You can walk when you get here, though.

Down in the Caribbean there's a saying among major league prospects:

"You can't walk to America."

Yes, there's water between those nations and the United States. But it's a pun. They're referring to taking pitches and working walks and long counts. Apparently, the prevailing philosophy down there is to be more aggressive at the plate, accumulate high BA, RBI, and HR totals, and get noticed by clubs.

Baseball people understand the value of those traditional hitting stats, but they also care about a hitter's ability to work deep counts, foul balls off, get walks, and make the pitcher throw a lot, all of which affect the pitchers ability to stay in the game. The 1998-2001 Yankees were masters of this art.

The same cannot be said for this team. Jeter, Damon, Teixeira, Posada, Matsui, and Swisher know how to tire pitchers out. But Cano, Melky, and Arod seem to have trouble. Cano and Melky are famous for their strange high BA, low OBP stats.

As an example, Cano leads the team in batting average, at .310. But his on base percentage is .341, which reflects the fact that he has only walked 14 times this year.

Compare that to Swish. Nick Swisher is batting .243, his career average. But he gets on base 38% of the time, a reflection of his 46 walks.

To me this does not mean that Swisher is more valuable than Cano. They just do different things. If Cano could take pitches he'd be a hall of famer, in my book.

Why am I going over this? Well I noticed that Melky has walked in 4 of his last 5 games. Yesterday he walked twice. For some players that's nothing to get excited about, but for Melky it could be a sign that he is improving in this area. After all, he played almost every day between May 7th and June 1st, and didn't walk once.

We'll be keeping an eye on his progress here. And also on Arod, who desperately needed a break. He got one, and let's hope Mr. QuarterMillion-Rod enjoys his rest.