Mood Music - Bring it on Home by Led Zeppelin
Alex Rodriguez is going to top 50 home runs, bring back shades of 2007, and take home the American League MVP in a landslide.
After watching him hit this Spring, it was easy to get carried away into those types of expectations. When healthy, A-Rod is the most productive hitter in the lineup (apologies to Robinson Cano and Mark Teixeira) and one of the best hitters in all of baseball. When healthy.
The reports from Dr. Marc Philippon on Alex's hip that were talked about during Spring Training were extremely encouraging, but he has continued to battle nagging injuries.
While he has looked great at the plate so far this year, I think it might be time to back off the MVP expectations, and be happy to get 140 games of a 5-6 win third basemen: Optimistic, but reasonable.
Elsewhere, here is a story about Russell Martin adapting to being a Yankee, with a few "best shape of my life" quotes from Russ. I think we have all been very pleasantly surprised with what we've gotten out of Martin, but historically, he has seen his production at the plate take a strong dip after April and May, so I'm going to hold off on calling him a long term catching solution for the time being.