El Duque: Old Man; Boston - Taking Over

First off, oh baby! El Duque, the 55-year-old man, has a tight shoulder. Which just goes to show - prayer really does work! I couldn't be more excited. The one guy who's been consistently good in the starting rotation has shoulder problems. So now you have the always-overrated Mussina, the you-never-know-what-you'll-get Lieber and Vazquez, and let's not forget the one-year-wonder Estaban Loaiza, whose one good year was 2003. This team is going down! Back in '98, '99, you knew the Yankees were going all the way. With Cone, Pettitte, Clemens, Wells, a younger El Duque... you knew this team had darn good pitching, and no one was going to beat them. But the 2004 crew is a joke, and this Yankee despiser loves it!

And Boston is clearly the better team. I don't care if they come in second. They had a better team from day one, but they were so cocky that they played as if they'd win games merely by showing up to the park. That's when they had that two-month stretch of .500 ball. Once they turned up the heat, though, they've been nearly unbeatable. Heck, they might even be better than the Yankees position by position. Let's see:

1b - Millar and Minky over Giambi, Olerud, and Clark.
2b - Bellhorn is way better than Miguel Cairo.
ss - Close one, but I'll give Jeter a slight edge over Cabrera.
3b - Rodriguez, of course, although his .220 average with runners in scoring position is encouraging.
lf - Manny's way better than Shemp Matsui.
cf - Johnny Damon over Bernie and Lofton.
rf - Sheff takes the cake over Nixon.
c - Varitek over Posada, but not by much.
dh - Ortiz kicks.
sp - Shilling, Pedro, and Lowe over the Yankee clowns.
rp - Rivera gives the Junkees an edge over any team re the bullpen.

So we have Boston 7, Yankees 4, and keep in mind that if the Yankee starting pitching stinks up the joint, you don't even get to Mariano.

Let the playoffs begin!