Alright, not bad...

Thursday and Friday sucked, but Saturday and Sunday weren't too shabby, as the Yankees managed a split.

Mussina turned in another absolute gem on Saturday. Man, who would have expected Mike Mussina to compensate for his loss of velocity with such impeccable command. With a 3.77 xFIP, this hasn't been fluky. He's been as good as his numbers dictate. Hopefully this continues.

Mariano decided to do his best John Wetteland impression on Saturday, allowing a run and loading the bases with nobody out with a 1 run lead, but then turned back into good Mariano and got out of it. He's been incredible. 92.6 MPH cutter. 10.26 K/9 IP. 0.67 BB/9 IP. 29.4% of the flyballs he's allowed have been infield flies. And that home run he gave up to DeJesus was kind of a joke. It carried 404 feet into the bleachers, but without the wind and temperature that ball is a 361 foot flyout. So he got a tad unlucky with that. I hope he can keep closing when he's 50, because he has set Yankees fans' expectations so high that even when he allows a hit almost seems unacceptable. Forget about the guy who follows him.

Joba looked pretty good, too. He allowed 3 ER in 6 IP, but combined with the fact he really was not hit all that hard, he fanned 5 in those 6 IP, and it could have been more if he had more borderline calls go his way, I'm pleased with his performance.

Cano continues to swing the bat well, as he's hitting .375/.390/.556 over his last 20 games. His triple off Lopez was huge. He also picked up a solid single up the middle off Papsmear to set up the GW-single for Brett Gardner, whom I will get to next. Cano's walk rate might be down from last year (5.9% to 4.1%), but that's a function of the pitches he's seeing. Last year he swung at 34.43% of pitches out of the strike zone. This year, however, he has swung at just 28.60% of pitches out of the strike zone. Pitchers are simply throwing him a lot more strikes, and why wouldn't you? He wasn't hitting up until recently. I have a feeling he's going to start drawing more walks pretty soon now that he appears to be out of his funk.

Brett Gardner's proving to be a pretty solid player. He's only hitting .143, but he's had a lot of good at bats, seeing 4.4 P/PA so far, including that 8 pitch battle off Papsmear last night. He's a pretty good defender and has a solid arm. His strikeout rate was high in the minors, but I think that's simply because he takes tons of pitches. So far in the majors, he makes contact with just about everything he swings at. As long as he can be a down-on-the-ball, hit-it-where-it's-pitched kind of hitter, he will be a useful player.

Oh yeah, hey Papsmear. Mariano >> you.

And Red Sox fans, I know you guys like to talk about how the Red Sox do better than most teams against Mariano, but take a look at this...

Jonathan Papelbon (career vs. NYY, 2008 vs. NYY)
0-3
20.0 IP
1.20 WHIP
3.60 ERA
6 for 8 in SV opportunities

0-1
4.0 IP
1.50 WHIP
9.00 ERA
2 for 2 in SV opportunities

Papsmear doesn't have it so easy against the Bronx Bombers either...

Mariano >> Papsmear