We are at it again. The Red Sox and the Yankees have begun yet another year of highly touted and much watched baseball battles.

Is there any doubt about how good this rivalry is for major league baseball?

It’s so good that around the country there are always murmurings that national television only covers these two teams. However, the same people issuing the complaints are also watching.

Sports and fans can never quite figure out this dilemma. On the one hand, MLB needs teams to be competitive so franchises can attract fans and hold their interest for a season.

As an example, teams such as Tampa Bay and Washington are already in trouble in that regard. They are not good enough to be in their division races and everybody knows it.

That means unsold tickets and reduced fan interest.

On the other hand, MLB loves having a rivalry like the Yankees and Boston to constantly be in the spotlight and attract the casual fan repeatedly.

The fact is fans love to see powerhouse teams play. When games involve two such teams, you really are at the apex of sports interest.

That’s obviously why the playoffs in every sport garner such interest. The deeper into the postseason you go, generally the better the matchups and the more intense are the games.

The Sox and Yankees bring that playoff fever to every game of the regular season.

Sox pitching will have to quiet a very hot Yankees lineup and the Sox will hope Coco Crisp and Manny Ramirez can find the right lumber.

For the rest of the division, they will hope the teams split their series all year. Toronto is in the running and Baltimore has shown, at least at the beginning, that they have one of the best bullpens in the game.

So while all the attention will be on the Sox series this weekend, the Jays and O’s will lie in the weeds and hope all the talent in that series evens the outcomes while they try and take care of their own business with W’s that will move them closer to the top.

The division is still about the Yankees and Sox, but if they play each other to a stalemate, Toronto, in particular, will make a run.

The hottest bats in the game belong to the Mets. A look at their lineup is scary. Jose Reyes is at .356, Carlos Beltran .351, Moises Alou .367, David Wright .327, Shawn Green .321, and their backup catcher Ramon Castro is hitting .357 filling in for the injured Paul LoDuca.

That will raise some ERAs on opposing teams.

Old Town native Gary Thorne is an ESPN and ABC sportscaster.