One Good Week (For The Yankees)
- Monday, April 12, 2010 5:01 PM
- Written By: Jake Simpson
New York sports. Few subjects are more polarizing to sports fans. You hate the Yankees. You love the Yankees. You loathe Eli Manning and live to see him pout after an INT. You firmly believe Justin Tuck could be a poor man’s Lawrence Taylor for the next decade. You want to kill Derek Jeter. You want to marry Derek Jeter.
Love it or hate it, the Big Apple sports scene is worthy of your attention. And I’m going to bring it to you, from the Yankees to high school sports (or for those seeking a catchier tagline, from the Bronx to the Belt Parkway.) Enjoy.
Headlines out of the city have been mixed this week. While the Nets have pushed above 10 wins, the Rangers blew a third-period lead and lost their de facto play-in game in a shootout — to the Flyers, no less. Today’s big news is no different — the Jets got Steelers’ wide receiver Santonio Holmes for the bargain-basement price of a fifth-round draft price, but only because Holmes has been suspended for the first four games of the season and has a long history of off-the-field legal troubles.
In the sea of mixed bags, one New York team had an undeniably positive week. That would be the Yankees.
The defending champs opened the season with road series at Boston and Tampa Bay, their two primary division rivals. With notoriously slow starter CC Sabathia getting the ball twice in that stretch, a 2-4 start would not have been unexpected. Instead, the Bombers took both series and are 4-2 after the first week of the regular season.
Though their record can be extrapolated to 108-54 (which means about as much as the AL-East leading Blue Jays being on pace to finish 135-27), the Yankees can be happy about much more than early-season winning percentage. Their biggest off-season acquisition, center fielder Curtis Granderson, has started hot, with a 1.075 OPS and a pair of game-winning hits against the Red Sox. Ageless wonder Jorge Posada has an .824 slugging percentage, so far defying many (this scribe included) who said his production would fall off this season. And while Nick Johnson is hitting an anemic .136, his OBP is a respectable .367 thanks to a team-high seven walks.
Then there’s Sabathia. The big fella struggled late on Opening Night, giving up a three-run lead in a come-from-ahead loss for the Yankees. But on Saturday, he turned in one of the best performances of his career, pitching no-hit ball for 7 2/3 innings against the Rays in a dominating performance. Sabathia has historically struggled in April; if he’s already dialed in, watch out.
The Yanks have started fast despite no home runs from Alex Rodriguez and a .125 average from Mark Teixeira. They haven’t played a home game yet, and they have exactly two hits from their bench.
Yes, the season is barely a week old. Yes, six games is barely a blip, let alone a representative sample. But the defending champs have come out and played stellar baseball, on the road, against top competition. It’s a long way from defending a World Series title. But it’s a very good start.
Read more of Jake Simpson on the original "Back Page" blog.
