After starting out with three wins on the road this month, the Yanks have lost five of their last seven. This afternoon, the team managed to plate just two runs off Dustin Moseley and his 7.90 ERA. They couldn’t capitalize on a few ninth-inning base runners and played terrible defense en route to a 4-2 loss.
While we could blame Bobby Abreu’s poor fielding and Xavier Nady‘s bad throwing for this one, let’s look at Andy Pettitte. Following a July 26th win over Boston, Pettitte sat at 12-7 with a 3.76 ERA. Now, he’s 13-13 with a 4.52 ERA. It’s been a long downward spiral.
Over his last nine starts, Pettitte has thrown 54 innings. He’s given up 40 runs, 39 of them earned, on 74 hits on 18 walks and 44 strike outs. Pettitte is 1-6 with a 6.67 ERA and has many Yankee fans and team officials wondering if he should return next year. We know he wants to come back, but how would Pettitte fit into the Yanks’ plans? As long as the team doesn’t consider him more than a fourth or third starter at best, having a lefty in the rotation would help the team. He has to produce though, and right now, he just isn’t where he needs to be.
More optimistically, Joba Chamberlain finally made an appearance in a game today. He threw two innings and was utterly filthy. His fastball sat in the mid-90s and his breaking balls were nearly untouchable. He gave up a harmless double, struck out three Angels and zipped through two innings on just 17 pitches. While the fourth-place Yanks once again failed to show up for this game, we can breath a sign of relief as Joba looked awfully similar to the Joba we know and love.