AL East

The New York Mets have just received news that their star closer, Francisco Rodriguez, has been charged with assault. The incident occurred after last night's ballgame at Citi Field between K-Rod and his father-in-law.

Reports say that the Mets closer refused to speak with the media and got into a scuffle with his father-in-law about family issues. When asked what was wrong by the media, Francisco Rodriguez responded with an obscenity to mind their own business. 

Tony Massarotti said on the radio in Boston this week that the baseball season, for all intents and purposes, doesn't begin until August 15. The Boston Red Sox are inclined to believe that logic, given that much of what happened leading up to this month has been relatively forgettable.

A remarkable rash of injuries, silence at the trading deadline, wildly inconsistent performance. And yet, here they stand, just four games out of the Wild Card after taking two of three from the Toronto Blue Jays this week.

According to Jon Morosi of FOX sports, Toronto Blue Jays first baseman Lyle Overbay has cleared waivers successfully, and now can be traded by the Toronto Blue Jays.

Via FanGraphs:

Jackson’s profile does suggest that he should have an above average BABIP. He has a line drive rate of 25.8 percent and a ground ball rate above 50 percent, and both serve his speed quite well. As such, an above average BABIP should be expected.

The Yankees had to overcome a five run deficit last night to beat the Texas Rangers after Javier Vazquez's poor start, a start he shouldn't have even made.

Javy's pitches topped out at about 85 mph last night, which is not good enough to get major league hitters out, let alone the heavy hitting Texas Rangers.

The Yankees got seven innings out of their starter A.J.

The New York Yankees lost a heart-breaker to the Texas Rangers in the 10th inning, final score 4-3.

It’s no big secret that the Yankees are losing, winning only 4 of last 11 games and falling fast.

The Bombers first place lead is dwindling down, now just a half-a-game over the Tampa Bay Rays. The Boston Red Sox are playing catch-up sitting at five games back and also making the AL East a three-team event again.

When Blue Jays GM Alex Anthopoulos traded away Toronto's anointed next great First Baseman Brett Wallace, even the most hardcore of fans were perplexed.

We tried to console ourselves with speculation regarding Adam Lind taking over 1B full time or waxing poetic on Anthony Gose's huge upside (the guy we got in exchange for Wallace).

Looking at the MLB standings today, I couldn’t help but notice just how strong the AL East is so far this season. Even the fourth place team, the Toronto Blue Jays, are seven games above .500, and the only bad team in the division is the Orioles.

I thought it might be interesting to see what the differences are when an AL East team is playing in its division as opposed to playing teams in other divisions. 

Here are the results with in-division records first:

New York Yankees: 26-18, .591 winning percentage; 43-24, .642

The Yankees offense didn’t show up yesterday as they lost 2-1 to the Boston Red Sox thus splitting the four-game weekend series. Phil Hughes was on the mound and struggled through the first two innings before settling down and giving a strong performance.