Chicago White Sox

2009 Record: 51-51 (.500)
2009 Pythagorean Record: 51-51 (.500)

Manager: Ozzie Guillen
General Manager: Kenny Williams

Home Ballpark (multi-year Park Factors): U.S. Cellular Field (105/105)

Who’s Replaced Whom:

• Chris Getz (minors) replaces Orlando Cabrera
• Scott Podsednik replaces Nick Swisher and Brian Anderson
• Gordon Beckham (minors) replaces Joe Crede
• Jayson Nix replaces Juan Uribe
• Mark Kotsay replaces Ken Griffey Jr.
• Ramon Castro replaces Toby Hall
• Clayton Richard and Jose Contreras inherit Javier Vazquez’s starts
• Tony Peña replaces Nick Massett
• Randy Williams replaces Boone Logan

25-man Roster:

1B – Paul Konerko (R)
2B – Chris Getz (L)
SS – Alexei Ramirez (R)
3B – Gordon Beckham (R)
C – A.J. Pierzynski (L)
RF – Jermaine Dye (R)
CF – Scott Podsednik (L)
LF – Carlos Quentin (R)
DH – Jim Thome (L)

Bench:

L – Dewayne Wise (OF)
R – Jayson Nix (IF)
L – Mark Kotsay (1B/OF)
R – Ramon Castro (C)

Rotation:

L – Mark Buehrle
R – Jose Contreras
R – Gavin Floyd
L – Richard Clayton
L – John Danks

Bullpen:

R – Bobby Jenks
R – Octavio Dotel
L – Matt Thornton
R – Tony Peña
R – Scott Linebrink
R – D.J. Carrasco
L – Randy Williams

15-day DL: RHP – Bartolo Colon

Typical Lineup:

L – Scott Podsednik (CF)
R – Alexei Ramirez (SS)
R – Jermaine Dye (RF)
L – Jim Thome (DH)
R – Paul Konerko (1B)
L – A.J. Pierzynski (C)
R – Carlos Quentin (LF)
L – Chris Getz (2B)
R – Gordon Beckham (3B)

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The Yankees made the most of their recent ten-game homestand, going 9-1 against the Tigers, Orioles, and A’s. That’s good, because now things get tough. The first seven games of this nine-game road trip are against the Rays and White Sox, both contending teams. Then, after a two-game stop in Toronto, they come home to play four against the Red Sox. That’s 11 of 13 games against contending teams.

The Rays are 6.5 games behind the first-place Yankees in the AL East, but the Pythagorean standings look like this:

BOS 56-41  –
NYY 56-42  .5
TBR 56-43  1

The Rays still aren’t getting much from B.J. Upton or Pat Burrell, and their catching duo of former Yankee farmhands Dioner Navarro and Michel Hernandez is almost single-handedly keeping them out of the Wild Card race. Jason Bartlett has cooled a bit since returning from the DL, but is still contributing a solid .296/.354/.417 from shorststop and fellow flukester Ben Zobrist is hot as ever, hitting .379/.463/.500 since July 7.

In the rotation, Scott Kazmir is back from the DL and with pitch Tuesday night, but he’s not been that much more effective since his return, going 0-2 with a 5.08 ERA and just one quality start in five tries. Wednesday night starter Matt Garza, however, has been his usual inconsistent, but often dominant self. Tonight the Rays throw James Shields, who is turning in a season that looks a lot like the one he had last year plus a few extra hits.

The Yankees counter with A.J. Burnett, who is looking for his eighth-straight quality start. A.J. already has two quality starts against the Rays in as many tries this season, including an eight-inning, three-hit, nine-strikeout effort a the Trop back on April 14.

One other thing about the Rays: they’ve made lefty reliever J.P Howell their closer. Since June 1, Howell has posted a 1.14 ERA, 0.89 WHIP, and 11.03 K/9. His only two blown saves during that stretch came in the eighth inning against the Yankees the last time they were in Tampa. In neither case did he allow a run, and in one he didn’t even allow a hit (though he did walk in a run).

The Yankees are sticking with the extra reliever for now rather than calling up a replacement for Brett Gardner. Everyone’s in his usual spot in tonight’s lineup.

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The O’s could hit a little, but not pitch. The Yankees swept them. The A’s, who have a nearly identical record, can pitch a little, but not hit. The Yankees welcome them to the Bronx tonight for a four-game set that has the Bomber faithful salivating at the thought of their team extending their perfect 6-0 second-half record and building on their two-game lead over the Red Sox in the AL East and game-and-a-half lead over the red-hot Angles for the best record in the league.

The A’s arrive with the third weakest offense in the American League, and one which just lost ex-Yank Jason Giambi to the disabled list via a strained hamstring. Not that Giambi was hitting (.193/.332/.364 on the season), but he was tied for second on the team in homers with 11 and would have had fun trying to lift balls into that jet stream to right field (you just know J-Bombs is miserable over missing these games). Matt Holliday is doing what everyone expected he’d do, hit like his career road split, which is still good enough to make him the A’s best bat. His closest rival is replacement third baseman Adam Kennedy, who was released by the Cardinals in February, dumped on the A’s by the Rays after spring training, and spent April in the minors.

As for the A’s pitching, it’s typically park influenced. The A’s staff has a 3.83 ERA at home, but a 4.75 mark on the road. Accordingly, the A’s are a .391 team outside of Oakland. The A’s rotation currently consists of three lefties and four rookies, but the most effective left-handed rookie starter they’ve had this season, stirrup socked fashion plate Josh Outman, has been lost to Tommy John surgery.

The Yankees will face Brett Anderson, the most heralded of the rookie lefties, tomorrow. Anderson gave up five runs in 5 1/3 innings in the Yankees 16-inning win over the A’s in April, but has turned it on of late and enters tomorrow’s contest with an active streak of 21 scoreless innings and a 0.34 ERA and 0.68 WHIP over his last four starts. Saturday brings rookie lefty Gio Gonzalez, part of Oakland’s return for Nick Swisher. Gonzalez is Outman’s replacment and his four major league starts this season have been evenly split between decent and disaster, his last seeing him cough up 11 runs on on ten hits, including four homers, in just 2 2/3 innings against the Twins. Sunday brings non-rookie lefty Dallas Braden, who is the ripe-old age of 25. Braden has been the A’s most consistent pitcher having delivered quality starts in 14 of his 20 starts and maintaining his 3.40 ERA both at home and on the road. He’ll face Sergio Mitre.

Tonight, the Yankees will face one of the A’s two rookie right-handers in 22-year-old Vin Mazzaro, a Hackensack, New Jersey native and graduate of Rutherford High School who relies on a hard, heavy, mid-90s sinker. Mazzaro joined the rotation in June and got off to a fine start with four quality starts, but things have gone downhill from there, bottoming out with the eight runs he allowed in three innnings against the Angels his last time out. The A’s have lost Mazzaro’s last seven starts, with Vinnie taking the loss in six of them. In fact, the A’s haven’t won a game in which Mazzaro has given up a run all year (Mazzaro’s first two starts, both wins, saw him pitch 13 2/3 scoreless innings).

Maz has his work cut out for him tonight as he’s facing not just the major league’s best offense in a hitting-friendly environment, but CC Sabathia coming off seven shutout innings against the AL Central-leading Tigers his last time out. CC wasn’t as good as his numbers in that last start, however, as he walked three, hit a batter, threw 51 pitches in the first two innings, and had just two 1-2-3 innings. CC who started against Anderson in that 16-inning monster back in April and had one of his worst starts of the year, allowing seven runs in 6 2/3 innings while walking five. He’s come a long way since those early struggles, however, and will be looking to build some second-half momentum tonight.

Tonight’s lineup includes Hinske in right, Gardner in center, and Matsui at DH.

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Play a patsy.

To be fair, the Baltimore Orioles aren’t a complete pushover. There seven teams in the major leagues with worse records and the free-falling Mets are just two games better. In fact, for the first time perhaps since I started blogging, I’m actually looking forward to the Yankees matchups with the Orioles. That’s because of the exciting young talent the Orioles have in their lineup.

Nick Markakis is in his fourth season as the O’s right fielder, but he’s still just 25, and though his production has dipped down to his rookie-year level, he’s been a strong second-half performer in his young career, hitting .316/.388/.529 after the All-Star break. Adam Jones, who had the game-winning RBI in the All-Star Game, is having a big breakout season at age 23, though he’s slumped since the beginning of June, hitting .253/.307/.333. Those two have been joined by 25-year-old Nolan Reimold in left field. Reimold was called up in mid-May and made an immediate impact, hitting .296/.375/.533 with nine homers through the end of June. He’s scuffled thus far in July (.191/.269/.234, no homers), so it will be interesting to see if he can make the necessary adjustments to stay in the league.

Perhaps overshadowing those three is rookie backstop Matt Wieters, not because of his performance, but because of his blue-chip status. Wieters was supposed to be this year’s Evan Longoria, but with the Orioles out of contention they were able to wait a bit longer to bring Wieters up, thereby protecting his arbitration status. The fifth-overall pick in the 2007 draft, the 6-foot-5 Wieters hit .343/.438/.576 while burning through the Orioles’ minor league system in a little more than a year. Called up in late May, soon after his 23rd birthday, Wieters has yet to really settle in as a major leaguer. Even tossing out his rough first week in the bigs, he’s hit just .270/.330/.416 since June 9. Still, the potential is there for a huge breakout, and Wieters has the potential to develop into one of the best hitters in the league at any position.

Add to those four Brian Roberts, having a slightly down year at age 31, but still leading the majors in doubles, and a strong showing from fellow-31-year-old Luke Scott (.298/.380/.579 and hitting lefties even better than righties), and the Orioles have an offense worth watching.

What makes them a patsy is their pitching staff. The names have changed from when I wrote something very similar prior to the Yankees’ season-opening series in Baltimore. Adam Eaton has been released, Koji Uehara and Alfredo Simon are on the DL, and Mark Hendrickson has been banished to the bullpen, but the Orioles rotation is still awful. Would-be ace Jeremy Guthrie, whom the Yankees will miss, has a 5.12 ERA. The rest of their rotation made a combined five starts above double-A in 2008, all of them by Cubs castoff Rich Hill. Hill, who starts against Sergio Mitre tomorrow, has a 7.22 ERA thus far this year. Rookie Jason Berken, who will face A.J. Burnett on Wednesday night, is 1-7 with a 6.44 ERA.

The Orioles have had more encouraging results from 23-year-old rookie groundballer Brad Bergesen, though he won’t pitch in this series either. Bergesen has been solid (6-4, 3.51 ERA and a 2.41 ERA over his last ten starts), but his low strikeout rate remains a concern. The fifth spot in the rotation is being filled tonight by 24-year-old rookie David Hernandez. Hernandez. Hernandez has struck out 10.4 men per nine innings in his five-year minor league career, but save for his lone major league relief outing (2 2/3 IP, 0 R, 4 K), has yet to find the same success in the majors after five starts. Despite his middling major league strikeout rate, Hernandez turned in quality starts against the Mariners and Angels his last two times out and fell just one out shy of a quality start in two of his other three outings. The catch is that he’s a fly-ball pitcher coming to the new Yankee Stadium with a reputation for grooving pitches when behind in the count.

Facing Hernandez will be Andy Pettitte. Pettitte had always been a strong second-half performer prior to his second-half collapse last year. Even with last year factored in, he sports a second-half ERA of 3.64 and winning percentage of .687 compared to 4.17 and .578 in the first half. In 2007, Pettitte helped pitch the Yankees into the playoffs, coming out of the All-Star break to go 8-1 witha 2.61 ERA in his first nine starts of the second half. Pettitte claimed his poor second half last year was due to poor off-season conditioning, which he blamed on his desire to keep a low profile after his name surfaced in the Mitchell Report. Assuming Andy got back to his normal routine this past winter, it’s time for it to start paying off, particularly given his disappointing first-half performance.

Eric Hinske starts over Nick Swisher in right tonight against the righty Hernandez. Melky Cabrera starts in center. That’s four post-break starts for Melky to one by Brett Gardner. I don’t like that trend. Melky had a six-game hitting streak going, but it was snapped yesterday. He’s hitting .256/.319/.372 in July and was 2-for-10 with no walks or extra base hits against the Tigers over the weekend. Then again, Gardner is hitting .219/.265/.281 with just two walks and one extra-base hit on the month. Both players have taken advantage of slumps by the other this season. There’s no telling who will step up now, but Gardner needs to play to have a chance.

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Since their sweep at the hands of the Angels to close the first half, a lot has been made of the Yankees’ struggles this year against potential playoff teams (0-8 vs. Boston, 2-4 vs. Angels, 1-2 vs. Phillies). The exception to that trend is the Detroit Tigers, who dropped two of three to the Yankees in Detroit back in late April. The Tigers have been atop the AL Central since May 10, but, tellingly, can be stung by the same criticism given their 2-7 record against the Red Sox, Yankees, and NL Central leading Cardinals.

The Tigers are a good team, but they’re not a great one. Their offense has been average, their bullpen unexceptional, and their rotation top heavy. That last is the primary reason they’ve lorded over the Central thus far this season. Despite a rough start, 26-year-old Justin Verlander is having his finest major league season having gone 10-2 with a 2.22 ERA dating back to his confrontation with the Yankees and CC Sabathia in late April. Behind him, 25-year-old Edwin Jackson is finally delivering on his prospect promise in his seventh (!) major league season, dropping his walk rate to 2.6 BB/9 and going 8-4 with a 2.26 ERA and 11 quality starts in 12 turns since May 9. Twenty-year-old rookie and Morristown, New Jersey native Rick Porcello has been solid behind those two, but Venezuelan sophomore Armando Galarraga has been inconsistent, and the fifth spot remains unclaimed.

Coming out of the break, the Yankees have the ill fortune to catch both Verlander, who will rematch with CC Sabathia tomorrow, and Jackson, who will face Joba Chamberlain on Sunday. That makes tonight’s game against 23-year-old rookie lefty Lucas French, who is making just his third big-league start, the key to the series for the Yankees. An eighth-round draft pick out of high school in 2004, French seemed to make a leap upon reaching Triple-A this year, posting his best ERA, strikeout, and walk rates since rookie ball. French made two scoreless relief appearances for the big club in mid-May and was recalled at the beginning of July to take over the fifth spot in the rotation. After a short, but solid start against the Twins, he beat Zack Greinke and the Royals his last time out by limiting Kansas City a solo homer and five other harmless hits in six innings. That was impressive, but facing the Yankees in the new Yankee Stadium will be a much better test.

The offense behind French has a slightly different look than it had when the Yankees were in Detroit in April. Most notably, a .260/.330/.343 performance has cost 2007 batting champion Magglio Ordoñez the bulk of his playing time. He’s now the short side of a right-field platoon with 25-year-old sophomore Clete Thomas (.265/.339/.500 against major league righties this year). Similarly, Josh Anderson’s glove has proven unable to sustain his bat in left field, resulting in increased playing time for backup Ryan Raburn (.269/.346/.496 on the season). The eternally fragile Carlos Guillen is back on the DL and has yielded his DH spot to power-hitting ex-Yankee Marcus Thames, who hit .344 with four homers in his last eight games before the break. Meanwhile, three pillars of the offense this year have been Miguel Cabrera (of course), Curtis Granderson (still struggling against lefties at .194/.282/.291, but plenty dangerous against righties), and, much to my amazement, Brandon Inge, who has never posted an OPS over .780 before but is having a career year at age 32, hitting .268/.360/.515 with 21 homers and 58 RBIs (against career highs of 27 and 83, both from 2006).

A.J. Burnett will reopen the second half against the dangerous version of Granderson tonight hoping to keep his pre-break hot streak alive. A.J. has posted a 1.34 ERA over his last five starts, all of which lasted at least 19 outs. The Yankee offense behind him has Hideki Matsui batting fifth followed by Jorge Posada, Robinson Cano, Nick Swisher, and center fielder Melky Cabrera.

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Coming into the season, I didn’t think the Angels had the offense to leave their division in the dust the way they did last year when they greatly overachieved relative to their run differential. Thus far, however, the offense has been there, but the pitching hasn’t, and poor team defense (hello Bobby Abreu) isn’t helping. Or so it would appear.

Only two Angels starters have made their full slate of starts this year. Of those two, Jered Weaver, who starts Saturday’s game on FOX, has been excellent, but Joe Sanders, who starts tonight, has been no better than average, adding a run to his ERA of a year ago, seeing his walks and strikeouts converge, and allowing a league-leading 20 homers in just 17 starts.

After starting the season on the DL, John Lackey, who starts Sunday, has gone 3-4 with a 5.18 ERA in 11 starts. His poor performance can be traced to a .353 opponents’ average on balls in play, which would seem to be attributable to that poor team defense. Ervin Santana has been on and off the DL all year and has a dismal 1-5 record to go with his alarming 7.81 ERA. Again, one looks to the defense as Santana sports an absurd .385 BABIP.

So who are the culprits in the field? That’s hard to figure. Going position-by-position, the Angels are rarely more than a tick below average anywhere on the field. Torii Hunter’s not as good as he used to be, but Bobby Abreu’s not nearly as bad as he was for the Yankees last year. Juan Rivera, another former Yankee, who has rebounded from nearly two seasons lost to a broken leg with a strong showing at the plate, has actually been a significant plus in the pastures. The middle infield grades out to about average, and better than that when Howie Kendrick plays, and the corners have been solid.

Gary Matthews Jr. has been awful on both sides of the ball, but most of his playing time came in the outifeld before Lackey and Santana returned from their initial DL stays; it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which he alone could be blamed for their struggles. So maybe it’s not team defense that is the problem. Maybe Lackey and Santana are just all kinds of hittable right now. Either way, it’s bad news for the Halos, who are struggling to stay atop their division and enter this final series before the All-Star break a half-game behind the Rangers in the AL West and four-games out of the Wild Card race.

More bad news hit Anaheim today as both Hunter and Vladimir Guerrero hit the DL. Guerrero, who might be the oldest 34-year-old in baseball, is on the shelf for the second time this season. Meanwhile, Hunter’s replacement in center will be none other than Matthews, the team’s $50 million mistake.

Tonight the Yankees face lefty Joe Saunders, who has allowed 14 runs in nine innings over his last two starts. Saunders has really been hit or miss all season, with his two worst starts coming against the Rangers in Arlington (seven of the 20 home runs he’s allowed came in those two starts). At home, he’s posted a 3.43 ERA, though he was touched up by the Orioles at home his last time out. In addition to the Rangers, Saunders has been particularly susceptible to right-handed hitters, who are slugging .505 against him. That’s good news for the heart of the Yankee order.

He’ll face Joba Chamberlain, who got an ego check his last time out when he allowed eight runs in 3 2/3 innings. Joba’s been a bit obstinate about his performances thus far this season, often giving too much credit to the opposing lineup as well as to his own ability to make good pitches, when in reality he’s been inefficient, nibbly, and his velocity has lacked consistency. He’s still been valuable, but his lack of progress is becoming disturbing. Part of me almost wants him to get his ass handed to him tonight so he has to ugly outings staring him in the face through the All-Star break. The hope being that might put a crack in some of his delusions.

Mark Melancon rejoins the bullpen tonight with Jonathan Albaladejo getting optioned out despite his fine work in yesterday’s game. Derek Jeter gets a half-day off at DH with Cody Ransom, who drove in a pair of runs yesterday, playing shortstop against the lefty Saunders. Nick Swisher bats fifth ahead of Robinson Cano. Melky’s in center, and Jose Molina makes his first appearance since being activated, catching Chamberlain and giving us a chance to see just how much Francisco Cervelli and Ramiro Peña really are going to be missed in the short term.

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The Twins in a nutshell: average offense, average rotation, excellent defense and bullpen.

The offense is three-tiered, with the MVP-quality performances of Joe Mauer (.389/.465/.648) and Justin Morneau (.323/.399/.601, 21 homers, 69 RBIs) on top, the similarly alliterative Jason Kubel, Michael Cuddyer, Joe Crede, and, uhm, Denard Span at or above league average in the middle, and the punchless skill positions of shortstop, second base, and center field (currently occupied by Brendan Harris, Nick Punto, and Carlos Gomez, respectively) dragging things down from below.

The manner in which the Twins are punting offense at those three skill positions is a throwback to the days when teams couldn’t really expect to get much production from their middle infielders, which is to say, it’s outdated and inappropriate to competing in the DH league in 2009. The Twins are at least getting elite defense from Gomez in center and Punto at second base, but Harris is a complete dud on both sides of the ball, which underlines just how poorly Alexi Casilla (.180/.242/.225 and since demoted to the minors) and Matt Tolbert (.184/.275/.232 and benched) had to perform in order for Harris to make his way back into the lineup.

The presence of Harris in the lineup while Delmon Young rides pine behind Cuddyer, Kubel, Span, and Gomez underlines just how much the Matt Garza trade has blown up in the Twins’ faces. Young has now hit .285/.326/.392 in 204 games as a Twin and is well south of that overall mark this season. Meanwhile, Rays shortstop Jason Bartlett is headed to the All-Star Game on the strength of two and a half flukey months of hot hitting. Bartlett’s bat will come back to earth, but his glove will continue to outshine Harris’s. Meanwhile, Matt Garza helped the Rays reach the World Series last year as the ALCS MVP.

The Twins aren’t hurting for starting pitching. Their rotation of Scott Baker, Kevin Slowey, Nick Blackburn, Francisco Liriano, and Glen Perkins is comprised entirely of home grown pitchers 27-years-old or younger and includes two lefties (Liriano and Perkins). They have so much home-grown pitching that even their injury replacements come from the farm, as is the case with 23-year-old Anthony Swarzak, who will start for the injured Slowey on Thursday. Still, Garza was likely the best of their bunch given Liriano’s disappointing post-Tommy John performance, and while they tried to deal from that strength to correct a weakness, all they managed to do was create an additional weakness at shortstop. Young is just 23, leaving open the possibility of significant improvement, but he’s heading in the wrong direction for the Twins to hope for a way to salvage that trade.

The Johan Santana trade isn’t looking much better, though that comes as less of a surprise given the lack of bargaining power the Twins had and their rejection of superior offers from the Yankees and Red Sox. Like Young, Gomez is just 23, but he’s never shown any ability to hit in the majors. Most agreed that the Mets rushed him in 2007 due to injury-created need and that the Twins needed to give him more development time in the minors, but Gomez hasn’t spent a day in the minors since joining the organization. He might be the best defensive center fielder in baseball, but that doesn’t make up for his .250/.293/.353 line in 225 games as a Twin.

As for the three minor league right-handers included in that deal, Phil Humber was designated for assignment earlier this year, Kevin Mulvey has been solid but ordinary as a 24-year-old righty in Triple-A this year (4.17 ERA) and is trapped behind the aforementioned home grown starters, and Deolis Guerra has yet to impress in his third full-season in the Florida State League (though he is just 20).

The Yankees swept the Twins in a memorable four-game series in the Bronx in mid-May. The first three wins were all walkoffs, two of them coming in extra-innings. The difference in the entire series was five runs. Since then, the Twins have dropped two of the losing pitchers, letting the A’s claim lefty Craig Breslow off waivers and demoting Jesse Crain to Triple-A. You can bet the Twins remember that series all too well and will come out with some extra fire for this week’s three-game set in the Homer Dome.

Things kick off tonight with a battle of aces. Scott Baker doesn’t lead the twins in any major pitching category, but his 1.41 WHIP and 4.11 K/9 add up to make the 27-year-old righty their best starter despite his 4.99 ERA and .500 record. Indeed, Baker fell one inning short of his sixth-straight quality start in his last outing, but still held the Royals to one run over five inefficient frames. Over those last six starts, Baker is 4-0 with a 3.20 ERA, a 0.97 WHIP, and a 4.38 K/BB. Much to my surprise, Baker hasn’t faced the Yankees since 2006, when he beat them twice.

CC Sabathia takes the hill for the Yankees. CC’s coming off a disappointing outing in which he couldn’t locate his pitches yet still struck out eight Mariners in 5 2/3 innings. Two starts prior to that, he was pulled in the second inning due to tightness in his bicep. Otherwise, he lasted a minimum of seven innings in each of his other nine starts since May 8, going 6-1 with a 2.75 ERA in those outings and only passing 113 pitches once (tellingly in the one loss).

Francisco Cervelli catches CC yet again tonight. Brett Gardner roams center. Hideki Matsui hits fifth behind Alex Rodriguez with Nick Swisher batting sixth and Robinson Cano dropping to seventh ahead of Gardner and Cervelli.

Finally, this series marks the Yankees last trip to the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome barring an only moderately unlikely postseason matchup. Good ridance, I say. I’m happy to have the place confined to my 1987 World Series box set, bringing us one step closer to the end of Astroturf and indoor stadiums in baseball.

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I said my piece on the Blue Jays’ hot start on SI.com when the Yankees were in Toronto in mid-May, so let’s see how things have changed since then.

Entering their series with the Yankees on May 12, the Blue Jays were 22-12 (.647), the best record in the American League at the time. Since then, they’ve gone 20-26 (.435) and fallen back to their expected place as the fourth-best team in the AL East.

At the time, I pointed to the unexpected health of the Jays’ starting nine as one reason for their early-season success, saying “Injury seems sure to strike the offense at some point, and several of the team’s batting averages, including [Aaron] Hill’s .346, catcher Rod Barajas’ .307 and platoon left fielder/utilityman Jose Bautista’s .311 seem sure to regress.”

The starting nine has stayed healthy, but Hill has lost 45 points off his average, Barajas has shed 40 points, and Bautista has lost 57. Hill was the Jays’ best hitter in the early going, but since going 2-for-4 with a homer in the first game against the Yankees on May 12, he’s hit just .255/.294/.452. Barajas has hit .228/.267/.378 since the start of the Yankees series; Bautista .191/.353/.309.

Scott Rolen, on the other hand, is hitting like he did before his shoulder problems derailed his path to the Hall of Fame. Rolen went 6-for-11 with three doubles against the Yankees and has hit .341/.405/.508 since, though with just six homers on the season. Accordingly, Cito Gaston has moved him back to the cleanup spot after having demoted him from that spot upon taking over for John Gibbons last June. Adam Lind and Lyle Overbay have also maintained their hot starts, the latter by virtue of not having to face left-handed pitching thanks to the presence of platoon partner and Yankee killer Kevin Millar. Marco Scutaro has come back to earth a bit, but has hit a still-respectable (for a fine fielding shortstop) .290/.364/.403 since the Yankee series and still leads the league in walks (though Nick Swisher is in hot pursuit).

On the flip side, Alex Rios and rookie slugger Travis Snider weren’t hitting in mid-May, and they’re still not. Rios, another Yankee killer, still managed to go 4-for-10 with a double and a homer against the Yankees in May, but has hit just .256/.311/.421 since. Snider was demoted to Triple-A then aggravated an old back injury and has since been replaced by former Yankee David Dellucci, who was released by the Indians at the end of May and signed a minor league deal with the Tribe. Dellucci was just called up this morning.

As for the pitching, I raised red flags about the unsustainably low opponents’ batting averages on balls in play being recorded by starters Scott Richmond and Brian Tallet, and relievers Jason Frasor, Jesse Carlson, and Bill Murphy. Richmond, who starts Sunday, was bounced by Yankees in the second inning on May 13, but rebounded with seven shutout innings against the White Sox and has posted a 3.18 since his Yankee disaster. His season BABIP has actually dropped a point over that stretch. Similarly, Tallet, who starts this afternoon, has been solid with a 4.30 ERA over his last nine starts while his BABIP has also shifted just one point (up to .228).

The rotation suffered from Roy Halladay’s DL stay, but Halladay is back and will pitch on Saturday, still leading the majors with ten wins. Meanwhile, the return of former first-round pick Ricky Romero has further solidified the rotation. Romero will bring a 20-inning scoreless streak into Monday’s game and has posted a 1.91 ERA in six starts since the calendar flipped to June.

As for those relievers, Frasor’s BABIP has increased by 54 points, but that hasn’t hurt his bottom line much. Carlson’s BABIP has increased 85 points, as has shown up in his performance as he’s posted a 7.32 ERA since the start of the Yankee series. Murphy was optioned to Triple-A right after the Yankees left town.

The man Murphy made room for was B.J. Ryan, who has posted a 3.14 ERA since coming off the DL, but with more walks than strikeouts and without a single save opportunity. Those opportunities were going to Scott Downs, but he’s replaced Ryan on the DL, leaving the closing duties to Frasor and his tight-rope act and 2007 closer Jeremy Accardo, who started the year in Triple-A after a forearm injury ended his 2008 campaign prematurely.

All of that adds up to . . . well, the fourth-best team in the AL East, just like everyone thought.

A.J. Burnett faces Tallet today in the first game of an unusual, wrap-around, Independence Day weekend series in which all four games will start at 1:05pm. Burnett gave up five runs in 7 2/3 innings to his former team on May 12, but has been nails in his last three starts posting this line: 20 1/3 IP, 10 H, 2 R (1 ER), 10 BB, 26 K, 0.98 WHIP, 0.44 ERA. Amazingly, A.J. lost one of those three starts, having matched up against the ace of his other former team, Josh Johnson of the Marlins.

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Seattle Mariners

2009 Record: 39-36 (.520)
2009 Pythagorean Record: 36-39 (.480)

2008 Record: 61-101 (.377)
2008 Pythagorean Record: 67-95 (.414)

Manager: Don Wakamatsu
General Manager: Jack Zduriencik

Home Ballpark (Park Factors): Safeco Field (96/97)

Who’s Replacing Whom:

• Russell Branyan replaces Raul Ibañez
• Ken Griffey Jr. replaces Richie Sexson and Jose Vidro
• Franklin Gutierrez replaces Jeremy Reed and Willie Bloomquist
• Rob Johnson (minors) replaces Jeff Clement (minors)
• Chris Woodward is filling in for Adrian Beltre (DL)
• Ronny Cedeño is filling in for Yuniesky Betancourt (DL)
• Mike Sweeney replaces Bryan LaHair (minors)
• Josh Wilson replaces Miguel Cairo
• Mike Carp replaces Willie Bloomquist
• Ryan Langerhans replaces Brad Wilkerson and others
• Garrett Olson is filling in for Erik Bedard (DL)
• Jason Vargas is filling in for Carlos Silva (DL)
• Brandon Morrow is taking over the starts of Ryan Feierabend (DL) and R.A. Dickey
• David Aardsma replaces J.J. Putz
• Sean White replaces Sean Green
• Chris Jakubauskas replaces Rowland-Smith’s relief innings

25-man Roster:

1B – Russell Branyan (L)
2B – Jose Lopez (R)
SS – Ronny Cedeño (R)
3B – Chris Woodward (R)
C – Kenji Johjima (R)
RF – Ichiro Suzuki (L)
CF – Franklin Gutierrez (R)
LF – Wladimir Balentien (R)
DH – Ken Griffey Jr. (L)

Bench:

R – Mike Sweeney (1B)
R – Josh Wilson (IF)
L – Mike Carp (1B/OF)
L – Ryan Langerhans (OF)
R – Rob Johnson (C)

Rotation:

R – Felix Hernandez
L – Garrett Olson
R – Brandon Morrow
L – Jarrod Washburn
L – Jason Vargas

Bullpen:

R – David Aardsma
R – Mark Lowe
R – Miguel Batista
R – Sean White
R – Chris Jakubauskas
R – Roy Corcoran

15-day DL: 3B – Adrian Beltre (bone spurs in shoulder), SS – Yuniesky Betancourt (hamstring), LHP – Erik Bedard (shoulder inflammation), RHP – Shawn Kelley (oblique strain)

60-day DL: LF – Endy Chavez (ACL), RHP – Carlos Silva (labrum, rotator cuff), LHP Cesar Jimenez (shoulder and biceps tendonitis), LHP – Ryan Feierabend (TJ)

Typical Lineup:

L – Ichiro Suzuki (RF)
L – Russell Branyan (1B)
L – Ken Griffey Jr. (DH)
R – Jose Lopez (2B)
R – Franklin Gutierrez (CF)
R – Kenji Johjima (C)
R – Wladimir Balentein (LF)
R – Ronny Cedeño (SS)
R – Chris Woodward (3B)

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The Yankees were lucky to take two of three from the Mets two weekends ago. Literally. Only Luis Castillo dropping a pop up in the first game—one of the flukiest plays I’ve ever seen giving the fact that it turned the last out of a Mets win into the last play of a Yankee win in the course of the ball falling six feet to the ground—prevented the Mets from winning that series.

Since then, the Mets have gone 5-5 and added Carlos Beltran to their list of key players on the DL (along with Jose Reyes, Carlos Delgado, John Maine, Oliver Perez and J.J. Putz). That means more major league exposure for 20-year-old top prospect Fernando Martinez, who enters the series on an 0-for-14 bender and is hitting .167 on the season. It ain’t pretty, but it should make Mets fans appreciate the .336/.425/.527 line Beltran put up before hitting the DL.

Tonight the Mets send 25-year-old sophomore groundballer Mike Pelfrey to the hill tonight. Pelfrey had a great run of seven starts from late April through the end of May in which he posted a 2.96 ERA while the Mets went 6-1, but he’s been unimpressive since, even tossing out his stinker against the Pirates on June 4.

The Yankees counter with CC Sabathai, who left his last start in the second inning with discomfort in his left bicep, but has reported no further problems since. The injury interrupted a streak of eight-straight games in which he completed seven innings. Sabathia was 6-1 with a 2.92 ERA over that stretch. The Yankees noticed Sabathia was hurting his last time out because he wasn’t finishing his pitches and was leaving everything up. Look out for that in the early going today.

Melky Cabrera, who missed yesterday’s game with the flu, is in right field tonight as Nick Swisher takes a seat. Brett Gardner, who has hit .342/.432/.513 since May 13, seems to be winning the center field job back. Francisco Cervelli, who hit his first major league homer on Wednesday night, will catch Sabathia for the seventh time this season.

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Atlanta Braves

2009 Record: 33-36 (.478)
2009 Pythagorean Record: 33-36 (.478)

2008 Record: 72-90 (.444)
2008 Pythagorean Record: 79-83 (.488)

Manager: Bobby Cox
General Manager: Frank Wren

Home Ballpark (Park Factors): Turner Field (99/99)

Who’s Replacing Whom:

• Casey Kotchman replaces Mark Teixeira
• Nate McLouth replaces Mark Kotsay
• Garret Anderson replaces most of Gregor Blanco (bench)
• Matt Diaz reclaims playing time from Josh Anderson
• Diory Hernandez is filling in for Omar Infante (DL)
• David Ross replaces Corky Miller, Clint Sammons (minors), and Brayan Peña
• Derek Lowe replaces Tom Glavine and Mike Hampton
• Javier Vazquez replaces Tim Hudson (DL) and Chuck James
• Kenshin Kawakami replaces Jorge Campillo (DL) and James Parr (minors)
• Tommy Hanson replaces Jo-Jo Reyes (DL) and John Smoltz
• Eric O’Flaherty replaces Will Ohman
• Mike Gonzalez reclaims his innings from Vladimir Nuñez
• Rafael Soriano reclaims his innings from Julian Tavarez and Jorge Julio
• Peter Moylan reclaims his innings from Blaine Boyer
• Kris Medlen is filling in for Buddy Carlyle (DL)

25-man Roster:

1B – Casey Kotchman (L)
2B – Kelly Johnson (L)
SS – Yunel Escobar (R)
3B – Chipper Jones (S)
C – Brian McCann (L)
RF – Jeff Francoeur (R)
CF – Nate McLouth (L)
LF – Garret Anderson (L)

Bench:

R – Matt Diaz (LF)
R – Martin Prado (UT)
L – Gregor Blanco (CF)
R -Diory Hernandez (IF)
R – David Ross (C)

Rotation:

R – Derek Lowe
R – Jair Jurrjens
R – Javier Vazquez
R – Tommy Hanson
R – Kenshin Kawakami

Bullpen:

L – Mike Gonzalez
R – Rafael Soriano
R – Jeff Bennett
L – Eric O’Flaherty
R – Peter Moylan
R – Manny Acosta
R – Kris Medlen

15-day DL: PH – Greg Norton (hamstring), UT – Omar Infante (broken hand), LHP – Jo-Jo Reyes (hamstring), RHP – Buddy Carlyle (upper back strain/Type-1 diabetes)

60-day DL: RHP – Tim Hudson (TJ), RHP – Jorge Campillo (shoulder tendonitis)

Typical Lineup:

L – Nate McLouth (CF)
R – Yunel Escobar (SS)
S – Chipper Jones (3B)
L – Brian McCann (C)
L – Garret Anderson (LF)
L – Casey Kotchman (1B)
R – Jeff Francoeur (RF)
L – Kelly Johnson (2B)

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Florida Marlins

2009 Record: 33-35 (.485)
2009 Pythagorean Record: 31-37 (.456)

2008 Record: 84-77 (.522)
2008 Pythagorean Record: 81-80 (.503)

Manager: Fredi Gonzalez
General Manager: Michael Hill

Home Ballpark (Park Factors): Dolphin Stadium (99/99)

Who’s Replacing Whom:

• Emilio Bonifacio replaces Mike Jacobs
• Chris Coughlan replaces Josh Willingham
• Ross Gload and Brett Carroll replace Luis Gonzalez
• Ronny Paulino replaces Matt Treanor
• Alejandro De Aza is filling in for Alfredo Amezaga (DL)
• Josh Johnson and Chris Volstad inherit the starts of Scott Olsen
• Sean West is filling in for Anibal Sanchez (DL), who inherits the starts of Mark Hendrickson
• Leo Nuñez replaces Kevin Gregg
• Dan Meyer, Kiko Calero, and Brian Sanches replace Doug Waechter, Joe Nelson, and Logan Kensing
• Cristhian Martinez is filling in for Renyel Pinto (DL)

25-man Roster:

1B – Jorge Cantu (R)
2B – Dan Uggla (R)
SS – Hanley Ramirez (R)
3B – Emilio Bonifacio (S)
C – John Baker (L)
RF – Jeremy Hermida (L)
CF – Cody Ross (R)
LF – Chris Coughlan (L)

Bench:

L – Ross Gload (1B)
R – Wes Helms (3B)
L – Alejadro De Aza (OF)
R – Ronny Paulino (C)
R – Brett Carroll (OF)

Rotation:

R – Josh Johnson
R – Chris Volstad
L – Andrew Miller
R – Ricky Nolasco
L – Sean West

Bullpen:

R – Matthew Lindstrom
R – Leo Nuñez
L – Dan Meyer
R – Kiko Calero
R – Burke Badenhop
R – Brian Sanches
R – Cristhian Martinez

15-day DL: CF/UT – Alfredo Amezaga (knee contusion); RHP – Anibal Sanchez (shoulder sprain), LHP Renyel Pinto (elbow inflammation)

60-day DL: RHP – Scott Proctor (Joe Torre surgery), LHP – Dave Davidson (shoulder)

Typical Lineup:

L – Chris Coghlan (LF)
S – Emilio Bonifacio (3B)
R – Hanley Ramirez (SS)
R – Jorge Cantu (1B)
L – Jeremy Hermida (RF)
R – Dan Uggla (2B)
L – John Baker (C)
R – Cody Ross (CF)

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Washington Nationals

2009 Record: 16-45 (.262)
2009 Pythagorean Record: 23-38 (.377)

2008 Record: 59-102 (.366)
2008 Pythagorean Record: 62-99 (.385)

Manager: Manny Acta (for now)
General Manager: Mike Rizzo (acting GM)

Home Ballpark (Park Factors): Nationals Park (101/102)

Who’s Replacing Whom:

• Adam Dunn replaces Lastings Milledge (minors)
• Corey Patterson is filling in for Josh Willingham (bereavement list), who replaces Wily Mo Peña
• Nick Johnson reclaims his playing time from Aaron Boone
• Josh Bard is filling in for Jesus Flores (DL)
• Anderson Hernandez replaces Felipe Lopez
• Alberto Gonzalez replaces Emilio Bonifacio
• Jordan Zimmermann replcaes Tim Redding
• Shairon Martis replaces Odalis Perez
• Ross Detwiler replaces Shawn Hill and Collin Balester (minors)
• Craig Stammen is filling in for Scott Olsen (DL), who replaces Jason Bergmann (minors) and Matt Chico (DL)
• Joe Beimel, Ron Villone, Kip Wells, Julian Tavarez, and Mike MacDougal replace Jon Rauch, Luis Ayala, Saul Rivera (minors), Garrett Mock (minors), Steven Shell, and Charlie Manning

25-man Roster:

1B – Nick Johnson (L)
2B – Anderson Hernandez (S)
SS – Cristian Guzman (S)
3B – Ryan Zimmerman (R)
C – Josh Bard (S)
RF – Austin Kearns (R)
CF – Elijah Dukes (R)
LF – Adam Dunn (L)

Bench:

L – Willie Harris (UT)
R – Ron Belliard (IF)
R – Alberto Gonzalez (IF)
R – Wil Nieves (C)
L – Corey Patterson (OF)

Rotation:

L – John Lannan
R – Craig Stammen
R – Jordan Zimmermann
L – Ross Detwiler
R – Shairon Martis

Bullpen:

R – Joel Hanrahan
L – Joe Beimel
R – Julian Tavarez
L – Ron Villone
R – Jesus Colome
R – Kip Wells
R – Mike MacDougal

Bereavement List: OF – Josh Willingham (R)

15-day DL:

LHP – Scott Olsen (shoulder tendonitis)
RHP – Kip Wells (strained adductor)
C – Jesus Flores (fractured shoulder)
1B – Dmitri Young (back)
OF – Rogearvin Bernadina (broken ankle)

60-day DL:

LHP – Matt Chico (elbow soreness)
RHP – Terrell Young (shoulder inflammation)

Typical Lineup:

S – Cristian Guzman (SS)
L – Nick Johnson (1B)
R – Ryan Zimmerman (3B)
L – Adam Dunn (LF)
R – Elijah Dukes (CF)
R – Austin Kearns (RF)
S – Josh Bard (C)
S – Anderson Hernandez (2B)

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New York Mets

2009 Record: 31-27 (.534)
2009 Pythagorean Record: 31-27 (.534)

2008 Record: 89-73 (.549)
2008 Pythagorean Record: 89-73 (.549)

Manager: Jerry Manuel
General Manager: Omar Minaya

Home Ballpark (Park Factors): CitiField (100/99)

Who’s Replacing Whom:

• Fernando Martinez is filling in for Carlos Delgado (DL)
• Alex Cora is filling in for Jose Reyes (DL)
• Wilson Valdez is filling in for Alex Cora, who actually replaces Damion Easley
• Omir Santos replaces Ramon Castro
• Dan Murphy replaces Endy Chavez
• Gary Sheffield replaces Marlon Anderson
• Jeremy Reed replaces Nick Evans (minors)
• Tim Redding is filling in for Oliver Perez (DL)
• Fernando Nieve is filling in for John Maine (DL)
• Livan Hernandez replaces Pedro Martinez
• Francisco Rodriguez replaces Billy Wagner (DL)
• Robert Parnell replaces Joe Smith
• Sean Green replaces Duaner Sanchez
• Ken Takashi replaces Scott Schoeneweis
• Jon Switzer is filling in for J.J. Putz, who replaces Aaron Heilman

25-man Roster:

1B – Dan Murphy (L)
2B – Luis Castilla (S)
SS – Alex Cora (L)
3B – David Wright (R)
C – Omir Santos (R)
RF – Ryan Church (L)
CF – Carlos Beltran (S)
RF – Fernando Martinez (L)

Bench:

R – Gary Sheffield (OF)
R – Fernando Tatis (UT)
L – Brian Schneider (C)
L – Jeremy Reed (OF)
L – Wilson Valdez (IF)

Rotation:

L – Johan Santana
R – Mike Pelfrey
R – Tim Redding
R – Livan Hernandez
R – Fernando Nieve

Bullpen:

R – Francisco Rodriguez
L – Pedro Feliciano
R – Robert Parnell
R – Sean Green
R – Brian Stokes
L – Ken Takahashi
L – Jon Switzer

15-day DL:

SS – Jose Reyes (hamstring)
OF – Angel Pagan (groin)
IF – Ramon Martinez (dislocated finger)
RHP – John Maine (shoulder fatigue)
LHP – Oliver Perez (patellar tendonitis)
RHP – J.J. Putz (bone spur in elbow)

60-day DL:

1B – Carlos Delgado (torn hip labrum)
LHP – Billy Wagner (TJ)

Typical Lineup:

L – Alex Cora (SS)
S – Luis Castillo (2B)
S – Carlos Beltran (CF)
R – David Wright (3B)
L – Dan Murphy (1B)
L – Ryan Church (RF)
L – Fernando Martinez (LF)
R – Omir Santos (C)

Notes: Fernando Tatis is platooning with Murphy at first base. Santos and Brian Schneider are splitting the catching duties. Gary Sheffield has been spelling Martinez and Church in the outfield corners, but will more likely DH for all three games at Yankee Stadium.

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The Yankees look to reboot their season series with the Red Sox with three games in Boston starting tonight. They’re 0-5 against the Bosox entering the series, but hold a one-game lead over Boston in the American League East and have played their best baseball in the month since the two team’s last met. Dig:

April 6 to May 7

Red Sox 18-11 (.621)
Yankees 13-15 (.464)

May 8 to June 8

Yankees 21-8 (.724)
Red Sox 15-13 (.536)

Take out their five head-to-head games, and the Yankees outplayed the Sox against neutral opponents during the season’s first month as well (13-10 to 13-11). Having taken series from all of the league’s other winning teams (the Rays, Jays, Rangers, Tigers, and Angels), all the Yankees have left to prove in the first half of this season is that they can beat the Red Sox head-to-head.

Not that it is likely to matter in the short run. As I wrote in my initial Red Sox preview in April, since the implementation of the unbalanced schedule in 2001, the season series between these two teams hasn’t put one team in the playoffs while keeping the other out, and all signs point to both making it to the postseason again this year. Still, bragging rights are fun, and despite the Yankees’ dominance of the league over the past month, the Red Sox still hold them.

The big news in Boston is that David Ortiz seems to have gone from hero to zero for realsies, forcing Terry Francona to drop him to sixth in the order. Ortiz actually enters this series on a six-game hitting streak and hit his second homer of the year on Saturday, but he’s still hitting just .197/.288/.308 on the season. I had figured Ortiz for a quick decline following his wrist injury last year, but I never thought he’d just vanish like this, which probably means he’ll pull out of it. Just look at Jason Varitek. The Red Sox’s catcher looked washed up last year when he hit .220/.313/.359 at age 36, but he has rebounded this year, hitting a solid .247/.337/.519 with ten homers.

Despite Ortiz’s vanishing act, what the Sox have done well this season is hit (fourth in the majors in runs scored per game) and pitch out of the bullpen (major league best 2.76 pen ERA). What they have not done well is field (second-worst defensive efficiency in the AL) and start games (fifth-worst starters ERA in baseball at 5.02).

Tonight’s starter, Josh Beckett, leads the Sox rotation with a 4.09 ERA and is the only Boston start to have an ERA below league average. Beckett had a terrible April, including allowing eight runs in five innings to the Yankees at Fenway on April 25, but he’s been awesome in May, going 4-0 with a 1.94 ERA in six starts and posting a 0.40 ERA across 22 2/3 innings over his last three starts.

A.J. Burnett, who helped turned that April Beckett blow-up into a Red Sox win by also allowing eight runs in five innings, again starts against his former Marlins rotationmate. In his six starts from that first match-up against Beckett through his return to Toronto on May 12, Burnett went 0-2 with a 6.34 ERA, but he rebounded nicely in his last two starts, both wins over Texas. In those two games, he posted a combined line of 13 IP, 11 H, 3 R, 1 HR, 5 BB, 15 K. Some more of that would help get the Yankees’ reboot off this series off on the right foot.

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Coming off their World Series appearance last year, the Rays were expected to be one of the best teams in baseball yet again in 2009, but two months into the season, they have yet to be a factor in the AL East race. It’s not for lack of trying. The Rays have the second-best Pythagorean record in all of baseball (behind the Dodgers). They are second only to the Yankees with 5.57 runs scored per game, and have been better than average at keeping runs off the board, ranking sixth in the AL in least runs allowed per game.

What’s gone wrong is some bad luck in one-run games (they’re 6-11 in such contests), and some bad luck in April. Since the beginning of May, the Rays gone 19-14, winning at a .576 clip. That despite the litany of other things that have gone wrong for them.

Expected to be a boon to the offense, designated hitter Pat Burrell landed on the DL in early May with a neck problem having hit just one home run and slugged .315 to that point. Second baseman Akinori Iwamura was lost for the season two weeks ago after tearing his anterior and medial collateral ligaments on a collision at the keystone. Slick-fielding shortstop Jason Bartlett was off to a fluky start, hitting .373/.418/.596, but he sprained his ankle in the same game, landing on the DL.

The Rays new and improved right-field platoon of lefty Matt Joyce, acquired from the Tigers in the offseason, and righty Fernando Perez never got off the ground when Perez dislocated his wrist in spring training, ending his season. The Rays then inexplicably kept Joyce in Triple-A for most of the first two months of the season while persisting with the unexceptional Gabe Gross (.256/.362/.400) as the strong side of that platoon.

The Rays have finally called up Joyce, who hit .315/.408/.530 for Durham, as well as his Triple-A teammate David Price, who was supposed to fill the rotation spot vacated by the man the Rays traded for Joyce, Edwin Jackson. Price was kept down because of arbitration and innings limit concerns, but now that he’s here, he’s replacing the injured Scott Kazmir (quad), not Jackson or Jackson’s early-season replacement, rookie Jeff Niemann. Then again, maybe that’s just as well. Kazmir posted a 7.69 ERA before hitting the DL, and Andy Sonnanstine, who will start Monday, has posted a 7.07 mark.

As for Price, after a shaky, abbreviated first outing, he dominated the Twins for 5 2/3 innings his last time out, striking out 11 against just two walks while allowing just one run on five hits. He takes on CC Sabathia this afternoon in what should be a thrilling pitchers duel. Over his last five starts, Sabathia has gone 4-0 with a 2.08 ERA. In those five starts he’s averaged nearly eight innings per start, and held opponents to a .187/.242/.259 line.

Francisco Cervelli will continue to catch Sabathia this afternoon. Jorge Posada will DH. Evan Longoria, who leads the majors with 55 RBIs, is expected to return to the Rays lineup after missing a couple of games with a tight left hamstring.

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The Yankees and Rangers enter this week’s three game series in the Bronx separated by a half game for the best record in the American League. Since the Yankees took two of three from the Rangers in Arlington last week, both teams won three games of a four-game series against a lesser opponent. Beating up on losing teams has been the Rangers’ m.o. thus far this season, but they’re just 5-10 against teams currently over .500, including last week’s series loss to the Yankees.

The Yanks, meanwhile, are flat-out rollin’, beating all comers. Dating back to May 8, they’re 16-6 (.727) and 6-1 in series. Their one series loss came at home against the NL East-leading Phillies, but their current run also includes series wins against the then-AL best Blue Jays and still-AL best Rangers. Since May 13, the Yankees are 14-4 (.778) and have not made a single error, setting a major league record with 18-straight errorless games. Just three American League teams have turned balls in play into outs at a higher rate than the Yankees (Texas is one of them), and no team in the majors is scoring runs more often than the Bronx Bombers.

The Yankees current run began after they were swept at home in consecutive two-game series by the Red Sox and Rays. After this week’s three-game set against Texas, the Rays return to the Bronx for four games after which the Yankees travel to Boston for three. That will be the real test, of course, but by taking two of three from the Rangers now, they could enter that gauntlet with the league’s best record.

As for the Rangers, they haven’t changed much since we last saw them save for tonight’s starter, Vicente Padilla, who returns from the disabled list to reclaim his rotation spot from the now-injured Matt Harrison (sore shoulder). Padilla ran off three impressive starts (23 IP, 4 ER) before landing on the DL with a strained shoulder two weeks ago, but had a 7.42 ERA entering that stretch, so who knows what to expect from him tonight. Last year, he faced the Yankees just once, allowing four runs in six innings in Arlington in early August.

Padilla will be opposed by A.J. Burnett, who ten starts into his Yankee career looks an awful lot like the same old A.J. Burnett. He’s struck out 21 men in 18 2/3 innings across his last three starts, but also walked 12 in that span and allowed three home runs in a loss to the Phillies two starts ago. Last time out, he held Texas scoreless on three hits (and four walks) over six innings to earn the win. Here’s hoping for a repeat of that tonight.

The Indians helped open the new Yankee Stadium last month, and while their 22-run outburst in the third game of that inaugural series (most of the runs coming off Chien-Ming Wang and Anthony Claggett) is what sticks in the mind, they only managed a split of the series. In fact, the Indians had not won more than two games in a row prior to their just-completed four-game sweep of the Rays in Cleveland. When the week started, they were 17-28 and 8.5 games out of first place in the American League Central.

Things just aren’t going well for the Tribe. Travis Hafner is back on the disabled list. Grady Sizemore his hitting just .223/.313/.411 and is now DHing due to a sore right elbow that could soon land him on the DL. Since leaving the Bronx, they’ve turned over more than half of their bullpen, restocking with veteran retreads including Matt Herges, Tomo Ohka, and former Yankee Luis Vizcaino, and two fifths of their starting rotation has landed on the DL, with Anthony Reyes possibly out for the year.

Still, that sweep of the Rays was encouraging, and despite the injuries to Hafner and Sizemore and Jhonny Peralta’s power outage (.342 slugging, one homer), they’re third in the AL in runs scored per game. That’s due in large part to a tremendous comeback season from Victor Martinez (.359/.434/.557), a nice rebound by Asdrubal Cabrera (.321/.385/.439, seven steals in eight attempts), and a strong showing from right fielder Shin-Soo Choo (.289/.408/.457). They’re also benefiting from the fact that their non-stars (including Cabrera) are performing at or around league average, preventing any drains on the lineup beyond those being created by Sizemore, Hafner, and Peralta, the last of whom is at least getting on base more than a third of the time.

Their real problem has been pitching. Their starting rotation has a 5.70 ERA, better than only the Phillies’ among the thirty major league teams. Their bullpen as been a bit better, but still ranks ahead of the relief units of just four American League teams. Amazingly, Carl Pavano, who will face Phil Hughes on Sunday, is one of the three Cleveland starters who hasn’t hit the disabled list. After a rough start, Pavano has pitched well over his last six starts (5-1, 3.58 ERA), and Cliff Lee, who faces Andy Pettitte tonight, is leading the staff with a 3.04 ERA, but Fausto Carmona, who faces CC Sabathia tomorrow, is pitching like 2008 all over again (6.42 ERA, more walks than strikeouts), and the back-end of the rotation is halfway between a mystery and a horrorshow. Meanwhile, Kerry Wood is closing like Joe Borowski, converting eight of ten save opportunities, but with a scary 6.35 ERA, and the team’s sub-par defense isn’t helping matters.

Getting back to tonight’s starters. Lee is also pitching like it’s 2008, posting a 1.86 ERA with a 4.33 K/BB ratio over his last eight starts. However, he’s not getting any run support. The Indians have scored zero or one runs in five of his ten starts, are averaging 2.87 runs per game for him, and have gone just 2-8 in his starts, though one of those wins came at Yankee Stadium in the only game this season in which Lee has received more than five runs of support. The Yankees, meanwhile, are 7-2 in Andy Pettitte’s stars despite his comparitively inflated 4.30 ERA. Over his last five starts, Pettitte has compiled a 5.46 ERA, but the Yanks and their AL-leading offense have still gone 4-1 in those games and scored six runs in the one they lost.

Meanwhile, Jorge Posada’s back, catching, and batting sixth, making the league’s best offense that much better. Kevin Cash is in Scranton. Brett Gardner is in center for the still achy Melky Cabrera, and the bottom third of the order is now Hideki Matsui, Nick Swisher, and Gardner. Not bad at all.

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I picked the Phillies to repeat as National League champions this year because of their devastating lineup, the presence of Cole Hamels, and the weakness of their competition in the NL. Despite slow starts from Hamels and Rollins, the Phillies enter this weekend’s series against the Yankees in first place in the NL East, in large part thanks to the strength of their offense and the weakness of their competition.

The Phillies have scored 5.74 runs per game this season, tops in the majors and comfortably ahead of the second-place Yankees (5.66 R/G). They’ve done that despite the fact that Rollins was hitting just .195/.231/.268 with one stolen base on May 11. Since then, Rollins has hit .341/396/.500 and stolen four bases, and the Phillies have gone 7-3 while scoring an even six runs per game.

With Rollins having returned to form, the top two-thirds of the Phillies lineup is indeed devastating. Behind Rollins lurks Chase Utley (.295/.432/.597), Raul Ibañez (free from pitcher-friendly Safeco, he’s leading the majors in homers, total bases and slugging, and the NL in RBIs and OPS), and Ryan Howard. Behind them is my preseason breakout pick Jayson Werth, who is living up to my expectations by hitting .272/.371/.500 and leading the team with eight stolen bases in nine attempts (including a recent successful steal of home). Only then do you get to switch-hitter Shane Victorino.

Yes the bottom third is weak, it is a National League lineup after all, but playing in an American League park, as the Phils will be doing this weekend in the Bronx, they can slot in ace lefty pinch-hitter Matt Stairs (.304/.515/.609) as the designated hitter behind Victorino.

No NL team can rival that firepower, which is why the league has to be thankful that the Phillies’ pitching has been so bad in the early going. Only four teams, the Yankees among them, have allowed more runs per game than the Phillies this year, and no team has a worse starters’ ERA than the Phillies 6.31. Forty-six-year-old Jamie Moyer has had just two quality starts in eight tries; last year’s deadline pickup, Joe Blanton, has just three in eight tries and has allowed ten runs in 13 innings over his last two starts; and fifth-starter Chan Ho Park just got booted from the rotation altogether.

Fortunately for the Phils, Cole Hamels is emerging from his early season struggles. After starting the season nursing an inflamed pitching elbow, which pushed back his first start, Hamels was rocked in his first two outings (12 runs in 9 2/3 innings), then took a comebacker off his pitching shoulder in his third, and rolled over his ankle trying to field a ball in his fourth. He had to leave both of those latter games following those injuries, but over his last five starts, including those two, he has posted a 2.70 ERA and struck out 33 men in 26 2/3 innings, and he’s lasted at least six full innings in each of his last three.

With Hamels and Rollins rounding into form, it’s no surprise that the Phillies are on a hot streak. They’re 6-1 on their current road trip, which has fare more to do with how they’re playing than where. It’s not outlandish to treat this weekend’s series between the Yankees and the defending World Champions as a potential World Series preview, but it’s enough for me that they’re two of the best and hottest teams in baseball.

The Yankees will send CC Sabathia to the mound to take on fellow lefty Hamels in a rematch of Game One of last year’s NDLS on Sunday. Tomorrow they’ll face another lefty in 26-year-old J.A. Happ, Park’s replacement  in the rotation. Tonight, they’ll face the pitcher who has been keeping the Phils afloat through Hamels struggles, Brett Myers.

Myers hasn’t been pitching like a proper ace, he isn’t one, but he’s been consistently solid for the Phils, turning in a quality start in five of his last six outings. His last two have been his best, as he’s allowed just three runs in his last 13 innings and struck out eight Nationals in seven innings his last time out. Myers one bugaboo has been his major league leading 12 home runs allowed. That’s a bad weakness to have coming into the Bronx as the Yankees lead the majors in home runs (the Phillies lead the NL), and the new Yankee Stadium has been host to more home runs than any other park this year.

The Yankees counter with A.J. Burnett, who will look to push the Yankees’ winning streak into double digits. Burnett held the Twins to two runs in 6 2/3 innings his last time out while striking out seven, but he also walked six men. The Yankees have won just two of Burnett’s last four starts over which he’s posted a 4.61 ERA and walked 4.28 per nine innings. Those are his four starts since giving up eight runs in Fenway. Burnett is giving the Yankees length, but he’s thus far looked like little more than the league-average innings eater he was when not facing the Yankees last year, which means it will be up to the Yankee offense to take advantage of Myers’ gopheritis tonight.

In other news, Brian Bruney’s elbow is hurting. He was unavailable last night and is unavailable again today. Given the hit the bullpen took last night after Joba Chamberlain’s first inning exit, the team has decided to activate Chien-Ming Wang to reinforce the pen. Jonathan Albaladejo, who gave up four runs in 2 1/3 innings last night, has been optioned to Scranton to make room for Wang.

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The Yankees and Orioles split their first six head-to-head games this season, all of which were played in Baltimore, but the three Yankee losses were all directly attributable to poor starting pitching performances: CC Sabathia on Opening Day (4 1/3 IP, 6 R), Chien-Ming Wang the next day (3 2/3 IP, 7 R), and Phil Hughes two Saturdays ago (1 2/3 IP, 8 R). The Orioles scored just five runs against the Yankees in the other three games, while the Yankees have scored at least four runs in all six games and are averaging 5.83 R/G on the series.

That’s been par for the course for the O’s this year, as only the Nationals have allowed more runs per game than the O’s 5.92. That’s hardly come as a surprise. The first sentence of my season preview for the O’s back on April 6 attacked the quality of their starting rotation. Now, just shy of the quarterpole, the O’s starting rotation sports a 5.76 ERA, better than only that of the Phillies, who come to town on Friday.

The O’s are optimistic about the return of lefty Rich Hill from the disabled list, and his first start gave them reason to be, but the Yankees won’t see him this week. Nor will they face early-season staff ace Koji Uehara, who has held the Yanks to two runs over 11 innings thus far this season and sports a 4.34 ERA that’s nearly a run better than that of the O’s next best starter. Instead they’ll kick things off tonight against 23-year-old rookie Brad Bergesen, who has lasted six full innings just twice in five starts (and never more than six full) and has allowed at least three runs every time out, though he’s also not done worse than the five runs in four innings he allowed in his second major league start.

Bergesen and tomorrow’s starter, Jeremy Guthrie, who has two nearly identical quality starts against the Yankees this year, have been middling thus far, sporting .500 records and ERAs in the low 5.00s. Thursday’s starter, Adam Eaton, has been awful (2-4, 7.93 ERA). Things don’t look much better in the pen, though Danys Baez has made a nice return from Tommy John surgery and George Sherrill continues to cling to his closer job despite Dave Trembley announcing that the role would be shared.

At the plate, the O’s have lost one of their hottest hitters, DH/left fielder Luke Scott (.303/.384/.515) to the DL, and have been without their hottest, center fielder Adam Jones (.370/.426/.669), since Wednesday due to a tender hamstring.

Jones is expected to return to the lineup tonight, which is bad news for the Yankees, though CC Sabathia could help get him back off on the wrong foot. Sabathia avenged his Opening Day loss with a four-hit shutout of the O’s two turns ago. He then held the league-best Toronto offense to two runs over eight innings his last time out. After struggling with his control in three of his first four starts, Sabathia has walked just six men in his four (1.17 BB/9) and seems to have over come his one-bad-inning syndrome in his last two strong performances.

It’s easy to say that players like Sabathia and Mark Teixeira are starting to click with the Yankees riding a six-game winning streak, but those performances are part of why the Yankees are on a six-game winning streak to begin with. Tonight, CC looks to make it seven. I like his chances.

Hideki Matsui returns to the lineup today as the DH batting fifth, and Brian Bruney is supposed to be activated before game time. No word yet on which reliever is getting shipped out to make room for him, though I suspect Edwar Ramirez, who unlike Jose Veras has options left, could be on his way to Scranton.

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