With the loss of two Yankees legends in the span of three days, I thought it would be fitting to talk to Steve Lombardi, founder of the Yankees blog, WasWatching.com, and a follower of the Yankees since George Steinbrenner’s first season as owner of the Yankees, back in 1973.

Keefe: You have been following the Yankees since 1973, and lived through the entire George Steinbrenner era. On a day like today, it feels surreal that The Boss is no longer with us. Even though George hasn’t been the in the forefront of the front office or the polarizing figure he once was for the last few years, it is still feel weird to think about the Yankees without him. What are your memories of The Boss?

Lombardi: I went to my first Yankees game on August 8, 1973 when I was 10 years old, so I sort of feel like George Steinbrenner and I have been running side by side with him in terms of our passion for the team. And now, there does feel like there’s a void there for me; granted, he has been out of the picture for the last few years, and he was 80 years old and in ill health when he passed, I should have been prepared for today’s news, but it’s still somewhat of a shock and surreal.

In terms of memories, like many Yankees fans, I’m only focusing on the good stuff now. Sure, there were times in the past where his quick trigger and impulsive moves made the organization look bad, but in retrospect, as Yankees fans, we were very lucky to have an owner who wanted to win so badly, who was not looking to stick profits into his pocket and who was willing to spend money to bring a winner to New York. As I have recently written, in his salad days, Big Stein was narcissistic, illogical, pompous, impetuous, delusional and pathological, and that made life terrible for all those who worked for him.  But, at least 70 percent of the time, he gave Yankees fans teams that allowed them to walk the streets with their heads up and chests out. You can’t say that about a lot of owners in baseball or sports, period.

Keefe: George Steinbrenner was certainly a unique owner and extraordinary businessman, as well as a pioneer of the game in many different ways. He always made sure he reinvested his money back into the team and always tried to put what he felt was the best team on the field for the Yankees even if it didn’t always work out. What would you say was the most significant move George made during his time as the owner of the Yankees?

Lombardi: That would be signing Catfish Hunter back in December 1974. The Yankees had a pretty good team in ’74, yet signing Hunter (to what was then a huge contract) set the tone and let the rest of baseball know that the Yankees were going to do whatever it took to bring premium talent and winning ballplayers to New York.

Bringing Catfish was start. That, combined with Gabe Paul’s trades led to the pennant in 1976, and that led to Reggie Jackson coming and the rings in ’77 and ’78. During the 1980s, the Yankees had a lot of wins but no rings. Wanting to get back to those rings led to the magic of the late ’90s. But, again, it all started with bringing in Hunter. For what it’s worth, I think Steinbrenner has mentioned this in the past too.

Keefe: The Yankees also lost an iconic figure not just in New York, but in all of sports in Bob Sheppard. What are your memories of Bob Sheppard from the old Stadium and how will you remember him?

Lombardi: Bob Sheppard was a small part of the Yankees organization but a major part of their history. That’s not an easy thing to pull off. Pete Sheehy did it. Gene Monahan is doing it. And, Sheppard is in that group too. It’s a very small team picture.

I will always remember him as being part of the Yankee Stadium experience before the Stadium became what it was in 2009. It’s so different attending games now, and the difference is not all good. Bob Sheppard will forever be part of that special “before time” Yankee Stadium feeling compared to what the Yankees, and going to their games, is like today.

You didn’t need to stay up on Monday night to know how bad A.J. Burnett was against the Diamondbacks. After his previous three starts prior, you probably could have guessed how his night would go. I was naïve to think that someone making $500,000 per start could shut down the worst team in the NL West. Stupid me.

It’s never good when a six-game West Coast road trip starts with a first-inning mound visit, and it’s never good when you are hoping your No. 2 starter gets drilled when he comes up to hit and has to be placed on the DL. But such is the life of a Yankees fan dealing with the frustrating A.J. Burnett.

If you missed the game, first off you’re lucky, and second off you don’t even need to see Burnett’s line from the game to find out just how bad he was. All you need to know are the pitchers who followed him out of the bullpen. That would be Chad Gaudin and Chan Ho Park. Yes, it was another egg laid by Allan James Burnett in what has become a trend every five days for the Yankees, and a costly one at that. Here is the supposed No. 2 starter on the Yankees losing four straight games and allowing 23 earned runs in 20 innings in June and doing his best Chase Wright impression by allowing nine home runs over that span. I guess $16.5 million a year just doesn’t get you what it used to.

Sure there are going to be plenty of people with Yankees blinders on that take offense to me saying such terrible things about a player on my team, but honestly, I take offense to the idea that Yankees fans can stand by this guy and say anything good about him. And if anyone has anything good to say about his on-field performance, I know what that good thing is going to be: Game 2 of the 2009 World Series.

I am well aware that A.J. Burnett won Game 2 of last year’s World Series after the Yankees lost Game 1. What about the rest of the postseason? Did we forget that Burnett was 1-1 with a 5.27 ERA in five starts in October and November last year? Did we forget about his Game 5 meltdown in the World Series when he allowed six runs on four hits and four walks in two innings of work, or does that start not count?

I will be forever grateful that Burnett was able to win Game 2 and prevent the Yankees from going into an 0-2 hole with the series shifting to Philadelphia. But it’s not like the man single-handedly carried us to a championship (that would be Alex Rodriguez and Hideki Matsui), and it’s not like he never has to perform well again because of one start last fall.

A.J. Burnett is perfectly capable of going off between now and his last start of the season and making June just a minor bump in what ends up being an outstanding season. The problem is he is also capable of continuing to be the worst starter in the Yankees rotation the rest of the way, and right now, it’s hard to think of him in any other light than what we saw on Monday night, June 16, June 10 and June 4.

It’s not like I didn’t see these types of starts coming from Burnett. We all saw them at times last year, and we saw them prior to his amazing 2008 season with the Blue Jays. Except, I saw them coming at Fenway Park and Tropicana Field. I didn’t expect them to come against the Orioles, Blue Jays and Diamondbacks.

Here is what I wrote about A.J. Burnett after his first start of the season at Fenway Park:

“Watching A.J. Burnett pitch is harder to watch than the scene in Casino where Nicky Santoro (Joe Pesci) and his brother Dominick are beaten within an inch of their lives by baseball bats and then buried alive. Sure it’s only one start, but it’s not like we didn’t also see this last year. Burnett is either going to come within reach of a no-no or have a start that includes that one letdown inning. On Tuesday, he had the latter and the letdown inning was the fifth.”

And here is what I said about him when I ranked the Yankees starters in order of how much I enjoy watching them (Burnett ranked fourth, but he would be fifth in updated rankings):

“A.J. has two types of starts… 1.) The start where you start checking the inning and how many outs are left because a potential no-no is in the works and 2.) The start where he cruises for every inning except for one and allows three-plus runs that inning. A.J. will never give up a run here or a run there. It’s all or nothing with him. He is either going to try to burn out the P.C. Richard strikeout whistle at the Stadium, or have people heading for the exits with the game out of reach. He’s a nightmare for anyone that likes consistency or good strike-to-ball ratios, or for anyone that plays fantasy baseball. When he’s on, he can be the best pitcher on the planet with the best breaking ball in the league. When he’s off, expect every count to go full and free passes to be handed out.”

This time I decided to take what I have learned about A.J. Burnett since he became a Yankee and take it out a step further. I think its necessary that we have a unit of measurement for Burnett’s starts and a way to categorize his many meltdowns and losses. So like the Richter scale, here is a way to measure another type of natural disaster: A.J. Burnett meltdowns.

Grade 1
Example: June 10 vs. Baltimore

Getting through the first inning with A.J. Burnett is key. If you can get through the first, there’s a chance he will be able to get you through a lot more. A.J. is usually good for allowing at least one run before the Yankees have time to get on the board, but if he can hold the opposition scoreless so the Yankees can take an early lead, you’re in good shape. The problem is you aren’t out of the water yet since there isn’t a lead that is safe with A.J. on the hill.

The meltdown usually starts once the Yankees have given him a lead and he feels it necessary to give it right back. Andy Pettitte did a lot of this in the second half of 2008 before we later found out that he was injured. A.J. Burnett might be the only pitcher that I don’t feel confident with getting out of an inning unscathed with two outs and no one on. Once he gets those first two outs, things can unfold pretty quickly. And when they do, you can no longer control a Grade 1 implosion from becoming …

Grade 2
Example: April 23 vs. Angels

If A.J. doesn’t come with his best stuff (which he never does anymore), then there is without a doubt going to be an inning where he allows at least a three spot.

Most starters prepare for games with the mindset that they are going to go out and win the game for their team. A.J. goes out with the idea that he is going to throw a perfect game. The only problem is that after that first walk, he starts to think, “OK, the no-hitter is still intact.” Then after that first hit, he thinks “Well, now I am just going to strike out every hitter.” It’s this mentality that gets A.J. Burnett in trouble. Instead of pitching the way he finally learned how to under Roy Halladay at the end of his Toronto days, A.J. becomes the oft-injured pitcher he was in Florida, trying to knock down the catcher with his fastball like Steve Nebraska.

A.J. Burnett isn’t capable of limiting damage and working through men on base the way Andy Pettitte has made a career of doing, and he isn’t capable of working through a game without his best stuff the way CC Sabathia can grind through a start. It’s all or nothing with A.J. Burnett and when it’s nothing, it turns into this …

Grade 3
Examples: May 9 vs. Red Sox and June 21 vs. Diamondbacks

This is what we saw on Monday and what we have seen for most of June. It’s like an uncontrollable California forest fire. You think A.J. has had his bad inning for the night and that he will enter cruise control, only to have the game unravel in a matter of pitches (on Monday night it took 15) and once that second crooked number starts to take shape, there is no stopping it until he is removed from the game. The only problem with that is that the game is out of hand by this point and likely out of reach for the offense, so the “loser” relievers (I call them this because they only pitch when the Yankees are losing and also happens to be prime examples of the word) like Chad Gaudin and Boone Logan and Chan Ho Park start to get loose in the ‘pen.

The entire scene is enough to make you think about picking up your remote control and throwing a two-seamer right through the TV screen, or at the very least it’s enough to make you make yourself a strong cocktail.

It was hard enough to watch all nine innings on Monday night that I wasn’t about to sit through the postgame show and listen to Joe Girardi tell us that A.J. “had great stuff in the ‘pen before the game” or that “his velocity and breaking ball were there, he just missed his location.” As much as I despise Ozzie Guillen, at least he would take A.J. to town after a month of losses with a three-team race now taking shape in the AL East.

But the real reason I didn’t watch the postgame show (other than the fact that I had just wasted over three hours of my life watching the Yankees lose 10-4 to the Diamondbacks) was because I didn’t want to see A.J. Burnett. I didn’t want to see him stand in front of his locker and tell reporters that “he sucked” and that “he needs to better.” Tell us something we don’t know. I’m glad that A.J. holds himself accountable (something Joba Chamberlain needs to learn to do and something that got Ian Kennedy a one-way ticket to Arizona), but being sorry on a night when you just made more than Phil Hughes will make all year isn’t enough. Go win a game for once. Go beat the 28-win Diamondbacks.

All weekend long I gave my friend Dusty a hard time because his beloved Dodgers were swept by the Red Sox and allowed the Red Sox to further close the gap in the AL East. After Monday’s loss, I expected a response from Dusty and sure enough at 11:14 a.m. on Tuesday morning, there it was … “The Yankees lost to the worst team in the NL West.”

Thanks, A.J. Burnett. Only another three-plus years of this …

On Tuesday night at the Yankees game, the first few notes of “Enter Sandman” descended upon the Bronx, Mariano Rivera began his trip to the mound from the bullpen and my friend Redz turned to me and said, “So sick.” The expression isn’t always “so sick,” but every time No. 42 makes his way into a game, it draws a similar reaction with a similar expression.

There is nothing like Mariano’s entrance in all of sports. There is a chill when the door opens, Metallica comes on, Mariano throws his last warm-up pitch and then walks across the warning track before beginning a slow jog to the infield. I think being on-hand for the atmosphere created when Mariano enters a home postseason game should be on everyone’s sports bucket list. The only problem with that is there are only a few seasons left to experience it.

There is a real chance Mariano Rivera is superhuman, and if you told me he will still be getting outs in the ninth inning in 2016, I’d be ecstatic and also have a hard time arguing against it. Aside from a minor ache or pain that comes with a 162-game season and doing his job for the last 14 years, there is nothing to suggest that the Yankees should be worrying about a successor to the ninth inning anytime soon. Realistically, there will be a time when No. 42 will sit behind the outfield for good with the other Yankee legends and won’t be coming through the bullpen door to save the game and the day for the Yankees.

It has always been in the back of my mind that that some day the only way I will be able to watch Mariano pitch is on Yankees Classics or in scenes from Yankeeographies. Eventually, hoping for the Yankees to hold a lead of three runs or less for the ninth won’t make Mariano appear. I will probably need therapy and counseling once the post-Mariano era is upon on, but I don’t think it will be as bad personally as the post-Jeter era.

The more and more I think about it, the more and more I feel as though I have taken his abilities and success for granted. Actually, I know I have taken Mariano Rivera for granted. And now that he is 40, an age where very few people play baseball professionally and an age where no one gets the final three outs of a game, it makes sense to savor every Mariano appearance and not just see each save as No. 538 or chalk up a perfect ninth in what is just another Yankees win.

When you look at the highs and lows of closers around the league and the average life span of every other closer not named Mariano being that of an ant, it makes me lightheaded to think of life without Mariano. If life without Mariano means life with Joba Chamberlain as the closer, the ninth inning will become more of a gamble than a sure thing, and if I want to gamble I will head up to Connecticut and go to Mohegan Sun. I need the ninth inning to be a guarantee, not something left to chance.

Jonathan Papelbon refers to Mariano as “The Godfather” and never forgets to mention that he wants to carry the torch for closers in Major League Baseball after Mariano. But there isn’t another Mariano and there’s a better chance of Armando Galarraga throwing another perfect game than there is of seeing another closer with one pitch being as successful as Mariano has been.

For as long as I can remember Mariano has been my favorite pitcher to watch, and there isn’t even a close second. I have spent more time following his every pitch and every stat than my politician friend Scanlon has spent watching C-Span. In my mind, Mariano is on a level by himself in an exclusive club of one, and I don’t know if anyone else will ever be gaining admission to that club. Joba looked like he might be able to make a case to join the club in 2007, but he’s closer to joining my Boone Logan Fan Club than joining Mariano in the V.I.P.

There isn’t another Yankees reliever that I care about seeing come in as long as they put up zeroes. Aside from getting excited to watch Mariano, it’s all about the Yankees’ starters for me, and in order for most enjoyable to watch, here they are:

Phil Hughes
The Phranchise has me counting the calendar to find which day he is starting and planning my schedule accordingly. There is something about watching homegrown talent succeed that I’m not sure can be described in words. It’s why everyone loves Derek Jeter and why I was devastated to see Alfonso Soriano go. It’s why it’s easy to boo free agents who come here and fail, and it’s why it took A-Rod an October for the ages to finally be accepted. Homegrown talent makes you do crazy things like believe in the future of Brandon Claussen or Brad Halsey, or think that Chase Wright might be able to stick around. Phil Hughes finally showed consistency as a reliever last year, and this year he has Brian Cashman saying, “I told you so” after he didn’t pull the trigger on the deal on that would have sent The Phranchise to Minnesota for Johan Santana. Hughes has me more excited than other Yankees starter right now, and hopefully that doesn’t change for a long, long time.

Andy Pettitte
If I had to play a game for my life and Andy Pettitte was starting that game, I wouldn’t be nervous … as long as the game doesn’t take place during the 2001 World Series when Andy was tipping pitches like he wanted Arizona to win. There isn’t a jam Pettitte is scared of and there isn’t a jam he is in that I’m scared he won’t get out of. Andy will get his Ks and eat his innings, but it won’t always come in the cleanest or most impressive way, but a win is a win and as long as he gets it, that’s all that matter. There will always be runners on when Andy pitches, but that is part of the fun of watching him and seeing the stare, the pickoff move and the sweeping curve touching the outside corner.

CC Sabathia
CC Sabathia ended the World Series drought and is the “ace” of the staff even if he hasn’t pitched like it in 2010. After last October and November, I have a great amount of trust and respect for CC. He might not be my favorite starter to watch, but he is a horse and always keeps the Yankees in games even when he leaves his best stuff at home. If I wrote this, say after the All-Star break, it’s likely that Andy and CC would be No. 1 and 2 on this list given their histories of late-season dominance. But it’s June and for now, CC is stuck in the middle.

A.J. Burnett
A.J. has two types of starts… 1.) The start where you start checking the inning and how many outs are left because a potential no-no is in the works and 2.) The start where he cruises for every inning except for one and allows three-plus runs that inning. A.J. will never give up a run here or a run there. It’s all or nothing with him. He is either going to try to burn out the P.C. Richards strikeout whistle at the Stadium, or have people heading for the exits with the game out of reach. He’s a nightmare for anyone that likes consistency or good strike-to-ball ratios, or for anyone that plays fantasy baseball. When he’s on, he can be the best pitcher on the planet with the best breaking ball in the league. When he’s off, expect every count to go full and free passes to be handed out.

Javier Vazquez
On Tuesday, I saw Vazquez for the Yankees in person for the first time since 2004, and I’d have to say I was impressed. Let’s not pretend that one start against the Orioles in June is going to erase all of my ill will toward Javier, but it’s a good place to start. When Joe Girardi elected to load the bases for Javier with one out, I was pretty sure a three spot or four spot was going to go up on the scoreboard, but Javier showed the ability to get out of a tight spot late in a game, which is something he has had trouble doing all season. I believe that he can succeed in this town for this team and be a productive member of the pitching staff, but there is still work to be done.

There is no one in the world that I like to see fail at their job worse than Jonathan Papelbon. A Yankees win is enough for me to have a great night and feel good about life. A Yankees win over the Red Sox that comes at the expense of Papelbon is my version of euphoria.

Before Monday’s win, the Yankees had been a tease when trailing in the late innings. There was usually a run in them, but for the first 37 games, they always seemed to miss that one hit that would complete the comeback. A couple of first-pitch fastballs from Mr. Papelbon changed that. But as enjoyable as Monday’s win was, it had the emotional swings of no-limit hold ‘em and there was certainly more than one time I had to restrain myself from spiking my Blackberry off the floor like Brandon Jacobs.

Some more disgusting bullpen decisions from Joe Girardi were once again covered up by the offense, and all will be lost and forgotten thanks to the instant Yankees Classic moments that took place in the ninth inning. Except it won’t be forgotten with me. I don’t forget. I don’t forget when Boone Logan comes into a game with the lead and tries to blow it. I don’t forget when Chan Ho Park is summoned to hold a one-run lead and leaves with a two-run deficit. I don’t forget any of the hundreds of questionable decisions made by Joe Girardi.

After the disastrous Sunday loss, the Yankees couldn’t blow a 5-0 first inning lead and lose to the Red Sox at home, but they nearly did just that when Girardi made everyone with talent in his bullpen unavailable. Getting 12 outs from Logan, Park, and the other bullpen benders just wasn’t going to happen without a few Boston runs scoring, and thanks to Joe Girardi’s magical bullpen phone, and the ever-helpful mound visits of Dave Eiland, the Yankees’ lead fell apart like David Ortiz’s career.

Nearly every new addition to the 2010 Yankees played a role in the in the up-and-down affair that resulted in an 11-9 win on Monday, with some more having a more positive impact than others. I always hated tests, surveys or questionnaires that gave you options like Strongly Agree, Agree, Neutral, Disagree and Strongly Disagree, but I am going to use a similar method in judging the new Yankees through the first 38 games of the season.

Love
I am a huge Curtis Granderson fan. So much so that I didn’t care that they traded Austin Jackson (someone I have been following for nearly four years) to acquire. I wasn’t exactly fond of Granderson when he tore apart the Yankees pitching in the 2006 ALDS, but I am happy that he is in pinstripes now. Granderson’s devastating groin injury has turned the Yankees outfield into a gongshow, and the removal of his bat along with Nick Swisher’s and Jorge Posada’s has turned the bottom of the order into an NL lineup. The fact that the Yankees are currently where they are in the standings with so many injuries and without their center fielder and a 30-home run hitter is flat-out scary. The Grandy Man needs to get back ASAP and make people forget about Austin Jackson’s hot start to his career.

I am usually a sucker for homegrown guys, so when the Yankees had a chance to bring Marcus Thames back, I was all for it. Aside from the fact that Thames was just two years removed from a 25-homer season, anything I have read about Thames talks about his strong clubhouse presence and his positive clubhouse chemistry. Thames has been extraordinary against left-handed pitching this year, and after his moon shot off Papelbon on Monday, hopefully Girardi realizes that he can play Thames against right-handed pitchers as well.

Like
Randy Winn isn’t exactly raking, but that’s not what he is here to do. A career starter, Winn has picked up his offense lately with more of a regular spot in the lineup due to injuries. He has played well in the outfield, and despite that one throw that went about four feet on what would have been a play at the plate, Winn has done everything expected of him so far as a Yankee. There hasn’t been anything to really love about Winn, but there is also hasn’t been anything to really not like. Just a solid player doing a sound job while the injury bug makes its way through the clubhouse.

Dislike
Javier Vazquez faced one hitter on Monday and ended up with his second win of the season. Go figure. I want Javier Vazquez to succeed, I really do, because Vazquez’s success means a seamless rotation for the Yankees. However, Vazquez’s early season struggles have been frustrating to watch and tough to take, and I have written some not so nice words about No. 31. Sometimes I feel bad for Vazquez and sometimes I don’t. In his postgame interviews, he seems like a genuinely nice guy, but we are talking about results here and not personalities. So far it’s been a love-hate relationship, but if he can turn it around with a big game against the Mets this Friday night and be consistently good, then the past can be forgotten.

Hate
The Yankees’ plan to get younger this offseason has gone as well as the Red Sox’ run prevention plan. Johnny Damon and Hideki Matsui are being penciled into their respective lineups everyday for the Tigers and Angels, while Nick Johnson sits in the dugout and works on grooming his hideous moustache. Johnson was close to being my least favorite Yankee during his first go-around in the Bronx, and so far, the second verse has been the same as the first. Johnson’s absence has turned the No. 2 spot in the order into a revolving door between Brett Gardner and Nick Swisher, and Curtis Granderson will join the two-hole platoon once he returns to the lineup. Was signing Nick Johnson in place of Damon or Matsui in the offseason the biggest mistake of the winter? No question. Now instead of watching Nick take called third strikes, we get to watch him watch games from the dugout while Damon and Matsui contribute to their new teams.

When Chan Ho Park was activated from the DL, I knew Phil Hughes had to go at least seven or eight innings or Girardi would be shaking with his anticipation to get Park into the game. Chan Ho Park has pitched in 17 major league seasons. Before last night he had a 3.99 ERA in the NL and a 5.78 ERA in the AL in his career. When you have a chance to give someone a guaranteed spot on the Opening Day roster with numbers like that, you have to do it. Don’t you? Park has made four appearances this season, has allowed runs in three of them, including four home runs in 6 2/3 innings of work with two blown saves to his name. He has had some success in the majors (though not much of it), so he hasn’t fallen to the Boone Logan level yet, but he appears to be have a one-way ticket there.

My hatred for Boone Logan is well documented. I think I would take my chances running across the Major Deegan at 5:30 p.m. before I gave Boone Logan the ball with a lead. For some reason, Joe Girardi doesn’t feel the same. Logan is currently the worst Yankee on the 25-man roster, and he has been since he was called up. Does no one else think it’s weird that Joe Girardi’s favorites are always the worst players on the team (Phil Coke, Brian Bruney, Boone Logan, Chan Ho Park)? Logan has now put 17 men on base in 9 1/3 innings to put new meaning to the term “lefty specialist.” I am willing to pay for his bus ticket back to Scranton-Wilkes Barre if that is what his roster spot is about, and I’m also pretty certain I can take up a collection before tonight’s game to pay off his salary, so the Yankees can rid themselves of him.