Weekend discoveries

Things I learned this past weekend...

One - It's early yet, but the Yankees pitching looks about how I expected - not much beyond Chien-Ming Wang. Phil Hughes was battered for six earned runs in two innings and Mike Mussina's outing doesn't even qualify as a quality start (defined as six innings completed with no more then three earned runs allowed), completing five and two-thirds while giving up four earned runs.

The irony of the weekend is that the Red Sox turned in two quality starts for the weekend series, but won only one of them - Josh Beckett's start on Saturday night.

Two - The Yankees' issues go far beyond starting pitching.

I know the Sox have more speed on the base paths than they used to, but when has anyone ever heard of the Red Sox stealing six bases? SIX?! Ten, fifteen years ago that would have been the team's total for the first two months of the season, and they did it in one game.

If the Yankees don't shore up the catching, the team could be cooked early.

Three - Boy...the Detroit Tigers are a special sort of bad right now. With the second worst batting average (.235), and the worst ERA (5.94), Detroit has put together a grand total of two wins through the first 12 games. The next worst team, the Washington Nationals, has still managed at least four wins.

Considering no team that has started 0-7 in the history of baseball (the Tigers started 0-7) has even made the post-season, it might just be time to start thinking about next year in Mo-Town.

Four - I'm always trying to introduce my daughter to women's sports and female athletes in an effort to give her healthy female roll models in athletics to look up to. To that end I watched yesterday's broadcast of one of the big gymnastics tournaments.

We had the opportunity to be introduced to Nastia Liukin, a 19-year old Olympic hopeful.

Liukin might be the most impressive gymnast I have seen since Mary-Lou Retton. If she doesn't garner multiple gold in the games in Beijing, I'll be shocked.

Five - I often forget about athletes that aren't involved in what we consider sports. My wife sent me this youtube video of The Great Chinese State Circus. This might be some of the most incredible athletic stunts I've ever seen performed...