How Do the Yanks Like Them Apples?

This is what gets me excited about baseball. The best rivalry in baseball going at it in Boston over the weekend with the Sunday night matchup featuring Dice-K who sees the Yankees for the first time this season. Yankees bringing the one man offensive machine A-Rod who is on a torrid offensive pace but still won’t mean anything if he bats .150 in October. Nice pressure huh?

On Friday night A-Rod put on an offensive display (2 HR’s and 4 RBI’s) that had to of wowed even the most hated Boston fans. It looked like it was going to be all Yankees until the eighth inning when the Yankees gave up five runs including ones off the sure handed Mariano Rivera.

Sunday’s matchup looked like the Yankees were going to avoid the sweep after a quick 2-0 lead. Before you blink again it was 3-0. Then Boston did something so historic that fans will be talking about this game for years. Yanks pitcher Chase Wright, who will be shipped back to Double A in a FedEx box ASAP) had been crusing along until he faced Manny, JD Drew, Mike Lowell, and Varitek in consecutive at bats in the 3rd inning and all absolutely crushed homeruns. It was home run Derby in April. It looked so easy. It was surreal.

Then the game could not have ended in anymore dramatic fashion. It’s only April but damn I felt like we were in October. Papelbon comes into close the game leading 7-6 and struck out Damon and Jeter in unfair fashion. He walks Abreu to have A-Rod come to bat in another clutch situation. Power vs. Power. I don’t think Boston fans wanted to see him at bat but in the end they cheered that he was the final victim in a Boston sweep of the Yankees.

In the end, it showed that the Yankees are going to have a long season unless they fix their starting pitching and find ways to plug holes in their weak bullpen. Even Mariano Rivera has blown two saves this season. Friday’s starter Andy Petitte came in for an inning of relief. That’s how bad it got in the bullpen.

Fifteen more games left in this series and if they’re even more exciting than this one, we’re in for a treat. Apr 27, 2007 is the next time the meet, with possibly Dice-K pitching the opener in Yankee Stadium.