Season To Date

It's now June 1st. We're two months into the season already. What are the big stories?

The New York Yankees Meltdown

At 22-29 the Yankees are 13.5 games behind the Red Sox and tied with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. It's been an incredible combination of poor pitching, injuries, and bad luck that has kept the highest paid team in baseball on the ropes all year.

Although the Yanks are getting great seasons from Alex Rodriguez (19 home runs), Jorge Posada (.357), and Derek Jeter (.343) it hasn't been enough. The rest of the team's hitters are under performing in particular Bobby Abreu who is hitting just .228 and even worse he has a pathetic .289 slugging percentage.

Johnny Damon is hitting just .264 and Jason Giambi has a .436 slugging percentage. A lot of Yankees fans expected a lot from young Melky Cabrera but he has a .590 OPS thus far, which puts him below even the light hitting Doug Mientkiewicz who has a .661 OPS. Robinson Cano has been a disappointment as well best shown by his .298 OBP (last year he was at .365)

Speaking of Cano does any regular player in the big leagues walk less than this guy? 42 career walks vs 1197 career at bats. That's insane.

As much as most of their hitters have struggled (other than A Rod, Posada, and Jeter) it's their pitching that has been their real down fall. Perhaps most indicative of their problems is that only Andy Pettitte has enough innings to qualify for the ERA title as of now. The Yankees starters have been plagued by injuries and by just awful performances. Pettitte has been the only real exception with his 2.51 ERA and 9 Quality Starts in 11 games started. I'm sure that if before the season you said Pettitte would have a 2.51 ERA through 11 starts you'd expect him to have 7, 8, or even 9 wins already but he's got just 3 (his record is 3-4.)

Yankees Pitching Problems:
Much hyped rookie Phil Hughes was pitching a no hitter in his second big league start when he went down with an injury. He is expected back later this season.

Long time lights out closer Mariano Rivera has been having an awful season and currently has a 5.50 ERA.

Mike Musina has struggled with injuries and his game. He's got a 5.86 ERA and 2 QS in 7 GS.

Kei Igawa has been horrendous (ignore his 2-1 record, a great example of how meaningless W-L records are: Igawa vs Pettitte!) He has had just 1 QS in 5 GS and has a 7.63 ERA.

The Yanks are now hoping that Roger Clemens can come in to save the day. Which leads me to my next big story of the season to date.

Roger Clemens chooses the Yankees

Clemens is scheduled to pitch his first game for the Yankees on Monday, June 4th. They'll need him pitching up to his standards of his last couple of years in Houston to solidify their pitching rotation.

Looking at the records now can you imagine if Clemens has chosen the Red Sox?

I find it amazing how Clemens is so greatly respected by most baseball fans as a "living legend" of the game (which I do not argue, he is one of the greatest pitchers of all time) while a similar living legend is playing left field out in San Francisco is receiving far less respect from the media and from fans.

There's just as much circumstantial evidence against Clemens for performance enhancing drug use as their is against Bonds. Clemens was mentioned in the Grimsley affidavit (Pettitte was named too) and similarly to Bonds had a late career surge, posting some of his best seasons statistically after age 40. Clemens will be turning 45 this August. Also recall that Clemens had some pretty so-so seasons with the Yankees, in 1999 his ERA was actually higher than the league average and in 2002 he barely avoided it. Something helped him turn it around. The last few years he's put up some of the best seasons of his career all while past age 40. If you're going to claim that PEDs helped Barry Bonds hit home runs then I'm going to claim they helped (and probably still help) Roger Clemens pitch strikeouts.

And to go off on a rant here a bit: How can people be so incredibly hypocritical? I live in New York and during the rare times when Yankee fans or sports radio people aren't talking about the Yankees they say very nasty things about one Mr. Barry Bonds. Yet they are ecstatic over their own PED users like Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte. I just find the focus on JUST Barry Bonds to be incredibly ridiculous. It's as if baseball fans all want to blame just one player so they can pretend everyone else is a savior? So they can pretend all of the players on their team never touched the stuff? Give me a break. It's especially hilarious when this sort of BS comes from Yankees fans considering how important players like Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, Gary Sheffield, and Jason Giambi have been to their team.

Barry Bonds Home Run Chase

Of course Barry Bonds closing in on the all time home run record has been a major story all year. Bonds has been struggling recently and this has slowed him down considerably. Before the year I predicted he would break the record in the last game before the all star game. I didn't actually check if that game was at home or not and it's not. As many have said I think the Giants would prefer Bonds breaks the record at home from a PR stand point but I don't know if they would actually go the step of sitting Bonds when he's at 755 on the road. I don't think they'd do that. Bonds is the best hitter on the team and they are trying to make the playoffs (not trying hard enough, but that's another story.)

Bonds is currently at 746 homes. He needs 9 to tie and 10 to break the record.

The St. Louis Cardinals are also 22-29

The defending champion St. Louis Cardinals have the same poor record as the Yanks at 22-29. Luckily for the Cards there is no team anywhere near as good as the Boston Red Sox in their division and they are only 6.5 games out of first.

Albert Pujols hasn't been as awesome as usual but he has shown some signs of getting it together. He hit .340 in May. While his OPS is at a career low (.876) it's still leading the Cardinals this year. That's probably the real bad news for the Cards.

The New York Mets are rolling through the NL

I thought before the year began that the Mets were the best team in the NL and they are making me look like a wizard. They are 34-18 and even more impressively they are a 18-7 on the road.

And just like the other team in New York they will be adding one of the best pitchers of all time to their team at some point this year. If Pedro Martinez can pitch at something close to his peak level the Mets will be deadly.