Almost Perfect
You can quibble with the results of this weekend, after all it would have been better if Detroit had lost two to Seattle, but the end result is that the Yankees gained a game in their wild card lead while taking three off of the schedule.
The next three games will be very interesting as Toronto is playing better of late and the Yankees are sending three starters, Hughes, Moose and Kennedy, who are essentially mysteries right now. By giving the Wednesday start to Moose, the Yankees have setup their pitching for the Boston series and beyond, let me illustrate.
As things are now, here is my guess at how the rotation shakes out the rest of the way:
Hughes (11th, 17th, 23rd, 27th)
Mussina (12th, ??)
Kennedy(13th, 18th)
Pettitte (14th, 19th, 24th, 28th)
Wang (15th, 21st, 25th, 29th)
Clemens (16th, 22nd, 26th, 30th)
This maximizes the starts of the top four starters (four each) and puts the three best on schedule to pitch the final weekend if needed. This can obviously be amended if needed and the Yankees could start almost anyone that final weekend (since I am going to Baltimore I can just see it: Wright, Clippard and Igawa). As for the playoffs, they start Wednesday in one of the AL matchups and Thursday in the other, but both AL matchups play their second game on Friday. That means even if Wang makes his start on the 29th, he is ready to pitch by Game Two.
But, I get ahead of myself. The Yankees still need a combination of 16 wins and Tigers' losses to clinch, but the picture looks pretty good right now.
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I was totally wrong about the move made to add Ohlendorf to the 40-man. The Yankees put Andy Phillips on the 60-day DL which means he is out for the year. Considering his limited production this year and all the arms in the system, it may be the end of Andy on the roster.
Comments
Coolstandings has the Yanks playoff chances at 87%. I think this Tor, Bos swing could be very tricky. See road record & Tor/Bos home records. However, our 41-19 (post-ASB) is simply awesome.
Cashman has 1 job this offseason, get A-rod signed up for the duration of his career. The rest of it he can leave to a monkey if he likes.
Posted by: tim | September 10, 2007 04:02 AM |
Toronto will be tough. I'd be happy with winning 1 of 3.
Mussina's start is huge. Will be tough to get to the postseason and to win in the postseason without the Moose.
Posted by: Corey | September 10, 2007 11:50 AM |
The Yankees turned in a terrific performance tonight. You can't help but notice how dominant the young pitchers were in a critical game on the road. Hughes gave them his second straight quality start, Ramirez struck out 5 in 2 innings and Ohlendorf had a very solid big league debut.
Just one year ago, Ramirez was pitching in an Independent League and Hughes and Ohlendorf at AA.
Posted by: Tyler![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://yankeesredsox.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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September 11, 2007 10:39 PM
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A-rod's last nine games: 18/34 with 7 HRs 15 RBIs. His OBP is .579 & his SLG is 1.205 for an unreal OBPS. Oh yeah, he stole 2 bases as well. Just thought I'd mention that as the Yanks pull away from the rest of the wild card competitors.
Posted by: tim | September 12, 2007 03:12 AM |
The amazing thing about this year is the Yankees have had 28 pitchers pitch this season vs. the Sox have had 20.
Now with call-ups this is inflated a bit but if not for the callups, pitchers like Ohlendorf would not be playing.
Posted by: blmeanie | September 12, 2007 01:01 PM |