River Avenue Blues

Heyman: Yankees open to two-year deal for Soriano

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Via Jon Heyman: The Yankees are open to re-signing right-hander Rafael Soriano to a two-year contract even though Mariano Rivera will return next season. They haven’t made him an offer (other than the qualifying offer) and don’t appear to be in a rush to do so, however.

The Yankees are said to be fixated on one-year contracts this winter in advance of the 2014 payroll plan, but a two-year pact with Soriano would give them a made-ready replacement for Rivera when he presumably calls it a career after the season. This offseason’s two other elite free agent relievers (Ryan Madson and Joakim Soria) are both coming off Tommy John surgery and there figures to be some hesitation about giving either guy multiple years, especially Soria since it’s his second elbow reconstruction. If Scott Boras can’t get Soriano three years this winter, he never will.

Pineda continued throwing program following check-up on Monday

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Via Buster Olney: Michael Pineda was checked out by a doctor in New York today, then continued his throwing program at Yankee Stadium. Brian Cashman recently confirmed that the right-hander has been throwing off flat ground down in Tampa, and I assume today’s visit was a routine check-up.

Pineda, 23, had his arthroscopic shoulder surgery in New York back in May and has been to the city for a check-up at least one other time since then. Cashman said he doesn’t expect Pineda to return to the big league team until June and even then they aren’t count on him, they’ll treat whatever he gives them this year as a bonus. Either way, the fact that he came through the check-up fine and continued his throwing program is good news.

Trout & Harper take home Rookie of the Year awards

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Unsurprisingly, Mike Trout was unanimously named the AL Rookie of the Year tonight. Yoenis Cespedes and Yu Darvish finished a distant second and third, respectively. David Phelps, who was the Yankees only notable rookie this season, didn’t receive any votes. Neither did Jesus Montero. Not much surprise there, it was a very strong class and those two simply weren’t good enough to garner votes.

On the NL side of the things, Bryce Harper narrowed beat out Wade Miley to become the youngest position player Rookie of the Year in baseball history. New Jersey native Todd Frazier finished the distant third. The full voting can be found here (AL and NL). The Manager of the Year awards will be handed out tomorrow night, and we already know that Joe Girardi isn’t one of the three finalists.

Monday Night Open Thread

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The worst part of the offseason is the waiting. The GM Meetings provided a little spark last week but not much else, and now things are pretty silent. The Yankees have several holes to fill and appear to be focused on retaining their own (specifically Hiroki Kuroda, Andy Pettitte, and Mariano Rivera) at the moment. In a week they’ll have to set their 40-man roster for the Rule 5 Draft, a week after that comes the non-tended deadline, and a few days after that will be the winter meetings. Things should pick up soon enough.

Here is your open thread for the evening. The Monday Night Football game is the Chiefs, who technically have not held a single lead all season, at the Steelers (8:30pm ET on ESPN). There are also various NBA games in action, but neither of the local clubs are playing. Talk about whatever you like here, enjoy.

It’s always a bit of a pain to come up with photos for these things, so I’m going to just embed random MLB.com video clips until I get bored and think of something else.

Report: Torii Hunter expects to sign within two weeks

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Via Mark Saxon: Outfielder Torii Hunter is expected to make a decision about his next team within two weeks, though a source told Mark Feinsand that “I’d say there is little shot” of him winding up in New York. Hunter said he hopes to sign soon during a recent radio interview and signed his last contract with the Angels before Thanksgiving, so he has a history of wrapping this stuff up quickly.

A number of teams have expressed interest in the 37-year-old Hunter, including the Yankees, Tigers, Rangers, Dodgers, and Red Sox, among others. Lots of teams have cash and need outfield help this winter, so he figured to be a popular target. The Yankees reportedly won’t offer him a two-year deal given their plan to get under the luxury tax threshold by 2014, which means they might be left on the outside looking in. Here’s my Scouting The Market post on Hunter.

Nightengale: Yankees have interest in Mike Napoli

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Via Bob Nightengale: The Yankees have interest in free agent catcher, first baseman, and DH Mike Napoli. He’s also been linked to the Red Sox and Mariners this offseason.

Napoli, 31, hit .227/.343/.469 (114 wRC+) with 24 homers this season, and the Rangers didn’t make him a qualifying offer so it won’t cost a draft pick to sign him. I’m not sure what the Yankees would do with him unless they truly think he can catch 100+ games next year, which is something we have no reason to believe. He hasn’t started even 80 games behind the plate since 2009. I get the sense that this might be more about driving up the price for Boston than it is acquiring a good hitter who is an imperfect fit for the roster.

What Went Right: David Robertson

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(Mike Stobe/Getty Images)

Last season was David Robertson’s coming out party. The right-hander emerged as one of baseball’s most dominant setup men, usurping Rafael Soriano as the eighth inning guy while pitching to a 1.08 ERA (1.84 FIP) in a career-high 66.2 innings. His follow up in 2012 didn’t go as smoothly, but the end result was the same. Robertson was again one of baseball’s most dominant setup men.

The 27-year-old opened the season in pretty much the only way he knew how: with a Houdini act on Opening Day. Joe Girardi handed him the ball with a one-run lead in the eighth inning against the Rays, and Tampa had men on the corners with no outs in the span of eleven pitches thanks to a walk and a single. Robertson then struck out Stephen Vogt (four pitches), Jose Molina (five pitches), and Matt Joyce (five pitches) to escape the jam and end the inning. Pretty much par for the Houdini course.

Through his first dozen appearances, Robertson had allowed zero runs with 21 strikeouts against just three walks in 12 innings. In five appearances from April 20th through May 4th, he struck out 12 of 17 batters faced including eight in a row at one point. That’s when Mariano Rivera got hurt. The club’s long-time closer blew out his knee on the Kansas City warning track on May 5th, and Robertson was the obvious replacement in the ninth inning. He nailed down his first save three days later but blew the save next night, allowing a three-run homer to Joyce. Two days later he wiggled out of Boone Logan’s ninth inning jam to preserve the four-run lead, and that was it. We wouldn’t see him for more than a month.

Robertson had strained his left oblique and needed to spend time on the DL. The injury cost him more than a month, as he didn’t return until June 15th after a handful of minor league rehab appearances. Soriano had seized the closer’s job during his absence, so Robertson came back as the setup man and was eased back into things. Girardi didn’t use him in back-to-back days at first and didn’t bring him into the game in the middle of an inning even though he had some chances. It raised some questions about whether Robertson was actually fully healthy, but he was pitching fine and striking a ton of guys out so it wasn’t a huge concern.

(AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

In 26 first half appearances, Robertson struck out 40 and allowed just seven earned runs in 24.2 innings. He walked a dozen, but that’s nothing unusual for him. The second half opened with seven straight scoreless appearances and just one run allowed in his first eleven outings. Robertson melted down in an early-August game against the Tigers (three runs in one inning), but the Yankees held on to win anyway so it didn’t hurt anything but his ERA. Another ten scoreless innings followed as he carried a 2.18 ERA into September.

Outside of the blow save against the Rays, Robertson’s most infamous blowup of the season came on September 6th against the Orioles, the first game of the important four-game series in Camden Yards. The Yankees had just scored five runs in the top of the eighth to tie the game at six, but Robertson surrendered a solo homer to Adam Jones to leadoff the bottom half, and then two batters later Mark Reynolds took him deep for a two-run shot. Three batters faced, three hits allowed, two homers, three runs. The Yankees went on to lose the game and Robertson’s ERA climbed by more than half-a-run.

Robertson allowed two runs in two-thirds of an inning in a win against the Blue Jays later in the month but that was pretty much it. He followed up his strong but injury-shortened first half with a 2.75 ERA (2.49 FIP) in 36 second half innings. Girardi leaned on his setup man heavily down the stretch, as Robertson made four sets of back-to-back-to-back appearances in the team’s final 35 games of the season after Girardi never once asked him to work three consecutive days in the first four years of his career. He was also the team’s best reliever in the postseason, allowing just one run on three hits and no walks while striking out seven in 6.1 innings. Despite missing all that time with the oblique issue, Robertson still threw 60.2 innings across 65 appearances during the 2012 regular season.

At the end of the year, the right-hander owned a 2.67 ERA (2.48 FIP) with his usual sky-high strikeout rate (12.02 K/9 and 32.7 K%). He did allow a career-high-tying five homers one year after allowing just one, which was a bit of a problem. The good news is that he also posted a (by far) career-low walk rate, just 2.82 BB/9 and 7.7 BB%. He came into the season with a career 4.72 BB/9 and 12.2 BB%, and even last year it was 4.73 BB/9 and 12.9 BB%. The cool part is that nearly all of the walk improvement came in the second half …

In those 36 second half innings, Robertson walked just seven batters. From July 21st through the end of the season, a span of 36 appearances and 33 innings, he walked just five batters. From August 11th through September 24th, a span of 22 appearances and 82 batters faced, he walked zero batters. That seems impossible, but it’s true. He closed the season out with 81 strikeouts against just 19 walks, setting a new career-high (by far) with a 4.26 K/BB.

Robertson wasn’t as great as he was a year ago, but no pitcher, not even Mariano Rivera, sustains a near-1.00 ERA. He did have two really memorable meltdowns and at times he stopped throwing his curveball for no apparent reason, but it never really cost him effectiveness. Robertson hurt the Yankees the most when he wasn’t on the mound due to the oblique injury, but otherwise he was again a fantastic setup man and one of the five or six best non-closing relievers in the game.