IT STARTS IN CLEVELAND WITH CC MONSTER

“As long as I’m out there Friday, I don’t care.” 

– CCSabathia

The stage now needs to be set.  The New York Yankees just came off a horrendous 3 game series against the Chicago White Sox in which they were swept. It's embarrassing and it's not my New York Yankees.  Now, after 48 hours of thinking and rethinking about the games they just played, they are getting back their ace, CC Sabathia to hopefully he will right the ship and get the Yankees winning again…starting in Cleveland.

It’s been a tough road of late. The Yankees offense and pitching just can’t get on the same page.  Someone said on Twitter that they needed to get "in sync."  That’s the best way to describe it.  It doesn’t help that the starting pitching has been mixed and matched and not stable as of late. I mean, Bleeding Yankee Blue declared at the start of August to that the Yankees needed to begin their big push toward the playoffs… it’s far from it right now...I'm alittle worried. The Tampa Bay Rays are now 2.5 games out of first and while we can't worry about them and instead, just play good ball, it's hard not to scoreboard watch right now, let's be honest.

CC Sabathia can set the tone.  He has to, because if he doesn’t as the Yankees ace, the likelihood of the Yankees getting to the playoffs will be tricky.  Sure, Hiroki Kuroda has done incredible work when we needed to. So has Derek Jeter, Ichiro Suzuki, Eric Chavez and I can go on with a few more warriors, but we need the full team push right now, bottom line.

No doubt, the distractions have piled up. This latest one involving Ivan Nova with a “grab” on his shoulder is concerning, read HERE. I mean, now he's on the DL and we need to shuffle pitchers again. David Phelps is getting some work in, huh? We need to do what we always do, power through the bad luck to get to a winning streak.  But think about this for a moment…the Yankees aren’t winning and when we are, it’s few and far between.  Combine that with no guarantee too make the playoffs right now and we have problems.  By the way, if the Yankees made the playoffs and today was Game 1, I have no faith that we’d win the first round of the playoffs with he starting pitching we have.

And what about guys like Russell Martin that are trying to grind through the season but just can’t get over the .200 mark? What about guys like Joba Chamberlain who is severely struggling since his return? There are major, major problems here. 

No doubt, there are guys that really have stepped up and I applaud their hard work.  Clay Rapada, Cody Eppley, Jayson Nix, Raul Ibanez…Jeet and Ichiro,Nick Swisher and of course and Tex and Chavez, even Rafael Soriano has just been awesome.  Hiroki Kuroda is my flavor of the month.  The guy is so in the zone, I swear, I hope I didn’t just jinx him.  You gotta love the guys that have really stepped up.  

But we need more, that extra push we’re missing with guys like ARod, Andy Pettitte and Mariano Rivera being out.  Where can we get that extra energy? That extra drive? I know where…but that’s for another post for another time.

For now, CC Monster needs to set the tone and he will in Cleveland tonight.  Come on Yankees…we need you now more than ever!

Please comment, we have DISQUS, it's easier than ever. Let me know what you think and follow me on Twitter @BleednYankeeBlu and join the group Bleeding Yankee Blue on Facebook, just type it in.