How are we actually in first?

Ok. Here's a scavenger hunt for y'all. Open up your newspaper to the Sports Section. Find the baseball standings. What team is in first place in the American League East? The New York Yankees. While I am truly overjoyed by this, I have to wonder how this happened.

Have you watched this team lately? We've been playing like garbage, similar to how North Korea looked against Portugal. I see two key reasons as to why we are in first:

First off, Andy Pettite and Phil Hughes have been indomitable lions this year. They have a combined 18 wins and 3 losses. Hughes is third in ESPN's Cy Young Tracker (behind Price and Bucholtz). Pettite is 4th. Both these pitchers are rolling. They're the Super Eagles of this squad.

Second, Robbie Cano. Don't Ya Know? Cano is on a tear this season. His BA is about .25 points higher than anybody in the majors. First in the AL in hits, second in the Majors to Martin Prado on Atlanta. He's driving the car known as the Yankee offense right now. He's batting like the Celestial Blue Sky.

See...we really shouldn't be in first place. I'm a huge Yankee fan, but come on:

We have AJ. He's tanking fast. Last six starts? 2-4, 6.55 ERA, a WHIP over 1.5, and not too statistically, he can't get people out on two outs. We've got nothing on the top. Jeter is struggling, Tex started slow, but hopefully will get up soon and A-Rod just isn't crushing it this season. We need these guys to get going soon.

We're not going be in first for long without a third of our line up hitting and a two fifths of our rotation pitching like garbage. Especially since we have the Red Sox Fury and the Bafana of the Rays slowly gaining on us.

World Cup Contest:

I will give a prize to the first person who can name all the World Cup References in this post. In order to win, you must comment the references on this post. There are 5 of them.

Other notes:

Vote Nick Swisher to the All-Star team. He needs all the support he can get. Vote here early and often.

AJ looked like crap yesterday. No two ways of saying it.

GO TEAM USA TOMORROW IN THEIR GAME.

Liz, learn some practicality

YANKEE FANS LIKE THE YANKEES. WE HAVE NO INTEREST IN YOUNGER SIBLINGS TAKING MORE RISK. WE WANT TO HEAR ABOUT TEX'S MONSTER SERIES AGAINST THE NEW YORK "JAYVEE" METROPOLITANS.

Fear not Yankee fans, for I, Mike, am here. I will analyze the heck out of everything about this "Tex Message" to Yankee fans that he is still alive.

For those of you who did not hear about Marky Mark's Monster weekend, he single handedly destroyed the Metros. A two run shot yesterday to put away New York's JV team and a grand salami today, absolutly wrecking Johan Santana.

While I've said this about 3 times this season, Tex is back. I said it after his 3 home run game against the Evil Empire. I said it when he hit a big 3 run home run a few weeks back against Cleveland. But now, I think things are going to turn around Big Mark.

Things have been changing for Mark "Legs" Teixeira since his 5 strikeout game against Toronto on June 5th. That game was a travesty. Since then, his OBP is up above his career average, and the desired .400 mark. His BA, while below his career average, is about .05 higher than this season's average. Since June 5th, his slugging percentage is up an astonishing .15 points, to .549. These numbers don't even include today's game, which he slammed the Mets on his own.

So, can everybody shut up about Tex crashing? He's fine. It was an extended slow start that will bring his finial numbers down. But I think he's going to go on a thrash for the rest of the season. Look for some pretty good things from Mark Man for the rest of the year.

Mark, I know you're a techno-phobe (similar to Liz). But we have some questions for you. How long are your legs? Also, send us a picture?

Risky Business

First, lets celebrate the 2-1 series against the Mets. Teixeira's grand slam was a beautiful, beautiful thing.

But I really want to discuss this article in the New York Times a month ago, about a study conducted about siblings and risk. It describes a study by Frank J. Sulloway and Richard L. Zweigenhaft for the current issue of Personality and Social Psychology Review.

The two wanted to see if siblings acted differently with regard to risk given their birth order. They used MLB siblings as they're data group. The article reads, "Given how younger siblings have been shown to take more risks than their older counterparts — perhaps originally to fight for food, now for parental attention — Drs. Sulloway and Zweigenhaft examined whether the phenomenon might persist to the point that baseball-playing brothers would try to steal bases at significantly different rates."

Their findings supported their hypothesis. In over 90 percent of baseball siblings, the younger brother tried to steal more bases than his brother. They also controlled for overall skill.

Anecdotally, it's totally true that younger siblings take bigger risks. I'm a complete perfectionist, who spends hours antagonizing over simple decisions. Seriously, it will take me a minimum of twenty minutes to decide whether or not I want whip cream on my waffles if we go out for breakfast. Mike can attest to this. We went out for Indian last night and it was a huge deal that I ordered something I'd never gotten before. This is a risk for me.

Mike, on the other hand, dives head first in situations. I don't want to say he does things blindly, but he's much more likely take a risk than I am.

If you put both of us on first base, there's no doubt in my mind that he'd steal and I'd wait. It's just the way we are.

The researchers offer up possible explanations for this behavior in younger siblings, such as "originally fighting for food, [and] now for parental attention."

In my case, my risk-averse nature has nothing to do with fear of losing food or parental attention. And everything to do with a fear of failure. I don't want to screw up, so I take the safe track.

Mike, I'm interested to know what you think about this article.

Only 100 to go!

Thats right folks. We have a mere 100 games left to this season. Following today's win against the Astros, the Yankees stand at 39-23, an excellent 16 games over .500. So, here is the report card for Yankee Players as of the 38 percent of the season mark. In no particular order

Robbie Cano-A. Cano is on fire this season, and shows no signs of slowing down. He's batting .373 with an OBP of .417. He's slugging .610. He leads the Yanks in OBP (1.027), so he's having a great year. On the fielding front, he hasn't made nearly as many bonehead plays in the field as he has in past years.

Derek Jeter-B. A subpar start for Jeter, but that's ok. He tends to come on later on anyways. I'm not too concerned about Jeter. He's only about .1 points below .300 batting and his OBP is respectable (.343). He looked strong today with 2 home runs against the 'Stros.

Mark Teixeira- D-. Tex has clearly struggled. About a month ago, we blamed it on April. May wasn't much better. Mark is last among the Yankee starters in batting average. However, he's 4th on the squad in RBIs and 3rd in home runs. It's just the lack of singles and doubles thats keeping him down. I foresee a down year for Mark, but he should still improve by the end of the year.

Carsten Charles Sabathia- B-. Sabathia has looked brilliant in his wins this year, especially in his near no hitter against Tampa Bay. However, it's the losses that's dragging Carsten Charles down. 4th among the starters in ERA, Sabathia just isn't shutting down opponants like the way he was last year. Expect a rebound soon from CC.

Andy Pettite- A. A Cy Young-esque year for the Southern Man . He's wheelin' and dealin'. He's leading the Yankees with 8 wins. He leads the starters in ERA (2.46) and BB/9 (2.5). Pettite looks poised to win a Cy Young this season, but in order to do so, he'll have to beat out teammate...

Phil Hughes-A. Cy Young-esque year for the young gun. If Pettite doesn't lead the starters in a category, Hughes does. This is the sort of pitcher the Yankees have been waiting for from Hughes. Have a pair of teammates ever been this dominate? One has to look back to the dreaded 2001 Diamondbacks with Curt Schilling and Randy Johnson.

And last, but not least

Joba Chamberlain-D. Joba has done horrible this season. He is 1-3 on the season (from the bullpen) with an ERA of 4.94. Joba seems to be struggling to get anyone out. As of late, he's brought his grade up from the depths of hell, but he needs to give up less runs. His strikeout number is excellent and his low walks make him seem better. But he needs to turn around quickly in order to be the dominant pitcher he has the potential to be.