Saturday's 6-5 loss to the Twins means the Yankees have dropped their third straight road series to open the season, are 2-6 on the road and sit in last place, despite having scored the most runs (71), while allowing the third-fewest (49), among 14 American League teams.

Timing is everything, and for us it's been next to nothing.

I don't know if you can put much stock in anything after only 11 games — not when last place means two games out of first place, and you haven't played a division rival yet — but here are some thoughts:

• That was your typical Mariano Rivera loss, huh? Starting and ending with some bullshit hit. Justin Morneau's bat-splintering bloop made Luis Gonzalez's 2001 clincher look like Mickey Mantle's 565-foot blast at Washington D.C.'s Griffith Stadium. Mo's two strikeouts prior were vintage Sandman, though. He just found a couple of bats in the wrong spot.

• Hideki Matsui made a bad decision throwing to third base on that hit-and-run after Luis Castillo's second Willie "Mays" Hayes-like "oops" hit of the evening. Mike & the Mad Dog were commenting the other day that Godzilla's horrendous out there, but I never really noticed. He fumbles, bumbles and stumbles sometimes, but I didn't have the impression he was below average.

• Jaret Wright was a disaster. That's not a tongue twister, but you might be saying that 15 times fast this season. Trying to figure out who's gonna contribute more this season, him or Carl Pavano, is like deciding which Nigerian royal to wire money to.

• Gotta feel bad for Scott Proctor. He was great in long relief, even though I wrote, when he came in to pitch the bottom of the ninth in Oakland, that "he might as well have carried a white flag with him." Face it, I wouldn't use him in a video game, let alone one that counted in the standings, but I was glad to see him own the mound for 3 1/3 innings. Gotta give an A+ on that Proctor-ology exam.

• Neither Michael Kay nor Bobby Murcer commented on Joe Torre's decision to not load the bases — and set up a force-out at home or a game-ending double play — in the bottom of the ninth. The ensuing events made it a moot point, but I thought it was worth mentioning, at least, that Torre thought a potential game-tying walk was too great a risk.

• That 0-for-4 with three strikeouts is gonna keep Andy Phillips on the bench for awhile, huh?

• Looks like we'll miss Roy Halladay on our two-game swing through Toronto next week, meaning the Yankees will not have to face a fourth former Cy Young Award winner so early in the season. They've fared quite well against the other three, pounding Barry Zito and Bartolo Colon, and giving Johan Santana (6 1/3, 4 runs, 8 hits, 2 walks, no-decision) a bit of trouble.