I hate to be phoning this one in, but c’mon, these teams finished a four-game tilt on Monday, there’s not much that needs to be said. Since then the Yankees took two of three from Texas and the Mariners dropped two of three to the Tigers. Neither team’s made a roster move since then (though the M’s farmed out Julio Mateo for Sean Green in the middle of last weekend’s series following a possible abuse incident involving the former), and tonght’s game is a rematch of Sunday’s contest, which the Yankees won 5-0 behind Darrell Rasner’s job-winning 5 2/3-inning, 3-hit, no-run performance.

Odds are this series won’t be nearly as eventful as last weekend’s, which saw the return of Roger Clemens, Chien-Ming Wang’s near perfect game, a near brawl, Matt DeSalvo’s major league debut, and that dreadful, game-changing blown call in the series finale. One does wonder if there’s any lingering bad blood from last Sunday’s incidents, and if that will in any way be exacerbated with Josh Phelps likely starting against the lefty Jarrod Washburn again, or by a Scott Proctor relief appearance (Proctor has a suspension coming for throwing behind Yuniesky Betancourt, but it’s still on appeal). Of course, Joe Torre, who already served his one-game suspension, could quell the conflict somewhat by starting the hot-hitting Doug Mientkiewicz over Phelps, but he can’t avoid Proctor for the full extent of a three-game series, nor should he.