5 BOROUGH SPORTS

Sunday afternoon the Yankees dropped the final game of the opening series to the Tigers 10-7. It was a rough day for the Yankees pitching staff, as three different pitchers were unimpressive in their outings.

It all started with Phil Hughes who couldn’t seem to locate his pitches. Hughes lasted only four innings, in which he amassed over 90 pitches, and gave up 5 runs. Hughes’ debut is not what the Yanks need from the guy who we’re relying on to be our second best starter to CC. I have faith in Phil, but we need Phil to pitch like he did for the first 2/3 of the year last year, not the one who finished poorly.

Bartolo Colon made his Yankee debut, and it was rough. While Colon did settle down a bit after a giving up four runs, he still can’t be trusted. Colon still has stuff to strike people out, but for now he seems like a mop up guy at best, as he was today. If Colon doesn’t put together a few good outings then his days in a Yankee uniform will be short.

The Yanks also went to Joba in the ninth, and it wasn’t what we wanted to see either. Joba gave up three hits and a run, after a solid first outing back on Thursday. The Yankees can be successful without Joba being who he was two years ago, but it’d be nice if he could be half the pitcher he was. The Velocity is supposedly improved for him, but he’s not buying us faith that he’s got the 7th or even the 6th locked down. It’s early, but lets see him rebound from this outing, and get it done when it counts more.

Colon Had a Forgettable Yankee Debut

Overall the Yankees offense has been great so far, and that’s a good sign. The Yankees might need to break the MLB record for runs this year to win the AL East and so far they are getting it done. Home runs have been flying off the bats of the bronx bombers. Nine home runs, from six different players is great.

Mark Teixeira has been the story early, as he’s hit a homer in three straight games to start the year. Its nice to see Tex get confidence early as he’s struggled in April over his career. If he can play like he does from May on, all year this year, then the Yanks might have an MVP candidate in Teixeira in 2011.

Russell Martin has been the biggest surprise. He’s off to a 5-11 start, and has added in a homer and 3 RBI’s. If Martin can hit behind the plate, then it will be easy going for the Yanks lineup all year. Any second guessing putting Jorge at DH might soon disappear.

Speaking of Jorge, after going 0 for in the first two games, he had a great day today, hitting two homers. Jorge is getting old, and doesn’t love DHing but if the Yanks can get the usual from Posada then it’ll be great. I’d like to see the Yanks give him a shot behind the plate a few times this year, to keep the bat in the lineup when Martin is resting. I’m not excited about the backups behind the plate swinging the bat, so we should give guys like Eric Chavez and Andrew Jones AB’s as a DH too.

Overall the first series for the Yanks was successful because they went 2-1, but I would have preferred to see a bit more out of the pitching staff. The Yanks can and will hit all year, but we can’t expect them to score this many runs every game. They’ll have off days, especially against better pitching then the Tigers have to offer, so we’ll need every good outing from a starter we can get.

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