CC Sabathia

The New York Yankees have some pretty bad contracts on their hands these days. Alex Rodriguez isn't coming close to earning his $30 million salary, Mark Teixeira isn't worth his $23 million fee and even Derek Jeter is overpaid at close to $16 million.

Thank goodness for CC Sabathia. The Yankees are paying him over $24 million this season, but Sabathia is somehow managing to give them their money's worth.

Cleveland was, once upon a time, a baseball town, featuring a team on the cusp of the World Series and perennial All-Stars like CC Sabathia, Cliff Lee and Victor Martinez.

Those days are a distant memory.

The Yankees were no match for the newly-extended Andrew McCutchen and the Pirates today in Bradenton. To celebrate his new six-year contract with Pittsburgh, McCutchen killed the Yankees for two hits and two RBI.

Baseball perfection is one of the most exciting, rare and unpredictable feats in all of sports. Yet here I am trying to predict who will hurl the next ultimate gem.

The last time we saw one, Roy Halladay pulled it off in a 1-0 victory over the then Florida Marlins in May of 2010. The fact that Halladay has done it so recently makes him an automatic candidate to pull it again, never mind the postseason no-no he threw that same year.

The Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees are tied for first place in the American League East heading into their series-finale on ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball. The first pitch is scheduled for 8:05 p.m. (ET) at historic Fenway Park.

Boston holds a significant 9-2 advantage over New York in the season series, including a 10-4 home victory on Saturday afternoon.

Not since the late Early Wynn pitched for Cleveland in a comeback to win 300 games has there been a pitching staff with two starters who look like the monsters who ate Cleveland.

Bartolo Colon and C.C. Sabathia, in combined British stone, would be heavy enough to build Stonehenge. Colon’s kind public relations guys claim he is still under 275 pounds. Sabathia is in the same ballpark as his fellow Yankee starter, but he hides it better.

New York Yankees starting pitcher C.C. Sabathia enters Saturday's start against the Boston Red Sox with a 16-5 record and 2.55 ERA.  He leads the majors in wins and has allowed just seven earned runs over his last eight starts.

It's not even an argument that the 31-year-old is the Most Valuable Player on his own team, as the club has won 18 of his 24 starts. 

This is a slideshow on the top 10 Yankee performers right now.  Keep in mind that the entire show is not based on past seasons' performances.  It is only based on the future, which I think is the most relevant tool that we can look to at this point.  Thus, don't be surprised if you see some major names kept off of this list.

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Overall, the upcoming MLB free agency class for the 2011 offseason is fairly weak.  Unlike 2010 when baseball fans anxiously watched to see where pitcher Cliff Lee and All-Star outfielder Carl Crawford would end up, 2011 will figure to be a quiet offseason.

Remember back in December when Cliff Lee declined the Yankees' enormous offer to sign with the Phillies and Andy Pettitte subsequently retired to spend more time with his family?

Every baseball fan on the planet immediately began to write off the Yankees and question their previous thoughts of the Yankees making the playoffs.