The annual Great Yankeeland Panic isn’t yet upon us. No one has threatened to fire the manager, and the manager hasn’t threatened to resign. The team hasn’t sunk five games below .500, or 10 games out of first place. Bernie Williams and Roger Clemens have not been spotted in Tampa jogging and snatching fly balls. Until at least one, and preferably two, of these things happens, the present state of affairs will more properly be called doldrums, or perhaps a rut.

Still, if the walls aren’t closing in, they’re at least starting to creak. Jorge Posada is on the disabled list, and there’s at least a chance that he’ll miss the rest of the season; both of the team’s Hall of Fame shortstops are dealing with balky quadriceps muscles, and Robinson Cano, the odd home run notwithstanding, is hitting like Luis Sojo. Perhaps worst of all, young starters Ian Kennedy and Phil Hughes seem not just to be imploding, but to be doing so in spectacular fashion. The thrashing that the Detroit Tigers dealt Hughes last night sent his ERA to 9.00, and did its bit to confirm an impression, which becomes more credible every day, that the Yankees made a terrible error when they staked their season on two starters who didn’t, between them, start even 80 games in the minor leagues.

As it usually does in the Bronx, though, failure is obscuring success. It’s easy to understand why; here is a team that will be charging $194,400 for season-long rights to box seats three rows back from the photographer’s well next year. But it’s also worth pointing out that things are, in all, going fairly well.

First, consider the Yankees’ schedule. As all have been incessantly reminded, this is the first team ever to be scheduled for 18 road contests in April, let alone a stretch of 18 in 20 games. At least as important, though, has been the brutality of the competition. The only really weak clubs the Yankees have played have been Kansas City and Baltimore. Against the former, they drew Brian Bannister and Zack Greinke, a terrific pair of stylistically unusual pitchers; against the latter, they had Kennedy and Hughes going. This doesn’t entirely excuse a month of mediocrity, but it does help explain it.

More important, consider the overall picture of their pitching strength. Coming into the season, everyone knew there was some significant chance that Kennedy and Hughes would prove themselves simply unready to assume important roles in the majors. With both pitching beyond atrociously — Kennedy has walked more batters than he’s struck out, and it took Hughes 156 pitches to get through five innings against Kansas City and Boston — that’s borne out, at least to date.

It’s easy to forget, though, that just weeks ago there were other real concerns: Would Joba Chamberlain prove a fluke? Would Andy Pettitte’s hellish winter destroy his ability to compete? Would Mariano Rivera start showing his age? Would Chien-Ming Wang’s smoke-and-mirrors act stop working? The answer to all of these questions, thus far, has been a loud “No.” Chamberlain is no fluke, Pettitte and Rivera are their usual selves, and Wang, on the strength of a masterpiece in Boston and an improved strikeout rate, looks like he just might be blossoming into a true ace.

All of this is even more reassuring when you take into account that Kennedy and Hughes have been so terrible that replacing them with any random minor leaguers would benefit the team. Either the kids will improve (as seems likely — no one is really so bad he gives up a run per inning), or they’ll be replaced with pitchers capable of pitching at least less badly, if not well. The team is in the middle of the pack in run prevention, and for this reason will likely get better. This might not be enough to stave off panic, but it’s something.

Much the same dynamic is at work with the offense, which has been the real problem. (The Yankees are solidly in the lower third of the league in runs per game.) Robinson Cano’s OPS will not, presumably, stay below .450, nor will Jeter keep hitting like Homer Bush. On the other hand, no one save Melky Cabrera is hitting much better than expected, and because he’s so young, it’s quite possible that we’re seeing real, sustainable improvement in his game. The injuries don’t help, but as the season wears on and equilibrium takes hold, the strong parts of the team should remain strong, while the weak naturally improve.

With the Yankees not having buried themselves, as they did last year, it doesn’t even much matter if the improvement starts today or a week from now; they’ll be fine either way. One just hopes no one tells Hank Steinbrenner — another week of wishy-washy baseball, or another game like last night’s from Hughes, might provoke something truly wonderful, maybe even something worthy of his old man.

tmarchman@nysun.com