Fan News

In Derek Jeter's second at bat, he blooped a down-and-away knuckler from Tim Wakefield to short right-field, but Teixeira followed him grounding into a 5-4-3 DP.

For years, the San Francisco Giants and Los Angeles Dodgers have had the biggest rivalry in baseball that doesn’t include the term “Red Sox vs. Yankees,”  with every game just as heated as the one on the east coast.

However, as both teams have struggled and as players have gone from team to team in the National League West, the rivalry has cooled in recent years.

The thing that had the battle going when both teams moved west was that almost all the players on each roster were homegrown and were taught to hate each other.

Here are the lineups:

YANKEES
Johnny Damon LF
Derek Jeter SS (welcome back)
Mark Teixeira 1B
Hideki Matsui DH
Jorge Posada C
Robinson Cano 2B
Xavier Nady RF

There was a time in the not-too-distant past when baseball observers conjectured that pitchers who attain 300 or more career victories will be fewer and fewer with each passing season.

The primary reasons given were the preference of five-man, rather than four-man, rotations, and the increasing frequency in which managers these days pull a starter in favor of a reliever in late innings.

This state of affairs may be so, but there has been a bumper crop of 300-win talents in the last half-dozen years.

The Yankees acquired catcher Chris Stewart from the Chicago White Sox for a player to be named later earlier this week, and it has created lots of speculation as to what exactly that means for the team and its minor league affiliates.

At the major league level, the Yankees have Jorge Posada and Jose Molina, but obvious questions remain regarding Posada’s shoulder.

It seems to be a two man race for the final spot in the rotation, as lefty Jeremy Sowers was optioned to Triple A Columbus.

The Vanderbilt grad pitched alright, posting a 4.91 ERA in 14 2/3 innings of work. Sowers will most definitely re-surface sometime in 2009.

The last remaining spot is down to Scott Lewis and Aaron Laffey. Shapiro had glowing things to say about Lewis yesterday, so don't be surprised to see Scotty in the No. 5 spot in the rotation to start the season.

1. Matt Wieters
No he's not going to start the season with the big club, but all indications are that Wieters will be up at some point for the Orioles this season. The wunderkid is the best catching prospect in baseball right now and has a chance to be the face of the Orioles for years to come.

Orioles fans should be excited to see just how good Wieters really is and how he performs in the majors. If Wieters is the real deal, the Orioles could be really competative in a few seasons.

2. The real Adam Jones