Maybe I should only write pessimistic posts, as the Yanks, per my faint hope, swept the weekend and, despite Chien-Ming Wang's struggles, look likely to close within 4.5 games of the wild card. Finally, they are legitimately in the race.
The keys, of course, are they are hitting the hell out of the ball. Roger Clemens, too, has been a pleasant surprise, being closer to the NL version over his past five outings than could have been realistically expected. While Bobby Abreu has hit better, the team itself has played better (especially the tear Hideki Matsui is on), and Joe Torre has juggled the lineup well.
Even the bullpen hasn't been atrocious outside of the high-profile blowups. As long as Torre recognizes Vizcaino's success came from pitching a more-normal workload, he could be the answer in the eighth inning.
And, thankfully, they got a backup catcher. Jose Molina is no prize, but when you have one of the worst-hitting catchers of all time as the last resort, anything is better.
Unfortunately, there's no time for a letup, and these are still games that should be won by any Yankee team, not just a playoff one. The test is still to come, but the post-All-Star-break play has (mostly) shown the team is ready to be tested. One could not say that as recently as three weeks ago.
Labels: Yankees
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