Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Mariano Rivera's Career is Over.

We've been through this nonsense before. We've been through this nonsense every year since 1997:

"If Mo goes south, the Yankees have no chance."

No chance to do what? No chance to make the playoffs? Because, while I know that nothing is settled until it's settled, the Yankees have a 6-game lead on the Angels with 48 games to play. I think they could possibly hold off the Angels even if Mariano went on the DL for two months.

"Joe Girardi’s club can live with A.J. Burnett being the Mediocre Man just trying to have fun. They can survive for a time without Alex Rodriguez and they can weather Jorge Posada’s struggles that cost him his DH job.

But if Mariano Rivera falters, the Yankees might as well call it a season. They go as Mo goes."

Oh.

That's a stupid thing to stay.


"The Great Rivera stumbled for the second straight game last night, surrendering a two-run home run to Bobby Abreu in the ninth inning. That blast to right gave the Angels a stunning 6-4 win at Yankee Stadium and handed Rivera (1-2) the loss.

For now, life for the Yankees is 'Oh, Mo!' ”

It was "stunning."

I was "stunned."

I was actually stunned that Girardi didn't walk Abreu after the count got to 3-1. I considered if a failure by Rivera, Marin, Girardi, and the architect who moved the RF fence in 50 feet to accommodate Babe Ruth.

As for Rivera's back-to-back meltdowns, they consisted of exactly one legit hit.


"Abreu’s home run, his second of the night, sent Rivera’s ERA against the Angels into orbit. His 3.60 career ERA against them is his highest against any opponent."

I'll let the stupidity and irrelevance of that observation speak for itself.


"Rivera is Yankee gold. Still, in a season of questions, the biggest question is staring the Yankees in the face: Is the Great Rivera finally showing his age?"

No.

2 comments:

Chris said...

I find it amazing that we go through this EVERY season. Mo always has a streak of 2 or 3 consecutive blown saves/shaky outings at the beginning of August. He does it every single year. And every time it happens, the media goes nuts and proclaims him done. Then he runs the table for the rest of the season and the playoffs. But nobody remembers and nobody bothers to do the research to find out. In this time of stats and the internet, it is inexcusable not to know that this is a regular occurance.

Darren Felzenberg said...

Mariano's struggles continued with a HR to Russell Branyan today. Ha ha ha. That really happened and that is the report I read about it on yahoo.

Mariano should learn a changeup.

I also like how the conclusion is that the Yankees would be in trouble (in the playoffs) if Mariano was ineffective. That's sort of like saying the Bulls would be ineffective without Michael Jordan. Thanks for the insight.