A stroll down Joba Lane: First five starts
ByNo player on the Yankees this season has taken up as much of our time as Joba Chamberlain. Sure, A-Rod has his his non-drama that everyone pays attention to, Posada had the whole thing where he couldn’t call a game for a while, and Burnett had a stretch of pretty poor outings. Each has caused a bit of an uproar here and there, but no topic has persisted throughout the season like Joba Chamberlain’s role. I need not reiterate the argument.
Over the next three nights, I’ll take a look at each of Joba’s starts through the first half. Tonight we’ll do his first five starts, with the next five on Wednesday night, the next five on Thursday night, and the final two clunkers on Friday afternoon. Maybe this will shed some light on Joba’s situation, and maybe it won’t. The hope is that we can find some kind of trend, but that’s doubtful. More than likely, this will be just a good chunk of information.
April 12 @ Kansas City
Synopsis: The Yankees, winners of three straight at the time, looked to sweep the Royals. Joba pitched pretty well, going six innings and allowing just one earned run, a home run to John Buck. He also allowed two unearned runs, one of them was the only guy he walked all game. With runners on first and second and two out, Nick Swisher, filling in for the resting Mark Teixeira, made an error at first which allowed a run to score and the inning to continue. Buck then struck again, singling in another run, making it 3-1 Royals.
Joba finished the sixth with 88 pitches, and the Yankees turned it on in the seventh with a four run showing, putting the team on top and Joba in line for the win. Girardi thought that was all for Chamberlain, though, replacing him with Brian Bruney, who mowed down the Royals in the seventh. Then came that dreaded eighth. Damaso Marte got two easy fly outs to left, but then for some reason Joe Girardi went to Jose Veras to get Billy Butler. He walked him, and then Phil Coke gave up the lead on a double to a guy who is too poor a hitter to still be with the Royals. The Royals, who just signed Yuniesky Betancourt as an offensive upgrade. The Yanks dropped the game, and Joba didn’t get the decision.
Pitches – Strikes: 88 – 56 (64%)
Breakdown: 57 fastballs, 13 sliders, 11 curves, 3 changes, 3 two-seamers
Average and Max FB: 92.5, 96
Notes: Threw 2/3 strikes with his fastball, which is always good. Threw almost 85 percent strikes with his slider. He had a bit of trouble with the two-seamer and the slower pitches. Still, good strike percentage, good velocity.
April 17 Cleveland
Synopsis: Joba lasted just 4.2 innings, throwing 93 pitches in that span. After allowing a homer in the first he seemed to settle down, but came apart in the fifth inning, walking the leadoff guy and then getting hammered by the heart of the Cleveland order. A double by Ryan Garko, putting Cleveland ahead 5-3, would chase him from the game. The Yankees came back and tied it on an E1, and going ahead for good on a Derek Jeter long ball. Joba got a no-decision thanks to the offense.
Pitches – Strikes: 93 – 46 (49%)
Breakdown: 65 fastballs, 19 curves, 6 sliders, 2 change, 1 two-seamer
Average and Max FB: 91.5, 95.5
Notes: Joba was down about a mile per hour on his fastball from last game, and totally lost the strike zone. That’s far more concerning than the velocity. He also threw almost 70 percent fastballs, which seems like too much. He did go with the curveball over the slider in this game, but it didn’t quite work out for him. He only threw it for strikes 37 percent of the time. Still, something tells me it wasn’t his curveball that failed him, per se. He threw his fastball for strikes only 52 percent of the time.
April 24 @ Boston
Synopsis: Joba tosses 5/1 innings, allowing one earned run, two overall, and walking four. He had no earned runs heading into the sixth, though the first run was enough of his fault that it should have counted. Anyway, with runners on first and third with one out Joba allowed a single to Nick freaking Green, tying the game and chasing Joba, who had 91 pitches at that point. For the second straight game Phil Coke came in to finish off the job, and for the second straight game he did so without allowing an additional run. Then Mo allowed the two-run jack to Bay, and we don’t want to remember this one any more than we have to.
Pitches – Strikes: 91 – 49 (54%)
Breakdown: 53 fastballs, 23 sliders, 8 curves, 2 changes, 2 two-seamers
Average and Max FB: 92.4, 94.5
Notes: Decent with the average fastball, but he didn’t seem to ramp it up. Threw only 51 percent strikes with his fastball, which is sorta kinda really bad. Here we see something I’ve been pointing out recently: complete reliance on the fastball and slider. Of his 91 pitches he threw either of those 76 times. He’s essentially a two-pitch pitcher at that point. Still almost 70 percent strikes with the slider, but I would hypothesize that the percentage would go down if he continues to rely on just two pitches.
April 29 @ Detroit
Synopsis: Joba dominates. Yankeeland is happy. Seven innings with only 88 pitches, six strikeouts, three hits. The three walks are not nice, but not enough to rain on the party.
Pitches – Strikes: 88 – 50 (57%)
Breakdown: 63 fastballs, 12 sliders, 10 curves, 1 change, 2 two-seamers
Average and Max FB: 92.75, 96.3
Notes: The fastball is there. Maybe a tick below where we’d expect, but remember, this isn’t a guy who’s going to continue what he was doing last year. Basically, he was throwing like a reliever as a starter, maxing out his throws. Then he got hurt. While it’s not necessarily causal, it’s hard to ignore the correlation. Anyway, the 63 fastballs is a lot, but he mixed his slider and curve more, which give him three distinct looks. His 58 percent strikes with the fastball wasn’t great, but much better than his start in Boston. Also threw half his curves for strikes, and 58 percent with the slider.
May 5 Boston
Synopsis: This was the one where Joba allowed three straight hits and a three-run homer before finally getting out of the inning. It looked terrible at first, but then he went to strike out 12 Red Sox in the next 4.2 innings, most of them looking. It wouldn’t be enough, as the Yanks could only muster three runs of Josh Beckett. Joba took the loss, making his first inning even more of a shame.
Pitches – Strikes: 108 – 65 (60%)
Breakdown: 53 FB, 23 sliders, 16 curveballs, 11 changeups, 5 two-seamers
Average and Max FB: 92.3, 96
Notes: Fine velocity again, but it was clear that the fastball wasn’t working. So what did Joba do? Threw a ton of secondary pitches. Even so, he threw the fastball for a strike a hair over 60 percent of the time, dropped his curve for strikes close to 70 percent, and was about 64 percent with the change. Even though the first inning sucked, and even though the Yanks lost, I was kind of proud of Joba after this game. He realized something in the first and acted on it later, and it paid off heavily.
If you just looked at the breakdowns without looking at the results, you could probably pick out which of his starts were the better ones. For the most part he performed poorly when he 1) didn’t throw strikes, 2) relied on just two pitches, and 3) didn’t have his fastball averaging over 92. The same could be said for many, many other pitchers.
We’ll come back tomorrow to look over his next set of five starts. Spoiler: you get cheated with his short start, but you get the one where he annihilated Cleveland. A fair trade-off, I’d say.
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The argument is a preposterous one. Joba Chamberlain is a starting pitcher! Exclamation point, end of story.
Let me just say that in 3 years, everyone wanting him to be in the bullpen will look like complete imbeciles.
Roy Halladay had this same problem as a 23 year old pitcher, and as he got older, he got better. Joba’s prime will be 25-32, and we will appreciate it for years
+42
rebecca i thought only Mo could use that number
The imbeciles you talk about are the people who don’t care about 3 years from now. Their response will be- BUT WHAT ABOUT NOW!! I WANT A ROY HALLADAY NOW!!!! SEND JOBBER TO LOCK DOWN THE 8TH FOR MO!!!! Rational fans know how good Joba is and will be and these are the people who aren’t clamoring for him to be sent to the pen or traded.
Well that’s how sadly the majority of Yankee fans are.
So now he’s Roy Halladay?
Yes the majority of Yankee fans are Roy Halladay.
JOBA TO THE PEN!
Date against KC is a mistake. Don’t know the date off hand. The 12th I think.
you are correct, it was april 12th
My birthday =(
my birthday is april 16th!
Mine’s the 10th.
crazy!
I’m the 11th – For what it’s worth.
mine too
My guess as to his recent struggles: lack of control of the slider, decreased usage of the curve
Actually, I suspect that it’s lack of fastball command, which leads to nibbling, which leads to a him trying to pick off the corners with his slider and missing.
Which leads to him throwing 100 pitches in 4 innings, which leads to defense to be playing back on their heels because every count is 3-2 and it’s hard for them to stay on their toes when each inning takes 25 minutes. That, in turn, leads to them making errors in the field behind Joba which forces him to work harder and throw more pitches which then, in turn, forces him to max out in the 4th inning which then forces the bullpen to become over worked. All in all, throw strikes. Please.
Basically, he was throwing like a reliever as a starter, maxing out his throws. Then he got hurt. While it’s not necessarily causal, it’s hard to ignore the correlation.
I would love to co-sign this sentiment, but the problem I have is the fact that scouting reports on Joba Chamberlain through the Minor Leagues stated he was able to maintain his mid-nineties fastball throughout an entire start, and that’s one of the main reasons as to what made him so electric.
It’s definitely logical to say he was throwing as a reliever when he first ascended to the Major League rotation in 2008, but how would that explain his dominant velocity in the Minor Leagues during his 2007 campaign as primarily a starting pitcher?
I should note that I am not worried about Joba’s velocity, or anything of the sort, just playing a little devil’s advocate here. Some have raised some valid concerns in regards to Joba Chamberlain and his velocity readings this season possibly in relation to his health, so, I just want to see what you (Joe) think about it.
Look at the Fangraphs chart–and the way the velocity dips after the injury. It’s telling.
I’ve been saying this for the whole year and it is very troubling. Despite the lower velocity I still thnk Joba can be a good #2 pitcher (#1 if he can stabilize that velocity). Joba’s still young and has plenty of time to learn, but sometimes a player needs to completely fail (demotion) in order to get back on track. The best thing may be to ship his ass back to AAA, especially after some of the postgame comments he has made after a terrible start. His big success in 07 may have been the worst case for his long term development.
I think another problem is the management kissing his ass all the time saying how great he is. Let him prove it himself how great he is. He has had 2 great starts this year, but the other ones have been either average or just plain terrible. Let him earn his keep and stop pampering him. If he thinks his stuff is so great and his pitches are so wonderful then how come he has let up 18 hits in his last 2 starts. He has 10 NDs this year…10!. That’s pathetic. Send him to AAA to get his shit together. I’m tired of watching him go 4.2 innings.
+1.
Scouts’ guns had him mid-90’s late into starts in 2007.
Back in 2007 KLaw saw him in Trenton and told me he had him 94-97 all night.
Told you as in you personally?
Damn, man, you get around.
If it’s the post I’m thinking of, it was via email.
If he could only get to that velocity again, his control issues could be slightly covered by the overpowering stuff.
so what are we saying here? That Joba might have never recovered from his shoulder injury and he might never have that velocity again?
I’m not sure that he won’t EVER have this velocity again, I’m optimistic he will. But yea, it could be that he’s never recovered from his injury yet.
I think it may be more of Joba deliberately holding back to avoid future injuries. I recall AJ preach ing to Joba about not going max effort as a starter.
Except the velocity drop coincided with his return from the DL last year.
And he was able to sit in the mid-90s as a starter in 2007. He was sitting in the upper 90s as a reliever. There’s no reason he should be at 91-92, unless he’s trying to take a bunch off on purpose to improve his command. And he’s not getting that improved command, if that’s what he’s trying.
A deliberate holding back by Joba makes sense considering the drop in velocity after the injury. Get injuryed, hold back after injury, talk with AJ (who has many injuries in his past that he attributes to his max effort delivery) and reinforce your thinking regarding holding back as a starter. Let’s not overlook that there was a big deal made about whether AJ could stay healthy for this contract, his reason why he felt he could, and how that may of effected Jobas thinking.
Holding back by 6 MPH?
That’s not holding back…that’s some more fundamental difference.
Remember that Hughes was throwing 88-91 for a year and a half. Only this year did he get back to 91-94 as a starter. Different injuries but maybe Joba needs a year or more to get back to 94-97.
THe funniest thing about this whole debate is that he will NEVER have a full year of a .39 ERA. The dummies that want him in the bullpen actually believe that’s possible. How much crap will they give him he disappoints with a 2.34 ERA. Fools.
In his first game in the old yankee stadium against the oioles the gun was hittin 99 with his fastball and his slider was 92-93 thats when i said wow our future ace.
orioles i meant to write but joba was on that night i remember it was preety cool to sit by third base and seen joba dominate. i want that joba back.
“The rise of Joba Chamberlain has hit a speed bump. The solution is… simple: …start throwing more strikes.”
- Steve Phillips
The Middle East Peace Plan has hit a speed bump. The solution is simple: Israelis and Palestinians need to start liking each other more.
Sincerely,
Steve Phillips
I think Jobas recent bad starts are related to the lost velocity on his fastball which i think was caused by last years injury, when Joba has his velocity right he is dominant.
The good thing is sometimes young pitchers go through this kind of things when they had an injury or a big workload, for example Verlander was awfull last year he had pitched a lot of innings from a really lw age end his fastball dropped all the way to 93.6 from 95 m/ph average that caused his number to go down as well, butt after some rest he looks like he has regained that fastball this year with an average fastball of 95.5! with some splendid numbers as well.
So bottomline i think Jobas fastball will be back somewhere betwen this year or next and then hell be that dominant starter we all want him to be.
doesn’t explain the command issues or the fact that he’s pretty much relying on just two pitches. We’ll see how the rest of the recaps go, but based on what I’ve seen and read, I’m guessing we’re going to see a pattern of poor fastball command and a tendency to use just two pitches, with lots of velocity fluctuations over the course of the season. But just look at his last start…average FB of 94 MPH (which is plenty) and still horrendous.
Gossage calling for Joba to the BP in the Post, again. Says the Yanks have lost a lot of games after the 6th and 7th inning, implying that they blew leads…..
Don’t the Yanks have a ridiculously good record when leading after 6?
34-1
But why should Goose bother to pay attention to that?
Where can I find stats like that, with team streaks and such? Or was it something you knew offhand?
whozat has all his scorecards ready.
It was posted just the other day either here or on RLYW. I’m sure that it’s compiled from b-ref or retrosheet.
It’s on the baseballreference team page, under the scoring tab. Just scroll down a bit.
I’d still give him up in a package including one of montero/ajax + another prospect.
Joba will never have a season as good as Hallady would have AFTER he’s on the Yanks.
Montero/AJax are prospects, and who really knows what they could be.
I mean has cashman ever really given away a prospect that turned out to be a super star?
I actually think Halladay will never have another season as good as he has had after being on the Yanks.
i wouldn’t at all, and we have a decent idea of who montero and ajax are gonna be, and that is good major league players. montero’s bat will play anywhere and ajax should be a solid center fielder. joba will get better, i’m pretty sure of that. and he’ll probably be an ace someday. cashman has been pretty good about not giving away our best prospects, which is why he WOULDN’T make this deal (hopefully).
As awesome as Montero can be. He’s still got a long, long way. I’m praying he turns into Albert Pujols. I do the ritual every night and hopefully it works for us fans.
I dunno man. a guy killing AA ball is rarely a long ways off.
Alex Gordon killed AA.
Does the ritual include live chickens?
Terrible. There is no need to deplete the farm system when the answer is already on the team- Phil Hughes. Joba is an untouchable. Montero is an untouchable. A-Jax could be dealt for Halladay, but there’s likely not enough other parts to make it work.
Yes, Cashman has never traded away a prospect that turned into a superstar.
That’s EXACTLY why he’s not going to trade Montero, Joba, or Hughes.
Trading for 32 year old pitchers works sometimes (Cone). And otherwise, it doesn’t.
Pitchers are fragile. Period. For years, one can be dominant. The next, he can be hurt. See: Brandon Webb.
Heck, Aaron Harang hasn’t been the same since being used for four innings in relief last year.
Halladay’s already been hurt once this year, and he hasn’t had one dominant outing since. I don’t trade Montero or Joba or Hughes for that.
Also, as someone pointed out last night, the Yankees got Cone without giving up Bernie Williams, Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, or Andy Pettitte.
Nowadays, that ain’t happening.
Back then, scouting wasn’t nearly as good. It was a lot easier to hype a prospect as being awesome and get other teams to believe you. At the time, people believed Marty Janzen was a top prospect.
Marty Janzen was a decent prospect, not a top one. He was thought of as a potential future rotation mainstay.
He was not, however, remotely thought of as close to the Joba/Hughes/Montero/AJax stratosphere.
So he was ZMac or Nova
At best.
That was me.
If we could get Roy Halladay for the equivalent of Marty Janzen, Jason Jarvis, and Mike Gordon, sign me up.
By my calculation, that would be roughly George Kontos, Ryan Pope, and Humberto Sanchez.
I give up with what has become of Yankee fans. I actually got in the car last night and turned on WFAN (first mistake) and somebody called in and this is his comment verbatim:
Host (I dont know who it was): “Joe your on”
Joe: “Hey, listen Cashman has to do whatever it takes to get Halladay, I don’t care who he gives up. I’m sixty five years old and I have waited nine long years for a championship….”
He may have gone on but I gave up in disgust. The comedy of such a comment is almost tragic. I’m sure there are Red Sox, Cubs, Mets, Jets, NY Ranger fans who would have vommitted in their mouth a little. Not to mention the fact that 65 years old isnt even that old! And then I did the math, that guy has been alive for 16 Yankee World Series victories. 16! Really? Really? Nine years, really?
Ummm what prospect has he had that has turned into a superstar in NY????
If Cano is the standard we’re all in trouble
Because above league average production out of a 2nd baseman is a bad thing?
Who was playing 2nd when they brought up Cano, do you remember, Bo? Tony Womack. So that obviously wasn’t an immediate upgrade, just the Yankees playing a lazy Dominican who didn’t deserve it.
How many 2b are better than Cano this year? Aaron Hill, Ian Kinsler, Chase Utley, Ben Zobrist and….nobody else. I’ll take a top 5 player at their position, thank you very much.
Cano is much, much better than Kinsler. That’s insulting.
Well I’m enjoying Kinsler’s bombs on my fantasy league team. I’ll tell ya that much!
But looking at the MLB Leaders for OPS for 2nd basemen, I was happy to see Mr. Cano 4th behind Zobrist, Utley, and …..Sanchez (wtf?!). Freddy Sanchez seems to be having himself a nice season.
Thats just not accurate
Ian Kinsler, career, road games:
.248/.319/.416 (.736)
Ian Kinsler is a myth. He’s the second baseman version of Dante Bichette.
Off the top of my head the only prospect Cashman traded that has had a good career is Mike Lowell.
Dioner Navarro and Carlos Pena are both all stars.
Making an All-Star appearance does not mean you had a good career.
And Cashman didn’t trade Carlos Peña, he just released him. As did 4 other GM’s, including Billy Beane and Theo Epstein.
Re. Joba:
-Embarrasingly and unacceptably inefficient as a starter. Come to terms with it, folks.
-Lowest average innings per start of any starter in MLB this year.
-Fewest decisions of any pitcher in the history of baseball his first 29 starts.
-Fastball is straight w/no movement, resulting in very few swings and misses. At 90-92 mph, no wonder he has become overly dependent on the breaking stuff.
The question now isn’t whether to start or relieve, it’s how do we fix him as a pitcher, because, right now, he is a mediocrity.
FF wrote: “The question now isn’t whether to start or relieve, it’s how do we fix him as a pitcher, because, right now, he is a mediocrity.”
I can fix it. It should read:
“Right now, Joba is 23 and going through the normal growing pains young pitchers go through. The Jays didn’t give up on Halladay when his WHIP went over 2.2 in his second season, and the Yanks, similarly, won’t give up on Joba, either.”
The Jays sent Halladay to the minors. Too bad that’s not on the table.
I 100% agree that it should be
I 100% agree that it should be, when the fifth starter spot/CMW injury is sorted out.
It should be on the table to send Joba down if he needs it.
Most scouts and pitch f/x though don’t show that his fastball is straight. That is or was what separated him from Hughes. Explosive fastball with movement.
He is not overly dependent on his breaking stuff, he’s become a 2 pitch pitcher, fastball slider. If he had better command of the fastball and more velocity, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.
He’s absolutely right about the straight fastball. He gets almost zero swings and misses with his fastball. He’s going to need to either get that velo back to 96mph to blow mistakes by hitters or improve his command drastically to be able to paint the corners with 91, 92mph.
Why the need to go thru each start? Do the short hand version. Too many pitches, not enough innings, doesn’t put hitters away, avoids pitching to contact, and has delusional quotes after every start.
They’ll put him back where he belongs by mid August.
Thanks, Bo. Way to sum it up.
I can’t wait to read your blog when it comes out. It will be the saddest, most depressing blog ever, but at least it will be short and thus, easy to read and then forget about forever.
I agree. He will be back in the starting rotation by mid August. Not that he will ever have left it, but since he belongs in the rotation I can only assume that’s what you mean.
How about flash in the pan-scared to throw his fastball for some reason, and excuse making. Age is b/s I dont want to hear that when guys like Lincecum and Josh Johnson and at 23 Verlander, Lester and Beckett are able to maintain velocity. Next start if he dips below 94pm on a fastball yank him right there and then.
Yeah. That’s a winning way to teach him! /wrists
If he dips below 94 on a fastball yank him? Come on. Lets look at Joba after the break. I wouldn’t yank him until he starts looking like Wanger in his first three starts.
Regarding Joba’s velocity; I think he’ll get it back.
This situation is eerily similar to Phil Hughes’ last season IMO. Hughes was touted as a potential #1 who could throw into the mid nineties. That all but disappeared after his hamstring injury in Texas, and he was never the same afterward after suffering though a multitude of injuries in 2008. I remember sitting through his starts where he struggled to get his fastball above 90mph, and we were all wondering the same thing, “where did his velocity go?” This year is a different story, both as a starter and reliever. What we’re seeing this year is a healthy Phil Hughes.
Joba has shown flashes of good velocity this season, which tells me it’s there. It’s not like he’s physically unable to throw hard anymore. I’m hoping to see a Joba Chamberlain in the 2nd half that has made some adjustments and can finish out strong. But more than that, he needs to go into the offseason and work really, really hard. I hope (and think) he’ll come back next season strong and healthy.
I don’t think the Yankees will have it any other way. They think this kid is their next ace. They will get it figured out. They did it with Hughes and they’ll do it with Joba.
Wow this board is great. Gotta say I’m impressed (not that you care). The yesnetwork message boards are full of idiots. Frank the Tank, I’ve been saying the same thing about the Hughes injury over there but dummies don’t want to hear it. Lot of other good arguments here. Mr Yank being an exception. Pitchers develop differently dude. The Lincecum, Verlander argument loses steam when the other Tiger (Edwin Jackson) is having the year he’s having. Patience paid off there. Check the stats for the 1st 2 years of Halladay, Glavine, Maddux, Smoltz and probably 88% of stud pitchers.
I’m all for Joba in the bullpen if he is given this year and next to prove that he’s less than a 2 starter. Patience people.
And what I meant was the messages for the regular articles not this blog.
Desde que fue aprendido en estado de embriaguez. Nunca mas ha sido el mismo lanzador