To be perfectly honest, I have missed baseball so ridiculously much that I wouldn't care if Spring Training was going terribly for the Yanks (unless, of course, Pavano cast his plague upon the rest of the team [I started to write "his teammates", but implying that Pavano is any part of the team is insulting to the guys that actually contribute]). The fact that the three games they've played thus far have been fun to watch/read about is just a bonus.

Their first game went far from smoothly - though the Moosester did have a good outing that day, which was positive - but the unsmoothness was mainly due to the inexperience of youngsters; none of the "core" Yanks (Cano, Jeet, A-Rod, etc) were behind those 7 errors and the only roster pitcher to give up a walk was Moose. Game 2 against the Phillies was an improvement, with the boys walking just three and making no errors. It ended in a 7-7 tie, but they hit well - 12 hits, with 2 each from Abreu and Giambi. Today's game happily followed the improvement trend, as they scored 7 runs on 14 hits to beat the Astros 7-6. Sadly, Moose's pitching was a far cry from his last performance - he gave up 6 hits and 4 earned runs in just 3 innings (silver lining: he didn't walk anyone!), but let's ignore that and focus on the fact that Karstens pitched 3 innings, allowed just 2 hits, struck out 2, and didn't walk a soul. On the offensive side, as I mentioned they combined for 14 hits. Cano had 3 hits and 2 RBI, Shelley the Spirit Coordinator hit 2 singles and knocked in 2, and Melky also had 2 hits. The Girardino also had a good day - he played 1B during BP and even pitched a round! When was the last time Joe Torre made a showing like that?

Shelley's performance today earned him the honor of being the YCPOSTTF (Yankees Chick Player of Spring Training Thus Far). He's rockin' a .571 average and has already batted in 7 runs. Congratulations, Spirit Coordinator! Perhaps I'll make a special "My Spirit Coordinator is a YCPOSTTF at Yankees Chick University" bumper sticker...

The Yanks will play the Jays tomorrow at 1:05pm EST. I still wish I was actually AT Spring Training rather than just sitting at home writing shit like this, but there's always next year for one of you to send me a plane ticket and fly me out there on your dime*.


*Just kidding**
**That's a lie. I'm not.