Who Can Take The Sunrise... ?

Sprinkle it with dew?  The motherfucking Grandy Man can.  Now somebody hit the fucking music!!!

The First Base Black Hole

6-40 (.150 BA), 8 R, , 1 XBH, 5 RBI, 8 BB, 18 K

That's the combined batting line from the first base position in the Yankee lineup since Mark Teixeira went down with his calf injury.  Or more accurately, that's the combined first base batting line since Teix went down with his calf injury, got rushed back into the lineup before he was ready to play because the offense was complete ass without him, and then had said calf blow up on him again in his desperate attempt to break up Saturday's still bullshit game-ending double play.  You don't have to be a sabermetric genius to figure out that the batting line you see above is terrible, even if there is some marginal value in the runs scored and walks.  What's worse is that this type of marginal production might be all the Yankees get from first base from here on out.

Thoughts On The Arizona Fall League Selections

(Happy 20th, AzFL!  You can almost legally drink)

To break up the monotony of analyzing the Yankees' continued problems at the Major League level, and the slight depression that comes with it, I thought I'd change gears and talk about a more positive topic- Prospects!

The Yankees announced their position player selections for the Arizona Fall League a few weeks ago, and officially finished those selections yesterday with the announcement of the group of pitchers who they'll be sending.  Josh Norris had the details, and the final AzFL Yankee lineup is an intriguing one for Yankee fans to say the least.  My quick take on each selection after the jump.

Game 141 Wrap-Up: BOS 4 NYY 3

(You can't give up game-tying HRs to midgets.  Courtesy of the AP)

I guess that off day came at the exact wrong time, huh?  On Sunday the Yankees were hitting, they were fielding, they were pitching, and they were winning.  Big.  Last night they came out against a gutted, deadstick Fraud Sawx team and put on a display of all their recent problems for the Bahhston fans who hadn't gotten to experience them.  They managed just 6 hits and 3 runs against a clearly-not-there Jon Lester and a cast of B-relievers, despite drawing 8 walks, they went 1-12 with RISP, their starting pitcher gave back the one lead the offense did get him, and the bullpen gave them game away in the 9th inning.  Sprinkle in a little bad defense and bunting, which reader Mark was kind enough to remind me about, and you have another vintage 2012 Yankee "coulda, woulda, shoulda" loss.

Game Notes:

- Things certainly got off to a good start offensively, when the Yanks worked 3 walks and a Nick Swisher double in 1 run.  But as usual, it was only 1 run because they made outs on their run-scoring plays.

- Lester looked like he was fixing to walk the yard when he gave up free passes to Alex Rodriguez and Robinson Cano to start the 3rd.  After Bobby V came out and blasted him, however, he was a different pitcher and retired the next 3 in order.

- Hiroki Kuroda had his first hiccup in the bottom of the 3rd when Pedro Ciriaco (who else) led off with a double and came around to score on a Jacoby Ellsbury single.  Ellsbury scored after a SB and a single by Dustin Pedroia to make it 2-1 Sawx.

- Yanks got 2 more runners on to lead off the 6th, and this time they didn't let the opportunity slip by.  Derek Jeter made great use of the Pesky Pole by bouncing a 2-run ground rule double right around it for a 3-2 lead.

- And this is where Kuroda's night went from potentially good to another "blah" outing.  He left a 2-0 sinker up in the zone to Pedroia and Pedroia tied the game with on a HR to left.  Shutdown innings, my ass.

- The 7th inning could have been a disaster, thanks to some bad defense by Russell Martin and even worse defense by Boone Logan that helped load the bases with 1 out.  But in came Joba Chamberlain, seeing some real high-leverage work for the first time this season, and he shut the door.  That's the one positive that can be taken from this game.

- It's tough to get on D-Rob when he got beat on 2 groundball singles, but he was still throwing too many cutters and not mixing his curveball well at all.  Ellsbury was hot all night, so it was fitting that he got the game-winning single to win it in the 9th.