This just in: Mike Mussina is no longer a good pitcher. Hell, he's not even a mediocre pitcher anymore. Yes, shocking news to all of you, I know. Mussina couldn't have possibly picked a worse time for the Yankees and their fans to lose his Hall of Fame arm. Admittedly, late August is not a good time for any pitcher to go in the tank, but it's especially heartbreaking for the Yankees right now. Except that no one has sympathy for the Yankees woes outside of their fandom, so the empathy factor doesn't have much legs on this topic.

It really did look, up to a couple of weeks ago, as if the Yankees were going to put themselves in position to pull off another "Boston Massacre" this year. I don't care how hard-core and confident any Red Sox fan is; they had to be looking over their shoulder for a bit there and praying. But now, whatever mojo the Yankees had working seems to have bottomed out, and those much-derided old arms are really showing their age, to put it mildly. Hell, even Rivera has looked extremely shaky on occasion this year. Apparently, going out on top isn't in the vocabulary of star Yankees pitchers.

Furthermore the bats are dreadfully lacking (from the perspective of any Yankees fan) lately ... a 16-0 blowout delivered by the Tigers in the middle of a Wild Card push? Ouch. That HAS to hurt. Not that the Tigers are a joke, but to get blown out by that margin this late in the season when every single win can mean the margin of figurative, baseball life-and-death will inevitably shake the confidence of a team, which is the last thing the Yankees need right now. This all gives the massive legions of Yankee haters out there something to cheer for: a year where the Yankees miss the playoffs altogether.

Back to the topic that started this, what do the Yankees do with Mussina? Dusty Baker speculates that the Yankees will simply DL the pitcher to save face for both parties, as there is no way the club will allow such failure to continue at this point in the season. If this isn't just a pride-hidden injury that Mussina is trying to pitch through, Mussina's Hall of Fame ballot may come up a little sooner than expected.