The Yankees beat the Seattle Mariners 6-1 behind a strong performance by Mike Mussina Saturday at the stadium.

It was just another great pitching performance by Mussina who has raked up great performances this season nearly every time he goes out to the mound. Nearly every time except against the Boston Red Sox that is.

Mussina’s record this season is 4-3 with a 4.23 ERA, but those stats are deceiving. When you take out his two poor starts against the Sox his record jumps to 4-1 with a 2.73 ERA. Looks pretty good for a 39-year-old starter especially one who’s boss attacked him saying he needed to learn to pitch like Jaime Moyer.

When you inspect his starts against the Red Sox with a little more scrutiny it was Manny Ramirez that did most of the damage. In those two starts Ramirez had three home runs and six RBI’s against Moose. If you remove those numbers from his stats you’re left with a 2.81 ERA.

Last season, his worst in his career, he went 11-10 with a 4.73 ERA and was removed from the rotation after three successive bad starts in August. That time off might have might have rejuvenated him as he finished the season with a strong September going 3-0 with a 3.49 ERA during the stretch run.

“You don’t win over 250 games by accident,” said manager Joe Girardi. “But as you grow older, you have to make adjustments, and Moose has done that.”

Many thought Mussina would not be able to rebound after last his failures last August pointing to his age and the decline in velocity of his fastball (His old fastball velocity was 91-93 and is now 86-88). He has adjusted well though and has thrived this season by moving around the plate and changing speeds. His out pitch this year has been a changeup that regularly drops into the mid-sixties.

“Stuff was nagging at me that made it difficult for me to do what I wanted to do,” Mussina said commenting on last seasons struggles. “But coming into this year feeling 100 percent again, I’ve been able to do what I want to do - for the most part, make the pitches I want to make. I know the ball isn’t going to come out of my hand at 93 ever again, so I have to make the most of what I have, and I’ve been doing OK.”

This good start so far isn’t going to get Moose off the hook. Every bad start from now till October is going to be scrutinized and he’s going to have to face the Red Sox and Manny again at some point. But that won’t keep him from being satisfied when he does pitch well.

“Now after five weeks of the season,” said Moose. “I’m pretty pleased with what’s happened.”

Hopefully some of Mussina’s success and adaptiveness rubs off on Ian Kennedy.