Heading to the NL
ByWith interleague play making its return tonight, the Yankees find themselves in the unenviable position of losing the DH. While Jason Giambi’s bat will stay in the lineup, the Yanks will either have to sacrifice Hideki Matsui’s bat or Johnny Damon’s bat and defense (or, as a few commenters have noted, Melky Cabrera). That’s not an easy decision to make.
Making matters worse for the Yanks is the lack of data against tonight’s starter Shawn Chacon. No one on the Yanks outside of Bobby Abreu has faced the former Bronx flash-in-the-pan more than a handful of times. Matsui is 2 for 3 off of Chacon, Damon is 1 for 5 and Melky is 1 for 1. Decision. Decisions. Decisions.
Meanwhile, as the Yanks head to an NL park, their pitchers will have to bat. Overall, the Yanks on the team with official at-bats are a whopping 36 for 295. That’s .122 for those keeping score at home and a far cry from their DH production this season (.319/.407/.504). With the Yanks offense slogging along, it’s time for the guys slumping and underperforming — middle infielders, I’m lookin’ at you — to pick it up a bit.
I don’t want to start a fight, but they could start Damon in center for a few games
if the yankees don’t put up a ten-spot tonight, i will be very surprised.
Tonight they should bench Melky, start Damon in center, and Matsui in left.
Doh. How could I forget benching Melky? I strongly support that decision.
Its time to start taking AB”s away from the melk man . If the yankee offense was clicking then they could afford to have him and his 4th outfield of a bat slumping. but when the offense is at the point of emptyness its time to start making some changes
yup, agreed.
the way Damon and Matsui are hitting, you cant take either bat out of the lineup right now, even if it means having Damon in CF.
the only worry i have is the Astros seem to be a running team, and could stretch out singles into doubles, doubles into triples, etc, with Damon’s noodle arm out in CF instead of Melky.
but this team needs the offense. sit Melky, and then you have him to pinch hit/run late, and can put him in for defense late, too.
Just tell Joba to only throw pitches that get hit to Right or Left, so Damon doesn’t have to field anything in Center.
Problem solved.
It is frustrating to watch people tag up 1st to 2nd on a ball hit to center when Damon is out there … but at least we can expect him to get to most balls hit to center and give MUCH better offensive production than Melky
(I still stand by my comment Melky is an avid reader and uses the negativity as inspiration … Melky, you suck!)
Yeah normally I’d be against Damon in center, especially with Huston’s odd outfield, but Matsui & Damon have been going to well to sit either of them, Melky should be off today.
Otherwise I bet Girardi goes with something like “Abreu was due for a day off” and plays Matsui in RF
and that LF wall is a bonus for us. Matsui can more than handle that short porch OF, and Damon is still quick enough to cover CF… just need double cuts set up for him, thats all.
A-Rod should hit a couple of balls on the train tracks, lol.
Damon in CF with Matsui in LF is the way to go.
Yup I’m all for benching Melky.
How about Bobby in center, Godzilla in right and Johnny in left?
Just trying to avoid Damon’s arm in center.
Arm strength is generally considered the least important tool for a centerfielder. As long as he manages to run down balls in the gaps, I’m content with a few more 1st to 3rd’s.
And Matsui doesn’t have that much of an arm for RF
Well no matter who starts in the outfield, I still think that Joba is going to go deep tonite.
Agreed. Anything less than a 68-pitch no-hitter with 4 homeruns for Joba is an abject failure.
….then everyone will scream that Girardi should DH Joba on his days off.
No, everyone will scream that Girardi should use Joba as an 8th inning pinch hitting specialist.
In a related story, Micah Owings is the greatest player in ML history.
Tonight will be interesting.
One thing the Astros have that the Jays and the Royals really don’t are some genu-wine big league hitters. Facing a pitcher is nice, but squaring off against Berkman, Tejada and Lee won’t be fun.
Plus this is his first road start and it’s in a hitter’s park. As I said, should be interesting.
In Little League once played a game by himself against a full squad and won 12-0.
Also, Joba Chamberlain once bet NASA he could survive re-entry without a spacesuit. On July 19th, 1999, a naked Joba Chamberlain re-entered the earth’s atmosphere, streaking over 14 states and reaching a temperature of 3000 degrees. An embarrassed NASA publically claimed it was a meteor, and still owes Joba a beer.
Carlos Delgado now stands for the National Anthem becuase Joba Chamberlain says he will.
When you go to see Joba play, you have to pay for two tickets. One for the game, and one for the gun show.
Joba sold his soul to the Devil for his rugged good looks and unparalleled pitching ability. Shortly after the transaction was finalized, Joba drilled the Devil in the face with a 100mph fastball and took his soul back. The Devil, who appreciates irony, couldn’t stay mad and admitted he should have seen it coming. They now play poker every second Wednesday of the month.
Joba once hit a ground rule double on a sac bunt.
Joba once thew a fastball at a ten dollar bill and broke it into 200 nickels
Joba can impregnate women with his sweat.
During a postgame press conference at the University of Nebraska, Joba once impregnated three journalism students interviewing him just by looking at them. Seven months later, all three women prematurely gave birth to three Ford Excursions.
Joba once gave up a deep fly ball to centerfield but ran out and caught what would have been a homerun into the black seats in Yankee stadium. He then threw out Ichiro trying to tag from third by 10 feet
Joba invented a time machine just to go back and strike out Jesus Christ on 3 pitches.
Every time a pitcher walks a batter, Joba runs to first, because he thinks the ump is referring to Joba’s scrotum when he says “Ball Four, take your base.”
In a related story, Joba once challenged Lance Armstrong to a “Who has more testicles?” contest. Joba won by 5.
The first time Joba played a round of golf he shot a 22.
(That is an actual story that is attributed to Kim Jong-il)
Joba also once hit a homerun on a hit by pitch.
Joba doesn’t go pitching. He goes KILLING.
He once stole second base, then stole first base back on the next pitch, just so that he could steal 2nd again.
Joba can win a game of Connect Four in just three moves.
Joba can jump-start a car using jumper cables attached to his nipples
His pierced nipples?
Joba doesn’t need to pierce his nipples, they’re made of platinum
Players actually used to be able to do that to cause a distraction for a runner on 3rd to score, but baseball since outlawed it
Baseball outlawed Connect Four?
They’re ruining the game!!
There is no ‘ctrl’ button on Joba’s computer, he’s always in control
Joba can kill two stones with one bird.
Joba doesn’t kill two birds with one stone. Joba kills all birds with two stones, the ones in his pants
Joba once prevented Milton Bradley from scoring on a sac fly by making him cry with a yo momma joke
Joba is so charming that he got Melissa Ethridge to wear a pretty pink dress, bake him a cake and rub his feet.
Joba Chamberlin can pitch and play catcher. At the same time.
Joba once hit two inside the park grand slams off the same pitch.
Joba is so smooth that he once had a threesome with Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Anniston, and he made Brad Pitt wipe the sweat from his brow.
I saw that game he hit the two insde the park grand slams, I think he saved a little girl’s cat that was stuck in a tree on his second time around the bases
One of the things to me that always separated baseball from all the other sports was that the leagues didn’t meet in a game that mattered until the WS. Now thanks to the premature ejaculators at MLB we pollute the sport by having this interleague play. Teams that aren’t set up to play in the other league have to compensate, with poor results. Add to the mix an unbalanced sked and we have situations like we had last night when the Yanks leave Oakland and arrive in houston at 6AM, TotalBullshit.
Here here, my boy. Add to that, we are put upon by the malady of these young ruffians drinking their sarsaparilla at all hours of the noon and these strumpets not even wearing knickers under their pantaloons, and it’s clear that the halcyon days of the glorious 90’s are long gone, eh chap?
I couldn’t agree more - unfortunately interleague play is popular and not going anywhere
my solution would be to limit it to 2 three game series a year .. home and away against your natural rival .. teams that lack a natural rival make due by playing another team without a natural rival
still is lame, but at least slightly realistic
By the way, what a cool park Minute Maid is. Great place to watch a game.
“Making matters worse for the Yanks is the lack of data against tonight’s starter Shawn Chacon. No one on the Yanks outside of Bobby Abreu has faced the former Bronx flash-in-the-pan more than a handful of times.”
Really? I would have thought this would be a good thing. No bad decisions can be made on the basis of meaningless statistics, and Michael Kay doesn’t get to talk about them as if they matter. What am I missing?
That, my friend, is a very bright silver lining. Made me laugh.
This is by far the most amusing thread I’ve ever read