Two Plus Two Older Archives - Ahhh, baseball. NYY vs Red Sox

crappy series for a Sox fan. I've been more pessimistic about the Sox chances than most fans, but even this is bad. The Yanks offense is better, IMO. Baseball prospectus has both teams with EQAs of .275, but I believe they are using this year's faulty park factors which actually has Yankee Stadium as a better hitters park than Fenway.

Sox bullpen sucks, and it's only because so many of their games are blowouts that it hasn't cost them more so far. Sox have an advantage in starting pitching - but it's not huge. I'm not about to proclaim Randy Johnson a slightly above average pitcher yet. The top of the Yankee rotation is better - it's just their question marks from 3-5 especially with the injuries that hurts them.

The Sox are also slightly less bad defensively.

Everyone has been quick to jump on the Yanks problems this year, but the Sox aren't exactly having great seasons from many players. Their infield in particular has been a big disappointment, with Millar, Renteria, and Bellhorn all performing far below projections. It was an awesome thing the past 2 years how the Sox lineup was so consistently good top to bottom. I think all regulars were above .800 OPS - better than most team's OPS. We don't have that this season, and while the offense is still very good, it just doesn't impress like it has the last few seasons.

The pitching has also underperformed. Our ace has been out all year and ineffective in his few outings. Clement is really the only guy pitching better than expected.

At this point, I don't see the Sox winning the division more than half the time. And they'd stand very little chance if the Yanks were anywhere near as good as they've been the past several years.