Archive for Rants
Rotation concerns are nothing new
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(AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)
The date is August 26th and the Yankees seemingly have one sure thing in their starting rotation. CC Sabathia has been nothing short of brilliant for months, A.J. Burnett has pitched to an ERA north of six for a month now, age appears to be catching up with Andy Pettitte, the 24-year-old phenom in his first full season as a starter in the AL East is starting to show signs of fatigue down the stretch, and the various journeyman dreck filling out the back of the rotation inspires confidence in no one. It’s a scary thing when a team built to win year after year suddenly starts to show cracks in the most vital part of the roster.
And here’s the kicker: that was last year.
Last year’s rotation was led by Sabathia, who as I said was absolutely money. There are zero concerns about him in any shape or form, and everyone involved feels extremely comfortable trotting him out there in Games One, Four, and Seven in a playoff series. Any negative you can drum up about CC is nothing more than nitpicking.
Burnett, as always, is a wildcard. Last year at this time he was coming off a nine run, five inning outing against the Red Sox in Fenway, his third clunker against the Yanks’ biggest rival in four starts. He was in the middle of a stretch that extended into mid-September and saw him post a 6.14 ERA with a .273/.347/.445 batting line against in nine starts, including a 6.32 ERA, .293/.370/.447 ledger that August. Is that really all that different than the 6.08 ERA and .288/.362/.490 line against Burnett has put up this month? No one really feels 100% comfortable with A.J. on the bump today, and guess what, no one did last year either.
Pettitte had been solid most of last summer, coming into this date with a rock solid 4.25 ERA on the season, though that was on the way up after he allowed at least six runs in four of his last 11 starts. This year he’s on the disabled list with a groin injury that, as Brian Cashman likes to say, isn’t career ending. He’ll be back in mid-September and more likely than not resume being the same pitcher he’s been for the last decade-and-a-half.
(AP Photo/Ted S. Warren)
Phil Hughes, meanwhile, has assumed the role of Joba Chamberlain, the young kid with a big time bullpen background thrust into the rotation for a full big league season for the first time. He got smacked around last night and hasn’t recorded an out after the 6th inning since before the All Star break. But Joba … do we even have to relive that late season nightmare? Last time at this year he had allowed at least four runs in each of his last four starts, and had pitched to a five-plus ERA for the better part of two months. Once the Joba Rules took over in September, things only got worse. Thankfully, the Yanks have learned from that and aren’t planning to jerk Phil around in the same way.
I find myself doing this all the time, saying that this year’s team doesn’t make me feel as confident as last year’s, but you know what? That’s a load of crap. The only reason we feel that way is because we know what happened at the end of last season. There’s no mystery. It’s like seeing a horror movie for the second time; while everyone else jumps and screams at the scary parts, you sit there and try to act tough like it didn’t scare you even though you knew what was coming. It’s a false sense of security brought on by the power of hindsight.
Just take a quick look at the archives, late last August there were injury concerns about both Jorge Posada and Alex Rodriguez, complaints about Joba using his slider too much (much like Hughes and his fastball this year), rumors of the Yanks pursuing Brad freaking Penny, and talk about all the games they had left against teams with better than .500 records in September. It’s the same story this year, just with different a different cast of characters. We were no more confident then than we are right now; it’s the (mostly MSM driven) shock factor, where every little thing that goes wrong late in the year is shoved down our throats as a potentially fatal flaw.
Example: I’ve seen plenty of people talk about not being able to use just three starters in the playoffs like last year and act as if it’s a big problem, yet no one seems to remember that – hello! – the other team has to use their fourth starter too. Go ahead, give me Tommy Hunter in a playoff game, or Kevin Slowey, or Jeff Niemann, or Edwin Jackson. I’ll take my chances with this club against those pitchers eight days a week and twice on Sundays.
This year’s starting rotation is a bit of a wreck at the moment, but frankly it’s in better shape than last year’s because they have a ton more options. Offense and individual players slump all the time and we accept it as part of the game, yet we don’t afford the same luxury to the starting pitching. Dustin Moseley has been better than either Sergio Mitre or Chad Gaudin was late last year, Hughes has been demonstrably better than Joba was last year, and they still have Javy Vazquez in reserve. He might figure it out and contribute down the stretch, he might (probably) not. And who was 2009′s Ivan Nova? Exactly. The rotation won’t sink the Yankees because the core of the team is extremely strong, and that’s what will carry them to where they need to go.
Exactly one year ago today the Yanks’ record stood at 79-47 with a +113 run differential, pretty damn close to their 78-49 record and +164 run differential this year. Well, the run differential isn’t all that close, last year’s team would finish the season at +162, worse than the current team’s with 30-something games to play. Of course the 2009 club had the luxury of a six game lead in the division on this date, but the fact that they’re tied atop the AL East today isn’t their fault. The Rays are much, much improved and have forced their way the picture. The Yanks didn’t let them in.
Remember, it’s never, ever as bad as it seems, and we’ve been here before. Just last year, in fact.
The great Francisco Cervelli rant
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Oops. Photo Credit: AP Photo, Frank Franklin II
Francisco Cervelli isn’t supposed to be here, enjoying this much playing time. The weakest of the Yankees’ deep organizational corps of catcher, Cervelli has somehow caught 539 of the Yanks’ 958.1 innings this year. He isn’t hitting, and as a defensive specialist, his fielding has let him and the Yankees down. As a dinky pop up bounced off his glove and three unearned runs cost the Yanks the game last night, I had to wonder what exactly Cervelli was doing with so much playing time on a team with a $213 million payroll.
I don’t hold a grudge against Francisco Cervelli, the person. He’s a 24-year-old kid from Venezuela who clearly loves playing baseball as a career. He’s enthusiastic to a fault, and for a few weeks, he had a penchant for big hits. But he’s nothing more than a back-up catcher, but because Jorge Posada is a fragile 38, Cervelli has become the de facto starter, earning 56 percent of the team’s playing time and accruing far too many at-bats.
Coming up through the Yanks’ system, Cervelli never cracked the Yanks’ top 20 lists. The 2008 Baseball America Prospect Handbook has him at 23 and cites his “above average catch-and-throw skills.” After playing for Tampa, he had “impressed scouts with his toughness and ability to grind through the season.” Last year, he moved up to 21st and again, Baseball America praised his defense. “His defense is first-rate,” the book says, with a plus arm and above-average receiving and blocking skills.” His bat would never play as anything better than a back-up.
This year, half of this prediction is true. After his 1-for-3 performance last night, Cervelli is hitting .255/.328/.317 with absolutely no power. (Since the arbitrary date of May 18, he’s hitting under .200 with a .500 OPS in over 170 plate appearances.) His offensive value has him at 5.3 runs below average. As a back-up catcher, we could tolerate 100-150 plate appearances of Francisco Cervelli, but he’s now at 239 PAs. His playing time is in no danger of lessening any time soon.
The bigger problem right now is that Cervelli’s defensive prowess has fallen off the face of the earth. The botched pop-up last night was his seventh error of the season, and only Jason Kendall, with 300 more innings, has a higher error totals. The Yanks’ catchers now lead the AL with 13 errors on the year. He has allowed two passed balls while pitchers have thrown 22 wild pitches with him behind the dish. He’s also thrown out only seven of 44 would-be basestealers, and while much of that rests with the Yanks’ pitchers’ inability to hold runners on, Cervelli’s arm just hasn’t been as strong or as accurate as billed. That 16 percent rate is worst among all AL catchers with at least 300 innings caught. He’s fidgety behind the plate, and often lets his enthusiasm get in the way of framing pitchers and receiving the ball. Last night, he jumped up on a few pitches and may have cost the Yanks’ hurlers some called strikes.
In terms of overall value, Cervelli is still contributing positively to the team. Before last night, his WAR sat 0.5, but just a few weeks ago, he was a one-win player. As his numbers decline further, that total will continue to drop. Based on his strong April, he should be able to pull in a 0 or positive WAR value, but it’s not going to be much when the dust settles.
Meanwhile, the Yankees have turned to Cervelli on a regular basis this year. Due to age and nagging injuries, Jorge Posada just hasn’t been able to play much. He couldn’t — or Girardi didn’t want him to — catch last night, a night after an off day following a day game. At most, he’ll catch two of four games against the Red Sox, and the Yankees will replace Jorge’s bat — 10.6 runs above average — with Cervelli for a swing of nearly 15 runs. He has become the Melky Cabrera of 2010, an adequate bench player overrated by many and granted too much playing time.
With the Yankees’ financial clout, they shouldn’t be rolling out near-replacement players at any position. Even though there is a benefit to developing cost-controlled young players, the final piece of that equation concerns those players’ qualities. They must be good cost-controlled young players, and right now, Francisco Cervelli does not fit the bill. If the Yankees cannot trust Jorge Posada to catch three out of four games against the Red Sox, the team absolutely needs someone better than Cervelli, and right now, that’s not going to happen.
So what, then, were the Yankees to do? The list of free agent catchers following the 2009 season was sparse. The team wasn’t going to bring back Jose Molina. The Ivan Rodriguez Experience was one no one wanted to relive, and he — along with Rod Barajas, Benjie Molina and Gregg Zaun — wanted to start. They could have thrown good money after so-so players, but they went with Cervelli instead. It is a decision that’s backfired.
As the season plays out, I’ll have to come to terms with Cervelli. Despite last night’s game, when he didn’t take charge of a pop-up and his pitcher couldn’t take charge, Cervelli isn’t going to make or break a season. But with Jesus Montero knocking on the door, the Yankees aren’t going to stick with Cervelli much beyond October. He’s a constant reminder that the team still hasn’t yet figured out how to put together an adequate bench, and his ample playing time is a constant reminder that the Yankees buried their collective heads in the sand over Jorge Posada’s age and potential health problems. They didn’t plan accordingly, and we’re stuck with Cervelli.
With Hughes, it’s damned if you do, damned if you don’t
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Photo Credit: Seth Wenig, AP
As he fielded questions from Yankee fans on Monday evening during a talk at The Times Center, Yanks GM Brian Cashman spoke about doing his job in one of the loudest and most volatile media markets around. With two tabloids competing for readers and two sports talk radio stations on everyone’s dials, New York fans are fed constant outrage over their favorite teams’ decisions. Everything is scrutinized, and few in the media have faith in the process.
Cashman, though, knows that he has to tune out the noise to be able to do his job. “If you listen to the fans,” he said, “you’ll be sitting with them soon enough.” The same, he noted, applies to the media. If Brian Cashman and Randy Levine ran the Yankees as Mike Francesa and those columnists in The Post and The Daily News want him to, the team would be a train wreck of contradictions with a $300 million payroll and no farm system. Baseball requires an even keel.
Yet, the fans carry on and on. Last night, Phil Hughes had a bad outing. Against a poor offensive club, Hughes couldn’t escape the sixth and walked away with just his second loss of the season. He allowed 10 hits and two walks in 5.2 innings while surrendering six earned runs. After the game, he claimed to be too strong after 10 days off, and that set off the fan base.
They shrieked, “The Yankees don’t know what to do! Didn’t they learn from Joba? They can’t develop young pitchers! Just let him pitch! Off with their heads!” It was a typically expected response devoid of reason or context.
The Yankees have a plan. After last night’s start, Phil Hughes was on pace for 188 innings, and the team will not have him throw that many. Last year, they tried limiting Joba’s innings by having him throw stunted starts, and it clearly did not work. This year, they’re going to do what teams do with many pitchers and allow Hughes extra rest. They’ve done it with Andy Pettitte; they’ve done it with Javier Vazquez; they may even do it with A.J. Burnett. Hughes will get his rest, and that’s that.
Yet, the fans bemoan no matter what. If the Yanks had to shut Hughes down at the end of August, they would complain that the team is without one of their more effective starters for the stretch drive. If they give him rest now, they complain. Such is the nature of New Yorkers.
This approach — what I would call 20-20 managing — is nowhere more evident than in the bullpen as well. When Joe Girardi brings in a reliever and that reliever struggles, the 20-20 managers would have left in the starting pitcher. When the starting pitcher faces one batter too many and the game slips away, the 20-20 managers would have gone to a reliever. The 20-20 managers always push the right button and are never wrong.
But baseball doesn’t work like that. The Yanks know what they want to do with their young arm, and right now, that will involve keeping his rhythm regular and his innings under control. The real issue with Phil Hughes is that his last eight starts have been unspectacular. He’s 5-2 over that span but with a 5.33 ERA, and opponents are OPSing .798 against him. It is, though, only about innings to fans who think they know better.
The Yankees will always be scrutinized. They’ll always be second-guessed. Even when they win, someone will say they could have won faster or better or sooner. Damned if you do; damned if you don’t.
Gardenhire bemoans pitching change shenanigans
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Ron Gardenhire shows just how much he's going to whine about something rather mundane. AP Photo/Duane Burleson
With the Yankees and their pitching changes, it’s always something. For years, teams have complained about how, at home, the Yanks ice their opponents by drawing out “God Bless America.” The extra 30 seconds of signing, apparently, are to blame for any effective pitching, and the Yanks managed to reach the 2001 World Series simply by exploiting Ronan Tynan.
Yesterday, though, Twins manager Ron Gardenhire managed to trump those complaints with a rant of his own. In the ninth inning of the evening match-up between the two clubs, the Yankees jumped out to a 3-2 lead when Nick Swisher homered with two outs in the 9th. After Mark Teixeira was thrown out at second, the Yanks had to rush back onto the field, and Mariano Rivera didn’t have enough time to warm up. So Joe Girardi stalled.
At the time, Andy Pettitte had thrown just 94 pitches, and the Yanks’ skipper sent his lefty back onto the field to take his warm-up tosses. From a baseball strategy perspective, it made sense. Rivera had pitched just a few hours earlier, and Justin Morneau, a lefty who doesn’t hit southpaws as well as he does right-handers, was due up. Pettitte took his seven pitches to the glove, and then, Joe Girardi came out to retrieve him. Into the game came Mariano, and three batters later, the Yanks had themselves their second win of the day.
Later, Gardenhire claimed that he knew Pettitte wouldn’t actually face Morneau, and he ranted against the Yanks. He said:
No, he wasn’t going to throw a pitch. That was kind of tired, to tell you the truth. You don’t know normally get that long between innings to do all that, but we know what’s going on there.
That’s a situation Major League Baseball needs to take care of when stuff like that happens. You don’t have a guy ready in the bullpen, if your starter goes out there, he should have to face a hitter. That’s just the way it should be. If you don’t get a guy up, that’s the way it should be, unless the other team makes a change.
But that’s not what lost the game for us. That’s stuff that just gets old right there.
Now, I can see why Gardenhire might be frustrated with the Yankees. Since he took over for Tom Kelly in 2002, Gardenhire’s Twins have gone a woeful 15-45 against the Yankees during the regular season and have lost three ALDS series to the Bombers as well. Even though the Twins are one of the more successful AL Central teams of the decade and even though Gardenhire has managed the club to five first-place finishes during his first eight years at the helm, the Yankees just have the Twins’ number.
But this little rant comes across as a sore-loser whine. How many times do we see pitchers throw over to first to give a reliever more time to warm up? How many times have we seen a manager send out one pitcher to start an inning to allow another more time? I’m sure Gardenhire has done this himself, and it’s really not a different tactic than sending out a pitching coach to make a perfunctory and unnecessary mound visit.
Ron Gardenhire has been nothing short of professional in his time with the Twins, but he’s wrong here. The Yankees did what any team would do in their situation, and the Twins didn’t lose because of it. They lost because their closer allowed a home run to Nick Swisher five minutes earlier. Them’s the breaks.
When will Girardi have seen enough of Boone Logan?
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With this photo, I've already seen enough of Logan today. | Photo credit: Duane Burleson/AP
We haven’t seen much of Boone Logan this season. Recalled after the Yankees placed Chan Ho Park on the disabled list, Logan has appeared in just eight games and has faced 26 batters. Of those 20 have been in low-leverage situations. In other words, he’s something of a mop-up man who sometimes acts as a LOOGY. Either way, he hasn’t shown much in his short stint.
It seems like any time a manager has a lefty in the pen he uses him only against left-handed hitters — hence the term LOOGY (lefty one out guy). Joe Girardi has had Logan face 12 left-handed hitters this year, and the results are pretty disastrous. He has walked a quarter of the lefties he has faced. There is no way to rationalize that as acceptable in any way. Logan has never been a control guy, but at least in the past he’s avoid issuing too many free passes to same-handed batters.
To his credit, Logan had avoided the extra base hit until last night. Unfortunately, last night’s hurt a lot. It started with, guess what, a walk. He had actually walked Johnny Damon to start the inning, but erased him by inducing a ground ball off the bat of Magglio Ordonez. With a fresh slate and two outs he walked Miguel Cabrera. Then, facing lefty Brennan Boesch (shameless Brennan Boesch self-plug here) he laid a fastball right down the middle. That scored Cabrera and gave the Tigers a 5-2 lead. The Yankees would score two in the top of the next inning, but after the extra base hit it wasn’t enough to tie the game.
It might seem like Logan is getting a bit unlucky against lefties, since his BABIP against them is .355. That, however, is not the case. Of the six balls in play he has allowed off the bats of lefties, four have been line drives. Those are going to drop for hits more often than not. He has thrown only half of his 52 pitches to lefties for strikes. Apparently he’s made those count, laying them right over the plate. Lefties have gotten a good look at him, too, seeing 4.33 pitches per plate appearance. Righties have seen 3.64 pitches per PA.
Even if Logan reverts to his career numbers, he still won’t be a quality bullpen component. Against righties he’s an unmitigated disaster, a 5.69 FIP and 5.37 xFIP. Against lefties he’s a bit better, 3.91 FIP and 3.77 xFIP, but he still walks way too many of them and averages about a home run allowed every nine innings. That’s not impressive for a guy whose primary job is to retire lefties. He’s also terrible once men reach base, a 5.28 FIP and 5.15 xFIP. He’s also more prone to walk guys and less apt to strike them out.
This is mostly an emotional rant about the frustration I feel every time Logan enters the game. I understand that everything he has done falls under the short sample umbrella, and that he’s bound to do better against lefties as the season progresses. But, as I said, even his career numbers against lefties don’t represent anything special. The sooner he’s back in Scranton, the better.
Twelve games in, All Star balloting opens
Posted by: | CommentsIt never fails to amaze me that Major League Baseball’s All Star Game counts for something. Voting is but a popularity contest, and a glorified exhibition game determines home field advantage in the World Series. I shouldn’t complain because the AL has a dominant lock on the Mid-Summer Classic these days, but it rankles me nonetheless. To that end, it seems absurd that, on April 20, nine games into the season, we can now vote for the 2010 All Star team. Perhaps we should Scott Podsednik to the Small Sample Size All Star team for hitting .457 over 46 ABs or Vernon Wells for bashing six dingers in the early goings, but I don’t want either of them anywhere near the AL All Star team come mid-July.
Baseball does not move fast enough for Joe West
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Cowboy Joe has a problem: The glacial pace of Red Sox-Yankees games is getting under his skin, and the players just don’t respect him or the game.
“They’re the two clubs that don’t try to pick up the pace,” Joe West, umpire, crew chief at Fenway this week and sometimes singer/songwriter, said prior to last night’s game. “They’re two of the best teams in baseball. Why are they playing the slowest? It’s pathetic and embarrassing. They take too long to play.”
West’s rant came after players on both teams complained Tuesday night when they were denied time outs by home plate umpire Angel Hernandez. With reporters at the ready, West continued his tirade. “The commissioner of baseball says he wants the pace picked up. We try and still almost went four hours,” he said. “All of baseball looks to these two clubs to pick up the pace… The players aren’t working with us. This is embarrassing, a disgrace to baseball.”
A disgrace to baseball. Strong words coming from an umpire who once quit his job as a failed labor negotiation tactic.
The reaction to West has, unsurprisingly, been swift and somewhat critical. Rob Neyer supported West’s statements but wondered if the umpires should be at fault. Jason at It’s About The Money, Stupid highlighted West’s strike zone. Others have questioned West for speaking out in the first place. Umpires, many believe, should be seen and not heard.
But West has a point, and we’ll get to that in a minute. First, I’d like to address concerns about West’s strike zone as one reason for the game’s delay. The argument alleges that West doesn’t call low strikes, and thus, pitchers are throwing more pitches and the game takes longer. That is partially true, but if we take a look at the normalized strike zone, that argument breaks down. Via Brooks:
It’s true that Joe West doesn’t call a low strike, but he’s willing to extend the zone to his left a bit. By my count, he called nearly as many pitches that were strikes balls as he did pitches that were out of the zone strikes. That’s a spurious argument, and it detracts from West’s valid points.
The valid point is that Yankee-Red Sox games are very, very long. Sunday’s game took three hours and 46 minutes to play; Tuesday’s lasted three hours and 48 minutes. Even last night’s 10-inning affair went on for three hours and 21 minutes. According to figures from last year, an average major league game lasts around 2:52 while the Yankees play games that average 3:08 and the Sox 3:04. When the two teams play each other, they averaged nine innings in 3:30 last year, a good forty minutes slower than league average. Pick up the pace, indeed.
But, as always, the question remains: Does it matter? The Yankees and Red Sox both take more pitches than just about any other team in baseball, and the two teams were one and two in the AL in on-base percentage last year. As I said yesterday, the more pitches a team takes, the baserunners they have, the more runs they have, the more pitchers they see, the longer the game takes.
Meanwhile, from the money perspective, few fans care. In the New York area, YES Network enjoyed its second-highested rated regular season game ever on Opening Night, and NESN had its highest Opening Night ratings in its history. ESPN2, airing the game outside of the two major New England and New York media markets, scored a 2.4 rating, just a few thousand viewers behind the NCAA women’s championship game. The fans have repeated said they don’t mind the long games; they just want baseball.
In the end, I think Joe West’s claims are right. The Yankee/Red Sox games do take too long, and some of that is because the games are sometimes managed as though they are Game 7 ALCS chess matches and not just games one, two and three of the regular season. I think baseball should try to cut down on these lengthy games for the overall health of the sport. After all, we want to see game action and not David Ortiz spitting on his batting gloves for the fourth time in three pitches.
But Joe West is also wrong. It’s not his place to call baseball’s marquee teams an embarrassment. It’s not his place to yell at the players. Let Bob Watson spin his wheels arguing with teams over picking up the pace. The umpires just sound as though they’re whining in the face of baseball’s success, and that is what I find to be a disgrace to baseball.
* * *
Update (5:09 p.m.): Mariano fires back
As Joe West’s comments reverberate throughout baseball, Mariano Rivera has slammed the umpire over his remarks. Brian Costello and George A. King III caught up with the Yankee closer who wasn’t too pleased to hear West complaining about having to do his job.
“It’s incredible,” Rivera said to the two Post reporters. “If he has places to go, let him do something else. What does he want us to do, swing at balls?”
Rivera, a player who has tremendous respect for the game and the umpires, didn’t hold back. “He has a job to do. He should do his job,” Rivera said. “We don’t want to play four-hour games but that’s what it takes. We respect and love the fans and do what we have to do and that’s play our game.”
On the one hand, it will, as Costello and King write, be interesting to see how West reacts the next time he’s behind the plate for a Mariano appearance. On the other hand, Rivera, the Yankees and the Red Sox should be insulted by West’s comments. As many have pointed out, West’s partiality is now in doubt, and Bud Selig should step in to calm this escalating situation.
On slow starts and small sample sizes
Posted by: | CommentsLast night, after he failed to record a hit, reporters pestered David Ortiz with questions about his slow start, and the embattled Red Sox DH erupted in the greatest example of Mad Libs ever. “You guys wait ’til [expletive] happens, then you can talk [expletive]. Two [expletive] games, and already you [expletives] are going crazy,” he said. “What’s up with that, man? [Expletive]. [Expletive] 160 games left. That’s a [expletive]. One of you [expletives] got to go ahead and hit for me.”
Earlier today, Fack Youk, in a post that fills in the graphic-language blanks, takes on the topic of small sample sizes and the early goings. We know that slow starts don’t mean much in the grand scheme of a 162-game season. We know that players will eventually regress to the means, get their hits, hit their home runs. We know that we can’t judge Ortiz on eight plate appearances and can’t proclaim the return of Joba based on two strike outs. Yet, so many people — from players to fans to reporters — do so. Anyway, check out what Matt had to say at Fack Youk, and remember that there are “[expletive] 160 games left.”
Sherman: Hughes will be the fifth starter
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Phil Hughes, says Joel Sherman today in the Post, will be the Yankees’ fifth starter out of Spring Training. The team isn’t ready to make an official announcement, but the move has been all but decided since February. The job, says Sherman, was Phil’s to lose this March, and although Sergio Mitre and Alfredo Aceves have pitched well during Grapefruit League action, Hughes, 23, has thrown as he needed to do in order to secure that final rotation spot.
Sherman offers up an extended take on the Yanks’ thinking:
But this was never a numbers contest. If so, Alfredo Aceves and Sergio Mitre, both of whom statistically have outpitched Hughes, would still be in the mix. This was more about projection. The Yanks like Mitre and, especially, Aceves. But they view both as back-end starters who already have reached their ceilings.
They envision Hughes as a No. 3 starter or better depending on his ability to keep the aggressiveness he showed last year out of the bullpen while honing what, until this point, had been an unappetizing changeup. Thus, Yankee officials were elated Monday despite the poor overall line by how far Hughes’ changeup had advanced, both in its deception and his trust in deploying it.
The homers they saw more as a function of the wind and Hughes’ still gaining arm strength. His fastball was mainly 89-91 mph, and the Yanks anticipate several mph more over the next few weeks. If that comes along with the changeup, the Yanks really may have a No. 3 starter in the No. 5 spot in 2010. But, just as vital, they also may have a No. 3 starter in the No. 3 spot in 2011 should Andy Pettitte retire and Javier Vazquez leave as a free agent.
Now, I’ve been turning the news in Sherman’s column over in my mind all day, and I can’t come to terms with it. I’m a Phil Hughes guy, and I truly think he needs to have a chance to start. But this leaves Joba dangling in the wind. It throws into the Yanks’ ability to develop pitchers and their patience with young arms into doubt, and it makes me wonder just what the team accomplished after three years of highly-publicized Joba Rules. It doesn’t make sense.
Joba, just 24, hasn’t been bad as a Major League starter. Over 43 starts, many of which were limited by the Yanks’ overly cautious approach, he has thrown 221.2 innings and has struck out 206. His 101 walks are on the high side, but as one of the younger starters in the league, he has done the job admirably enough.
The problem though has been in the way the Yanks have kept the kid gloves on. A full 17 of Joba’s Major League starts were shorter than 15 outs. In some of those outings, Joba was just bad; in one, he left after getting struck by the ball; but by and large, the Yankees pulled him due to an innings limit or a pitch limit or some kind of limit. They kept the leash on for a very, very long time.
Now, we hear that the Yankees are ready to end that experiment for now. Sherman sees Chamberlain in the eighth inning with Aceves and Mitre serving as the team’s sixth and seventh starters should the need arise. Just yesterday, I decried such a move. The Yanks should, if not going with Chamberlain in the rotation, have him log innings at AAA. The team has toyed with Joba for so long that he has finally escaped the innings limit, but now they’re going to take him out of the rotation entirely. Who’s steering this ship anyway?
Maybe Sherman is wrong. Maybe his reading of the tea leaves will have been for naught, and the Yankees will surprise all of the B-Jobber analysts who want Joba in the bullpen. Maybe the Yankees will wake up and determine that, after three years of experiments, Joba’s year to dazzle — or fail — without any sort of limit is 2010.
I’m not too optimistic though, and I have to wonder if the Yankees should begin to think about ways to maximize Joba’s value through other avenues. If they’re not willing to let him take his lumps in the rotation as a 24-year-old pitching behind four others good enough to be staff aces, then cut bait and trade him. As early as 2011, the Yankees will need starters who don’t have innings limits, and these constant bullpen/rotation back-and-forths need to end. Joba’s role in 2010 shouldn’t involve rooting for an injury to another starter or waiting for Hughes to reach an inevitable innings cap. He should be starting. Period.
The “leader” of the fifth starter competition
Posted by: | CommentsJust a week ago, Sergio Mitre apparently led the fifth starter competition. But then Al Aceves pitched well, so he was the story. Last night Phil Hughes pitched well, so Wednesday’s stories revolve around how he has stepped up in the fifth starter competition. That, and how this is Joba’s last chance — ever, according to many scribes — to audition for the rotation. The way we’ve seen this story portrayed makes the Yankees’ braintrust seem rather fickle.
I’m not really buying any of it. Maybe the team had a fifth starter picked out before they even came to camp. Maybe they’ve already made a decision based on what they’ve seen. I doubt, however, that they’re anxiously awaiting the results of exhibition games in order to determine the winner. These games are played under completely different circumstances than normal games, and I’m not sure the Yankees can make their decision based on those results.
That isn’t to say that the games are meaningless. The staff can observe the pitchers and see if they’re doing the right things — mixing pitches, throwing strikes, challenging hitters, etc. The results, though, shouldn’t much matter. As we’ve been saying all spring, there’s just too much going on.
Take Phil Hughes’s appearance last night for example. The results show that he pitched very well: 4 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K, 59 pitches. Yet he faced mostly substitutes. Not only substitutes, but substitutes from the NL’s worst offense. Can the Yankees really trust the results in this case? Of course not. But they can observe other aspects of Hughes during the start and make determinations. That, I think, is what this competition is based on — if it’s really a competition at all.
Today Joba starts against Philadelphia, the NL’s best offense. If he goes his four innings, but allows five hits, two runs, and walks one, will that really be judged as worse than Hughes’s outing? The discrepancy in talent there is immense, the reserves on a terrible offense against the starters on the best offense. In fact, if Joba pitches well we should all be encouraged, since he did it against tougher competition.
This is all a rant to say that these stories in the newspaper don’t necessarily reflect the actual decision-making process. They’re stories based on the results of the game and conversations with staff. Maybe they give us a little insight into the team’s thought process, but maybe they don’t. Again, maybe the team is keeping its true intentions under wraps. We don’t know. What we do know, though, is that trusting the straight results of these spring training appearances won’t help us better guess the competition. There are just too many variables involved.
