Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Can The Yankees Win The East?
The Yankees are 5 games out, 4 in the loss column. Two weeks ago, that wouldn’t be bad, but with the Yanks and Sox having only 36 remaining games combined, that’s a massive deficit. Even the Yankees’ three games against Boston this weekend don’t make things much more plausible, because even with the unlikely outcome of a sweep, the Yanks still need to make up 2 games to win the East.
Now, if the Yankees win the next six games, they’ll be 1 1/2 back (1 in the loss column), but we can’t assume they’ll win ANY of those games. Surprisingly, Friday’s game against Boston is the closest to the Yankees have to a “gimme”, with how Daisuke Matsuzaka has pitched lately (1-4, 9.57 ERA since 8/15).
Shaun Marcum is 11-3 with a 3.45 as a starter, and the Jays are 15-5 in those games. Hughes has a 6.35 ERA in his last four starts, and the Yanks are 1-3 in those games. Dustin McGowan has a 2.95 ERA since late June, is 2-0 with a 2.45 against the Yanks, and Mike Mussina seems highly likely to give him more than enough runs to win—unless Torre has him on a very short leash, which is very unlikely. A.J. Burnett has been utterly dominant his last six starts—3-1, 1.90 ERA—and while Ian Kennedy has pitched pretty well it’s been against the D-Rays and Royals, so this will be his first real test.
Yeah, the Yanks might actually get swept in Toronto. Of course, the offense could carry them to a sweep, but the main point is that they can’t count on winning this series, which they absolutely have to do.
Then we get to the weekend. Like I said, combine Matsuzaka’s recent struggles with Pettitte’s pitching since mid-July (8-2, 3.01) and you’ve got to expect a win that night. Wang certain *can* hold his own against Beckett, especially considering that Wang is 3-1 with a 3.24 against Boston this season while Beckett has a 5.49 ERA against the Yanks. But Beckett is 18-6, so you can’t *expect* a win.
Then Schilling vs. Clemens, which would again be an edge to the Yanks if Clemens wasn’t pitching after his first-ever cortisone shot following an arm injury of undisclosed seriousness (but probably fairly bad, as far as injuries you can possibly pitch through go).
But say the Yanks sweep ALL of these six games. Assuming Boston wins the next two at home, the Yanks are one out in the loss column. No problem, right?
Well, the Yanks have six left against Baltimore (fortunately minus Bedard and Guthrie), three against the D-Rays (sorry, but they don’t miss Kazmir), and four more against the Jays (and they get Halladay this time). Meanwhile, the Sox get the Jays (without Halladay), D-Rays (with Kazmir, too—but with outstanding matchups for the series making a sweep not unlikely), two at home against Oakland (no Haren) and four to finish the season at home against Minnesota (with, you guessed it… no Santana). The team-by-team matchups clearly favor the Yankees, but the pitching matchups favor Boston. Fortunately, if the Yanks win 2 of 3 this weekend they “only” need to tie Boston to win the division, but still…
And that’s if they sweep Boston!
So could the Yanks win? Sure, but it’s going to require BOTH a great surge and a slump by the Red Sox. Possible, not likely.
Don’t give up, of course. If they sweep Toronto and the D-Rays win one of the next two then this weekend will be VERY interesting, especially if the Yankees win the first game.
I’ll finish by saying that the only reason this matters is that the Yankees want to somehow avoid playing the Angels in the first round if it’s at all possible. If they catch Boston, they would probably get the Indians, who they’ve pretty much proven they can handle (though I guess they proved that against the Tigers last season, too…). But they’ve clearly proven over the last decade that they can’t beat the Angels, so they’ll want Boston to play them. If they were to get the Indians, beat them and face the Red Sox—they’ll probably win the pennant. And I have no doubt they can take whatever team the NL throws at them. Of course, we’ve seen many times that a short series goes differently than you expect VERY often, but the next week could mean the difference between another first-round exit and a World Championship. Not to make it bigger than it really is…
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