E-Mail This Article to a Friend The Sox and Yanks’ war of attrition BY CHRISTOPHER YOUNG

HUH? THE TOP two highest-salaried teams in all of baseball are in the heat of battle — for the wild card? What in the name of Dwayne Hosey is going on here? Sure, the season’s only 20-some-games old, but that’s still an eighth of the season, and there are the Red Sox and Yankees — the top two payrolled teams — struggling to hover around .500.

The Red Sox in particular have a bit of explainin’ to do, since their schedule to this point has not exactly been awe-inspiring. Sure, they’ve met the Pinstripers six times (and split), but otherwise it’s been a combination of Toronto (against whom Boston is 2-3), Baltimore (2-2), and Tampa Bay (4-2), and the defending champs haven’t exactly knocked the sox off any of those supposedly flawed teams. Still, the Red Sox are at least a winning team heading into their weekend series in Texas, but at 11-10, their mark is in the same ballpark as such no-hope squads as Detroit, Toronto, Seattle, Cincinnati, and even the Nationals (who are 11-11).

But Boston’s still better off than the Yankees, who, even with their $200-million-plus payroll, are sputtering along at a 9-13 clip. New York has indeed played a slightly tougher schedule — having already played the Rangers and Angels — but it’s still hard to believe that this talent-laden team is no better than a fourth-place team in the AL East right now.

Both the Sox and Yanks have experienced setbacks in their pitching departments, which contributes to their dismal statistical rankings (Boston is 14th in the majors with a team ERA of 4.22, while New York is 22nd — at a stupefying 4.80). The Sox have a bit of an excuse in that they’ve lost two starters from last year’s roster to free agency, while a third (Curt Schilling) has seemingly been hobbled from the get-go and is back on the DL with ankle problems. Add to that the 0-2 start and simultaneous injury-list visit by lefty David Wells and you can begin to trace the Sox’ inherent difficulties.

But the Yankees had retooled their rotation after their disastrous collapse in the ALCS last season, picking up perhaps the two most coveted free-agent hurlers (Carl Pavano and Jaret Wright) that were available — and added them to a staff already enhanced by the trade for Randy Johnson. Along with veterans Mike "Moose" Mussina and Kevin Brown, the starting rotation should have provided a veritable juggernaut of pitching prowess on a nightly basis. Instead, Johnson is an unremarkable 2-1 (with a 4.19 ERA), Pavano and Wright are only 2-2 (with the latter sporting a ghastly 9.15 ERA before himself ending up on the DL), and Moose is 1-2 with an ERA of nearly five.

And then there’s Brown, the team’s high-priced fifth starter. At 0-3 with a 6.63 ERA, the 40-year-old is the biggest $15-million bust in baseball history, and he’s got another year at that figure left on his contract. Think the Yankees perhaps made a bad choice when they traded for the former Dodger upon the Sox’ acquisition of Schilling?

Luckily for the Yanks, their offense has carried them to this point, as Alex Rodriguez has posted ridiculous power numbers in recent days, and stalwarts Derek Jeter and Gary Sheffield have also consistently hit well over .300. But the overall performance of the starters (26th in MLB with a 5.22 ERA) and its shaky and aging bullpen (15th, 4.21) does not bode well for an immediate or even long-term marked turnaround.

New York’s problem is that not only is the franchise stuck with a lot of expensive-yet-underproducing contracts (Brown, Jason Giambi, and Bernie Williams), but its farm system is also barren because of the team’s history of trading away prospects to secure trade-deadline assistance.

Sure, New York may be a bit down in the dumps right now, but that doesn’t mean the Red Sox are laughing it up themselves. The Sox have been notoriously quick starters in recent years, and that’s why fighting to maintain a winning record despite primarily playing the supposed second tier of the East doesn’t bode well for the upcoming schedule. Losing Schilling and Wells — the team’s top two starters — is more dire than the Yankees losing Wright (their fourth starter) and getting nothing out of Brown (their fifth), but at least Boston has a modicum of depth in its starting pitching that the Yankees do not. It seems inconceivable that a team so populated with all-stars does not have adequate backups when guys go down, but that’s what the Yankees face now that Wright’s gone for a few months and spot starter Tanyon Sturtze is also hurt. What to do? The Yankees had little choice but to bring up unknown Chieng-Ming Wang to start for the team on Saturday, all the while wondering if they will ever get another quality start out of the quickly-fading Brown. New York cannot afford to concede two out of every five games this season, especially when its bullpen as a group is aging and iffy.

Joe Torre, watch your back. Grady Little, stick by the phone.

Sporting Eye runs Mondays and Fridays at BostonPhoenix.com, and Christopher Young can be reached at cyoung[a]phx.com.