The bullpen has been a source of early-season strength for the Yankees. (Photo courtesy of flickr user Rodrigo Amorim.)

So we know that the Yanks’ starting pitching has left much to be desired. I covered that early today. I can only hope that warm weather and a few times through the rotation will clear up this messy picture.

But on the other hand, the Yanks’ bullpen deserves some credit. Let’s take a look.

	IP	H	ER	BB	K	ERA
Mariano Rivera	2.0	1	0	0	4	0.00
Kyle Farnsworth	2.0	1	0	1	1	0.00
Scott Proctor	3.2	3	2	2	2	4.91
Luis Vizcaino	3.1	2	1	1	1	2.70
Brian Bruney	2.2	1	0	1	6	0.00
Mike Myers	4.0	1	0	3	2	0.00
Sean Henn	4.2	2	0	1	0	0.00
Totals	22.1	11	3	9	18	1.21

So the Yanks’ bullpen has been the antithesis of the starting rotation. They’ve allowed less than a baserunner per inning and are recording just shy of a strike out per inning. Brian Bruney has been tremendous, and Mike Myers has been stellar in saving the arms as well. Even Andy Pettitte — not included on this list — got into the act today recording one more scoreless inning for the pen.

For Yankee fans, this early season bullpen success comes as a relief. For too long, we’ve watched Joe Torre trot out one subpar reliever after another. Remember Paul Quantrill? Steve Karsay? Felix Heredia?

Right now — and I know it’s early — those days seem behind us. The Yanks have a full slate of bullpen arms with whom I would feel confident seeing in any given situation. The blue door opens in left centerfield, and I feel relief instead of heartache.

Of course, the bullpen can’t keep pitching half of the team’s innings. But that’s a story for another day.

Much has been made of the state of the Yankees bullpen. There are loads of choices, but realistically there are only two spots to hand out. Mo, Farnsworth, Proctor, Myers and Vizciano can be considered locks. You can bitch about Myers all you want, but I don’t think anything will affect his status as a LOOGY in this pen. Such is life.

Your task: select and justify the final two bullpen spots from the following list.

Karstens, Rasner, Britton, Bruney, Villone, Ohlendorf, Sanchez, Beam, Henn, Bean (just for fun)

Personally, I’m going with Rasner and Britton. There’s no reason to let Britton fester in the minors if he can repeat or even improve on his performance last year. If he doesn’t work out, he still has options, and can be replaced by another member of this list.

I like Rasner because of his performance so far this spring. Okay, so he’s only pitched twice, but he has looked good both times. At 26 years old, it’s getting to the point where he either peforms or he he might not ever. Might as well get a glimpse now.

As for the others: I’d rather see Karstens, Sanchez and Ohlendorf develop as starters at AAA; Bruney has spent much of the spring sick and/or hurt, so he could use some more time to build up strength; Villone was greatly overworked last year, and who knows how long he’ll last this year; I’m not completely sold on Beam as a major league reliever.

Chime in, everyone. The comments are waiting.