Last night marked a monumental occassion in baseball history as Balco B became the biggest douche to ever make the Yankees Chick tear up (don't even try to tell me you weren't getting a little misty-eyed when Barry choked up while mentioning his Pop), but rather than waste precious time and bandwidth rehashing a controversial milestone that I suspect most of us are already deathly ill of thanks to ESPN's non-stop playback and commentary, I feel it is imperative that we redirect our focus back to the Yankees. More so than any other time this year, they are right up in the thick of the post-season race - just a half game out of the wildcard and a not insurmountable 5 behind the Red Sox in the AL East. Big Stein and the Cash Man are keenly aware of the ground left to make up and the relatively short amount of time with which to work, and they are doing their best to craft the best possible 25-man roster out of all of their available resources. They've taken a number of steps to maximize the potential contributions of both the lineup and the pitching roster, and while it would be a lie of monstrous proportions to proclaim that anything truly ingenious has taken place in the way of roster moves, each change that has been made of late has made an impact. Philly Hughes' much-anticipated return from DL-ville upgraded the status of the starting rotation from an alarming "if one more of you morons gets injured the entire city of New York will simultaneously erupt into a violent rage" to a slightly more tolerable "well as long as you keep your collective ERA under 5 we will still cheer for you" (and as a sidebar, allow me to note that although he admittedly looked a tad shaky on Saturday, Hughes' credibilty among both the Yanks and the fans remains intact). Karstens was also activated from the DL and rejoined the team this time as a reliever, and last night Joba "How Fast Did You Rise Through The Farm System? Haha, Not As Fast As I" Chamberlain made his successful debut to the delight of Yanks fans and his teammates. Finally, Jason "Don't Bother Calling Me Giambino Anymore" Giambi returned to the lineup plantar fascia-free on Tuesday, and thankfully in a purely offensive capacity - Torre has no plans of allowing Jason anywhere near a first base glove anytime soon, thankfully. To make room on the roster for these boys, Mike Myers and Miguel Cairo were DFA, and Brian Bruney and fan favorite Kei Igawa (by "fan favorite" I of course mean "horrible, horrible signing by all accounts") have been busted back down to the farm.

As I mentioned before, since July 1st the Yankees have managed to cut the Red Sox's (grammar?) lead from 10.5 games down to 5, and they have gone from being 8.5 games out in the wildcard hunt to just half a game out as of today. I know that a lot of folks - BoSox fans in particular - wrote this team off long ago, but I think the Yanks recent performance has made many people rethink their opinion of this 2007 team. An especially irate Sox fan (aren't they all?) commented/shrieked on my last post about his/her utter lack of fear of the Yanks, but I truly do find it hard to believe that fans of Boston, Cleveland, Seattle and Detroit aren't getting nervous about the resurgance of the Yanks in the playoff mix.

That said... feel free to commence the hating in the comments section.