Open Thread: A day off

Is that a Doors Andy Warhol tie?

Somehow I think the Yankees will get over the Sox taking their seventh inning singer sloppy seconds… A guy who was let go because he made what were, at the very least, insensitive and stupid remarks, no less. So ridiculous. That’s embarrassing for the Sox, not the Yanks.

I never heard of that rule. If you are dealing with tools, you should misspell words and not use the reply button? Interesting.

you use proper punctuation and spelling and the reply button always, because it is good manners and good manners are worth maintaining at all times. People disagreeing with you does not make them tools. Grammatical laziness, however, when people are taking the time to address an argument despite the fact that they’ve addressed the EXACT SAME UNCHANGING POINTS countless times, does make someone a tool.

And as for the actual debate, please, please, please respond directly to this point: what has Alfredo Aceves done to show you that he’s a better starter than Joba or Hughes? Aceves’s track record consists of pitching in independent Mexican leagues until he was 26, then coming stateside and putting up good but not drool-worthy MiL stats as a starter, and then succeeding out of the bullpen the next year. He also had three solid starts at the Major League level back in ’08, which demonstrates that he is not incapable of getting MLB hitters out, but shows nothing of his ability to succeed consistently as a starter.

Joba Chamberlain’s track record, on the other hand, consists of obliterating the minors well beyond the degree to which Aceves succeeded as a starter at 3 levels and then dominating well beyond the level that Aceves did out of the ‘pen at the Major League level, all during his age 21 season. In his next season, he pitched exceptionally well again as a starter, and then had a stretch of 9 or so starts where, apart from average-y innings totals (generally around 5.2-6.0, which is normal for a young starter), he was truly dominant, pitching to the tune of a 2.63 ERA in the offensively unchallenged AL-East, and striking out more than a batter per inning while maintaining a FB velocity around 95 (touching 99 on occasion) and the same devastating movement and command on the slider, plus an effective curveball.

Then, in early august, disaster struck when Chamberlain had to dive out of the way of a low throw to 2nd base from Pudge Rodriguez. Two pitches later it was clear that Joba’s shoulder was bugging him, and to the DL he went. The Yankees wisely decided not to push him back as a starter, and when he came back in september, he was in the ‘pen, visibly going easy on his shoulder, barely touching 92-93 on the gun.

The next season, the yankees felt that the combination of prior shoulder injury and a need to bump up his innings totals, along with a revamped rotation that now included CC Sabathia and AJ Burnett to go along with Andy Pettitte and Chien-Ming Wang (pre-suckitude) and their usual dominant offense, that it was much more important for Joba to stay healthy all season than it was that he pitch to great results. Thus they discouraged him from trying to overpower hitters, hoping he’d learn how to pitch to contact somewhat and conserve himself in the process. First and foremost, however, they wanted him to stay healthy. He did that. Now, I think it’s a stretch to say that the training wheels are completely off – i don’t expect any 122 pitch outings from Joba this year, and i’d imagine they’ll look for ways to slow him down as he begins to surpass 170 innings, especially if he’s pushed himself past Pettitte for the Postseason rotation, but it’s certainly not unreasonable to expect this season to be a much better gauge of him as a starter than last.

So let’s compare the two then, shall we? We have one pitcher who was successful as a starter in the minors, and successful as a reliever in the majors, but who lacks a quality out pitch and who did not pitch in the major leagues until age 26, which was probably not a fluke. Then we have another pitcher who was dominant as a starter in the minors, dominant in the bullpen in the majors, and had a stretch of dominance as a starter in the majors that was interrupted by an injury (and another, shorter stretch of dominance that was interrupted by innings limits). We’ve seen this pitcher throw two legitimate out pitches with command as a major league starter before, and we’ve seen him show flashes of two other quality pitches. Naturally, being a young starter, we can’t expect a great deal of consistency out of him. But we’ve seen flashes of what he’s capable of, and there is enough evidence to suggest that becoming a front line starter is within his reach.

So is it possible that Aceves is a better starter than Chamberlain? Sure. But right now, based on all of the available evidence, it’s not likely. Chamberlain has performed at a higher level than Aceves every step of the way, in every role, and has better stuff, and is 3 years younger than Ace. I really think you’re buying a lot more into 10 innings of ST than you should be. IMO, if Joba doesn’t demonstrate enough ability as a starter in ST to be in the rotation, he belongs in Scranton, not the bullpen.

/pete’d

The first time I ever posted was last spring training, after I saw Joba’s decreased velocity.

I posted something saying that Joba has lost his velocity from last year and I was “concerned.”

Little did I know, since I just started reading/commenting, the regulars here already had conversation after conversation about Joba’s velocity and ripped me for using a spring training start to judge his velocity. (He was at around 90, even high 80’s when I made the comment, so Joba did get some of the velocity back, just not all of it).

Part of the problem is that the regulars can get sick of talking/commenting about the same topics, so when a fresh poster, posts the same arguments that have been thrown around for weeks, the regulars can get restless.

Honestly, I started reading RAB in January, and it only took me a week to get caught up with all meme’s in this forum. Once I finally started getting them, it made this forum a lot funnier. I would wait for Bo to post so I can enjoy the comments afterwards. The meme’s are not bad, they take a little time to get used to but are worth it in the end.

See, this is what I’m talking about.

Habitual line stepper. No punctuation, no capitalization, refuses to use the reply button, no real logical thought to the post. And not a newbie either; nycornerstone does this all the time.

This is infantile, and posts like that don’t deserve mercy or kid gloves. Posts like this deserve to be excoriated.

All Drew said is spell correctly. He did not say it in a condescending tone he simply asked for correct spelling on at least the NAME.

Then dan proceeded to be insulting in response. Grammar doesn’t need to be 100 percent but at least give some thought onto it so it’s legible.

Yeah I agree. I think that this site is pretty much a place to come, read hopefully smart well thought out arguments regarding our beloved yankees. The funny inside jokes and meme’s are should just be in compliment to the yankee info. If some one wants has an argument that others disagree with, as long as its well thought out and not complete bullshit, let them put their two cents in.

I would agree that its slightly off putting when you don’t comment much. I certainly am not a regular, but once you post once or twice, I mean, the regulars that people say “bash” non-regulars human beings, not comment nazi’s.

it is what is (words to live by)

eh if someone gets on me a bout punctuation i tell em to eff off…but no one does, cause even though i dont give a shit about spelling or grammer i make cohesive well thought out rational points.

it really does go a long way. even if your points are batshit insane but you have tangible evidence to back ti up it at least has to be discussed