Pre-Midseason Report For Yanks, Mets

NEW YORK, NY – We’re almost at the point of the baseball season where all of the pundits give their mid-season reports on how teams have played so far and what’s in store for the rest of the season. I’m no pundit and I freely admit that I have absolutely no idea what I’m talking about. Nonetheless, I’ll give my almost-mid season, almost report on what’s happened so far.

The Yankees have been rolling like a well oiled bicycle (or boiled icicle?) lately and are coming off of back to back sweeps of the Mets and Braves. The Bombers are suddenly in first place and twelve games over .500. And they’re looking a lot better than the average team they seemed like a month ago when Mo went down. Soriano has been stellar in the closer role. As a 7th inning guy, he was about as reliable as Short Matt’s income. As a closer, Soriano has been almost lights out. The big bats in the lineup have started to wake up and the Yanks are starting to get some timely hitting. Even Lori Levine’s grand slammer, A-Rod has joined the fun. Pre-Midseason grade for the Yankees so far; B+.

It has all started to come together and the Yankees are in first place and 6.5 games ahead of the last-placed Boston Red Sox. A month ago, the starting rotation looked like an Ace and a bunch of number 4 starters. Now it looks like a whole rotation of number twos. Kuroda has stepped up to the occasion recently and even Phil ‘ughes has refrained from completely sucking lately.

I swear I will suck.

Speaking of number 2, Jason Bay still sucks (read this for a laugh). The good news is that Bay homered yesterday. The bad news is that he’s still on the interstate. At .187 he’s sitting in traffic on the Major Deegan. It remains to be seen whether the homerun is a sign of brighter days to come for Bay. Or whether the homer in Tampa was just a flash in the pan and Bay will be back to his suckiest of sucky Canadian ways going forward.

Ike Davis has started to hit and may have saved his place in the Majors with his current mini-hitting streak. Dickey may feel he got the shaft in his one-hit performance against the Rays this week. But nobody, not even Dickey, expects the league to overturn its decision on the quasi-questionable hit. Dickey is putting together a phenomenal year for an aging knuckler. He leads the majors in wins and is in the top 5 in the majors in ERA.

Since his no-hitter, Johan Santana has looked shaky. One wonders whether that extra high pitch count took more out of the Mets’ ace than he or the team are letting on. But as long as Santana stays healthy enough to pitch every fifth day down the stretch, Mets fans will be happy. Pre-Midseason grade for the Mets; A-.

Now for something totally different. The big news from the NHL this week has been Tim Thomas, star goalie for Cheesy’s Bruins, hinting that he will sit out this coming season to spend more time with his family. I have no problem with Thomas leaving the game behind for family obligations, but I don’t think that this is the real reason for him hinting at leaving. I think there are some ulterior motives at play and I’m leaving it up to the MTM faithful to speculate what those motives might be. Let’s hear the theories in the comments today.

Tune in for The Public Professor tomorrow.

Filed in: Different Matt
Tagged with: Boston Red Sox • Braves • Different Matt • Ike Davis • Jason Bay • Meet The Matts • mets • Tim Thomas