River Avenue Blues

Welcoming back Andy Pettitte

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(Patrick McDermott/Getty)

The Yankees improved their rotation this past weekend pretty much the only way a club can improve at this point of the season: they got a player back from the DL. Ivan Nova returned from his shoulder problem to throw six innings of one-run ball in an important game against the Rays on Saturday, striking out eight and looking an awful lot like the guy he was in the second half of last season. Considering how poorly Freddy Garcia had been performing in that rotation spot for the last few weeks, Nova’s performance was a big lift.

Tonight, the Yankees will welcome another player back from the DL. Forty-year-old Andy Pettitte will return to the rotation after spending close to three months on the DL with a fractured left leg, a fluke injury suffered when Casey Kotchman hit him with a one-hop ground ball. He’ll be limited to 70-75 pitches after throwing just three simulated games and zero minor league rehab games, but returning tonight ensures that he’ll be able to make four regular season starts before the club potentially heads into the postseason. These four starts are essentially tune-up starts, which can be a scary thing in the middle of a pennant race.

Prior to the injury, Pettitte was arguably the team’s best pitcher. He owned a 3.22 ERA in nine starts (58.2 innings) with peripherals that made wolverines purr — 9.05 K/9 (25.2 K%), 2.30 BB/9 (6.4 BB%), and 58.3% grounders. That’s video game stuff. Andy was pitching better at age 40 and coming off a year-long retirement than he was during the prime of his career. Now is it reasonable to think he’ll maintain that performance after the injury? Almost certainly not. It’s entirely possible that he comes back as, well, an ineffective 40-year-old who sat out a year and missed an additional ten weeks with injury. I have a hard time betting against Pettitte, though stranger things have happened.

Anyway, an added benefit to getting Andy back in the rotation is that it pushes David Phelps into a relief role. Phelps didn’t pitch all that well in his latest stint as a starter (5.01 ERA and 5.20 FIP in 32.1 innings), though most of that damage was the result of two subpar outings against the Orioles. We already saw the 25-year-old get some big seventh inning outs in relief on Sunday, and now he’ll be able to take some of the load off Joba Chamberlain, David Robertson, Boone Logan, and the other middle guys leading up to Rafael Soriano. If Joe Girardi takes advantage of Phelps’ ability to throw multiple innings out of the bullpen, the Yankees will be even better off.

Good or bad, Pettitte returns to the rotation tonight. The club may have rushed him back from his injury and they may suffer for it, but at the same time they didn’t have much choice. The rotation had been struggling in recent weeks and the Yankees have welcome two starters back from injury in the last four days. I’ll be happy to watch Pettitte on the mound against the Blue Jays this evening just because hey, it’s Andy Pettitte, but I’ll be even happier if he proves to be the pitching boost we all hope he can be.

Randy Levine talks to MLB.com’s Barry Bloom

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Yankees team president Randy Levine recently sat down for a chat with MLB.com’s Barry Bloom, and the two spoke about a wide range of topics. The new playoff system, the club’s injuries, the 2014 payroll plan, the impact of the New Stadium, a potential sale of the team … all of that and more were discussed. I’d provide a recap of the interview, but MLBTR beat me too it. I’ll just point you to that instead. Levine didn’t say anything juicy or controversial, so you’re going to be disappointed if you were looking for someone to call the team out for their recent poor play. Still, check it out though.

Monday Night Open Thread

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(Jared Wickerham/Getty)

For the final time during the 2012 regular season, the Yankees had a scheduled off-day today. They’ll wrap the year up with 16 games in 16 days, including the next six at home. Only three of those 16 games — this weekend’s home series against the Athletics — will be played against a team with a winning record. That said, you know the Blue Jays (seven games) and Red Sox (three games) will come to play. Those clubs are essentially in their playoffs right now and would love nothing more than to throw a wrench into the Bombers’ postseason plans.

Anyway, here is your open thread for the evening. The Mets are playing the Phillies and the pitching matchup is top notch (Dickey vs. Lee), plus MLB Network will air a game as well. Those of you in the Tri-State Area will see the Rays at the Red Sox (Cobb vs. Cook). The Broncos and Falcons are your Monday Night Football game. You folks know how these things work by now, so have at it.

Pena in the running to manage in 2013 World Baseball Classic

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Via George King, Dominican Republic team GM Moises Alou has interest in Yankees bench coach Tony Pena to manage in next spring’s World Baseball Classic. Alou met with Pena at Yankee Stadium yesterday.

Brian Cashman said he would grant Pena — who is not under contract for next season anyway — permission to manage in the WBC even though Alou has not yet made any kind of formal request. I know Pena plays a big role in Spring Training, particularly with his brutal catching drills, but there’s no reason not to let him run his home country’s team during the event. As long as the Yankees don’t sent any pitchers to the WBC, it’s cool with me.

The Russell Martin Resurgence

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(Alex Trautwig/Getty)

In more ways than one, the second half of this season has been the polar opposite of the first half. The Yankees were winning games left and right before the All-Star break, but recently they’ve been struggling to string wins together. The pitching staff carried the club for lengths of time back in May and June, but August and September haven’t featured the same kind of effectiveness. A deep and productive lineup carried a weak-hitting Russell Martin early on, but lately it’s been Martin who’s done the carrying.

Martin, 29, had the big blow in yesterday’s 6-4 win over Tampa, a three-run opposite field blast off the hard-throwing Matt Moore. The at-bat was as impressive as the outcome, as Russ battled back from an 0-2 count to work it full before going deep. It was his third homer in his last nine starts and part of a second half surge that has seen him hit .246/.324/.437 with nine homers in 51 games (46 starts). Joe Girardi has been batting his starting catcher higher in the batting order — including fifth against left-handers — and it is not undeserved.

The first half of the season was not kind to Martin, who hit just .179/.300/.348 with eight homers in the club’s first 85 games. He struck out in 20.2% and walked in 12.3% of his plate appearances prior to the All-Star break, rock solid plate discipline numbers. His batting average on balls in play was abysmal though, an unsustainably low .193. Obviously luck plays a major part in any BABIP south of the Mendoza line, but not all of it was undeserved. Here is his day-by-day batted ball profile…

Green = grounders | Blue = fly balls | Red = line drives

Martin was beating the ball into the ground in the first half of the season, and if you watched the games, you know that most of those grounders were weakly hit to the left side of the infield. Smart teams played a bit of a shift on him, exacerbating the BABIP problem.

The second half has been a different story however, as the ground ball issue evened out and his batted ball profile normalized with last year, when he hit .237/.324/.408 overall. That looks quite a bit like his .246/.324/.437 line from the second half of this year, just with a little less power. His strikeout rate (17.0%) also began to approach his career average (14.7%) as well. Martin’s average on balls in play has jumped up to .254 in the second half, which is low for most hitters but probably right in line with his true talent level at this point. He is still prone to the weak ground ball and does hit a lot of pop-ups (especially on the infield), a combination that will forever keep his average in the dumps. There’s no away around that, his days of hitting .280+ like he did in 2006-2008 are undoubtedly in the rear-view mirror.

One thing we’ve learned during Martin’s time in New York is that he’s crazy streaky. He can carry an offense when he gets hot and he’ll turn into an out machine at the bottom of the order when things aren’t going his way. The lows are more frequent than the highs, but the Yankees needed him to perform better in the second half and he’s done that so far. It’s unfortunate that they’ve fallen back to the AL East pack and they’re relying on his production so much, but that isn’t really Martin’s fault. He’s hitting for some more power and a few more hits are starting to fall in, and lately they’ve come at the exact right time.

2012 Minor League Awards

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The 2012 minor league season officially came to an end for the Yankees’ organization over the weekend, closing out a decidedly negative season for the farm system. Top prospects got hurt, others disappointed, and few stepped up their game and raised their prospect stock. There’s no way to sugarcoat it, this season took a lot of luster out of the minor league system.

Although none of the six domestic affiliates were able to capture their league title, Double-A Trenton did play in the Championship Series. Triple-A Empire State spent the entire season on the road due to extensive renovations to PNC Field in Scranton, but they still managed to win their division for the fifth time in six years. That was particularly impressive. All told, the six stateside affiliates combined for a 366-326 record (.529), at least the 30th consecutive season they’ve put together a combined winning record.

These awards are not intended to be any kind of prospect ranking. It’s just a recognition of who had strong years in the minors regardless of their age or prospect status. Once a year it’s worth it to just sit back and appreciate what the fellas did this season. Here are my 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2011 awards post for reference. Just as a reminder, the Player of the Year is disqualified from the Pitcher and Hitter of the Year awards just the shake things up. Nothing personal.

Minor League Player of the Year: OF Tyler Austin
I mentioned earlier that very few players stepped up and raised their prospect stock this summer, but Austin was the overwhelming exception. The club’s 13th round pick in 2010 hit .322/.400/.559 with 17 homers and 23 steals (in 25 chances) while advancing from Low-A Charleston to High-A Tampa, plus he also made a late-season cameo with Double-A Trenton. Among hitters with at least 300 plate appearances, Austin led the system in AVG, SLG, OPS (.960), and doubles (35). The 21-year-old did all of that while learning a new position, moving off third base permanently and settling into right field. A concussion did shelve him for a month, but otherwise Austin dominated the most advanced pitching he’s ever faced and put himself on the fast track to the big leagues. He was simply marvelous from start to finish.

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Eduardo Nunez and solving the DH problem

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(Ed Zurga/Getty)

This has been a bit of a nightmare season for Eduardo Nunez, who had a chance to really establish himself as a useful player for the Yankees going forward. Instead, he lost his utility infielder’s job in mid-May because he struggled with the routine play, then suffered a thumb injury that cost him two months after being demoted to Triple-A. He resurfaced when rosters expanded in September and was used sparingly at first, but this past weekend he took over the shortstop position while Derek Jeter nursed his left ankle injury.

Nunez, 25, took advantage of the opportunity by going 4-for-13 (.308) with a double, a homer, a walk, and three stolen bases. He would have had another double had Jerry Meals not gotten in the way, plus he made a nice baserunning play on Thursday by aggressively advancing to third from second a routine ground ball to short. Eduardo Scissorhands did show up and whiff on a routine grounder that led to an insurance run for the Rays on Friday, but otherwise he played short quite well over the weekend. He even made two very nice plays going into the hole to his right and showing off his strong arm.

I have to think that both Nunez and the team are happy with his play over these last four games, as he provided some nice offense from the bottom of the lineup while adding some of the speed they’ve sorely missed since Brett Gardner got hurt in April. The Yankees have been a very station-to-station club these last few months and Eduardo’s energetic legs really did stand out. Add in his ability to make contact — just a 10.3% strikeout rate as a big leaguer — and you get a player that provides a much different dynamic than the rest of the lineup.

The Yankees are reportedly committed to using Nunez at shortstop and nowhere else following his defensive lapses as a utility player, hoping that sticking to one position will improve his glovework. With Jeter expected to return to his usual shortstop position later this week, perhaps as soon as tomorrow, Eduardo is suddenly a man without a place to play. Joe Girardi did indicate yesterday that he will consider giving Nunez at-bats as a DH against left-handed pitching, a move that seems beyond obvious given Andruw Jones’ brutally ineffective second half. Frankly, at this point they should consider playing Nunez against right-handers as well. Raul Ibanez is 3-for-51 (.059) over the last month and looks completely worn out after spending way too much time in the field earlier this summer.

By no means do I think Nunez is a budding star or anything like that, but the players the Yankees have been using at DH most of the season have completely cratered in the second half. With Mark Teixeira on the shelf and not close to returning, the Bombers need as much offense as possible right now. Ibanez and Jones aren’t getting the job done, not even close really. Nunez doesn’t fit the typical DH profile — the big, lumbering slugger type — but he does have a productive offensive game built on contact and speed. The Yankees can use more of that and fewer hitless games from their regular DH combo down the stretch.