New York Yankees Semi-Midseason Report Card

The New York Yankees were faced with low expectations in from the baseball community and lower expectations from their fans (relative to the usual playoff expectations). The Yankees have been the standard of excellence for quite some time now even though the Giants and Cardinals have been among the best teams in recent years as well. 

Here in 2015, the Yankees are playing without any of the Core Four that defined the team for nearly 20 years and instead are being led by new faces and veterans with the longest tenured Yankees being CC Sabathia, Brett Gardner and the returning Alex Rodriguez. 

63 games into the 2015 season and the Yankees are currently 34-29 (.540) which for most is a little better than expected. What helps the most is how abysmal the AL East is, Tampa holds the top spot but the Yanks are a game back and Toronto (fresh off of an 11 game winning streak) are a game and a half behind TB. If the season were to end today the Yankees would play a one game playoff against the Twins for the last spot in the playoffs. If the Yankees can keep up this pace then they're well on their way to a successful season. 

How is This Happening? The Yanks have gotten production from some unexpected sources. A-Rod so far has been better than most hoped hitting .268, .371 OBP and 12 home runs to go with it. Tex has been hitting like he time traveled back to 2009 leading the team in home runs (18) and RBIs (48). Brian McCann is looking more like himself as well. Tanaka was out with an injury but has come back and been lights out as of late and while Pineda has struggled his last few starts, he's proven himself to be an ace. The most impressive piece of the Yankees roster is the bullpen, mostly the stars in Dellin Betances and Andrew Miller, they've been as perfect as can. Betances has an ERA of 0.27 over 33.1 innings pitched and Miller has an ERA of 1.03 over 26.1 innings pitched. Andrew Miller is also the first Yankee in history to convert his first 17 save opportunities. It's safe to say that 99 times out of 100, if the Yankees have a lead and they send in Betances to set up Miller in the 9th, that's a Yankees win. 

A Bit Over a Third into this season the Yankees look pretty good and with this roster that's good enough. The pitching staff is really the star of the team having been as good as any really, specifically the bullpen. As stated earlier, if the Yankees continue on the path they've started on we could once again see the pinstripes in the playoffs, maybe not deep into the playoffs but it seems like the team could be on an upward trend. 

Yankees Semi-Midseason Grade: B+

The Allure of Opening Day

What is it about Opening Day? 

It's the first game in a 162 game season that stretches from April to September. In the long run, the Opening Day game means absolutely nothing but every year we look forward to it like it's Christmas Day in April. 

Opening Day is by far the best timed start of the season of all of the big four sports. Once football starts, school starts up, summer's ending, it's starting to get cold and you start to realize you'll be shoveling a foot of snow in a month, football season sucks. Contrast that with baseball season and it's getting warmer, you can go outside without being in pain because of the cold, summer and vacations are on the way, baseball season is great. 

But nevermind the weather, the one thing that Opening Day brings year after year is: Hope. 

During the NFL preseason I point out everything the Giants are doing wrong and what they need to improve on, during Spring Training I look into everything the Yankees are doing well and ignore the bad and then when Opening Day comes, I could almost convince myself that a 162-0 season is possible. 

April 6, 2015: The day is here and as I watched the Yankees announce their lineups and the players run on to the field in transported back to the days of being a child and looking at these guys as being giants and gods amongst men. While football may have become the most popular sport in America, it's moments like this that show that baseball really is America's pastime and isn't going anywhere. 

Yesterday the Yankees took a beating from the Blue Jays and Tanaka got lit up in the third inning and the Yankees couldn't hit water if they fell out of boat. The Mets on the other hand took down the much praised Nationals in an early division matchup. 

Even with the Yankees poor first game I'm still extremely optimistic about this season and the first thing I said after the game was that we're going 161-1; jokingly of course. 

That's the allure of Opening Day, believing the impossible is not out of reach.