Well Nunez had a chance at short and he didn’t do much with it. I still think the idea of making him only a shortstop was a mistake, but his injuries this year and last have deprived us of a chance to truly evaluate him. I will say this- I don’t think the Yankees win much with the leftside of the infield occupied by Nunez and Adams.

So now we get Nix at short and Adams at third for the immediate future. Maybe you believe A-Rod and Jeter are on their way back, but consider this. A-Rod watched, yes watched, pitches go by in BP today. He wasn’t allowed to swing. Jeter hasn’t even gotten to that point. Neither one of them is coming back anytime soon. Brian Cashman needs to see if there are anymore productive castoffs he can acquire. Otherwise, the Yankees are going to be forced into a tough decision. Do they sacrifice the future for today or do they sacrifice today for tomorrow?

For Yankee fans my age and older, the Dodgers are a hated rival. I was 9 when Bob Lemon pinch hit for TJ in Game 6 and the bullpen imploded as the Yankees lost the World Series. I still remember crying over that. The 1981 World Series came only 3 years after the Yankees won back-to-back World Series against the Dodgers in 77 and 78. So, LA vs. NY happened three years out of five.

Older fans remember even more intense rivalry. Back in the 40′s and 50′s the Dodgers played about 15 miles away from each other. From 1941 to 1956, they met in the World Series seven times! And when you include the New York Giants you see that for eight-straight years (1949-1956) the World Series trophy never left New York City with all three locals winning at least one championship. It must have been a magical time to be a baseball fan in this city, in some ways I am jealous to have missed it.  I wish I had seen guys like DiMaggio, Mantle, Robinson, Hodges, Snider and Yogi.

And tonight we will see Yankee fans cheer a guy wearing a Dodger uniform and we will be reminded of all the great names that have represented this rivalry. Just one question. Considering all the history, why on Earth did the Yankees choose Bubba Watson and Jason Kidd to throw out the first pitch tonight and tomorrow? How about Reggie and Gator?

Stay Tuned

UPDATE 2:50PM 6/16 The Yankees have dodged a bullet as Mark Teixeira has only inflammation in his wrist and not a tear. Despite this close call, the Yankees are not putting Teixeira on the DL yet as they are going to wait and see what happens to his wrist before acting.

Let’s start with the things that won’t get better. Chris Stewart and Jason Nix. I don’t know what the Yankees have to lose by letting Austin Romine play more. At the very least they could evaluate him further with an eye towards 2014. Likewise, I don’t know why Girardi keeps running Nix out there against RHP when Brignac is on the roster. Nix has a .557 OPS against RHP this year, not too far from his career mark of .600. He hits lefties, but righties aren’t his bag. Brignac hasn’t done much better against RHP (.608 OPS in his career) but unless they are going to use him, maybe try Corban Joseph out at SS? Anything is better than seeing Nix hit second with a righty on the mound.

It’s also time to realize that Wells and Ichiro should be a platoon and nothing more. Ichiro has reverted to his pre-September 2012 form and Wells is back to being a fringe bat. But Wells is hitting LHP (.795OPS) and while Ichiro is hitting lefties better than righties right now, its hard to see that continuing.

The Yankees should then consider keeping Hafner out of the lineup, unless the Yankees are at home. He is taking full advantage of Yankee Stadium (.264/.361/.611) but falls to Earth with a thud on the road (.188/.310/.313) The problem is who can the Yankees platoon him with? Maybe run David Adams out there against LHP and Overbay against RHP when they are on the road?

The Yankees have to hope that Youkilis and Teixeira show some offensive ability again and that Granderson heals up again quickly. But beyond that, it’s hard to see how they plug all of these holes. The minors don’t appear to have many solutions. Zolio Almonte is getting on base, but nothing much else. Thomas Neal is hitting well, but he doesn’t have a spot on the 40-man and it is hard to figure out how the Yankees can shoehorn him on there with guys like Cervelli and Pineda due back soon. They have already brought up Romine and Adams and neither one has been the answer so far. Trades are always a possibility, but barring that the Yankees are just going to have to hope for their pitching to hold up. And that is what we expected all along.

UPDATE- 7:05PM More injuries and more roster moves. According to various sources on the internet, the Yankees have put Youkilis back on the DL, sent Adam Warren to AAA and promoted Thomas Neal and Chris Bootcheck from AAA. To make room for Neal and Bootcheck on the 40-man, Nunez was shifted to the 60-day DL and Caesar Cabral was sent outright to AA. As Cabral was a Rule 5 pick, I believe that means he was offered back to the Red Sox, but they declined to take him back.

Wow, it never is simple around here is it? Well, Adams is obviously the third baseman again and Neal is probably going to take some swings against lefties either as a DH or OF. Bootcheck is simply cannon fodder. He is 34 and has spent the majority of his career in the minors. He has been starting at AAA, and is rested, so it will be his job to do what Adam Warren did yesterday if needed. In 10 days, the Yankees can bring Warren back and DFA Bootcheck. (It’s a tough business)  That will open up a spot on the 40-man for either Pineda or Cervelli.

So things are different. I don’t think they are better, but they are different.

You see MLB is equating competitive balance with small markets. So, it doesn’t matter that the Orioles and Reds were both highly successful last year, they get a leg up. And here’s the really fun part. The Tigers get a pick because they somehow received some revenue sharing, even with the 5th-highest payroll in the game, and are not one of the 15-biggest markets in baseball.

My question in all of this is what exactly is the point of the draft? I thought it was supposed to be a way for bad teams to try and improve themselves with higher picks. So how do you justify sticking three teams that were very good last year ahead of the second pick by the Astros? It makes no sense for me.

*****

As for the Yankees, there is nothing subtle about what they did with their first two picks. They selected a college third baseman and a college outfielder. Funny, how that worked. Obviously, the hope is the third baseman gets to the Bronx soon and takes over for the guy with $100-million left on his contract and that the outfielder gets there as well and takes over for almost anybody. You can’t fault the thinking, you just have to hope the evaluations are correct.

Their third pick was a power-lefty pitcher and their fourth pick is apparently Paul O’Neill’s nephew. Hopefully, one of these guys makes it to the Bronx one day.

2000- Dave Parrish- never made the majors

2001- John Ford Griffin, Bronson Sardhina, Jon Skags (2 supplemental picks and a 1st rounder) 32 MLB AB’s and 2 HR’s between them.

2002- no pick

2003- Eric Duncan- never made the majors

2004- Phil Hughes, Jon Poterson and Jeff Marquez Hughes is 54-40 with a 4.48 ERA in his career. Marquez pitched in 4 ML games

2005- CJ Henry- never made the majors

2006- Joba Chamberlain and Ian Kennedy That’s 70 wins in the majors with a sub-4 ERA between the two of them.

2007- Andrew Brackman 3 games in the majors

2008- Jeremy Bleich and Gerrit Cole Bleich is in AA after blowing out his arm. Cole didn’t sign, went to college and was the #1 pick of the 2012 draft.

2009- Slade Heathcott Finally had a good year last year in A-ball, struggling in AA, still only 22.

Let’s use WAR (Wins Above Replacement) as a way to quantify it and adding it all up the Yankees have produced a WAR of 24.6 from all of those draft picks. That’s a tiny bit less than Jason Giambi produced in his entire Yankees’ career.

Now the problem with comparing drafts is that the Yankees pick towards the back of the pack every year. They simply don’t have a shot at guys like Harper or Trout or Strasburg. So let’s compare them to some teams that also picked towards the back.

The Red Sox certainly did for the second-half of this study. From 2003-2007 their picks produced a WAR of 56.1. Now granted, slightly more than half of that is from Buchholz and Ellsbury, but both of those guys were picked in 2005 AFTER the Yankees selected CJ Henry.

The Braves also did for a lot of the time period and they produce a WAR of 57.2. Unfortunately for them, almost half of that figure comes from Adam Wainwright, whom they traded in 2003.

Now WAR isn’t a perfect stat, but I think you get the idea. The Yankees are at a disadvantage with their draft spot, but they haven’t helped themselves with their picks. The Red Sox and Braves have certainly had their misses, but in the 10 years from 2000-2009 the Yankees had 15 picks and only 4 of them can be considered even serviceable players or better (I am including Cole in that figure because he looks like a good one.) That’s not a good figure and something the Yankees have to improve on if they are going to compete in a more fiscally-prudent manner.

Besides A-Rod, there are some pretty big names on the list. Ryan Braun is arguably a bigger star right now than Alex. Melky is reportedly on the list as is Jesus Montero and Francisco Cervelli. In their report, ESPN details that not only will MLB seek to suspend them all, they will try and get 100-game suspensions for Braun and A-Rod under the second-time offender rule because they will claim two offenses were committed here. (Good luck with that.)

One of my biggest problems with the Mitchell Report was that MLB didn’t investigate enough. They essentially piggybacked on the work of the FBI and got lucky with Radomski. I opined at the time that there was probably a BALCO-like lab in most MLB cities. So, I am pleased that MLB aggressively pursued this and I hope that they are pursuing other unknown leads out there.

As for what this means for the Yankees, well a number of things. I suspect the Yankees will strongly try and invalidate the home run incentives in his contract if he is found guilty. They won’t have a prayer of getting his contract invalidated, but I suspect they will do at least that. You can be suspended while on the DL, so the timing of this will be interesting. The Yankees are playing Game #58 tonight. As long as the suspensions don’t come down in the next week, a 100-game suspension would mean no A-Rod in 2013.

There is also the matter of Francisco Cervelli. If he gets suspended 50 games the Yankees should really consider giving Austin Romine more of the catching duties. Cervelli is arbitration eligible in 2014 and I suspect the Yankees might let him walk away if he is guilty of this charge. Stay tuned, the next few days should be very interesting.

In fact, I suspect we are going to see a number of platoons for the Yankees in the upcoming weeks. They could platoon Nix and Brignac at short, Wells and Overbay in the outfield and use David Adams against LHP, shifting either Youkilis or Teixeira to DH in those games. It’s not an ideal situation, but by taking advantage of platoon splits, the Yankees might be able to coax some runs out of their suddenly anemic offense.

But most of all this is a smart move by the Yankees. Overbay has value to this team not only as a hitter, but as protection for an injury to Hafner or Teixeira. After what he has done in two months they couldn’t DFA him, so see if he can play the outfield. If he really can’t then you go ahead and DFA him, but why not try it first?

Let’s separate the names from the equation and just look at the situation. Boston starts the inning with three-straight hits and then Phil Hughes strikes out Pedroia. So now we have runners on second and third with one out and a left-handed hitter coming to the plate. The next guy up is a righty. This year lefties are hitting 100 OPS points higher against Hughes than righties are and they have twice the number of home runs. Furthermore, an intentional walk sets up a potential double play to end the inning. I don’t see why you wouldn’t intentionally walk the hitter in that situation.

But, if you have some hesitation then consider the fact that the hitter is David Ortiz, a guy who has murdered the Yankees through the years and is hitting incredibly well in 2013. And while Mike Napoli is certainly no slouch, he isn’t Ortiz and he is on pace to strikeout 230!! times this season. I just don’t see how Girardi can be criticized for his decision to intentionally walk Ortiz.

If you want to blame someone, blame Phil Hughes. Hughes served up the gopher ball and did so after jumping out to an 0-2 count on Napoli. Look at the breakdown of the at bat, a frustratingly typical tale for Hughes:

Pitch 1- 94-mph fastball-swing and a miss

Pitch 2- 94-mph fastball-called strike

Pitch 3- 94-mph fastball- foul

Pitch 4- 93-mph fastball-called ball

Pitch 5- 82-mph slider- called ball

Pitch 6- 94-mph fastball- deposited into the seats

Hughes struggles to put hitters away and it costs him. In fact, 39% of the plate appearances against Hughes this year have gone to an 0-2 count. (For comparisons sake I looked at the same figure for these pitchers: Verlander, Scherzer, Sanchez, Darvish, Moore, Buchholz, Hernandez and Kuroda. Most of them had a figure in the 20′s. Only Verlander and Sanchez were close to Hughes, but both of them were at 35%. Also, the MLB average is 23%.) I don’t know what it would take to transform more of those 0-2 counts into strikeouts, but that is what Hughes needs to figure out if he is ever going to live up to his potential.

And this is one of the biggest questions for the Yankees going forward. What exactly is Phil Hughes? He certainly doesn’t seem to be a top of the rotation pitcher. But it’s also worth noting that he is still only 27 with only 114 starts to his name. Look at Cliff Lee, who didn’t put it all together until 29. Or Annibal Sanchez who has taken it up to a new level at that same age. The Yankees have to decide if Hughes can make that jump and how much they are willing to spend on that bet. It’s just one more tough decision they will have to make in a season full of them.

Somehow the Red Sox have a 2 game lead on the AL East.  What is most amazing is that the Yankees, despite major injuries, simply won’t go away.  They have so many key players hurt, no other team could survive.  What does it take for them to be crappy?  I’m not asking too much, am I?  If you lose half your payroll due to injury, shouldn’t you be bad?  Or at least mediocre?

As of this post, the following Yankee players are on the DL:

ARod – $28m

Jeter – $17m

Teixeira – $22.5m

Granderson – $15m

Youkilis – $12m

Pettitte – $12m

That’s $107.5m in 2013 salaries on the DL.  Granted Youk and Teixeira are set to return tonight and Pettitte on Monday, but still.  For me, a Red Sox fan, this is so discouraging.   The Red Sox have had relative health and still only have a 2 game lead on New York.

I do take some solace in the fact the Red Sox really weren’t supposed to be competitive in 2013 and playing .600 ball was not at all a reality.  While the season is still young, I must say this Red Sox team has surprised me with their constant fight (5 walk off wins this year so far vs. 3 all of last year) and the collection of great personalities.

That’s all well and great, but even in second place, the Yankees are as maddening as ever to me.  An ever-present thorn in my side.  Serenity now!!!