Weekend Sports Wrapup

JWP vs. Maddog
John Wayne Parr closed out the year with a win in another Australian Muay Thai event. He defeated rising star Eli "Maddog" Madagan. It doesn't air on Fox 25 until later in December, but from what I've read, JWP made it look good too. Maddog had a pretty good year and was always in shape, but JWP keeps getting stronger and few surpass him as far as experience... probably no one in Australia.

NBA
The Bulls lost their game, dropping another one of the Circus Road Trip. As usual, they dug a hole and couldn't get out of it. They have Milwaukee tonight, so it's a chance to end the trip with a win. The Bucks are a beatable team and a division rival. As bad as the Bulls are, the Knicks are still worse. There was a lot of news around an improved Curry who lost 30+ pounds, but I'll believe it when I see it. He's still going to be rusty and far from the shape he was in during his tenure with the Bulls. And worse than the Knicks this year is the NJ Nets. They broke the record for worst start in NBA history last night by dropping their 17th straight! That's just unbelievable!

Yankees
Not much baseball news, but over the weekend, Roy Halladay said he would OK a trade to the Yankees if the Jays were looking to trade. That got Yankees fans drooling. Imagine a rotation of CC, Halladay, Pettitte, Wang and AJ! Then Hughes would get the 7th, Joba the 8th and Mariano the 9th. That would be one of the strongest pitching staffs in history! From Halladay's point of view, he totally wanted to be in CC & AJ's shoes after they won the World Series.

Tiger
Tiger Woods got into trouble over the weekend and it had nothing to do with golf. One report had him backing his SUV into a hydrant. The car got smashed and he was stuck. Then his wife tried to get him out by smaching a window with a golf club. Another report says it was a domestic dispute and she chased after him with a golf club, causing the crash. Hopefully tiger's report turns out to be the truth because someone of his stature going down with bad news like this would hurt the sport a lot.

Black Friday Results

As I expected, Black Friday didn't do that great. I heard on NY1 that it did slightly better than last year... which wasn't a good year. So a little bit better isn't going to do much for the economy. I noticed that the electronics and computer deals weren't great, but was hoping other departments would do well. There were huge lines at Best Buy, but it didn't seem like that had an effect. Maybe people were buying lower priced items rather than TVs and appliances.

So for another week, I have no deals to list. But definitely tune in to the Online stores on Monday for Cyber Monday. It's our last hope!

Allen Iverson

Last week, Allen Iverson officially left the Grizzlies and "retired." I have "retired" in quotes because I really don't think it'll be that long until he comes out of retirement. He's not that old and is still one of the league's best scorers. He's been the best scorer in the NBA since Michael Jordan retired. So while all of the cameras were on Kobe, it was AI that was filling up the stat sheet. There were talks of him going to the Knicks and the most recent news was him going back to Philly. I think he'll at most have a year off if someone doesn't pick him up now. Like I've been saying, this whole season is a dead one with teams waiting for the power (James, Anthony & Wade) to shift. After those 3 guys sign, then other stars will be considered. It's almost like a lottery, but with pro players instead of college.

I would love for the Bulls to get AI now. The desperately need a true scorer. Trying to groom Salmons into that role is going to cost them precious games and it might be too late by the time he improves.

Black Friday Deals (Part 2)

NewEgg
LG Black WH08LS20K Blu-ray Burner for $129.99
LITE-ON Black 4X BD-ROM SATA Internal 4X Blu-ray Disc Reader for $49.99
Rosewill USB 2.0 External Slim 8X DVD Burner for $39.99
Logitech G11 keyboard for $43.99
Logitech V550 Nano laser mouse for $9.99
Acer Netbook (Atom N270, 1 GB RAM, 160 GB HDD) for $189.99

CompUSA
Sony BDPS360 Blu-Ray Disc Player for $127.99
Patriot 8 GB SD Card for $19.99
I-inc 28" LCD for $249.99
Patriot 8 GB Flash Drive for $19.99
Patriot 32 GB Flash Drive for $74.99
Transcend 16 GB Flash Drive for $39.99

Amazon
Wacom Intuos3 6x8" Pen Tablet for $199.99
Samsung BD-P1600 1080p Blu-ray Disc Player for $149.99

Black Friday Deals (Part 1)

There are tons of deals out there for the craziest shopping day of the year. As usual, I'm just going to list the realistic ones... the ones that are possible to get without waiting on line all night long.

Apple.com
Apple isn't going to release their prices until Friday, but according to rumors, most will be online only (very weird). Supposedly it will be 10-25% off the computers. The 25% would be very hard to believe.

Best Buy
SanDisk 8 GB SD Card for $19.99
Sony BDP-S360 Blu-ray Disc Player for $149.99
Samsung BD-P1600 Blu-Ray Disc Player for $149.99
Logitech Harmony 510 Advanced Universal Remote for $39.99
Western Digital 1.5 TB External Hard Drive for $119.99

Staples
Logitech V450 Wireless Laser Notebook Mouse for $14.99
SanDisk 8 GB microSD Memory Card for $14.99
SanDisk 8 GB SD Card for $14.99
Coby 7" Portable DVD Player for $49.99
Acer 23" Widescreen LCD Monitor for $139.98

Office Depot
Height-Adjustable Mobile Laptop Cart for $17.99
SanDisk 8 GB SD Card for $14.99
Seagate 1.5 TB External Hard Drive for $99.99
Seagate 2 TB External Hard Drive for $179.99

Radio Shack
Gigaware 2.1 Multimedia Speaker System for $10.00
Gigaware Folding Notebook Cooling Pad for $10.00
Logitech Wireless Keyboard and Mouse Combo for $19.99
Acer 11.6" Netbook (Atom Z520, 2 GB RAM, 250 GB HDD) for $249.99
Samsung BD-P1600 Blu-ray Disc Player for $149.99

Joker's Mom

An old lady across from me in the subway was wearing a green leather jacket, which I thought was a little bright for the usual New York black & gray. She also had on neutral colored pants and a hat. The green was a little loud, but still normal. Then after a few stops, she was adjusting her hat and I noticed that she dyed her hair... of all colors... purple! That along with the green jacket make up Joker's palette! Of course Joker has the opposite... green hair and purple jacket. Maybe it was his mom.

Another Blown Lead

After 2 losses in a row to Western teams, this is starting to look like the traditional Circus Road Trip. Last night, the Bulls looked great in the beginning of the game as they were blowing out Denver in the first quarter. The Nuggets slowly gained ground in the 2nd and made it a close game by halftime. Then they slowly took the lead and pulled away in the 4th. In this game, pretty much only Deng (22 pts), Rose (28 pts) & Noah (9 pts/12 rbds) showed up. The rest of the team went into a scoring slump.

Last year, when the Bulls picked up Salmons, the front office was already preparing to let Ben Gordon go. BG might be a streaky shooter, but he would never put up 5 points in 28 minutes! On Detroit, Gordon continues to do an excellent job filling up his stat sheet. Yesterday, he had 25 points, 5 rebounds and 3 assists. Who said this guy can't play point? He's been doing this almost every game.

Black Friday (Preview)

There were a bunch of circulars this week, but nothing good. Traditionally, this is the weekend to ignore the sales because Black Friday is just around the corner. Based on trends in the computer world, here are some things I think we'll see:

Laptops
Laptops and netbooks have seen very large price reductions over the past few years. For Black Friday, expect to see very low prices on many netbook models, especially the ones that are still running N270 processors. On the laptop side, there will probably be huge deals on the Celeron-based machines.

Movies
The recent Blu-ray machine price drops, spearheaded by the slim PS3 means more people are making the move to hi-def. Expect some very great deals on DVDs and even Blu-ray titles. I'm predicting DVDs for $2-5 and Blu-rays around $10 for the older titles. DVD players will also see significant price drops. It doesn't make sense to buy one, but the portables are still useful as there are no Blu-rays yet.

LCDs
This will be a last ditch effort to get rid of the 720p LCDs. For the right price, these TVs make great bedroom models or large scale computer displays. Also expect old model LCDs to drop lower than the usually weekly sale prices. Keep your eye on the usual Acer, Asus and AOC as well as Samsung.

Apples
This is the most predictable one. It's the only day of the year where Apple discounts its computers and iPods.

Need 1 More

While the Bulls are off to one of their best starts since the 80's (yes... including the Jordan Years), I just don't think they'll have the same overall success as last year. They're not deep enough. If just one guy has an off night, they're going to lose. John Salmons isn't Ben Gordon. He's a good player, but not at the same level in my book. So with BG in Detroit, the Bulls still need to get someone to make up for that spot. Right now, Allen Iverson is floating out there as a free agent and Tracy McGrady is unhappy with the Rockets. I would love for the Bulls to get one of those guys. I think either one is a good fit. Personality-wise, they're probably too high profile for the Bulls, but I think they would be happy in Chicago. These 2 guys are generally good teammates when the team does well. The Bulls work hard and have a lot of role players. AI or T-Mac paired with Derrick Rose would be awesome. Unfortunately, I don't think it will happen. The Bulls are probably one of those teams waiting for 2010. Whatever they do, it better be worth it. For me, they can only make up for losing Gordon by doing whatever it takes to get LeBron or Wade.

Bulls vs. Lakers

I didn't really expect a win going up against one of the best in the West without Ben Gordon, so I'll just skip to some good things I picked up during the game. The defense against Bryant was relatively good. We got in his face for every shot and limited him to just 21 points. Unfortunately, we did nothing against Gasol, who had a big night. That's OK... as long as Kobe doesn't get the glory! Noah continued to be solid. I'm really feel like he's improved a lot so far this year. He's leading the league in rebounds and is actually scoring 10+ per game. My heart still stops when he dribbles, but I'd still trade that in for his current performance. Derrick Rose got back on track after a slow first quarter. He finished with 20. Hopefully this game breaks him out of his offensive slump. I also saw some good stuff from Brad Miller and John Salmons. We needed more from Deng & Hinrich for a win though. Steals and rebounds were there. Assists were good and turnovers were limited. We also did a good job forcing turnovers... pretty much the opening the Lakers had.

Bulls Win Again

The Bulls kept up their winning record by downing the team they swapped parts with last year. Andres Nocioni didn't get to play due to injury though. On the Bull's side, John Salmons had a big game, leading his team with 23 points. Deng had another double-double (16/10). The scoring was spread out with 6 guys in double figures. Defense was the story though. The team had 7 blocks and 12 steals and they kept the hot shooting Kings from reaching the century mark.

Last night's game was the type of games the Bulls need to play with their current team to be successful. The scoring needs to be spread out. If they have 5 guys score 10 and one guy score 20 and play tough defense, they can shutdown even the best teams. Guys who weren't scoring last year need to step it up. Noah has answered the call so far. They can't afford the entire team falling into a slump. Deng has made it a point to build his inside game. So they just need to keep all of this up.

Ear Buds

Electronic gadgets have made many manners get worse. I wrote about this with cellphones in the past and people answering them mid-conversation. Today I witnessed something odd with MP3 players. I was on the train and a guy across from me was listening to his music. A couple of stops later, a friend of his boarded the train, also listening to his own music. They noticed each other and at first just nodded to each other. A few minutes later, they started talking... just short one-sentence conversations. neither one turned their MP3 players off. They just took out one ear bud and took turns saying "what?" and then repeating themselves while the other had an ear bud off. Does it hurt to just turn the MP3 player off for a while!? These guys just needed to keep listening non-stop even if it meant making the conversation less efficient and totally broken!

Flood

On my way home from work, I was standing on the train, reading the paper. All of a sudden, I heard a loud splash followed by a lot of water pouring. I thought some idiot spilled a gallon of something. But when I looked over, it was some little kid throwing up... a lot. Liquidy brown stuff gushed out 3 times. It looked like more than his stomach could possible hold, defying the laws of physics. It must've flooded a good third of the train car. I've never seen a section of the car clear out so quickly. There was a little girl next to him and she got out of there the fastest and fortunately untouched! When we hit the next stop, the kid's mother quickly dragged her son out and jetted. He was still going too. Very gross!

Weekend Sports Wrap Up

Pacquiao vs. Cotto
The talk of the town was Manny Pacquiao vs. Miguel Cotto and it was well worth the money for PPV buyers. It was an entertaining fight that almost went the full distance. Aside from the first round, it was very one-sided, but Cotto kept getting back up and even had a second wind in the 5th. Pacman is just on another level though. His speed was amazing and too hard for Cotto to overcome. The referee stopped the match in early in the 12th round as Cotto wasn't really doing much but concentrating on standing up... only to get more punishment.

Bulls vs. 76ers
Finally... a legitimate win by a respectable margin as the Bulls down Philly 94-88. They built a lead in the 3rd and were consistent for the entire 2nd half. This one was headed by the 2 leaders of the team... Hinrich and Deng who had 19 a piece. Deng had 9 rebounds and Hinrich also had 7 assists. This is exactly what the Bulls need from these 2 guys to be successful without BG. Miller, Salmons, Rose & Noah all had 14 points each. So it was a well-rounded effort... a typical Bulls game.

NJ Nets
This must be one of the worst starts in Nets history... 0-10. They lost Carter over the Summer, but the makeup of the team shouldn't add up to the bottom of the cellar. They got one of the better big men in Najera and an OK point guard in Alston. It just doesn't make sense sometimes. They're actually 1 loss worse than the lowly Knicks too. It's hard to deny that both teams threw the season in the trash long ago in anticipation of the potential power moves in 2010. I'm pretty sure these aren't the only teams with that in mind either.

Tech Deals of the Week

The items in the weekly circulars continue to be lame as we approach Thanksgiving Weekend. Many items listed aren't really even sale prices. Staples and Radio Shack have been releasing very thin circulars lately. So right now it's best to hold out on buying anything. We just have 2 more weeks to go until the Holiday Season.

Silver & Gold

Earlier this week, both Derek Jeter & Mark Teixiera were given gold glove awards... something that we've become accustomed to. It's Jeter's 4th and Teixiera's 3rd. The 35 year old Jeter is the best shortstop out there. I see every night a different SS trying out Jeter's patented play running towards 3rd and snapping the ball in the opposite direction to take away a base hit. But it doesn't happen. The ball arcs too much and the runner is safe by a mile. Only Jeter can do that consistently. And Tex... his defense at 1st has made the highlight reel every night. He's a great compliment to Jeter & A-Rod in the infield because all of these guys move and react fast. Cano is even solid when he doesn't fall asleep. He has potential to be a lefty Jeter.

It was also just announced that both of these guys won the Silver Slugger award in each of their positions. This is Jeter's 4th as well. I have to once again draw comparison to Michael Jordan. Both guys showed no decline in stats as they got older. They just adjusted their games. Jeter still bats over 300 each year... a whopping 334 this year. Along with that, 100+ runs, 18 homers, 60+ RBIs and 30 SBs. He surpassed Gherig in hits, taking over the top spot in Yankees history and is quickly coming up on the 3000 mark! Tex had an amazing 1st year in NY, very unusual considering the history of power hitters that made the move. He lead the league in homers with 39. This is his 3rd Silver Slugger.

In my book, nabbing both of these awards puts them up top for the MVP since Gold Glove highlights the best defense and Silver Slugger honors the best offense. These are the 2 most complete players in the MLB!

A Typical 4th Quarter?

Last night's game was a good example of where I see the Bulls going this year. It was a close game all throughout. They were mostly losing, but made some runs. In the end, they fell short and let Toronto pull away. They went cold in the last couple of minutes. This is a world without Ben Gordon. Rose can be clutch at times and once in a while Deng or Salmons can get the 30 points, but subtracting BG and not adding anyone back reduces the chances of winning significantly.

I've been complaining about that move a lot, but the numbers back me up. Ben Gordon is putting up great numbers at Detroit... 24 points, 2.6 rebounds and 4 assists. They have the same record as the Bulls at this point because the rest of their team isn't as good. Let's put it this way... if you take BG away from both teams, the Bulls are better. So the Bulls with BG this year would definitely be at the top of their division.

Recession

We've been hearing about the recession every day for over a year now. It's always bad news... big companies going down, mass layoffs, more stress, etc. There is however an optimistic point of view. We can view the recession as a rebirth... starting over and doing things right. If a large company is forced to cut costs, they can really evaluate the situation and cut the high paid people who don't really do much. If they play it right, they'll end up saving money and increasing productivity. Let's face it, in many companies and industries, people used to move up or hop jobs so often that they would get massive salary increases each year... to the point where they became overpaid. Things usually balance out during recession. Those people have to take pay cuts or lose there jobs.

The recession can also favor the hardworking independent worker. Because companies are trying to cut costs, they may drop the expensive service firm and opt to hire a freelancer who would do a better job anyway. The company I work for used to use an expensive design firm for the public facing web pages and another for some print materials. They now use freelancers. The cost is several times lower and we get more personal attention and no additional politics.

To survive the recession, we all need to work hard and cut out the bs. When it's all over, we will have created a better business world.

By a Hair's Width

The Bulls just lost a close one to Denver... so close that the officials spent a good amount of time reviewing the final shot. They were out there looking at the replay for more time than an OT session! Denver had a slight lead the whole time... by 2-7. Bulls made a 7-2 run. Things were tied for a while. Billups was fouled with .6 seconds left. He made one shot and missed the second on purpose in hopes that a bounce would burn enough clock. Noah got the rebound fast enough... .3 left on the clock. The Bulls threw it in and Miller tapped a 2-ball in for what looked like the win. From some angles, it looked like it was out of his hands and from others, it did not. The officials gave it to Denver much to the dismay of the hometown crowd.

It's a tough loss, but the Bulls are still at the top of their division and are still off to a good start given their history. This is the type of loss where they miss Ben Gordon though. The Bulls have been terrible with 4th quarter freethrows this year despite the winning record. Gordon shot 90% consistently. They just don't have that security now. The positive is Rose did hit 2 clutch freethrows to tie the game, but it shouldn't have come to that. They had many opportunities to put some distance in the last quarter.

Wrong Metal!

I was talking to a coworker who was planning to buy a new iMac. He went on and on about the design and materials. One thing I had to stop him at was when he mentioned that the case was made of titanium. It's ALUMINUM!!! Apple just calls it titanium because of the color and now everyone is brainwashed into thinking that. If it was really titanium, the Apple computers would actually be worth the price!

Tech Deals of the Week

This is just a note that I still am doing the Tech Deals of the Week segment. I just haven't found any good ones lately. Like last year, I'm expecting it to be slow for the next 2 weeks in preparation for Black Friday. I'm also anticipating a stretched Black Friday again this year, meaning stores are going to start the sales about a week early to try to stimulate the economy. Definitely start looking around the week of Thanksgiving. The Online stores will likely kick things off first. CompUSA already has a sale, but the prices aren't great. It's just their standard sale prices with a Black Friday marketing label. Stay tuned for more!

Surprisingly Good Start

Who would've thought the Bulls would start out 4-2? They took out Cleveland last Thursday too, so no one can say they had an easy schedule. I have to admit, I thought they had no chance against the Cavs without Ben Gordon, but Deng really stepped up and Rose was excellent down the stretch with a key blocked shot. He also had 2 1-0n-5 plays. He took one shot coast to coast and another he just mesmerized his defender with his ball handling. Noah did a great job defending LeBron James on his final shot. There was a lot of contact, but every replay showed that it was not foul.

After playing one of the best teams, the Bulls beat one of the worst teams last night. They defeated the Bobcats 93-90. That was a lot closer than it should've been and the Bulls were actually losing at halftime. It was a big 3rd quarter that got them the win. Salmons did his job in this game, scoring a team high 27. Noah has also been stepping up this season as he scored 21 and grabbed 16 rebounds.

Hopefully a good start doesn't mean they'll bomb the 2nd half. If that's the case, I'd rather have it the other way around!

27

It was already written and it happened last night. The Yankees finally won their 27th World Championship! It wasn't a perfect looking game, but I felt the whole time that it was just a formality. There was no way they were going to lose this one. The hometown crowd was pumped and ready for the celebration. Starting for the Yankees was Andy Pettitte, the hero, the champ. His opponent was the Red Sox, Pedro Martinez, long time villain. It was their first season in the new stadium and a great way to break it in. Pettitte was solid and pitched better than he gave himself credit for. Catching him was of course Jorge Posada, who called a great game. Jeter had 3 hits and scored a couple of time. Mariano Rivera slammed the door and had another excellent playoff run in the closer spot. So the 4 champs played big roles in this final game. It was Hideki Matsui who took care of the offense though, batting in 6 of the RBI's definitively earning the World Series MVP.

The MVP was a tough one though. So many players did well and it was a such a big team effort. Jeter was the most consistent across the 6 games. A-Rod & Damon were clutch. Pettitte won 2 games. Rivera prevented any late inning comebacks. But Matsui deserved it, showing off his power hitting and 600 ball.

Hopefully Matsui & Damon earned new contracts after this. This team needs to be kept intact if there's going to be a run at a dynasty. Hopefully the organization realizes this. I've seen all too often championship teams that get broken up the year after. This team has chemistry and potential for a repeat and three-peat.

Go Yankees!

The New Macs

I few weeks ago, Apple updated their low end machines... no keynote or special event, but expected because they were at the end of their average cycle. These models are a little more realistic than the Pro models as far as price and they're not that far off with power.

MacBook
The MacBook is basically a plastic version of the Pro. It's now built out of a unibody mold, but is white plastic instead of "titanium." Because it's plastic, it's significantly lighter than the 13" MacBook Pro. I've used the Pro version before and it's pretty heavy for a 13" laptop... felt like a 15.4" PC. They improved the battery as with the Pros a couple months ago. It also has the multitouch trackpad. The screen is glass, so graphics look crisper. It also has an NVidia graphics card. With all of this, there's no reason to get the Pro... unless you need the 15" or 17" models... which are no longer portable in my book.

Mini
The Mini, which is always rumored to be discontinued is actually the best bang for buck. It's been seriously upgraded too with a faster processor, up to 4 GB RAM, 802.11n... and a server version (w/ 2 hard drives instead of a DVD burner). It also has a real graphics card so it can go toe-to-toe with the larger models.

iMac
Of the lowend models, I thought the iMac got the least upgraded. Besides the processor upgrade, the screen actually got smaller because they went to 16:9 instead of 16:10. I thought that was a little odd because the extra space is useful for computing. By going to 16:9, they're selling this as an HTPC. I guess that could work. My personal taste is just 16:10 for computers.

Magic Mouse
This is probably the best product of the release. It's a multitouch mouse! Why didn't anyone thing of this before!? The mouse has a smooth surface with no buttons, but the top of the mouse has touch sensitive buttons and supports finger gestures.

Deng 20-20

The Bulls were able to scrap up a clutch win after a sloppy 1st quarter where they shot 25% and only scored 13. The Bucks lead by as many as 18. The Bulls might be without Ben Gordon, but the Bucks didn't have Michael Redd either, so that made this a winnable game! Deng was really the only consistent player. He had 8 points and 11 rebounds by halftime and finished with 24 and 20 (career high in rebounds). It was a different Luol Deng than we were used to. He got inside and banged into the big guys. Hopefully he can do that more often and be the missing inside presence. The rest of the guys need to step up on offense as they need to make up for the 20+ points per game Gordon used to give them. I actually see some improvements in Noah. Thomas has the talents, but still has attitude issues.

When I break this down, a close game against the Bucks is not a good thing. This was a team they owned last year and now they barely got a win? If Redd was active, it surely would've been a loss.

Low Priority

All office emails are either unmarked or have the red exclamation point for high priority. The most unused option is the low priority button. In a world run by politics and big egos, nothing is ever low priority. In fact, the high priority button is used so often that it's really lost meaning. Most of the ones I get aren't really important at all. It's usually a salesperson just saying, "My work is the most important! It's all about me!" So I tend to put those aside based on the sender. I rarely use the high priority button unless it truly is high priority because I don't want to be the boy who cried "wolf." On occasion, I have used the low priority button. And oddly enough, that button gets a better response. When I send a message with that on, I tend to get an immediate response... the opposite effect. I think this is due to 2 factors. The icon stands out because it's very rare, so it's more likely to be noticed and not ignored. Also, because it's labeled as low priority, there's less pressure.

Rollins Was Wrong

I was hoping the Yankees would finish the series last night in Game 5. That would've made Jimmy Rollins' prediction half right at least. Cliff Lee was great again, though I thought the the Yankees did a better job of wearing him out. They didn't swing at the first pitch like they did in Game 1. By the 7th inning, he was starting to get tired as the Yankees started hitting and almost mounting a comeback. The pitching just wasn't there last night as AJ was already taken out in the 3rd inning .

On the bright side of things, stretching to a Game 6 means the Yankees have a chance to close this out at home where they're used to winning. The city's going to go nuts if they do it. It's also a storybook matchup between Andy Pettitte, the man with the rings and Pedro Martinez, the enemy. Both guys are veterans and have pitched in big games.

One More to Go!

Last night's game is going to be a classic if the Yankees can finish this thing off. It was a close game throughout. The Yankees scored first in what looked like a great start in the first inning (2-0). CC was shaky from the beginning though and already gave one run back in the bottom of the inning (2-1). The big guy didn't pitch a nice looking game, but he was still able to keep the runs down and got himself out of jams with his strikeout skills. The Yankees had a 4-3 lead into the 8th, but the Phillies chipped away and got one off of Joba with 2 outs left. Joba was looking good until that one mistake, as he easily struck out the first 2 batters. But the Yankees came up big in the 9th... also with 2 outs. Damon had a great at bat, fouling off pitch after pitch until he got one to hit. He then stole 2nd and to everyone's surprise ran ahead and also took 3rd! It looked like a little league play, but it was heads-up base running by a veteran. He took advantage of the defensive shift. The Phillies had all players beefing up the right side of the field to prepare for Teixiera. A-Rod eventually knocked Damon in from third for yet another game winning RBI. Posada gave them 2 more insurance runs, but that was all they needed as Rivera came in and closed out the 9th.

Game 5 will be tough as Burnett will be matched up against the almost unhittable Lee. Also, if he gets into a jam, I'm sure the Phillies will have everyone available as their back is against the wall.