Greg Maddux, who will be 43 shortly after next season starts, and Mike Mussina, who will be 40 Dec. 8, have announced their retirements. Tom Glavine, who will be 43 during next spring training, has not made any such announcement. That’s because he doesn’t know if he is retiring or pitching for a 23rd season.

“I’ll have a good idea in about a month when I start throwing,” Glavine said. “It will depend on how I feel. If I have pain and issues similar to what I had last year, I’m not going to try and pitch with that again. It wasn’t any fun.”

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If the Yankees get their way in the off-season pursuit of pitchers, their starting rotation next April will consist of CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett or Derek Lowe, Chien-Ming Wang, Joba Chamberlain and Andy Pettitte. Check those names again. Notice any missing? What about Hughes and Kennedy?

As much of a fuss as the Yankees made over Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy a year ago, those two young pitchers seem to have become an afterthought. They were the do-not-touch tandem of a year ago, and now you can look as closely as you want, and you won’t find them.

A year ago it was What? Trade Hughes and/or Kennedy for Johan Santana? Are you crazy? This year it’s more like Who? Let me check to see if they even play here.

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If a player should be rewarded in the most valuable player voting for enabling his team to overcome his teammates’ performances, should a player be penalized for not enabling his team to overcome his teammates’ performance?

The short answer is yes, and that’s why I think the wrong player was named the National League most valuable player earlier this week.

The results gave the award to Albert Pujols, whose team, the St. Louis Cardinals, finished in fourth place in the N.L. Central, over Ryan Howard, whose team, the Philadelphia Phillies, finished first in the N.L. East.

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