Game 39....maybe?

It doesn't look good right now as it's been raining all day and looks to continue to rain off and on the rest of the night. But if they do play, here's the lineups.

Yankees
Derek Jeter SS
Brett Gardner LF
Mark Teixeira 1B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Robinson Cano 2B
Francisco Cervelli C
Marcus Thames RF
Juan Miranda DH
Randy Winn LF

LHP CC Sabathia

Red Sox
Scutaro SS
Pedroia 2B
Drew RF
Youkilis 1B
Martinez C
Ortiz DH
Beltre 3B
Hall LF
McDonald CF

RHP Beckett

That's Why It's the Greatest Rivalry: So yesterday I made a post about how I wasn't as excited for this Yankees-Red Sox matchup and that I thought it was losing its luster. Well that didn't take long to prove me wrong. Yesterday's game is one example of why these two teams are the greatest rivalry in sports. It doesn't matter where they are in the standings, these two teams desperately want to beat each other no matter how they do it and yesterday's game was the exact definition of a Yankees-Red Sox game. You just don't know what you're going to get when they face each other.
Battle of Aces?: CC Sabathia has done a very good job at continuing to be the Yankees ace this season. Josh Beckett for the Red Sox....not so much. Beckett has struggled this season with a 1-1 record and 7.46 ERA.
Make Joe West Proud: With rain in the forecast, the Yankees and Red Sox should make Joe West proud and get this game in as quick as possible (if there's a window to play) so they don't have to make it up later in the season.


UPDATE 7:42: Jim here. the tarp is apparently off the field and first pitch is scheduled for 8 PM. Outfielder Greg Golsen was optioned to AAA and Mark Melancon was recalled to help the depleted bullpen.

As usual, we'll be on the Twitter accounts: @jgeant and @jphealy.

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Mo Fires Back at Joe West

Okay, I don't want to make a third post about this, but when Mariano Rivera is firing back at an umpire, it can't be ignored. Today in the NY Post, Rivera responded to Joe Wests' comments about the pace of the Yankees-Red Sox game. Here is what Rivera said:

"It's incredible," Rivera told The Post. "If he has places to go, let him do something else. What does he want us to do, swing at balls? He has a job to do. He should do his job," Rivera said. "We don't want to play four-hour games, but that's what it takes. We respect and love the fans and do what we have to do, and that's play our game."

Good for Mo. He is one of the most respected pitchers in the game, and to basically tell the umpire to shut and do his job while we do ours shut put this to an end. However, it should be interesting to see West's strike zone next time he's behind the plate when Mo pitches. As if his strike zone can't get any smaller.

On an unrelated note...bear with us as we are doing our best to make changes to the layout of our blog. As you may have noticed we have gone through a number of different styles over the last few days and are trying to find something that can fit well for the rest of the season.

Photo found in Google Images

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Really Joe West?

So, as John told you earlier, Cowboy Joe West called the Yankees and Red Sox games a "disgrace to baseball" because of how long they take. I just wanted to give you my take.

Image by Keith Allison via Flickr

Really Joe West? Are you kidding me?

So games between baseball's biggest rivals is a disgrace to the game? Well there's a couple million people who disagree with you, since that's how many people watched the game on Sunday night. So the Commissioner wants to speed up the games? Okay, I buy that. But, to go so far as call it a disgrace to baseball is ridiculous. A four-hour game between the Nationals and Pirates is a disgrace to baseball. (Actually, any game between the Nationals and Pirates could be considered a disgrace to baseball.)

Yesterday, the Yankees and Sawks play 10 innings, with the Yanks pulling out a 3-1 win. The game lasted an unmanageable (as Michael Kay used to say) three hours and 21 minutes. You know what I call that? A GREAT BASEBALL GAME!

Now, I am a huge baseball fan, so I could sit there and watch a five-hour game and be satisfied, so I'm not your average fan. Even if you agree with what he said, it was extremely hypocritical. How do you think Joe West would react if say Derek Jeter called the umpires embarrassing and pathetic? First of all, Jeter wouldn't do that, because he has class. But West, and the rest of the umpires, would go ballistic. The umpires would probably hold it against Jeter for the rest of his career. But West gets a free pass because he has all the power during a game. But he should be fined by Major League Baseball or who ever is in charge of fining umpires for saying stupid things.

Sorry I ranted a little bit. You can tell I don't like umpires too much, right? You're talking to a kid who almost got thrown out of a Little League game for arguing with an umpire.

Just a few more links on an off-day

• David Wright doing some GTL with The Situation for a Vitamin Water commercial.
• The Yankees Organization is worth $1.6 billion, according to Forbes. $1.6 BILLION! That's twice as much as the second-highest team, the Red Sox, and about the same as the Mets and the Red Sox combined. Those guys in the Front Office obviously know what they're doing.
  

That might be it for today, but the Yanks head to Tampa to take on David Price and the Rays tomorrow night.

SEE YA!

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Umpire Calls Yanks/Sox A "Disgrace"

Check out this interesting story I just saw on the LoHud Blog. Joe West, one of MLB's crew chief umpires, commented on the pace of the Yankees-Red Sox games saying it is, "embarassing and a disgrace to baseball." He continued by saying the Yankees and Red Sox are, "pathetic and embarassing. They take too long to play."

It is true that they take very long to play. Most games are closer to 4 hours rather than the normal 3. In fact, the quickest game of the series was yesterday, which was 3 hours and 20 minutes and it took 10 innings.

But can you blame them? These teams have two of the most patient lineups in the majors. The games are always close, which causes many late-inning pitching changes during the course of the game. It's the nature of the game and neither teams are going to change their style of play because an umpire says they take too long. Sure, the MLB can enforce pitchers to take less time walking around the mound, get batters to the box quickly,etc. But how much time will that actually save?

Another problem I have with West's comments is the "embarassing and pathetic" part. There's nothing embarassing or pathetic about it all. They just take long. What's embarassing and pathetic is a professional MLB umpire complaining that these teams take too long to play.

So Joe West, the next time you criticize the team's you officiate in public, try not to look "pathetic" while doing it.

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