Archive for May, 2009
Game 44 Spillover Thread
Posted by: | CommentsWe’re hoping this thread comes out of the pen and gives us multiple quality innings.
Game 44: Lefties battle in rubber match
Posted by: | CommentsToday marks the final game of a marvelous homestand. The Yankees have taken eight of nine games, and look to take the final one against the Phillies. They’ll send out their best to take care of it, as CC Sabathia will take the mound. He has started two career games against the Phillies, none of which came last season while in the NL with the Brewers. Well, except in the NLDS, and that wasn’t a pretty start. Otherwise he’s allowed seven runs over 12.2 innings, something he’ll look to improve on today.
The Phillies will counter with their best, sending out young lefty Cole Hamels. He is a Verducci Rule candidate this year, after tossing 227.1 innings last year before pitching through the playoffs. He’s been off to a slow start this year, pitching to a 4.95 ERA over seven starts, though that’s mainly a product of his first two appearances. Since then he’s been just fine, as he hasn’t allowed more than three runs in any start since April 23. The Yankees offense, however, is better than any he’s faced so far this year.
Nick Swisher gets a much-needed day off today. He showed some signs of life late in the week, but has looked pretty terrible over the past couple of games. He still has only four hits since May 12. Hopefully getting the day off and then hitting the road will get him back on track.
Lineup:
1. Derek Jeter, SS
2. Johnny Damon, LF
3. Mark Teixeira, 1B
4. Alex Rodriguez, 3B
5. Robinson Cano, 2B
6. Melky Cabrera, RF
7. Hideki Matsui, DH
8. Francisco Cervelli, C
9. Brett Gardner, CF
And on the mound, number fifty-two, CC Sabathia.
Pitchers frustrated by new Stadium
Posted by: | CommentsJust when it looked like the home runs at the new Stadium were coming back to a normal level, the hitters have started popping pitches out of the park at an alarming rate. Over the five games so far this week the Yankees and their opponents have hit 23 home runs. True, both the Yankees and the Phillies are home-run-hitting teams, but this is still a high total, and particularly to right field. Unsurprisingly, the pitchers aren’t taking the trend so well.
The Daily News spoke to Andy Pettitte on the matter, and he said what is true for pitchers at every park: “It’s simple, if you leave a ball up and they hit it with the barrel right now, it’s a home run. You can’t make a mistake up in the zone.” What he means, I would imagine, is that a mistake is far more costly then it was at the old park. Leave one up last year and maybe it’s a fly-out to the warning track. Leave one up this year and will almost certainly clear the fence. It’s easy to imagine how that makes a pitcher feel, especially a veteran like Pettitte who normally does a good job of keeping the ball in the park.
Pettitte goes on to talk about how a pitcher’s stuff plays into the equation: “You have to get the ball down, especially if you are not overpowering. If you don’t have, or if you are not throwing, overpowering stuff, you cannot let your guard down ever out there right now.” Yet as A.J. Burnett learned, even if you do have overpowering stuff you can’t let your guard down. Dave Eiland talked about Burnett’s mistakes from Friday night, noting that all three home runs he surrendered came when he left his left side open, altering the spin on the ball which ultimately meant a pitcher higher in the zone than intended. Those are the kinds of mistakes both the Yankees and their opponents are taking advantage of.
Unfortunately for a contact pitcher like Pettitte, the new Stadium just doesn’t play to his style. Runners frequently reach base off the southpaw, but he’s able to bear down in those situations and get ground balls or lazy flies, thus limiting the damage. Now, though, situations become tougher with men on base because even a slight mistake can lead to multiple runs. Again, this leads Pettitte to a universal pitcher tenet:
“I cannot walk guys,” Pettitte said. “I walked a guy in that inning before the three-run homer. I am gonna have to stop doing that, because you know you are gonna give up home runs. I am gonna give up a few homers, so I just can’t walk guys.”
I don’t think anyone is against any of the Yankees pitchers walking fewer hitters. Perhaps Andy should have this talk with Jose Veras.
Thanks to The Artist for sending this in.
Heyman: Angels were close on CC
Posted by: | CommentsWhen the Yankees and CC conducted their winter dance in December, rumors were flying left and right. Joe and Mike covered the Winter Meetings in Vegas for RAB, and I was home studying for finals. To relive the madness, check out the archives here and here.
When Sabathia finally signed his eight-year, $160-million deal with the Yanks, it was unclear who else was in on the bidding. We knew that the Angels and Giants had expressed some interest, but the only other rumored offer was one for six years and $110-$120 million from the Brewers.
As the early days in December wore on, a few stories emerged. Supposedly, the Giants were interested but never made an offer. The Angels were also rumored to be in on the negotiations, but the team shot those stories down. In fact, the Yankees were rumored to be confident that neither the Angels nor Giants would approach $140 million. They wanted to blow away Sabathia, and more than a few fans thought they were overpaying and outbidding themselves for the big man’s services.
Late on Saturday though Jon Heyman added a unique twist to the story, nearly six months later. He reported via Twitter: “very late scoop — turns out the angels made a $140-million offer to CC. so yanks were wise to go from 140 to 161 mil.”
That’s quite the rub. A lot of Yankee analysts and fans pushed the line that Sabathia didn’t want to play in New York, that his heart lay on the West Coast and that he would return as soon as he could. The presence of an Angels’ offer that was fairly competitive with the Yankee offer would seemingly dispel that notion. He could have turned down that extra money for the chance to pitch in Southern California.
In the end, we now know why the Yankees went so high with their final bid: They had a competitor with the financial resources to give them a run for their money. They wanted their prize, and they went for it. The Yankees probably didn’t know what the Angels’ top offer was, but they knew they had to stay one step ahead.
So when Sabathia takes the mound in a few hours, Yankee fans should be ever grateful that CC is in the Bronx and not in Anaheim. While I always assumed Sabathia would take the Yanks’ money, perhaps it wasn’t as sure a bet as I thought it to be.
Yanks save best for last in walk-off win
Posted by: | Comments
But I thought they were going to get swept?!?!? Yeah, so I hope some people out there learned today that a game is never over until it’s actually over.
Anywho, the first eight innings of today’s game were frustrating as hell. Rookie southpaw JA Happ all but shut the Yanks down for the first six inning, requiring just 75 pitches to do it. He gave up a semi-manufactured run (Cano double, Melky bunt, Swisher groundout) in the second, but then retired nine of the next ten before the Cap’n hit his second solo homer in as many days. Happ’s counterpart, Andy Pettitte, was actually pretty darn good today, allowed four runs in seven innings, which on most days should be enough to win. The only two mistakes he made were to Raul Ibanez and John Mayberry Jr., who tagged Pettitte for his first career homer.
But as far as I’m concerned, the ninth inning is when the game really started. Johnny Damon didn’t take the bat off his shoulder and worked a six-pitch walk off Brad Lidge to start the inning. Mark Teixeira swung at the same slider down and out of the zone three times for a strikeout, quite possibly his ugliest plate appearance of the season. Alex Rodriguez – who just narrowly missed a two run homer in the fourth – then took a first pitch slider down for a strike. Lidge threw him four more sliders to get the count to 3-2 before A-Rod took the sixth pitch of the at-bat, a 94-mph four-seamer up and out over the plate, to right field for a game tying two-run homer. I guess you can say A-Rod showed Lidge his OH!!! face. The entire at-bat showed the difference between A-Rod and everyone else; with two strikes he took two Brad Lidge sliders down for balls, he just spit on them as David Cone likes to say. Mere mortals like you and me and Eric Hinske have no chance in that spot.
With the game tied up at four and the crowd alive, Robbie Cano served a ball back up the middle for a single, and the game-winning rally was on. Cano then stole to get the tying run in scoring position, and someone deserves credit for that call. I don’t know if Joe Girardi or Tony Pena called that from the bench, or if Mick Kelleher picked something up from the first base coach’s box, or if Cano just went on his own, but whoever’s idea it was, bravo. Well done. Four pitches later, Melky Cabrera shot a single into shallow center for his third walk-off hit of the season and his second of the homestand.
The homestand and first interleague series of the year wraps up tomorrow with a top-notch pitching matchup as young Cole Hamels takes on CC Sabathia. The Yanks have won 8 of 9 on the homestand and 10 of their last 11 overall to work themselves back to just half a game back of Toronto for first. Good times, good times.
SWB breaks out of offensive slump in a big way
Posted by: | CommentsMike Ashmore has some Double-A Trenton roster moves for you. Seth Fortenberry and his .493 OPS find themselves back in Extended Spring Training.
Triple-A Scranton (9-2 win over Pawtucket) they pounded out 13 hits, 10 for extra bases
Reegie Corona: 1 for 5, 1 2B, 1 RBI
Austin Jackson: 1 for 4, 1 RBI, 2 K – 40 K in 38 games
Todd Linden: 0 for 5, 1 K
Shelley Duncan: 3 for 4, 4 R, 1 2B, 2 HR, 2 RBI, 1 BB – had been 3 for his last 33
Juan Miranda: 2 for 4, 1 R, 2 2B, 1 RBI, 1 BB, 1 K
John Rodriguez: 2 for 5, 1 R, 1 HR, 3 RBI, 1 K – jacked a three run homer off the Red Sox’s top pitching prospect
Justin Leone: 2 for 5, 2 R, 2 2B, 2 K, 1 SB
Eric Duncan: 2 for 5, 1 R, 1 2B, 1 RBI, 2 K
PJ Pilittere: 0 for 3
Casey Fossum: 6 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, 8-5 GB/FB - 52 of 82 pitches were strikes (63.4%) … has allowed two or fewer runs in all five starts for SWB
Anthony Claggett: 1 IP, zeroes, 1 K, 1-1 GB/FB – 6 of 7 pitches were strikes (85.7%) … how’s that for a nice quick inning?
Zach Kroenke: 1 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 0 K, 2-1 GB/FB – 13 of 19 pitches were strikes (68.4%)
David Robertson: 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 3 K – 12 of 17 pitches were strikes (70.6%)
Open Thread: Mets vs Sox
Posted by: | CommentsHalf of RABland is out preparing for their Memorial Day festivities, and the other half is still celebrating today’s walk-off win, so it’s a slow night ’round these parts. We’ll leave the floor open tonight for you to talk about whatever you want, though there’s some great sports action on the tube tonight. The Mets and Red Sox play at 7pm, though the Beckett-Pelfrey pitching matchup doesn’t work in the Yanks’ favor. Pelfrey, in case you missed my tweet earlier (shameless self promotion FTW), has walked 17 and struck out 11 in his 41 innings of work this year. Hitters have made contact on 92.8% of the swings they’ve taken against him, compared to the league average of 80.6%. Hooray for The Verducci Effect, eh?
Elsewhere, you’ve got a pair of Game Threes on tonight: Lakers-Nuggets (series tied 1-1) on ABC, and Pens-Canes (Pens lead the series 2-0) on Versus. DotF will be along later at it’s regular time, but until then feel free to talk about whatever you want here, just be nice.
Game 43 Spillover Thread
Posted by: | CommentsWhy does this two-run deficit feel like ten runs?
Game 43: Starting a new streak
Posted by: | CommentsToday’s game has the potential to be very, very painful. Let us count the many reasons why:
- Andy Pettitte does nothing but induce agita by allowing so many baserunners (1.45 WHIP). To his credit, he’s usually managed to eke his way out of most innings unscathed.
- JA Happ is a rookie southpaw the Yanks haven’t seen yet. ‘Nuff said.
- The game is on FOX, and by my count the Yanks are 0-500 when playing on that channel the last few years.
- The game is on FOX, therefore Joe Buck and Tim McCarver will have the call.
- The game is on FOX, therefore Joe Buck and Tim McCarver will spend roughly eight innings talking about teh bandbox!1!!
- The game is on FOX, therefore Ken Rosenthal will patrol the sidelines with his “they have to consider moving Joba to the pen at some point” propaganda.
Well, on the bright side, Will Carroll says that Joba’s knee is fine and it’s very likely he’ll make his next start. Here’s today’s the lineup:
Jeter, SS
Damon, LF
Teixeira, 1B
A-Rod, DH
Cano, 2B
Melky, CF
Swisher, RF
Cervelli, C
Pena, 3B
And on the mound, Andy “imagine if they were still paying him $16M a year” Pettitte.
Heyman: Yanks can’t add payroll (for now)
Posted by: | CommentsESPN puts the Yankees’ payroll at a cool $201,449,189. It is nearly $55 million more than the Mets who come in second on that illustrious salary list. Now, though, Heyman claims that the Yanks cannot add more payroll. Right now, this item jibes with what we heard about the Yanks’ spending in December: The team has reached its limit and cannot add any more. We’ll see if the same holds true when late July rolls around and the Yanks are one piece short of locking up a playoff spot.
Just 21 days 'til pitchers and catchers report.
