What a great week!  The Yankees cliched the AL East and home field advantage.   Hey what a year!  Jeter passes Gehrig, Cano and Jeter have 200+ hit seasons (first double play combo to do that in the modern era) , Mo get his 500th save, 15 walkoffs, 50 come from behind wins… shall I go on?

I thought it would be fun to look back on some of the preseason discussions, moves and concerns and how they panned out…

Derek Jeter… Getting up there in age?  Set to have at .333 season with a .405 OBP!  Hell of a year for the Captain.

Mark Teixeira… How will he hand the NY pressure? He is just “a beast”.  A welcomed addition to the the Yankee first basemen tradition.

Jorge Posada… Too old to catch and be a force at the plate?  .290 average, 81 RBIs.  Did a good job behind the plate.

Marinano Rivera… Is he too old?  44/46 Saves, 1.82 ERA… enough said.   He’s the King of Closers.

Robinson Cano… Would he rebound after a tough 2008 season?  Answer, He is now considered one of the best 2nd Basemen in baseball. And you wanted to trade him!

AJ Burnett… He’s been injured so many times during his career will he hold up?  Answer, Solid season and going into the playoffs with some mojo.  Good move Cash!

Andy Pettitte.. Isn’t he too old to pitch?  14-7 wins and also going into the playoffs with some mojo.  Not Bad!  Another good move Cash!

Alex Rodriguez.. Will he ever be a true Yankee?  I think he proved himself with clutch hits and contributions throughout the season.  Had a solid season considering he had surgery and missed about 40 games.

Nick Swisher… The “X” Factor in right field.  Chugging those Red Bulls one after another he brought intangibles to the club house.. along with 28 home runs.  Xavier who?

Phil Hughes… Should the Yankees wait for him to develop or trade him?  I guess now we can say he’s one of the best late game relievers in baseball and possibly heir apparent to Mariano’s spot.

There were a few rough spots…

Joba Chamberlain, Where does he fit?  The jury is still out.  Spotty performances all season.  Yankees over caring for his arm.  His performance in the post season will be interesting to watch and will probably help determine his future.

Chien-Ming Wang struggled to find his grove but then found his shoulder to be injured.  Hopefully he will be back to old form next season.

All in all it was a great year to be a Yankee fan.  I can’t remember the last time this team was so much fun to watch.   The highlight for me and the turning point of the year in my opinion was when they swept 4 games from Boston in August.  After that the Yankees never looked back.  Let’s hope they keep the mojo going in the post season.

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When Jorge Posada jeered back at Jesse Carlson you knew something was going to happen.  This after Carlson wasted a pitch thrown behind Posada in retaliation of Mark Melancon hitting Aaron Hill (clearly unintentional).   You could see the fire burning within Posada in the fierce swings he took during the at bat.  I was praying he would smash the ball right back up the middle or bomb a home run to deep center but the at bat resulted in a free pass and left Jorge steaming, looking as pissed off as a wet hornet.

When Gardner hit the double with Jorge on second I figured Posada would score and trot into the dugout without an incident.  But for some reason Carlson thought he was supposed to cover home (he should have been backing up third with runner coming to that base).  He was going there for reason of coures. This laid the ground work for the ‘perfect storm’…  There was no way Posada was going to trot by Carlson without saying or doing something.  Then BAM.. Bench Brawl.

Now I don’t really like fighting in baseball because player injuries can cause major havoc to teams especially this time of year.  More importantly though it is a bad demonstration to kids who watch baseball (I have two of those).   Kids emulate the pros… if pros fight they may see it as an acceptable part of the game.  Not good.

Now, speaking as a pure Yankee fan I think this event was significant for the Yankees because it showed how well bonded this 2009 team really is.  They will go to battle for each other and that says a lot.  Face pies and helmet tosses aside, these guys like, maybe even love each other and they want to win for each other in the worst way.  This team’s cohesiveness is a solid sign of the grit and fire they will need during the playoffs.

Is this incident over… probably.  The Yanks threw at the Jays, the Jays threw at the Yanks… Yanks and Jays got beat up a bit and a guy from each team was ejected… so it seems the sides are equalized now.  But.. You never know.   Hopefully they will get on with baseball tonight and the  Yankees will move one step closer to priority one…  home field advantage.

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Take a few moments.. watch this and remember those innocent people who lost their lives.

Great walk off last night for Nicky Swisher.  This guy is not the greatest fielder but he sure has brought alot of spirit to the team.  Check out this vid…

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A month has gone by since the 4 game sweep of the Red Sox at Yankee Stadium.  Looking back at it now those 4 loses were truly a crushing blow to Red Sox Nation.   If there was one critical moment that signaled the end of Boston’s bid for an AL East title this was it…

30 days later the Yankees are still rolling and have piled up a 9 game lead on the Red Sox.  Now Boston is fighting the Rangers for their wild card life.  It will be interesting to see how things shake out.

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