While the three guys behind him in the order spent Friday night hitting, Derek Jeter in the leadoff spot took the evening off from that pastime. He went 0 for 5 to drop his average down to a very un-Jeterian .272, and I have to wonder if Derek rushed back too quickly from his May 20th HBP. While Jeter says the Daniel Cabrera beanball isn’t impacting his hitting, the numbers tell a different story. Since coming back the next day, the Yankee Captain is 3 for 34. That’s an .088 average if you’re keeping score at home, and he’s slugging just .118 over that span. That’s not looking so great.
Mussina, Yanks’ win leader, does it again
Alright, Yankee fans, roll call time. Raise your hand if, in Spring Training, you predicted that Mike Mussina and his eight wins would be leading the Yankees. Put your hand down, you in the back.
As hard as it is to believe, Mike Mussina, 39, is the Yankees’ winningest pitcher. He’s confounding the analysts; he’s beating Father Time; and he’s certainly proving me wrong. By mixing speeds and hitting spots, Mussina is getting the job done.
Tonight, disaster nearly befell early on. Spotted to a 1-0 lead, Mussina came oh so close to falling apart when a Shelley Duncan error — his third of the season in limited duty at first base — lead to a big Minnesota inning. After the first, the Twins had scored four runs, two earned, and Mussina had thrown 36 pitches. Now, usually at this point, I’d write off Mussina, and in a text message to Mike and Joe, I did.
But Mussina, as is his wont this year, proved me wrong. Over the next five innings, Mussina would need just 73 pitches to keep the Twins from scoring again, and his line — 6 IP, 6 H, 2 ER, 1 BB, 4 K — is downright great. The final five innings looks even better: 5 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K. Color me impressed.
(As an aside, it seemed to me on the highlight reel that a lot of the Twins’ base hits in the first were aided by the turf. On grass, some of those balls are outs, no?)
Meanwhile, the Yanks, who left their baserunning shoes at home today, let the bats do the work. Bobby Abreu, Alex Rodriguez and the AL’s leading hitter Hideki Matsui went a combined 9 for 12 and were on base 11 teams. Jose Molina and Melky Cabrera contributed hits as well, and the Yanks were able to plate six runs en route to a victory.
Of course, Kyle Farnsworth looked a bit dicey, and of course, the media is going to harp on this for approximately forever. But Joba’s starting, and the eighth inning is a work in progress.
So the Yankees find themselves with one game left in May, and I feel like this game can set the tenor for the next month. The Yanks are now at .500, and to end the month at one game over would be a huge boost. Meanwhile, Chien-Ming Wang, winless since May 2, could use that very same boost. I’m always wary of watching Wang pitch on turf; his career numbers on turf are not too comforting, and his ERA on turf is 0.90 higher than it is on grass.
But that’s a worry for later. Right now, the Yanks can sleep comfortably with their seventh win in nine games under their belts.
Yanks vs Twins in AAA, AA and Hi-A too
As the big league team faced the Twins tonight, the AAA, AA and High-A affiliates played the respective Twins’ affiliates. Freaky.
Triple-A Scranton (6-3 win over Rochester)
Brett Gardner & Greg Porter: both 2 for 4, 1 2B, 1 BB – Porter scored two runs & K’ed
Alberto Gonzalez: 1 for 4, 1 RBI, 1 K
Jason Lane: 0 for 3, 1 RBI, 2 BB, 2 K
Ben Broussard: 1 for 4, 1 2B, 1 K – 4 of his 5 hits with Scranton have been doubles
Eric Duncan: 3 for 5, 3 R, 1 2B, 1 HR, 3 RBI, 1 K – you tease
Jeff Marquez: 6 IP, 10 H, 3 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K, 10-4 GB/FB – picked a runner off first … 1.70 WHIP & .307 BAA
Billy Traber: 1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K – 8 of 9 pitches were strikes
JB Cox: 1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 0 K, 2-1 GB/FB
Scott Patterson: 1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 Er, 0 BB, 2 K
Game 54: Handy Dome Hijinx
The Yanks are coming into this weekend’s wrap-around set at the Twins hot, having won 6 of their last 8 games. Despite that, I’m going to preview the series with one little question: Delmon Young has zero homers this year, how much you wanna bet that he hits at least one this series?
Thaaaaaaaa Yankees’ lineup:
1. Jeter, SS
2. Abreu, RF
3. A-Rod, 3B
4. Matsui, LF
5. Giambi, DH
6. Duncan, 1B
7. Cano, 2B
8. Molina, C
9. Melky, CF
SP – Mikey Moose
Notes: Joba’s starting on Tuesday … Jorge continues to make progress in his rehab … the air conditioner in my office is broke, and it feels like a sauna in here … did you know that Melky has a 4-yr old son named Melky Jr?
Joba to start on Tuesday
Get those tickets for Tuesday’s game, folks, because that’s Day One for everyone’s favorite fist-pumper. Joe Girardi announced during the Yanks’ pre-game routines tonight that Joba Chamberlain will start against the Blue Jays on Tuesday. Chamberlain will throw between 60 and 70 pitches during that start and is now considered a member of the starting rotation. The Yanks plan to add 15 pitches per outing until the 22-year-old reaches that magic 100-pitch threshold. Big days are ahead for number 62.
Quick draft links
Keith Law has a ton of new draft stuff up at the Worldwide leader, including a Top 75 Draft Prospects list, a projected first round, and a general draft roundup. Unfortunately, the Top 75 and projected first round are protected by the iron curtain of ESPN Insider. Over at Baseball America, Jim Callis chatted about the draft today, and yesterday they posted their latest Draft Tracker. With each passing day, it seems less likely that Eric Hosmer will fall into the Yanks laps at #28, but more likely that Gerrit Cole will.
The draft is a comin’, can you feel it?
The ‘stache ain’t going anywhere
Remember April? Man, we had some heated arguments back then. Cano wasn’t hitting, Giambi wasn’t hitting, Damon was on and off, Jeter wasn’t off to the hot start we saw the past two years. Two guys in particular, though, took the brunt of the offensive criticism: Giambi and Cano. Each time they came to the plate and failed, people were clamoring for them to find a seat on the bench. There was even a contingency of Yanks fans who wanted to see Giambi released.
Good thing they didn’t get their way.
On the month of May, Giambi is hitting .339/.481/.726. That is absolutely insane. Each of those three numbers represents the top spot on the Yankees for the month. On the season, he’s at .244/.393/.556, a more than respectable line that, if nothing else, shows the effects of his abysmal April.
Before the season started and during the first few weeks, some Yankees fans were up in arms about Giambi. DFA him! He won’t be able to help this team! Even as we got into May and the Giambino started hitting a bit better, especially for power, the detractors were still out. At this point, though, to rail against Giambi seems a bit foolish, eh?
(Then again, guys like Jamal looked the fool when he continually defended Giambi in the early going. Baseball’s a funny game like that.)
The thing is, we’ve seen this before. I present to you the year 2005. Giambi was coming off a 2004 defined by a stomach parasite and a benign pituitary tumor. But he was healthy in the spring, and was ready to get back into the game. Problem was, he was no good early on.
Prior to June 15, he had just three home runs. On May 22, he was hitting .215/.368/.346. Yankees fans wanted him out, and wanted him out fast. Even as we moved into late June and his OBP rose to over .400, people still weren’t happy with Giambi. The stigma of steroids still surrounded him, and I heard many a person talk about how he can’t compete without the juice.
Then a funny thing happened in July. He started hitting balls out of the park. Two against the Orioles on the 4th of July. One the next day. After an off-day, one on the day after that. One against Boston on July 14, in an 8-6 win. Two on July 20, two on July 21. By the end of the year, that Giambi who had a slugging percentage under .350 on May 22 finished with a line of .271/.440/.535. The complainers had shut up.
(He hit .282/.463/.655 from July on in 05. Just disgusting numbers.)
This year, it appears his resurgence is coming along a bit quicker. He’s been one of the drivers of the Yankees offense, which is finally starting to look like we expected from the get go. And, most importantly, he’s hitting well enough to compensate for his poor defense at first base. There are no guarantees that he keeps it up — as I said, baseball is a funny game like that — but Giambi has shown that he can in fact contribute to the 2008 Yankees.
Hopefully, Girardi’s veteran rotation will help keep Giambi — as well as Matsui and Damon — fresh throughout the year. Matsui and Giambi in particular have been integral in molding the offense. With A-Rod back and Jorge on the way, maybe we can start to put up some more crooked numbers.