April 3, 2011, Bronx, N.Y. – The 2011 Yankees made a lot of noise yet again Sunday afternoon, with four more home runs and seven runs scored. But an offseason bugaboo raised its ugly head, simply because they did not get a good start. Compounding matters, fifth-in-the-rotation candidate Bartolo Colon relieved a beleagured Phil Hughes and failed to stem the tide, dooming Yankee comeback efforts to failure.

Detroit starter and winner Max Scherzer hardly had a great day, surrendering six runs on nine hits and four home runs, but his teammates scored in five of nine frames, multiple runs in four of them. He fashioned six strike outs in his five innings, whiffing Curtis Granderson two times, and Brett Gardner twice too, the latter two of his three in the game. New catcher Russell Gardner had three hits, two of them leading off, and Gardner promptly went down swinging behind him both times, largely dooming these hopeful shots at a rally. Derek Jeter, hitting second, also had a tough day at the plate, rolling out meekly four times around a fourth-inning walk, three of them to second base.

But those struggles aside, the Yankee offense rallied often, and the seven runs on four long balls would have been sufficient in most games. But starter Phil Hughes showed little. Throwing a fast ball that rarely broke 90, his command of a curve in the 70s and an 80 mph slider did little to keep the visitors off the hittable heat, and after four innings some were asking what ever happened to the elusive change of pace he was incorporating into his game last spring when he nailed down a starting assignment.

Having seen enough of Hughes’s work the last few seasons, I have to think a few more mph on his fastball is in the offing. But the apparent abandonment of the change of pace leaves me wondering how Larry Rothschild expects to help Phil improve moving forward. As was the case oftentimes last year (when he was throwing 94- and 95-mph heat), Tigers batters seemed at their most comfortable once the Yankee righty got two strikes on them, quite the opposite of what would be hoped. Fourteen of the 41 times Detroit batters laid bat on ball through Phil’s four frames, they did so with two strikes on them, clearly a sign that they felt they needn’t fear that Phil had something different-looking in store for them. CC and A.J. coaxed 29 swings and misses in the season’s first two games; Phil managed two all day.

The day had another disturbing feature, from a Yankee perspective, as second-year Detroit player Brennan Bosech, DH’ing Sunday, had a huge game, reminiscent of what he did during three Tigers wins in four games vs. the Yankees in Detroit last May. The lefty-hitting Boesch, who was a rookie of the year favorite before dropping off precipitously in last year’s second half, had six hits and seven rbi’s back then. Today he became a one-two punch with Miguel Cabrera that the Yanks simply couldn’t overcome. Brennan singled immediately in front of Cabrera two-run home runs in the first and third innings, homered for two more off Colon in the fifth, and followed up with a sac fly and single for another rbi and run scored. It was more than enough for Detroit.

But the Tigers needed the three two-run homers because the Yankee offense was relentless. Following Cabrera’s two-run jack in the first, Alex Rodriguez lined deep to left, and just a great catch by Ryan Raburn kept the Yanks off the board. They knotted the score at two in the second on the first of two Posada two-run homers, then pulled to within 5-4 after a three-run Tigers rally with Teixeira and Cano homers in the home third. Neither pitcher deserved to be in the game any longer at that point, with Joe Girardi replacing Hughes after four, and the Yanks closing to within one run yet again in the fifth on Posada’s second bomb. The Yanks seemed poised to pounce, but Detroit roughed up Colon, off a great spring, on Boesch’s home run and a two-run rally featuring Ramon Santiago’s double in the sixth.

Much has been said, in this column and elsewhere, about Phil Hughes having trouble putting batters away. And it is a problem that Santiago in the third, Boesch in the first and the third, both Austin Jackson and Victor Martinez in the first, and Don Kelly and Brandon Inge in the second, got to take multiple hacks after being down two strikes. Hughes may be be lacking an “out” pitch to retire the likes of those guys when he’s ahead. If your cutter’s not deceptive or different enough, and neither the curve nor the slider is buckling anyone at the plate, you’ll struggle against everyday major league players.

But things become doubly disturbing against the elite, the guys who can consistently really crush the ball. Because if you can’t find an “out” pitch to throw to Miguel Cabrera, he’s got an “out” swing to show you, one the he’ll use to hit ’em…

“out” of the park.

YANKEE BASEBALL!!!