This past weekend's match-up against the Yankees in New York posed a variety of interesting story lines. The Mariners were coming into Yankee Stadium with a better record than the Yankees for the first time in five years. The Mariners had won seven of their past nine games. And the Yankees pitching was in complete disarray, forcing Joe Torre to rely on Kei Igawa, who had all ready been banished to the bullpen in his first month in the major leagues, and such high-profile names as Darrel Rasner and Matt DeSalvo. In short, it promised to be an interesting series.

And indeed, Friday night's game appeared to confirm as much. Due to some prior commitments, I had to attend a meeting at five in the afternoon. I was listening to the game long enough to hear the Yankees bats' make mincemeat out of Cha Seung Baek's offerings, jumping out to an early 5-0 lead. It appeared the prior night's doubleheader versus Texas and the incredibly late return to New York was having no effect on the Yankees' bats. Or it could be that Baek was being exposed as the far mediocre pitcher that he is. Whatever the case may be, after Kenji's home run put the M's on the board, I flipped off my radio and attended my meeting.

Two hours later, at the meeting's conclusion, I flipped my radio back on, expecting to hear Mike Blowers intricately explain how Baek's subpar offerings were akin to Christmas presents to the Yankees hitters, complete with shiny wrapping paper and thoughtfully wrapped bows. Baek intended to make sure that the Yankees' hitters knew he was thinking of them. Of course, not having been able to follow the game, I let out a blurt of surprise and shock to hear the score was 14-8 in the seventh inning. If there was one game that I could've bypassed every other intrusion upon my life, it was this slugfest, in which the Mariners were burying the Yankees. The final results were 20 hits and 15 runs. And the idea of the Yankees' pitching staff made me chuckle as I considered the rest of the weekend match-ups.

And then Saturday happened.

It wasn't just that Chen-Ming Wang dominated the Mariners. That's typically been the case, as Wang becomes an East Coast version of Joe Blanton whenever he pitches against Seattle. Matched-up against Jeff Weaver, I expected a blow out, and was surprised the Yankees managed just eight runs in the ballgame. To paraphrase Fugazi, you can expect a steady diet of nothing whenever the Mariners' square off against this pin-striped Korean. Unable to be patient and wait for a pitch they want, Wang has been masterful in every start against the Mariners, being able to coax a steady supply of ground balls that limit the M's ability to sustain any possibility to compete, as basehits are few and far between and double plays are far more common. But Saturday's game bordered on the absurd.

Perfect through eight innings, the Mariners stood a chance to set some dubious records. The record for most hits by a team in a game preceding a perfect game was 16 by the 1964 New York Mets (who picked up a victory against future manager, Phillie hurler Dallas Green). Any time your time is mentioned in the same breath as with any Mets team from the early 1960s, that is not good. Luckily, Ben Broussard kept the Mariners out of that dubious record book, waiting for the only hanging change-up Wang tossed all day, which Broussard immediately deposited over the fence in the eighth inning.

Have I ever told you that Broussard should be the Mariners' everyday designated hitter, and the signing of Vidro was a waste of money? Oh yes, Idid. Plenty of times.

Anyways, the mariners finished with two runs, and as I don't work for the Elias Sports Bureau, I can't cough up the facts that the M's set a major league record for largest one-game difference in number of hits with eighteen, dropping from 20 to 2. That did, however, enshrine this team in the Mariners' club record hall of infamy, sitting a team record. Twice in the franchise's past it had a seventeen hit difference in back-to-back ballgames, once against the White Sox in September of 1987 and the other against Oakland in July of 1984. So, history was set this past weekend in the Bronx, if only its history that we never ever want to see repeated.

And Jeff Weaver dropped to 0-5. There may have been one point in the franchise's history when it was expected for starting pitchers to drop their first few decisions to start the season off, with at least one pitcher dropping their first four decisions from the dismal seasons of 1977-1982. However, just as those days hearken to a different era, it had been nearly fifteen years since a Seattle starter had dropped his first five decisions, tracing back to John Cummings in 1993. Still, even though Cummings finished the season at 0-6, his ERA stood at 6.02, his ERA stood at a fraction of Weaver's current 15.32. Weaver officially has the worst start to a season by a Mariner starter. That flushing sound is $8.35 million saying good-bye.

The Mariners picked up four hits in Sunday's ballgame, but were shutout by Rasner and the Yankees' bullpen 5-0. The most excitement of the game was Roger Clemens announcing that his career has morphed into becoming Andy Pettitte's faithful lapdog, as he intends to sign with the Yankees this month and return in pinstripes in June. Hey Rocket, if Pettitte jumped offa bridge, would you follow?

The story on the field involved some dust-ups as Josh Phelps tried his hardest to take Kenji Johjima out on a hard slide at home. After the benches were warned, a close pitch inside to Yuniesky Betancourt resulted in Joe Torre and Scott Proctor getting ejected from the game. Still, the M's committed three errors and had no offensive punch to support Jarrod Washburn, who allowed three runs in five-and-a-third innings. Beltre went 0-for-4 in the game, and as he was given the day off Saturday, he's gone 2-for10 in two games of the series so far, his average dropping to .245 as the Mariners revert to .500.

The chance to leave the Bronx as an above-.500 team depends on how they face the Yankee's DeSalvo in today's game. DeSalvo, making his major league, debut is such an obscure prospect for the Yankees, that he doesn't even merit a mention in the 2007 Baseball Prospectus. Still, he has been having a solid season so far in the minors, with a 3-0 record and 1.05 ERA, throwing nearly 12 innings of scoreless ball over his last two starts. Still, DeSalvo is a 26-year old throwing in AAA, so you'd have to be concerned if he wasn't dominating.

Expect the Mariners to score at least a handful of runs, but don't expect Miguel Batista to shut down the Yankees. Sure, he may have been solid over his last four starts, allowing just four runs over nearly thirteen innings, but he has been mediocre versus the Yankees in his career, with a 2-2 record and 4.58 ERA over 37 innings in 16 games. Johnny Damon in particular (a .522 average and 1.462 OPS in 23 career at-bats0 has eaten Batista alive, along with Hideki Matsui (.583, 1.449 in 12 at-bats) and Alex Rodriguez (.385, 1.145 in 13 at-bats).

My money's not on the Mariners in this one. 10-5, Yankees, as the Mariners return to the ranks of mediocrity...