Joe Girardi just confirmed during his weekly spot on Mike and the Mad Dog that Joba Chamberlain will make his first major league start against the Toronto Blue Jays on Tuesday night at the Stadium. Andy Pettitte will make the start on Monday against Livan Hernandez and the Twins.
Girardi stated that he expects Joba to throw around 65-70 pitches.
On the mound for Toronto will be notorious Yankee killer - Roy Halladay.
Now I've gone on record saying the Yanks are making this transition way too fast and I think starting him on Tuesday at home with all the buzz surrounding it against one of the top pitchers in the league in Halladay is an enormous mistake and a helluva lot of pressure to put on him unnecessarily.
It is my belief that if the Yanks were going to insist on starting him next week, they should have done it on Monday against the Twins at the Metrodome in order to keep the hype and buzz down to a minimum.
It would be hard for me to imagine the Yanks handling this transition any worse than they have over the last 9 days.
Nonetheless, all eyes are going to be on Joba this Tuesday in the most anticipated start for this team in years.