The All Star break is behind us and we can get back to Yankees baseball. Scott and I discussed the new Home Run Derby format, the All Star Game festivities, the ESPYS, and the weekend series vs Robbie Cano and the Mariners. The weekend was going as planned until the news broke Sunday that Rob Refsnyder was optioned to Triple-A. We discuss this and more on the podcast this week.
We kicked things off talking about the HRD/ASG week. We are both in agreement that it was the best HRD we’ve seen since Hamilton went beast mode at Old Yankee Stadium or McGwire hit moon balls over the Green Monster at Fenway in ’99. Baseball finally got some rules changes right and we hope they do more of that. Perhaps the next change can be starting the All Star festivities earlier so we are not watching pre-game until 9 PM before the game even gets started.
On Wednesday, the slowest sports day of the year, Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez showed up at the ESPYS. DJ accepted the legend award and made a pretty standard speech; nothing too ground breaking or exciting but I think Yankees fans just love seeing Jeter out in the public eye. ARod made an attempt at self-deprecation; Scott was not a fan (big surprise) and I, while it was not funny, had no issue with it. Maybe next time just get better writers, ARod…
Onto the Yankees news and games from the week. The big one was that Refsnyder was optioned to Triple-A to make room for Carlos Beltran and Brendan Ryan. Both Scott and I are totally against this move. We have loved seeing the rookie up; despite his slow start with the bat he was playing a really solid second base and seemed to provide a spark to the team. Cashman stated that he made this move so he would have flexibility going into the trade deadline and that Refsnyder would be back, so you can hang your hat on that.
The Yankees took 2 of 3 from Cano and the M’s over the weekend thanks to timely home runs from ARod on Friday and Teixeira on Sunday. CC also had a good start (finally), which is a step in the right direction for him. I think if the Yankees get 5-6 innings from him and not push past that mark, then CC should be able to have a positive impact on the team in the second half.
The Yankees currently sit 4 games up on Baltimore in the AL East, and they start a big 3 game series at home vs the O’s on Tuesday. Its time to start putting some more distance between us and the rest of the division!
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