Scouring Ebay for Yankee Memorabilia

I looked up at my Yankee memorbilia collection earlier and decided to go to ebay. Not only can you sometimes find some cool, unique, things there, but you can get them fairly cheap as well. But soon into my search I realized that ebay is full of some worthless junk as well. Don't get me wrong, I was not surprised by this at all. I mean, it's the internet after all. If it's not porn, then there's a good chance that what you come across on the world wide web is completely pointless crap. Just take a look at these items...

New York Yankees Fingernail Tattoos 5 Sets FREE SHIPPING!!
I saw a set of these earlier in my search, and decided to pass on writing about them. As silly as it seems to bother putting these things on, I'm pretty sure if I went to the home opener tomorrow night I'd see at least one annoying girl with these on. But what caught my eye was the fact that the first listing had them for 99 cents, while this set has a Buy It Now of $2.99. I don't care if it's "FREE SHIPPING!!" or not, if you're the type of woman that would take the time and energy to purchase these things on ebay, then I want nothing to do with you. Unless you're hot, of course. Barney Stinson said one should always give in to a hot chick.

NY Yankees Luggage Tag
I skipped by this at first too, but had to go back to it. I couldn't help but imagine a baggage handler, that hates the Yankees like so many people do, treating a bag with a Yankees luggage tag on it like I treat my toilet after feasting on some Taco Bell. Hell, baggage handlers already treat your bag like crap, why possibly give them a reason to make things worse? Of course, since you may not ever see the bag again anyway, then I guess it doesn't matter.

MLB baseball Pinheads lapel pin - Mike Piazza, New York Yankees - photo
I have nothing against Mike Piazza. He was the 1993 Rookie of the Year for the Dodgers, and finished in the top 10 of MVP voting in his first 5 seasons. He went on to have 2 more years finishing in the top 15 of MVP voting, as well as two other finishes of 7th and 3rd. Piazza was a great player, no doubt. But the thing that really ticks me off about this item is that not only did he never play for the Yankees, but this is of Mike's days with the Mets. And anybody that mixes up the Mets and the Yankees should suffer the most painful death possible.

Yankees Souvenir Opening Day Ball & Assorted Yanks Cards *LOOK*!!!!
I don't think you want me to look that hard at this, so the word "look" should neither be in all-caps, nor be followed by four exclamation points. I imagine that if you were trying to sell a set of baseball cards, you'd put the best one's on display to try and make people think the rest of the collection was as good. Now, the Lou Gehrig card is cool, but it goes downhill from there. In 7 seasons with the Yankees Rick Cerone hit .249/.297/.351, so I don't think anybody is going to get excited about his card. Lou Piniella was a good manager, and I have nothing against the guy, but in 417 games managing the Yankees he didn't exactly blow anybody away (winning percentage of .537, no playoff appearances). Jerry Rooster? Tom Brookens? A replica Opening Day ball? If this is the best this collection has to offer, your auction's $19.99 starting price is quite the rip-off.

Ching Ming Wang Trenton Thunder NY Yankees Baseball
*sigh* At least he didn't spell Wang's first name with a "k" at the end of it. Does it bother anybody else when somebody that is clearly not a Yankees fan is selling Yankee memorabilia? I mean, it's not like nikanya made this baseball. I'm sure it was sold at the Thunder sourvinir shop, and when the person that bought it realized that Chien-Ming Wang sucked, the person threw it out only for nikanya to find it and try and make a buck.

Oh, sorry. The bidding was started at 99 cents. Hell, even a non-Yankee fan knows that Wang isn't worth shelf space at a dollar store.

4 Yankees ROLLERZ A. Rod, Derek, Jeter Matsui, Giambi
Okay, let's start with the headline. "A. Rod"? Not a big deal, I guess. Sure, I don't think I've seen Alex's name written like that, but it's not a travesty of grammar. Unfortunately that's not the only grammar issue with the headline, as we come to "Derek". Not a problem at all, as Yankee fans don't need anything other than the first name to know exactly who it is referring to. When a person says they went to the childhood home of "Elvis", nobody is going to assume that person meant Elvis Andrus. So I kept looking and came to "Jeter". Seriously? Did the "Derek" part not make it clear?

Note: I was going to insert a "maybe he meant another Derek that played for the team" joke here, but after going to the Yankee history page I couldn't find another Yankee player named Derek... ever. Hell, there have been three guys with the first name "Babe", but not a single other Derek besides our current captain. Anyway...

Then, edsmagnets1, couldn't take the time and energy to put a comma between "Jeter" and "Matsui". And one final thing regarding this headline... Am I the only one that would be happier with this set if it didn't come with Giambi? *shrugs* I wasn't a fan of the guy.

I looked under the description, to see what the poster had to say about this item, and he says "Saw a Set [sic] of these at a Show [sic] For [yet another "sic"] $75.00". Wait... wait! This guy is trying to convince people these were on sale somewhere for $75, yet his Buy It Now price is $13.25. *cough*Bullshit*cough*

Oh yeah... what the hell is a "Rollerz" anyway?

I kind of went off on that last one, but it was by far the biggest issue I had in my search. I could have made this entry a lot longer, as all those items were found in the first 13 pages of a search that was 705 pages long. But I think I made my point. Besides, now you can go search yourself and tell me about some of the insane things you find.

By the way, my apologies if some links don't work. Chances are the action ended (I'd never mess up coding the links), but trust me... these things really do exist. They shouldn't exist, except for people like me to have something to write about on an off-day, but they do.

Series Wrap - @ Orioles 4/9-4/11

The three day long nightmare ended, as the Yankees won the first game of the series against the Orioles. Coming into Monday Baltimore was 3-0, after sweeping the Minnesota Twins in their opening series. Every position player to enter the game for the Yankees reached base (Swisher and ARod were hitless, but both reached base thanks to drawing walks), led by The Captain. Derek Jeter was 4-4, with a double, a run scored, and an RBI. On the run prevention side of things Ivan Nova threw 7 innings, giving up 10 hits, 2 runs (both earned), and a home run, while striking out 7 with 0 walks. David Robertson and Mariano Rivera each threw scoreless innings to finish off the Orioles.

I want to take a moment to talk about Eduardo Nunez. In the bottom of the 3rd inning Nunez was playing in on Nolan Reimold. With Robert Andino on 2nd base after a lead-off double, I guess Girardi thought a bunt may be on, so he had Eduardo move about 5 feet in front of the base line from 2nd to 3rd. Reimold ended up hitting the ball fairly well to Nunez's left, so that Eduardo couldn't get into a good fielding position, allowing the ball to come out of his glove. Eduardo tried to complete the play, but thanks to Reimold being fairly swift-footed, the throw was too late. After that play Twitter blew up with NunEz comments, basically pointing out another error by Eduardo. Nevermind that it was scored a hit, but it wasn't an easy play seeing as how Nunez was playing up like he was. Chances are that if the batter/runner had average speed Nunez would have thrown him out anyway. There will be plenty of chances to point out Eduardo's fielding woes, but that wasn't one of them.

Anyway, it was good to finally get a win in the standings. But what happened next?

Game 2 started off nicely, as Jeter took the 5th pitch of the game out of the park, giving the Yankees a quick 1-0 lead. That was followed by a double by Nick Swisher, as things looked like a high scoring game was coming. Unfortunately that was not the case, as the offense stalled after that. Wei Yin Chen is in his first season in MLB, having moved from Nippon Professional Baseball (Japanese pro league) for this season, and in typical first-time-the-Yanks-see-a-guy fashion he retired the next 10 batters (5 by strikeout). While all of that was going on Freddy Garcia was throwing the ball everywhere but over the plate. Sweaty Freddy put up a line of 4.2IP, 4H, 4R (3 earned), 3BB, 3K, 1HR, along with 5... that's right... 5 wild pitches (2 of which led directly to runs). Thankfully David Phelps came into the game and shut down the Orioles. In fact, Phelps, Robertson, Logan, Wade, and Rapada threw 6.1 innings, giving up only 2 hits, 0 runs, 2 walks, and struck out 10. On top of seeing the bullpen do an excellent job, the Yankees were able to score 3 runs in the 6th inning to even things up, and without the use of the long ball. The game stayed at 4-4 until the top of the 12th when, with runners on the corners and two outs (ARod and Teixeira failed to drive in Cano after a lead-off double), Raul Ibanez earned his pinstripes (well, they were away and wearing the gray uniforms, but stay with me) by hitting a ground-rule double. That was the game winning RBI after Mo was Mo in the bottom of the inning, locking down the Yankees second straight win, and second win of the season.

I already posted about Nick Swisher being thrown out at home, so I'm going to just move on. The question now is... are we going to have another "moment" in Game 3?

Nope. Although some people were questioning Girardi pinch-running Eduardo Nunez for Alex Rodriguez in the 8th, it wasn't a big deal to them at all. The game started off hot again for the offense, as Derek Jeter doubled, followed by Curtis Granderson's first homer of the season. Jake Arrieta retired the next 11 Yankee batters. The Orioles took the lead in the bottom of the 5th, thanks to a two-run double by Mark Reynolds, but the Yankees answered that run in a couple innings later, when Granderson singled home Russell Martin. After ARod opened the top of the 8th with a single, Nunez came in to pinch run. Nunez then stole 2B, but a throwing error by Wieters allowed him to advance to 3B with only 1 out. Unfortunately that was followed by a strikeout by Swisher, an intentional walk to Ibanez, and a strike out by Martin. The bullpen came through again in this one, throwing 3 innings of 1 hit ball, before Nick Swisher came through with a 2-run bomb to put the Yankees ahead by 2. Mariano Rivera came into his third straight game, and besides a single by Ronny Paulino, and saved another one.

Although it wasn't easy, and the bullpen was spent by the end of the series, the Yankees were able to bounce-back from being swept in their opening series against the Rays to sweep the Orioles, heading home for the 2012 Home Opener with a .500 record. Let's just pretend the season is only 156 games long, and not drop a single series this year.


Series Awards

Jake Taylor Award*
Derek Jeter - 7/14, 4 R, 3 RBI, 1 HR

Gentry Award*
Alex Rodriguez - 1/13, 1 BB, 5 K, 9 LOB

Rick Vaughn Award*
Ivan Nova - Game 1: 7IP, 10H, 2ER, 7K, 0BB, 1 HR

Kelner Award*
Freddy Garcia - Game 2: 4.2IP, 4H, 3ER, 3BB, 3K, 1HR, 5WP


Next Series
vs. Angels 4/13-4/15
Click here to talk about the series at the Daily Sports Pages Yankees forum.
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*The awards are named after one of the best baseball movies of all time... Major League.

Jake Taylor Award - Awarded to the most valuable position player. Named after the hard-nose veteran catcher that, despite making the league minimum, was the heart and soul of the 1989 American League East winning Cleveland Indians.

Gentry Award - Awarded to the least valuable position player. Named after the very first man cut from the 1989 Cleveland Indians, #47 Gentry. A man so insignificant he wasn't even given a first name.

Rick Vaughn - Awarded to the best pitcher in the series. This one is, of course, named after the "Wild Thing". The man that made Clu Haywood look silly in the division deciding game.

Kelner Award - Awarded to the worst pitcher in the series. Named after the Opening Day starter for the '89 Indians. Not a good game for Mr. Kelner, as Indians' announcer Harry Doyle famously quipped "thank God" after Kelner left the game. And yet another bad player without a first name.

Jorge Posada To Throw Out First Pitch Friday Night

Jorge Posada will be honored with the "Pride Of The Yankees Award" Thursday during a homecoming dinner and Friday night will through out the ceremonial first pitch on the home opener for the Yankees against the Anaheim Angels. 

This is obviously a great gesture to give Posada the honor to do this and no one is more deserving for this season. I look forward to seeing Jorge in the Bronx one last time.

Yankees @ Orioles 4/11/12

Tonight CC Sabathia and the Yankees look to sweep the series before going home against the Baltimore Orioles at Oriole Park in Camden Yards. CC Sabathia will be the key piece of tonight's game because David Robertson, Mariano Rivera, Cory Wade, and I will also assume David Phelps will all be unavailable to pitch. Also Rafael Soriano has a split finger nail and may also be unavailable as he was yesterday for the same reason. If we ever needed CC to go seven or eight innings then tonight would be the day. Anyway, here is tonight's lineup for the game at 7:05 pm on YES.

Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Mark Teixeira 1B
Nick Swisher RF
Raul Ibanez DH
Russell Martin C
Brett Gardner LF

Rob Thomson Did The Right Thing

Ever since Nick Swisher was thrown out at home plate in the top of the 7th of last night's game, people have been shaking their fists at Rob Thomson.

Swisher was leading off the top of the 7th of a tie ballgame, and was hit by a slider from Matt Lindstrom. The pitch got him in the right foot, and after hobbling around a bit Nick went to first. The hobbling would leave one to believe Swisher was hurt, and therefore was going to be more station to station (a la Hideki Matsui) than a pest on the basepaths (a la Brett Gardner). I believe he was fine after shaking it off, just like after one stubs their toe. Sure, it hurts like hell when it happens, but after a minute you're fine and walking around as if nothing happened. After all, if Nick had done any real damage, then he would have been removed from the game... even as a precautionary thing, as we've seen happen numerous times early in a season. But Nick remained in the game until the end.

So after a short delay for the hit-by-pitch, Robinson Cano came to the plate. After three pitches, which brought the count to 1-2, Robbie drove a slider down the right field line. Swisher was on his way to 3rd and Thomson was waiving him home. The throw from Endy Chavez wasn't right on line, but it was a strong throw. JJ Hardy then made a perfect relay throw home to nail Swisher on a bang-bang play. Replay showed that the throw being to Wieter's left helped him to block the plate, making it extremely difficult for Swisher to reach all the way around Matt's leg and touch the plate before the tag (make a mental note of this for later).

So not only was Swisher not injured after the HBP, but JJ Hardy's relay throw was as good as you can possibly ask for (hence the bolded and italicized "perfect" in the previous paragraph). If the throw was a little less than perfect Swish likely would have scored, giving the Yankees the lead, resulting in the the vast majority of Yankee fans saying Thomson made a great call. At worst, some Yankee fans would have said Thomson's decision was questionable, but they wouldn't be lambasting the guy.

And let's not forget that Swisher slid head-first into home plate, something that I believe is flat-out stupid. First and foremost, the chances of injury are really good. Nick was reaching out with his fingers, a part of the body that is not exactly tough to injure thanks to no muscle surrounding a bunch of tiny bones. Then, soon after his fingers is his face, all of which could slam into hard plastic shin guards wrapped around really stable legs. Even if a runner sliding head-first into home was able to avoid injury, a lot of momentun would be lost if there was any sort of collision, as one's arms are not nearly as strong as one's legs. Push somebody with your arms, and then push somebody with your legs. Did the victim fall away more with your arms pushing or your legs pushing? It's why MMA fighters don't immediately go after an opponent laying on the ground, whose legs are aimed at him. A runner should slide feet-first as to help avoid injury, as well as be able to hold onto as much momentum as possible, should a collision occur.

Oh, and by sliding feet-first directly at the plate, it probably would have led to Wieters not being able to get the tag down and in front of him (remember, Matt tagged Nick on the foul side of the base line... right where the throw went). Especially seeing that Wieter's legs were spread to get to the throw, creating a nice "5-hole" for Nick to put his feet through and get directly to the plate.

The point is, a lot of things had to go right for Swisher to be thrown out after being sent home by Robbie Thomson... and they did. The vast majority of the time the run scores, Yankee fans rejoice, and Mariano Rivera would have locked down win #2 at the end of 9 innings instead of 12.

Maybe my feelings simply come from coaching third base, and my belief in being aggressive on the basepaths. I don't like the "what if"s that come with holding the runner, and waiting for another batter to get him home. Of course my team doesn't have Alex Rodriguez and Mark Teixeira batting 4th and 5th in the order, but as we saw after Swisher was thrown out (leaving Cano at 2B with one out), having the heart of the order coming up is no guarantee of a runner scoring. Either way, though, I strongly believe that most of the time Yankee fans are applauding Thomson's decision instead of berating him for it.

The "Rock" of the Rotation

No... not that guy. This guy...


The more I read about Ivan Nova's demeanor, particularly when Girardi said "I don't really think he gets rattled", I wonder if Nova will be the next "rock" of the Yankees pitching staff. You know... the guy in the rotation that's very consistant, and seems to always give the team a chance to win. Not that he can't have a bad start every now and then, but you're hardly ever going to look back at his start and think "the Yankees had no chance to win that game".

In 13 seasons with the Yankees, Andy Pettitte was that guy. It's not his career 3.88 ERA (ranked 723rd all time), or 1.357 WHIP (ranked 722nd all time), that's going to blow people away when they look back at his career. But it's his Win Probability Added (WPA) of 23 (ranked 50th all time) that can turn heads (note, only 16 of the pitchers ahead of Andy in WPA were around for as many or less seasons in MLB). In case you're not familiar with WPA, it's basically attempting to measure a player's win contribution. So going by WPA alone shows that Pettitte was indeed a "rock" in the Yankee rotation.

So going back to Ivan Nova I decided to compare some pitching stats of the two, to see if this idea that Ivan Nova could be the next Andy Pettitte (aka be the "rock" of the Yankee rotation). What I found pleased me.


After looking at this comparison I don't just think Nova could be the next Andy Pettitte for the Yankees... he could be better. And that's really saying something, as many believe Andy Pettitte has a shot at being a Hall of Famer. Then again, every person that says Pettitte should be considered for the Hall points out Andy's 19-10 record, and 3.83 ERA, in the postseason. Not to mention that Pettitte failed to go at least 6 innings in only 9 of 42 postseason starts (note- he was one out away from a quality start in one of those starts).

Their ERA, WHIP, Hits/9, HR%, XBH%, and Triple-Slashes are virtually the same. All of which is a great sign for Nova. However, what really excites me is that this kid could be better than Pettitte was. Seeing as how Nova's GB% (ground ball percentage) is higher, and his LD% (line drive percentage) is lower, there's reason to have high hopes for Mr. Nova. All it would take for Nova to reach that level is striking out more batters and walking less, both of which he was able to do Monday night (7 Ks to 0 walks). Granted, that was against an Orioles lineup, which is composed of players whose career average OPS+ is 101 (the Yankees lineup has a career average OPS+ of 116). But expecting Ivan to strike out 1.1 more batters per 9, and walking .3 less batters per 9, is not a tall order at all.

For obvious reasons Yankee fans will be closely watching Phil Hughes, Hiroki Kuroda, and Michael Pineda this season. Two of those players have top of the rotation potential for years to come, while another one is being looked at as a "rock" in the 2012 rotation. But we should pay quite a bit of attention to Ivan Nova as well, because while Andy Pettitte was that "rock" in New York for 13 years, Nova could be that "rock" for the next 10.

Yankees @ Orioles 4/10/12

UPDATE:

Derek Jeter led off the game with a solo home run and was followed by a Nick Swisher double, although no other runs would score that inning. After that we saw the emergence of Cy Chen as he shut down the Yankees to the tune of 12 consecutive Yankees shut down before a Russell Martin single in the 5th inning. Speaking of the 5th inning, 5 wild pitches for Freddy Garcia later and he left with the Yankees behind 4-1 in the bottom of the 5th inning.

The Yankees put together a little rally in the top of the 6th as a sacrifice fly, scoring Cano, and an error on Mark Reynolds allowing a runner to score allowed the Yankees to creep within one run to 4-3. Gardner then tied the ball game up with a clutch 2 out rbi single to even up the score at 4-4. THANK YOU MARK REYNOLDS. Cy Chen , now over 100 pitches, looks more like the guy we all expected and less like Randy Johnson in his prime when he was finally taken out by Buck Schowalter after the Gardner single.

Sweaty Freddy Garcia will make his first start of the season tonight at Camden Yards and against the Baltimore Orioles. Here is tonight's lineup

Derek Jeter SS
Nick Swisher RF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Mark Teixeira 1B
Curtis Granderson CF
Andruw Jones DH
Russell Martin C
Brett Gardner LF

Utilizing Brett Gardner Better

A commenter at Yankee Fans Unite brought up a really good point after last night's game. The commenter said that the Yankees should play Brett Gardner regularly, as opposed to sitting him against left-handed starters like they did by starting Andruw Jones in LF last night. I have to whole-heartedly agree with him. I've been saying it for a while... the offense is more than good enough for the team to be a big success. What the Yankees need to work on is their pitching and defense.

Although Gardner's on-base percentage vs. left-handed pitchers is pretty good (career .351, with an OBP of .354 vs. RHP), his batting average suffers (career .243, with a BA of .271 vs. RHP). On the surface I can understand why Yankee fans would be against Brett facing lefties, as his bat would create a bit of a hole in the lineup that day. But like the commenter at Yankee Fans Unite asked... is a stronger lineup more important than a stronger defense? When it comes to some teams, who have an average offense, I'd be on the side that would sit Gardner vs. LHP. But you can't tell me that a lineup of Jeter-SS, Granderson-CF, Cano-2B, Rodriguez-3B, Teixeira-1B, Swisher-RF, Jones-DH, Martin-C, and Gardner-LF isn't that good. Add that still strong offense to a really good rotation, one of the best bullpens in baseball, and an improved defense, and I see no way this team can't win 65+% of their games against left-handed starters.

It's not like Brett Gardner can't improve his offense vs. left-handed pitchers either. Heck, I'm not even talking about Brett hitting more "traditional" base hits vs. same-sided hurlers. The first thing Brett needs to do is get his walk percentage closer to the 13.9% it was in 2010, rather than the 10.2% it was in 2011. A walk to Brett Gardner is almost as good as a double, thanks to Brett's ability to steal 2B after getting a free pass to 1B. And I don't have to tell you what Brett being in scoring position could mean when the team has Jeter, Granderson, and Cano batting after him.

On top of that it would be a really good idea for him to learn how to bunt better. Brett had 11 bunt hits last season, which is really good (tied for 6th most in MLB). But I'd like to see Gardner get around 23 bunt hits (that was Juan Pierre's total, which led MLB). Being a bigger bunting threat alone could lead to more "traditional" base hits, as third basemen would have to move up against him, and Brett hits a lot of balls to the left side.

You'll hear plenty of people talk about Derek Jeter still being a great hitter. You'll hear a lot about Granderson's ability to garner more MVP votes this season, and in the future. You'll even hear many mention ARod's and Teixeira's ability to bounce-back and have very productive seasons. Surely this being Swisher's walk year has led to more talk of his ability to have another high OBP, along with 25+ home runs. But what you don't hear enough of, at least in my opinion, is talk of what Brett Gardner could mean to the Yankees this season and for another 4+ years.

Reminder : Free Yankees Tickets Giveaway

Just a friendly reminder Yankees fans that this opportunity to get free Yankees tickets plus the Yankee bag full of goodies ends tomorrow. 4/10 so go ahead and sign up now for a chance to win. I would love it if a Greedy Pinstripes fan won it!

Also remember if you follow them on twitter and like them on facebook you get two more opportunities to win so why not right? Do it, Do it now!

Who Wants Free Yankees Tickets?

One of our latest partners and friends, Metro Commuter Network (MCN), is offering up a chance for one lucky Greedy Pinstripes reader to win a pair of Yankees tickets for the game against the Angels on April 13th PLUS  free Yankees themed gift basket. In the basket you get the two Yankees tickets, valued at $350, one matted and framed print of the original Yankee Stadium one XL official Yankee T SHirt, one official Yankees baseball hat, one sport bottle, and one tote bag. All pictured below!

Of course these guys are not going to just GIVE you the tickets, you are going to have to work for it a little. For everyone that goes to the website, http://metrocommuternetwork.com/, and signs up for an account gets one free entry. For two free additional entries you can go to their FACEBOOK page and "like" them and you can also go to their TWITTER page and follow them for the other entries.

The contest starts at 12:00 AM ET on April 4th (today.... now) and ends at 11:00 pm ET on April 10th so I would suggest all to go ahead and sign up now while reading this so you do not forget and let this opportunity pass you by. On April 10th one lucky Greedy Pinstripes reader will win the tickets and be notified by email so make sure you are using a real email address and not a fake one. Good luck to everyone and I am officially jealous of who ever wins!

Yankees @ Orioles 4/9/12

UPDATE:

The Yankees jumped on the board early in the first inning when Mark Teixeira had a rbi single to put the Yankees ahead 1-0 and put the Orioles playing from behind for the first time this season. The lead would be short lived as Orioles Catcher Matt Weiters hit a solo home run to tie the ball game at 1 off of Ivan Nova.

The Yankees got some insurance runs in the top of the 4th inning as Russell Martin had an rbi single, Derek Jeter had an rbi double, and a Eduardo Nunez sac fly accounted for 3 innings. Brian Matusz was made work all night throwing well into the 90 pitch count in the 4th inning.

Andruw Jones added a solo shot in the top of the 6th inning to extend the Yankees lead to 5-1. Gardner added an insurance run with a single in the top of the 7th inning to make it 6-1. Ivan Nova now has a 13 start win streak in the regular season dating back to the 2011 regular season. The best news is that Nova looked a lot more like the Nova we fell in love with last season and less like the Nova that struggled in spring.

These same two teams go at it again tomorrow, same time, same place.







Tonight at Camden Yards the Yankees and Ivan Nova will take on the 3-0 Orioles and Brian Matusz. Here are the lineups for the Yankees.

Derek Jeter SS
Nick Swisher RF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez DH
Mark Teixeira 1B
Curtis Granderson CF
Andruw Jones LF
Russell Martin C
Eduardo Nunez 3B