote to the majors?

More recently, you brought up our best hitting prospect ( Sanchez ) who struck out twice, popped up and hit a weak infield ground ball.  He, too, participated in a loss, and was quickly optioned back to Scranton.  Need I bring up some of the names of other teams' top  position prospects, and how they  fared in their debuts?

When a prospect gets a shot, they are supposed to show something.  When they don't, it usually means they really are not major league material.

So last night, the Yankees start one of the pitching prospects you traded for to add, " length, " to our starting staff in Scranton.  Many of us howled at the idea of trading for career minor leaguers, when you announced this coup.  So we were somewhat flabbergasted to see Green on the mound in a real game.

It was stated that Green was pitching the best of anyone down at Scranton.  He got hammered and the Yankees were embarrassed 12-2.  Let's look at the logic here;  if this guy is the best pitcher we currently have in Scranton, and if he was basically a batting practice guy to the Arizona batters, what does that say about his future?

Mor importantly, about the future of the Yankees?

Our top prospect pitcher and hitter put up only zeros, and of the bad kind.  Zero wins, zero hits, zero RBIs..

Our best pitcher in Scranton did the opposite:  he put up almost no zeros ( clean innings ).

Not for one second did I think we had any shot of winning that game.  Did you feel the same way?

So you have built  nothing but false promises.

 What have you to say for yourself, Mr. Cashman?  What reasons can you give us to have any hope for the Yankees now or in the next 10 years?

Eight games out, though it seems a lifetime

A-Rod returns Thursday, and CC on Friday. Ten years ago, such words would make a difference. Now? We just reshuffle the deck. The Bronx Boredoms are listing.

It's ridiculous to be watching scoreboards in mid-May. Nevertheless, the standings are starting to pinch. We are last in the AL East, four below .500, eight losses behind Baltimore, with a never-ending shuttle of middling prospects from Scranton, and a lineup stressed to score three times per game. Wasn't it yesterday that the Yankees were the premier franchise in baseball? Now, we're a distant second in NYC, delighted with ourselves for beating mighty Kansas City and - worst of all - an organization that curtsies to Big Papi just to keep alive the moribund Yankee-Redsock rivalry. What happened to us?

Well, okay... we became antiques. No news here. Everybody knew this team couldn't last forever. But why, why, why couldn't our farm system grow an infield? Other teams do. What happened to all our high draft picks, which the blog/YES propaganda mill touted? There was Dante Bichette Jr., Jeremy Bleich, Cito Culver, Andrew Brackman, Ty Hensley, et al - WTF happened? Some were hurt. Some are gone. Some are stuck forever in Trenton. WTF happened? We have scouts. We have coaches. We have "baseball men." WTF?

And then Hal ruled that he should not have to spend his hard-inherited money. That was Bud Selig's last joke on NY - the luxury tax, which Food Stamps didn't want to pay. Thus, we're stuck in Steinbrenner limbo, unable to get below the tax threshold, unable to legitimately contend, waiting for 2019, or maybe the year after that. We passed on Max Scherzer. We passed on David Price. We passed on Greinke, Cuetto, and a generation of Cuban players, including Yoan Moncada, who looks to be a Yankee scourge for years to come. What we do have is a raft of 18-year-olds from a burst of international signings two summers ago, before most of them started shaving. They're three years away, and considering our track record with the Bichettes and Culvers, who knows if they won't just disappear into the Charleston-Trentonian void? Are we really supposed to be following the Dominican Summer League?

Last night, we were shut down by the pitcher the Diamondbacks received in the Didi Gregorious trade, the one we spent the last 18 months congratulating ourselves over. Don't get me wrong: I'm glad we have Didi. But it's just one more reminder that you can't magically trade your way to the top. Those other GMs - the ones that are not us - they are not stupid. They don't give up something for nothing, especially when dealing with the Yankees. So here we are - last in the East, with a sea of empty blue seats in Yankee Stadium and a long hard summer ahead.

Doom? Gloom? Sorry. Maybe it's just the morning after a spanking. But these mornings-after are starting to become the norm. And the return of A-Rod isn't enough.

Coke adds life (to Arizona bats); Green lives up to his name; Goody not so much

Wallace what's-his-name on ESPN did a short article about the Yankees' lack of middle relief and how that makes the Closer Cluster a lot less useful. I guess it took him a while to figure that out.

Why did Girardi start the Green kid? Who knows? It's difficult to peer into his brain with all that cement in the way.

And a big welcome back to Phil Coke! Phil gave up a triple, a double, three singles and four runs...but only 3 of those runs were earned!!

More good news:  we got our two runs. It's a long season, and baseball rewards consistency. Right?

After 36 games, a perfect match

The 1966 Yankees won their 36th game, putting on an offensive display in an 11-6 win over the Angels. Mantle hit two HRs.

After 36 games, their record was 16-20.

The 2016 Yankees won their 36th game, putting on an offensive display (for them) in a 7-5 win over the White Sox. Beltran and McCann homered.

After 36 games, our record is 16-20.

The lineup for both of those 36th games below. Tracking pretty closely so far.

For the record, the scorecard and official program is no longer 25 cents and box seats cost more than a few bucks.

FUN FACT: Back in the 1960's, many Yankees players stayed at the Stadium Motor Lodge. Players who did not live in New York or near the stadium would stay here during the season. The lodge was just a short walk to Yankee Stadium. It still stands today but is used as a homeless shelter for men.

World coming to end: Mushnick gets something right

"A stronger stench could not be systemically and financially applied to a team whose legendary logo includes Uncle Sam’s stars and striped hat and carries the decorated-by-history name, New York Yankees."

Can Chase Headley still save his Yankee soul?

Fun Fact: Last July, Chase Headley hit .370. 

That's no false fun-fact. I'm not micro-dosing toad sweat. Headley hit three-seventy, raising his average to the respectable Jumbotron showcase of .285. For 31 days, we had a .370 masher at 3B - (albeit with lingering concerns about whether the ghost of Chuck Knoblauch was occupying his arm.) 

In August, Headley tapered off slightly - a sweet .298. In September, he tumbled into the sinkhole - .179. Then again, so did everybody on that moribund, hell-bound team. 

For the year, Headley finished at .259 and 11 HRs. Not bad, unless you're lashed to him like Ahab to the whale for four seasons. 

I don't have to say what a disaster Headley has been thus far in 2016. Why dwell upon the kidney stones? He went 23 games without an RBI. He hit his first HR Friday. At one point, he was unable to even see the Mendoza Line, and but yesterday, he had the game-winning hit. It's still May. The tulips are blooming. The summer reruns are just beginning. Let's ponder the extremes.

1. Bad. This is a Stephen Drew re-enactment. His hits merely extend the Yankees' willingness to stick with him, and - frankly - we'd be better off if he goes 0 for May. This is a brutal assessment, but Yankee fans have seen this movie many times - Vernon Wells, Alphonso Soriano, Travis Hafner - going back to the 1980s, and the days of Danny Tartabull and John Mayberry. A former slugger comes to Gotham, falls off the table, and we burn six months, refusing to accept what everybody else knows. He's done. Every time we are ready to pull the plug, he hits a home run, so we extend the leash for another month. This is a nearly a uniquely Yankee phenomena, because of our over-reaching, Steinbrennerian hubris: We somehow think giving a guy pinstripes and the wistful romance of NYC means he will become 28 again. It can happen on a great team - (see Strawberry, see Gooden, see Reuben Sierra, et al) - but is this a great team? Nope. Done.

2. Good. He's going to conquer this slump and re-install himself as a legitimate major league third baseman. It's not out of the question. Right now, it's hard to imagine Headley hitting .370 for a week, much less a month. But the Yankees have him for two more long, potentially depressing years. We have no other 3B at the upper end of the farm system. (Reports on Rob Reysnyder playing 3B in Scranton are not pleasing, even though Refsnyder hit 2 HRs last night for Scranton.) Nobody is coming to save the day. If Headley could turn it around - well - we really don't have any other option, do we? He seems to be a good person. Then again, so were Drew, Wells, Hafner, all the others. Being a good person doesn't mean hitting.

Of course, there are always shades of gray. Headley could start hitting and throwing balls into the dugout. More than perhaps any other Yankee position, we have no fallback. This is what happens when the only thirdbaseman your farm system develops in 30 years is Mike Lowell, and you trade him for a bag of donuts. Why do the Redsocks consistently develop thirdbasemen - in the last 10 years, a Youkilis, a Middlebrooks* and now a Travis Lee, while the closest we come is a scrap pile acquisition of Yangervis Solarte? What is wrong with our farm system, and will we ever address this problem?

*(Before you note that Middlebrooks turned into a disappointment, in 2013 - their championship season - he hit 17 HRs.)

Victory!

Con mucho gusto!

Ivan Nova throws a nice game, after a clunker. Who'd a thought?

Okay, we used the three-eyed bullpen raven to seal a big win, a critical win. (Note: Every Yankee win is a big win, a critical win.) I get that. But after using Dellin, Andrew and the Garage Door Opener last night, what now? How many threesomes can we go in a row before our, well, A-Rod bobblehead thingy falls off? Seems to me, the beauty of having three stoppers is that you should always have one, like snakebite remedy, to use as needed. But when we use them all in one single solitary win... a big win, a critical win... well, in another era, that would be called Scott Proctoring.

Of course, we had to win that game. I'm not faulting Joe. Seriously. Mr. G had no choice - no choice whatsoever - but to empty the keg. That's what Joe Torre would have done. Run the dogs until they fall. Nine up, nine down. Take that, Mrs. Obama! (I don't get that reference either, but I'm going with it.) Can we score a bunch of runs and win a shootout? Can we win a game with Kirby Yates and the cast of Glee? I dunno. Just asking.

I Finally Figured Out Why The Yankees Can ( usually ) Only Score 2 Runs

The reason is Brett Gardener.

It is as if he is the designated, " automatic out."

Situation:  runners on 2nd and 3rd and we have just been robbed of a run, because of the ground rule double.

Brett makes out.

Situation:  Runner on second, and Yanks need insurance run.  Gardener goes down looking.

Brett gets all his hits when they don't matter.  We are losing 7-0 in the 9th, with two out.  Gary hits a solo homer.  We lose 7-1.

If you want an at bat to put you to sleep, watch Brett at the plate.

He just never gets a clutch hit.

Good thing he moved to 7th in the line-up today.  I would bat him 9th.

 I would make him bunt at every at bat.

Or, sit him down.

I never liked him.  Now I know why.

New Idea

I have actually said this before.

NickSwisher is 35.  He can't run, hit or throw.

But he can pitch.  His arm strength peaks out in the 70's.

A perfect guy to learn the knuckleball.

He can replace Severino ( who only has an an elbow strain.....like I only have a few extra pounds on me ).

He can be ready by the all star break.

And another one bites the dust...

Comrades, the fix is in.

After last night, every Yankee fan in captivity must realize that the Fates are pissing on us, that we are the new Knicks fans, and that this nepotism-cursed, crony-run franchise won't win anything meaningful until OJ is free, Trump is in his second term, and Burnam Wood comes to Dunsinane Hill... and considering wide-load tie-ups on the NY State Thruway, good luck with that.

This season already feels like it's six months old.

Last winter, the Yankees offered us two rays of hope: Greg Bird and Luis Severino. Bird never even made it to Tampa. Last night, the second shoe dropped. Severino - 0-6 and horrible - walked off the mound holding his elbow. Wherever he is, Manny Banuelos must be flinching.

Later, the Upheaval Empire announced that Severino's elbow has only a mild strain and will not need Tommy John surgery, and that he will rest and maybe return soon, perhaps in a matter of weeks. It's all okay, everybody. Tokyo has been spared from Godzilla.

Of course, nobody believes a word they say.

If there is one given in the Yankiverse, it is that the Dolan Steinbrenner family sees no advantage in disclosing the true extent of injuries to the press and fans. Severino's MRI could have shown a Florida sinkhole; they'd say it was mosquito bite. Within this slow-motion Yankee collapse, credibility is an afterthought. That went out the door a long time ago.

Now we see why the Yankees have been fighting StubHub so bitterly: They rightfully see the secondary ticket market as their biggest nemesis in 2016. Come August, when even a Wild Card away slot looks like an impossible dream, those $500 fat cat tickets will be selling on StubHub for the price of a jelly doughnut. Those poor corporate bigwigs who still go to the games will have to sit next to barking street people, and not even John Oliver will give a damn about putting hipsters in the seats.

The fix is in, folks. The Redsocks are in first, the Mets own New York, it's barely mid-May and we are already down to stems and seeds... and the injuries are just beginning. What a sad time to be a Yankee fan.

Did You Think I Had gone?

" I got a message to pick up a young pitcher and bring him to the DL.

Dr. Andrews is waiting in his office.

Does it really matter?  Your top pitching [prospect with 0 wins?

He wouldn't get a uniform on the Mets."

Have a nice week.

Using double-secret reverse sarcasm, Seattle blogger promotes Joggie Cano for MVP

You'll need to read this five times to figure out the guy's message. That's a sign of very good writing.

With three out of four against the the Royals, the Yankees are holding on to that Wild Card dream

The other day, watching Max Scherzer light up Washington with 20 strikeouts, I couldn't help but close my eyes and imagine him as a Yankee. Isn't that how it's supposed to be? We're the effing Yankees, the one team that stops at nothing to put its greatest team on the field? Or at least, we used to be, until the Boy Owner took over.

Right now, all of baseball is wondering what's wrong with David Price? Will he be worth all that money? Redsock fans are apoplectic. Will he be a dud? But that should be our controversy, not Boston's. We should be the team everybody is talking about, not the Redsocks. When ESPN holds its game of the week, the announcers should be haggling over what's happening with the Yankees.

As it is, nothing is happening with the Yankees.

Today, we are 7 out in the AL East and 5 down in the AL Wild Card race, which - with 129 games left to play - requires a doctorate in theoretical mathematics to calculate. Our Wild Card Magic Number falls somewhere between grains of sand in the Sahara and the Celino & Barnes hotline, which is - as you know - 888,888,888.

Want to burst with pride? We finally have a pitcher with three wins - Nathan Eovaldi. We finally have a regular hitting .300 - Starlin Castro. Thanks to Chase Headley, we can finally field a lineup with every batter homering in 2016.

Thanks to El Chapo finally completing his anger management courses, we finally have baseball's best bullpen - at least from the seventh on. It includes the sport's greatest teammate - Andrew Miller - who accepted a role change without one complaint, even though the traditional contract structure rewards marquee closers over middle-men. Right now, beyond the hoopla over Chapman, we finally have a legitimate heir to Mariano - it's Miller.

We have finally seen the wave of injuries - to A-Rod, Ellsbury, CC and Tex - that everyone knew was coming. (Gardy is still out there, but struggling. In the last half of 2015, he hit .205. This year, he's hitting .235. He is nearing an entire full season of mediocre play. This is troubling.) We have yet to see what the old players will do after they return. With the exception of Tex, the others were showing signs of life just before the injuries. Now, what?

With luck, we look like a team that can win 86 to 90 games. That means challenging for another Wild Card slot, at least through mid-September.

This would be the fifth consecutive year in which we chase the Wild Card.

This is the modern goal of the Yankees: Win the Wild Card and hope to get hot.

Could we dramatically improve? I guesso. If Pineda and Severino somehow turn it around, that would be huge. Combined, they are 1-9. But after that, no single area of the team justifies great hope. Headley won't hit .140, but will he hit .260? We can bring up Aaron Judge, but will he really produce more than Beltran? (And a Beltran injury is waiting to happen.) What improvements suddenly make this team win the AL East? Jeeze, I dunno.

I guess our hope is that Baltimore and Boston stumble. (If Jackie Bradley Jr. is really a .329 hitter, and Travis Shaw continues to hit .320 - let's face it: We are toast.) Aside from that, we look like a carbon copy of 2012 through 2015. We're still chasing Wild Cards. And Max Scherzer is the most exciting pitcher in the game. It's something for us to talk about.

FINALLY, FINALLY... a spoken poem by The Master

FINALLY, FINALLY

         By John Sterling


The Yankees are finally,

     FINALLY

Starting to hit.

And you know what?
It's better this way.


   May 12, 2016
   Bottom of the fourth
   Yankees 5, Kansas City 2

The Redsocks may be cheating, yet the story is about how the mean MLB is asking questions

MLB is investigating Boston for its signings last July of several Latino 16-year-olds, a few who were considered as top talent in Venezuela, for only $300,000 per boy. Because they'd overspent their international allotment, the Redsocks were supposed to be capped at $300,000 per boy. So how did they buy these boys?

Well, what if you sign five boys - four duds, one stud - from the same pimp trainer, for $1.5 million overall, and then let the pimp jeefe agent re-distribute it? The prized boy prospect gets $1.2 million, or whatever, the others go home happy with scraps, Boston circumvents the rules and its vaunted farm system continues to magically produce.

Some would call it "cheating," but - hey - only the Yankees do that, right?

Evidently, Baseball America has been asking questions. Nevertheless, in this illuminating write-up, it's hard to figure out whether the villain is Boston or MLB. Questions are raised about the tactics of those mean old investigators, who rounded up the now 17-year-olds and tried to get information.

According to multiple sources, MLB officials told the players that if they lied, the commissioner’s office would suspend them. They asked the players to give them their banking information and said they would investigate their bank accounts, according to those sources. Some of the players broke down in tears.


The story goes on to prattle that everybody does these package deals, so why is MLB picking on Boston? Frankly, I assume the Yankees are just as guilty.

When you have a Third World economic system predicated on pimps trainers finding, raising and selling 16-year-old boys for millions of dollars, you're always going to find a garbage heap of morality.

In America, we don't allow teams to sign 16-year-olds. Last time I looked, the concept is creepy, disgusting, offensive and flatly wrong. How MLB allows it to continue in Latin America is a disgrace. So they're "investigating" Boston? What a crock.

In Scranton, forever, Refsnyder on a 15-game hitting streak

Last night, he went 3 for 4, playing thirdbase. As if it matters.

With a game on the line, the Big 3 sit and watch

Peabody here... Sherman, set the Wayback for May 11, 2016 - with the location as "Yankee Stadium." Make sure it's not the one with the 26 world championships and the ghosts of Ruth and Gehrig. It's the one now famous for empty blue seats. Yes, we're going back to early 2016...  the year of Trump, when collapses. Yes, the year that "America? became a brand of beer, owned by a foreign company. 

It is top of the 6th, the KC Royals lead 4-3 with Mr. Michael Pineda pitching for our heroes. But he is unraveling. Pineda walks the lead-off man. That electrical surge you detect is the collective shriek of 6 million Yankee fans, pleading to their TVs for Girardi to change pitchers. He doesn't. The next batter whacks a DP ball, and the East Coast power grid might be safe, after all. Then Pineda walks another man. Girardi calls time. "This call to the bullpen is brought to you by..." NO! Girardi leaves Pineda in. That bonking sound you hear is not thunder. It is 6 million heads slamming into 6 million living room walls. Tonight, it pays to be a Comcast customer.

Next guy singles. Two on, two outs, game on the line... Girardi signals to the pen. In comes...  Nick Goody.

Let me stop this torturous parlor game. Let me note for the record that I like Nick Goody and think he can become a serviceable relief pitcher someday. He is only 24 - adorable - and has pitched 10 innings in his MLB career. He is, basically, a loaner from Scranton. Whenever he throws more than 20 pitches, instead of a hotel room, they give him a bus ticket to Wilkes Barre and call up a replacement.

The Yankees have three of baseball's best relievers - perhaps the three best strikeout machines in any bullpen - and when clutching fingernail to chalk board - they go with Nick Goody.

So what happens? He hits Alcides Escobar, loading the bases. That brings up Lorenzo Cain, who hit three HRs the previous night. Again, there is no reason in Trump's holodeck universe why the Yankees - with the highest priced threesome in any bullpen, anywhere - have Nick Goody pitching to Lorenzo Cain.

So what happens? Do I need to say it? Cain singles, two runs score - it's now 6-3, and that's China Town, Jake. Phil Coke comes in. The Big Three go back to hibernation. They're like a great bottle of scotch that you bring out, let everyone sniff, and then put it back in the case.

The Yankees could have won last night, but it would have meant abandoning their nightly role-play costume pageant - Mr. 7th, Mr. 8th and Mr. 9th Inning. Everybody has his slot. You don't ask poise questions during the swimsuit competition. It's not cricket.

Last night, the Yankees had one pivotal moment to save that game. Instead of Betances, or Miller, or el Chapo... they went with Nick Goody. Wow.

Electrified by el Chapo, John hits 7.05 seconds in WinWarble

Is Headley this year's Drew, and why are we trapped in a torturous time loop?

Last year, Yankee 2B Stephen Drew - (age 32) - hit .177 in April and .143 in May. (I looked it up.) His fielding was spotty; he was still learning the position. But he was a Cashman Catch, picked from the scrap pile for only $5 million, and fans were constantly assured - (or "YESsed," as they should say) - that any day now, Drew would explode like a 7-Eleven in Alberta.

And he did! In June, Drew hit a scorching .230.

He finished the season at .201, recovering from a bad hop that forced the Bronx Boredoms to play The Man Who Is Not There - Rob Refsnyder - in their one-game, three-hit, pre-playoff, Wild Card date with nothingness. Basically, we burned an entire year, waiting on Drew. We might as well have been waiting on Amelia Earhart.

Well, Drew is gone. This year, in Washington, he is hitting .143. Apparently, 2015 was not an aberration. He simply cannot adjust to defensive over-shifts. His line drives get caught. Maybe someday, he'll change. I wish him the best. End of story.

No... wait! It's not the end! Drew is not gone. He just turned into Chase Headley - (age 32) - who is now hitting .171.

Last night, Headley recorded his first RBI since mid-April. (He has two.) They should have stopped the game for a ceremony. The best thing to be said about Headley in 2016 is that his throws to first are no longer sailing into the Hudson River, as they did last July and August. Once again, we are waiting on a player with the growing, discomforting sense that he is beyond his sell-date and that we are burning another season - the Yankee way, during this decade.

Like Drew, who came from a disastrous year in Boston, we are waiting for Headley to find a form that was long lost in San Diego. When traded to us in 2014, he was hitting .229 with six HRs - (and the year before, he hit : .243, with only 13). For that, we will pay him $13 million this year - and next year, and the year after that. (And, of course, Refsnyder - Baseball America's 2014 All-Star 2B for Triple A - remains in Scranton, now playing - you guessed it - 3B.)

So it goes. Deja vu, all over again. We are trapped in a time loop.

Listen: This is what drives Yankee fans frickin' nuts. Our owner announces that he won't take on any more big contracts, because he wants to lower luxury taxes. So he sits on free agents like Max Scherzer, or David Price or Robbie Cano - or Yoan Moncaaaaaaadaaaaaaaaaa - and then he bungees us to Headley's dorsal fin for the next four years. He clutches the pennies in his purse, and then pisses $52 million on a guy who been on the decline since 2012.

Of course, the Retrieval Empire hasn't developed a decent MLB thirdbaseman since Mike Lowell, whom Cashman traded in 1999 for three bingo cards named Todd Noel, Mark Johnson and Ed Yarnell. And we don't have anyone now in the pipeline. Meanwhile, for the Redsocks, Moncada is hitting .321 in Salem, playing beside a 21-year-old SS who is hitting .354. Boston has young prospects throughout their system, while our Double A team has more burnouts than Ft. McMurray. (Cito Culver, Dante Bichette Jr., Tyler Austin, et al...) And we will spend 2016 waiting for Headley.

Don't get me wrong. I hope the guy hits. But does this merry-go-round ever end?

There is only one player in the Yankiverse, his name is Aaron Judge, and he is hot

Victory, con mucho gusto!

Last night, we zombies of the Yankiverse were aroused by Aroldis Chapman's radar gun readings, and led by 39-year-old Carlos Beltran's two solo "belts from Beltran" in a win over that MLB dynastic titan, Kansas City. I hereby say: Thank you, El Chapo and Mister Carlos. We are now 12-18 - six games behind Baltimore and Boston, but it's only May. And generally, it's sad when the most hopeful words you can summon are, "It's only May."

So pardon me if I look elsewhere for sprigs of daffodils in the looming gloom of 2016. In my life, I never thought I'd write this next sentence, but here goes: Our world revolves around Scranton.

Down on Route 81, just over the hill past Clark Summit, catcher Gary Sanchez - who is NOT the Second Coming of Jesus Montero - is hitting .282 with 5 HRs (after a bad start), and Rob Refsnyder - who may be the Second Coming of David Adams - is hitting .273 (after a terrible start). And then there is Aaron Judge...

(Wait a minute. I looked it up: Jesus Montero - now 26 - is hitting .298 with 2 HRs, and David Adams - now age 28 - is hitting .276, both in Buffalo, an affiliate of the Blue Jays. It seems like only yesterday we were waiting for them to light up the Bronx - memories that should forever blunt prospect-hugging optimism, and yet... ) 

Last night in Triple A, Aaron Judge - 6'7", 275 pounds, age 24 - hit his 5th HR in his last nine games. Judge has seven HRs on the season, tied for second in the International League.

On the season, the RH hitting Judge is batting .270 - .250 against lefties and .282 v. righties (in a totally microscopic sample size, sort of like when Trump says he's leading among Hispanic Republican women in Utah.)

With runners in scoring position, Judge is 7 for 24 (.292.) He has 20 RBIs, tied for second in the IL.

When ahead in the count, he's 12 for 35, (.373.) Behind in the count, .216.

He has stolen one base and needs to draw more walks - a lot more. He has only 11, and considering his output, Judge's on base percentage is a middling .327. He strikes out too often - 33 times - tied for 12th in the league. (In the last 10 games, he struck out only 8 times and drew 7 walks, so maybe there is an improvement. Too small to know.)

Once again, I thank El Chapo and Carlos B for last night. That said, both will be key cogs in the 2016 Yankee trade makeover. No matter how you slice it, this team does not need three bullpen closers. Unless the Yankees catch fire, one will become trade bait. As for Beltran, there is really no point in watching him patrol right field. That's Judge's future office, and - for better or worse - he might be coming to claim it.

"Yanks' Aroldis Chapman says Latin American players are 'easy targets'"

Not as easy as garage doors, obviously.

Will Refsnyder ever get the call?

Starlin Castro may have tweeked his Willie last night. Does it matter to the Scranton Scrapper?

It's El Chapo Day in the Yankiverse

Considering his alleged crimes, Aroldis Chapman is the first player in MLB history to literally be traded in a garage sale.

Dear Mr. Steinbrenner, give me $600,000, and I will give you a revolution

Dear Hal,

Was it fun last night? Did you enjoy watching the Bronx Boredoms, once again, flail helplessly against a knuckle-ball pitcher? Three hits. Three measly hits. There goes our winning streak. Once again, Boston brings out a knuckle-baller, and poof go the Yankee bats.

Here's an idea. (It's sad that it has to come from a fan, but here goes anyway...)

Take - say - $600,000 from your wild weekend fanny pack fund. Hire Tim Wakefield, the former Redsock knuckleballer, or - better - the guy who taught him to throw the knuckler. Hire the guy who taught R.A. Dickey. Hire the world's three greatest authorities on the knuckle-ball. You can probably get them cheap. They're probably working at colleges or clinics. Send them to Tampa, where you establish the Niekro School of Flutter Balls.

Next, comb the waiver wires for the ten smartest minor league pitchers over age 27. They were hot prospects nine years ago, but now they exist as innings-eating fodder. They survive on guile and trickery. Each is a quality individual, maybe a future coach. Send them to Tampa, to practice one pitch. The Niekro Knuckler.

Sprinkle them through your farm system. Figure it will take them five years to reach the majors or surrender. They could be rookies at age 33 - but still have long careers in front of them.

The goal: Five years from now, a staff with three knuckle-ballers.

Imagine the havoc this wreaks on opposing lineups. You only need a 10-pitcher staff. You have three pitchers capable of throwing 300 innings. Other teams won't steal so many bases, because your catchers will be versed in dealing with knuckle-balls. You will never have an exhausted bullpen. And you will have others rising through the system, some emerging at age 35.

Worst-case scenario: Nobody makes it, but 1) you will have tried, 2) you won't have spent much, and 3) you'll have 10 smart, quality pitchers - de facto coaches - working with other prospects at Tampa. The upside: You revolutionize the game... for pennies on the dollar.

Pennies on the dollar. More money for you. Got it? More money for you. Did I mention that? More money for you.

A terrible truth

A very, very, very disturbing thought struck me the other day about the Yankees.

We have become more like Donald Trump than I would ever care to admit.

Our results aren't very good, check. We inflate, or worse, actually believe we have a high on-field value, check. We are blowhard nationalists who are far more patriotic than healthy, check. We intimidate those who aren't (think "God Bless America" at the Stadium, and God bless you if you don't stand up in rapture to the flag and Kate Smith). We are not doing so hot with non-white people (our best showing is in the broadcast booth due to Ken Singleton), check. We have a cretinous, tasteless idea of what's "classy" and elegant, check. We charge a lot of money based a hell of a lot more on marketing than on anything else, including performance, check. We appeal to white douchebags (they're in the big money seats during big games, but you can find them all over the place), check. 

The best thing you can say is that Cashman is balding, too, but at least he doesn't use an elaborate combover that resembles a ground hog crossed with a golden weasel in heat.

We once were the Corporation, the guys with the most professional attitude, the winning machine. Now we're a Trump company. 

It's sad.

A win today would shut up some big, fat mouths

In the long run, a win today cannot matter much. There's 134 games left, countless gonads to tweak, hammies to pluck, Tommy Johns to erupt, maybe even an outbreak of chlamydia. Good grief, in the long run, the universe will stop expanding, and time will reverse itself, causing Andy Hawkins to throw his no-hitter backwards and thus win the game. In the long run, we're dead, and there never was a Yankees, and two games ago, that was fine with me.

But in the short run - like, tonight - we have Boston. In the short run, we have Buchholtz and Blake Swihart, Workman and Matt Barnes, and all the can't miss prospects with lavish ESPN brown-nosing, but who turn into Zolio Almonte. Generally, Boston scares me the way Florida does: At any time, a sinkhole could open with a Burmese python at the bottom of it. (Nothing sexual in that image, eh?) Still, what if their long-awaited resurgence - Betts, Bogartes and Bradely - turn out to be their version of the Killer B's? 

They've already pissed away $72 million on Rusney Castillo, $95 million on Pablo Sandoval and $88 million on Hanley Ramirez. What if they also just frittered $217 million down the sinkhole named David Price? Could it happen? (By the way, this is no way justifies the Yankees being cheap. Plenty of players perform to their contracts, and the Steinbrenners don't need to collect bottle deposits on this franchise.) 

But what if Boston crumbles for one more, eency-weency year? Wouldn't it be delicious? Misery loves company. The best part of a rivalry is not necessary playing your enemy. It's following them every day, pushing stickpins into their likeness, cheering their DWI arrests, marital yeast infections and fines for overdue library books - channeling all your evil negativity into positive things, like flat tires and tax audits. Seriously, isn't following Curt Schilling starting to become one of our favorite pastimes?

Tonight, we can exacerbate one of the Fenway Nation's greatest fears: They own their own versions of Beltran, Ellsbury and Headley. With a Yankee win tonight, they can find themselves at the bottom of that sinkhole, staring at the python. And there'll be nothing sexual about it.

Hola, another victory, por favor?

Note To Editors ( see below )

Do we continue to list CC as our team leader in wins, even while he is on the DL?

Once again, Boston's cousins at ESPN back the Redsocks

Where I come from, journos aren't supposed to argue balls and strikes. 

But when the Redsocks lose, the rules change.

Papi goes berserk, gets thrown out like a Trump protester, and somewhere an angel received her wings

Well, 2016 won't be a total wipe-out, after all.

No matter what happens, no matter how many rock stars die, no matter how many Yankees get carted off the field, we'll always have Papi's steroidal, Oscar-caliber re-enactment of Al Pacino in Justice For All. ("I'm out of order? This court is out of order!")

From now on, every David Ortiz story involving the Yankees doesn't have to culminate with him leisurely stepping on home plate with his chubby fingers to the sky. There may not be a juju god, but at least we know there is an equilibrium of nature. Call it karma. Call it random sequence. Call it whatever. I call it strike three.

For once, Papi didn't get the benefit of the doubt on an ump's decision, so what happens? He pops like Cory Lewandowski, like a gummy bear in a hydraulic press. He goes Mento-in-Coke, railing against the world with the entitled outrage of a Hitler tweet from Curt Schilling. Ortiz is used to always getting the call. For once, it went our way. Our way.

If that pitch had gone against us - (ball four, run scores, game tied) - I have no doubt that we would have lost the game - (Phil Coke was warming in the pen) - and the series - (which we may still lose.) Joe Girardi - who has already this season absorbed more cuts than John Snow - would have been like Faye Dunaway at the end of Chinatown, staring vacantly into Suzyn's eyes and saying, "She's my sister... and my daughter. She's my sister... and my daughter..." Andrew Miller would no longer be Lord Commander of the Night Watch. We'd be waiting for the arrival of El Chapo, the shooter of garages.

But the call went our way. Our way. No matter what happens, we'll always have last night.

Victory!

At Least He Didn't Go With "Eat a Bag of Hicks"

Also on Twitter: Pineda is trending! Mostly because he threw up his arms when Hicks bobbled a ball. Twitter thinks he shouldn't do that!

Yanks now tied for first in Fantasy Umpire Ejection League

Girardi got himself ejaculated the other night. The league gave points to the ump.

Yankees team leaders in RC27!

(I have no idea what the fuck RC27 is.)

(My guess: Royal Canadian 27-proof whiskey?) 

CC out? Aye caramba!

Don't Jump To Conclusions.....

Just because our team leader in wins ( CC Sabathia ) has today been placed on the 15 day DL, it does not suggest an emergency visit back to Silver Hill for him.

He has a groin pull, and so would you if you fell off a barstool.  I'm not saying CC did that, mind you, I'm just suggesting  it could happen to anyone.

Luckily, we have a re-tread ready to go.  Phil Coke.

What's not to like?

This is just another signal telling the world how well prepared Brian Cashman is to any adversity affecting the NYYankees.

Next in line is Nick Swisher.

Things can only get worse.

You can leave the " cuffs" on.  I'll drink it with a straw.

Singles or home runs: The Yankees are dead last in doubles

Wonder why the Yankees have such an anemic offense?

No team in the majors this season has hit fewer doubles than the Bronx Boredoms. We are a team that simply stops at first, in part for fear of pulling a hamstring, (which we do anyway.)

Orioles Slam Door On Yankee Win Streak

Anyone here wonder about Joe Girard's decision to go with Barbato instead of Miller in the bottom of the 10th?

Or his choice to let Barbato get out of a possible game-ending jam when the first Oriole hitter in the bottom of the 10th reached base?

Are we trying to win games or teach lessons?  What will Barbato now bring to the one game play-in tension?

Truth is; it doesn't matter.

Even if Miller had been brought in and blanked the O's in the 10th, we lose in the 11th or 12th.

The math is pretty much unassailable.  Even though it was 0-0 ( and boring beyond belief ) through 9 innings, there was only a .05 probability ( per my formula ) that the Yankees win the game.

The Yankees have still not figured out how to win without scoring.  Or by scoring fewer runs than their opponent.  Or when we score 2 runs, maximum.  This team also can't bunt, won't bunt, and won't attempt to hit to the opposite field against the shift.

When is that charity game against the West Point baseball team?  We might win that.

As an aside;  Let's give some props to Tanaka.  Let's give some props to the catch made by
Ackley in the bottom of the 9th.  I don't think Carlos makes that play.

Note to readers:  I might have Ackley's name wrong, because I usually don't pay much attention to guys hitting below .100.  But he contributed, and no one else playing a position in the field did.

How about that Castro fella?  Go to sleep.  Get picked off.  Blow any shot at the winning ( or lead ) run.

Doesn't matter.  We lose anyway.

That's the beauty.  The bonehead moves Girardi makes, the bonehead plays our players make, the crappy players we add to the team, the worse prospects we bring up.......they don't change the outcome.

This is a fish dying from the head down.

And, as with all dying ( or dead ) fish, it stinks.

From 2009 and beyond: WHY WE FIGHT

(Originally posted by Mustang)
Red Sox complicity in U.S. torture flights

They feed their own fans prison food

They're bigger racists than Joe Torre

Their groundskeepers are thugs


Varitek clawed A-Rod's face, kept his own mask on

Schilling poured ketchup on his sock, called it blood

They decapitate their players when they're done with them

Big Papi has it in for Joba for no reason

They tried to freeze-out John and Suzyn.

They can't lose a game without whining about something.

The Yankees are the presumptive nominee to pick first in the 2017 draft

It's time to start collecting stool samples on the high school Class of '17 - such as Christian Robinson, a Florida prodigy who, right now, is surely out there wrestling a Burmese python in the town sinkhole. He could be the Justin Bieber of the 2017 draft, when the Yankees could pick first.

Yep, it's something to live for - along with Trump's happy wall, pizza carrying drones, and Channing Tatum's Magic Mike show in Vegas. (Says Chan the Man: "I have a really nice back porch, where the pool is." WTF?)

OK, maybe it's too early to fast-forward into the next millennium. But this one looks like a downer. In simple terms: You can change the pitcher, but you can't change the owner. We are seven games out of first - more an omen than unsolvable situation - with the fourth worst record in baseball. Once behind, this team inspires as much confidence as the Iraqi Navy. And when they talk about help from Scranton, the names Nick Swisher and Phil Coke leave a pool on your back porch. (WTF did he mean?)  

The AL East started looking dicey last winter. Now, the Wild Card looks like Alpha Centauri. By July 4, we could be an oldies farewell tour without anybody actually leaving. We could be the Philadelphia 76ers or Cleveland Browns, playing out the season in the hope of snagging some Christian Robinson, who is still learning to kiss. Dear God, we could be the Knicks... or the 1986 Yankees.

Based on your comments, I realize that many of you have followed the Yankees for decades, if not centuries. You remember Bob Shirley and Sheriff Cowley, and Andy Hawkins' no hitter. Like me, you wanted to believe the Yankees' late 1990s run would go on indefinitely, or at least run out our clocks. But we knew what could happen. Now, it's here. The wolf is at our door. This isn't about losing seven of our last eight. This is about a franchise in free-fall with a middling farm system and a nepotistic owner who wants to carve his mark by making money.

Folks, this could be one of the worst Yankee summers in our lifetimes.

We face a bad team, a boring product, impossible ticket prices, no cable TV (in Jersey), a demoralized John and Suzyn, and an exciting alternative across town. Even if Aaron Judge rises from Scranton, is he better than Michael Comforto? The Yankees' main attraction is a three-stopper bullpen that never gets to pitch.

Last night, we burned a great outing by Masahiro Tanaka. (What could we get for him in a trade?) We squandered Starlin Castro (What could we get for him in a trade?), Dellin Betances (What could we get for him in a trade?) and didn't pitch Andrew Miller (WCWGFHIAT?) The 2017 draft is about 15 months away. Should we start on DNA analysis?

How do we entertain ourselves in the wake of Hell?

Help us, Magic Mike.

Tanaka has a 2.29 ERA and is only 1-0; Girardi makes another genius move

The statheads who wrote that book I've been citing lately described a conversation with their team's manager where they tried to convince him their closer was more valuable as a starter or multi-inning reliever. The manager thought they were idiots and said,  "The closer is the closer, that's why he's the closer."

Which was basically the reasoning Girardi gave to reporters after losing the game by putting in Barbato instead of Miller for the 10th. Yeah, you have to save your best available, well-rested guy for when you're winning. Never use him in the most crucial at-bats of the game, because then you can't use him if you actually survive and somehow take the lead afterward.

Joe has not been given a good team to manage, but that doesn't excuse him from mismanaging. I guess Ellsbury is in center with his weak wing because he's the center fielder who's the center fielder, that's why he's in center field. And why Hicks is the one who gets to play when Gardy is plunked because his average is up to .091, verifying Cashman's claim that adding Hicks and Castro made the offensive juggernaut of 2015 only that much more terrifying.

Heck, I'm terrified. In all kinds of ways.

Snapping loss streak, John Sterling unveils a meager 5.28 second WinWarble

I hope he didn't pull a hammy. But considering the end of the losing streak, it was logical to expect the Master to cover 7.00 seconds.

Maybe he just hasn't had enough practice lately.

An Ode to CC

When he has all his pitches, 

he has two going one way 
and two going the other way

which I think is important.

And they’re all different speeds.

--Joseph Girardi
Postgame interview
May 4, 2016

Slammin' Yanks Begin Assault on AL East !

Let me start by congratulating our ace, CC Sabathia, on shutting out the Orioles for 7 frames.  He is definitely not, " on the rocks," although, per my pledge, I raced through my bottle of CC as the zeros kept getting posted.

Let me just say this;  a great friend gave me a stylish shot glass a while back, which is, " outside the normal limits" ( amount of alcohol contained ) when filled to the brim.  So I am typing slow, and thinking even slower, as the sun again fails to rise near my home.

If I say anything outrageous, or stupid, please wear your " forgiving " hats and think, " I have been there, so I know."

But the Yanks are back.  The Yankee offensive hammer is down.  Watch us rock, now.

Who needs re-enforcements?  That Hicks dude, our top off-season acquisition, is really close to getting on base.  His batting average (.045?) just doesn't show the intimidation factor that he brings to his at bats.

And with Carlos as our DH?

I could go on and on.  But there is little to say, and I am boring myself.

Go Yanks.  Keep it up.

I need a cheeseburger.

A-Rod departs, CC returns, Gardy gets x-rays, and Channing Tatum is planning a live Magic Mike Vegas show!

I'm not kidding. Last night, minions of the Yankiverse received a double-shot of joy: Victory over Buck Showaltimore and news that Channing Tatum is planning a live Magic Mike Vegas show!

Woah, easy now! Down, boy! DOWN! Yes, Kitty love to scratch! Rr-r-r-r-rrowl. But keep your hands off the Subway, Jared. The Chan Man won't be beef-caking himself - he'll direct the show, (whatever that means.) And it won't happen until next March - when CC and A-Rod are launching their farewell tours, and when we'll be anticipating the Fourth Coming of Rob Refsnyder, the Yankee Godot. 

If there is such a thing as
too much cheese, the Yankees have it.

Oooh! Oooh! Jumpin' Jehozifat! Didja know today's NY Post has a story about lowering cheese consumption without using the phrase "cutting the cheese?" They're becoming Presidential. 

Everybody is becoming Presidential, and lowering cheese consumption - without cutting any!

Last night, CC threw 7 shutout innings, bringing his ERA below 4.00. He now leads the team in wins with 2!  He could be our Bartolo. Last night, he was saved in the fifth from a two-out liner by Manny Machado that was hit so hard Jacoby Ellsbury ran in and then had to leap to snatch. If that ball wasn't directly at Ellsbury, we would have fallen behind by two - and, well, everybody knows what that means.

But it didn't go over his head. We notched three 2-out RBIs. (McCann, Didi, Gardy.) Chase Headley (.153) got a hit. Down in Scranton, Refsnyder played RF, by request. He wants to remind the Yankees he still exists. And, of course, we finished the night with a potential injury to Brett Gardner, who was hit on the elbow by a pitch.

Oooh! Oooh! Didja know Starlin Castro is currently on course to set the single-season record for hitting ground balls into double plays? He has five. If he keeps it up - (unlikely) - he'll hit 40 - beating Jim Rice's record of 36, set in 1984. But he shouldn't get complacent, because McCann has 4! (NOTE: A-Rod and Tex have three.)

John and Suzyn last night were Presidential. The Master's WinWarble sounded rather weak, considering the events: A Yankee victory and Magic Mike. I bet it got warm in that booth.

A-Rod tweaks a hammy, just as he starts to hit: Folks, we are standing on the tracks in front of a rapidly moving fate train

No sooner does he show a sign of life that A-Rod goes down.

Folks, I'll say it again. The 2016 Yankees are a team of destiny, sort of like Malaysian Flight 370.

Don't tangle with Fate.

FATE
Whether you're early
Or whether you're late,
It don't mean shit to Fate.

Deja Vu Squared

I was hanging in there while the game was tied 1-1.

But when our young pitching phenom, "boinked," his second assisted put out attempt
 at first base ( flip from Tex to beat the runner), and the second Oriole run scored, I did my calculation of probability, concluded that the Yankees could no longer win, and turned off the TV.

So here is my question;  Who did Brian Cashman hire to coach this young man?  Is it the same guy who teaches our players how to bunt, and how to hit the opposite way against the shift?  In other words, the same coach or coaches who leave our multi-million dollar professionals absolutely
useless ( almost comically bad ) at these traditional, required baseball skills?

Another failure of Mr. Cashman.  Often not noticed, until last night.  But a failure nonetheless.

It seemed as though Luis has never seen a play like that before, where he has to cover first, take a flip from Tex and step on the bag for the out.  I will grant you, that he, " got there," ahead of the runner both times.  The tricky part was the, " multi-tasking;  catching the ball while running, and then stepping on the base.

 Young Luis looked like a new born giraffe on ice.  He looked neither at the ball nor the bag, but just glazed over and, " went panic."  I wonder how it felt;  stepping on nothing without the ball?

At 2-1 Baltimore, of course, the game was doomed.

Better to watch the some near frozen guy trying to hunt a moose for his winter meat.  And leaving the safety on when he took the shot.

That's what Luis did.  He left the safety on his glove.  So it wouldn't catch.

More fine work for the organization, Brian.

When are you leaving?