Pavano Is A #1 Starter . . .

. . that is, if you believe his agent Tom O'Connell:

"Carl’s a 1-2 starter,” O’Connell said. “Those guys don’t grow on trees. Those guys are very rare, 200-inning guys are very rare in this game, and they’re the ones that make the money. And he did it two years in a row, before he got hurt, and I’m sure he’s going to do it again."

By "do it again," did O'Connell mean get hurt or make the money. I would have to assume he meant both.

Pags: Pavano Is Injury Prone

Former Yankee Mike Pagliarulo split the atom this morning, contending Carl Pavano is an injury risk. But in all seriousness, Pags breaks down why and how Carl the Crutch has been able to scamper onto the disabled list with such frequency:

Carl Pavano is at a very high risk for injury he has problems in pitching stage 2 (balance position over the rubber) and stage 4 (his tendency to leak his front side). Pavano has trouble repeating his arm-slot, therefore adding more strain to his shoulder and elbow joints.

And what does “leak his front side” mean? Good question. It’s used to describe when a pitcher opens up too soon. As a right-handed pitcher strides to home plate, his chest should be facing third and his front shoulder pointed toward home plate. The key to this process is effective balance over the rubber. The optimum position is reached when the pitcher is able to stay balanced over the pitching rubber long enough to allow his throwing arm to get in the proper position to throw. Pavano has horrible balance and tends to fall toward home plate too early. Because his body motion is ahead of his throwing arm too early, he has to speed up his arm in order to throw the pitch in the strike zone. This results in additional shoulder stress and hanging breaking balls and elevated fastballs.

And all this time we thought Pavano was just a brittle-boned wuss incapable of fighting through pain.

Wang Named Opening Day Starter

No shocker here, but Chien-Ming Wang has officially been tabbed the opening day starter for the 2008 New York Yankees. Wang would have been honored with the 2007 opening day start had he not suffered a hamstring injury during Spring training. In his stead pitched Carl Pavano before returning to the comforts of the disabled list.

Carl The Crutch Is Blind

Carl Pavano doesn't like baseball. The Crutch would rather play demolition derby with his Porsche, crack a few ribs and spend months indirectly damaging the Yankees starting rotation. Well, this is just speculation, but a story from the LoHud Blog is just as unbelievable - except it's actually true.

To say Pavano is a pariah is an understatement. He asked one of the clubhouse kids for a small box today to store some things he had in his locker. The kid went over to a garbage pail, fished out an orange Nike shoebox, dumped a half-eated sandwich out of it and handed it to Pavano.

None the wiser, the “American Idle” (as the Post calls him), put it in his locker.

When the clubbies hand you garbage, that’s a sign your team has had enough of you.

When Mike Mussina ripped Carl to pieces during last Spring training, that's pretty embarrassing. Mussina rarely criticizes anyone. But when an adolescent clubhouse attendant isn't afraid of publicly humiliating the American Idle, that's a sign that it's time to leave.