When I was two, my dad bought me a tiny wooden bat, a tiny glove and a little rubberish ball...oh yes and a tiny Yankees uniform. He instilled in me a passion for the Bombers that has lasted to this day, taking me from our home in Philadelphia to the Stadium to see Yankees' games. This passion was but a very small bit of the legacy I owe to my father, still the most principled individual I have ever known.
My father died a week ago. After a 15 month battle with stomach cancer, which he had fought to a draw, a bout with viral meningitis, which he won but at great cost, he succombed to yet another infection, of unknown origin, which unexpectedly shut down his organs over the course of 24 hours. I had the excruciating and terrifying experience of watching him go.
In the days immediately following, I resumed my habitual activities and thought I could get on with life more or less normally. But emotionally things have gone from awful to much worse and I find that outside of my family and my friends I have lost heart for everything: for work, for sport, and, yes, for this blog. The need to attend to my father's illnesses has been behind the hiatuses in the blog this summer and now, having caught up the few things I have been meaning to say lately, and with apologies for my truancy, I am going to pull down the curtain, as I probably should have done for good at the end of last season. Good-bye and be well.
I'll give my Dad the last word:
"The problem with mediocre people is not that they are themselves mediocre, but that they have a vested interest in preventing others from rising to excellence." http://williamdvalente.blogspot.com
Thursday, August 7, 2008
RETURN TO WHITENESS
Nomar. Pedro. Orlando Cabrera. Renterria. Soon Julio Lugo. The Red Sox were the last team to break the color line (Pumpsie Green, early sixties) and it was widely understood that the Yawkeys ran a less than racially friendly organization that mirrored the less than racially friendly nature of the city. Now we are seeing a return to the whiteness of the past in the make-up of the Red Sox. When they take the field, the only position player who is a minority is Jacoby Ellsbury, a American Indian. No African Americans, no Latins of color on the field. Outside of Dice-K, the rotation sounds like the board of a yacht club--not just all white but all wasp: Beckett, Bucholz, Lester, Wakefield. The bullpen has two Latins, Lopez and (for now) Del Carmen and of course there is Ortiz. But for comparisons sake look at the Yankees. In additon to an Ameican Indian (damon), they have Posada, Rodriguez and Molina at catcher (that's right they have as many Latins at catcher as the Sox have on their entire team), Cano, Betemit, Jeter, Cabrera, Abreu, Nady, AROD, Rivera, Veras, Marte, Ponson.
When Manny talked about the Sox arganization slandering great players when they wanted to get rid of them, it is worht noting that all of the players he mentioned (or meant) were players of color--which is why Boston currently has the pastiest team in baseball. Is this the way they folks in Boston like it?
When Manny talked about the Sox arganization slandering great players when they wanted to get rid of them, it is worht noting that all of the players he mentioned (or meant) were players of color--which is why Boston currently has the pastiest team in baseball. Is this the way they folks in Boston like it?
RED SOX (AND THE) NATION
When Hank Steinbrenner earlier this year doubted the existence of Red Sox nation, he was widely and perhaps justifiably ridiculed. Sure the existence of some virtual, unofficial community of sorry ass chowderheads can in fact be detected in the universe. But I think he was trying to say something else. I think he was trying to dispute the perception promulgated at ESPN aka Red Sox Network that the Sox had replaced the Yankees as America's team. In that I think he was both right and wrong. The Yankees had not been America's team before, in my view, and the Sox are not America's team now except in the minds of the Baseball Tonight crew who blithely dismiss the heartfelt and entirely correct charges of East coast bias hurled by baseball fans from Atlanta to Seattle. The truth is baseball is too regionalized, despite the existence of national networks, to sustain an" America's team." There are debates about who is the midwest's team (Cubs or Cardinals), California's team (LA or SF), and even Florida's team (the Marlins or the Rays, the latter having recently entered the specious America's team debate).
What the Sox have become, however, since the advent of John Henry's ownership, is an American team. Under the stewardship of the Yawkeys, the Sox remained at once an utterly provincial phenomenon, restricted to Boston, and a strangely international phenomenon, taking their ethos from the mother country of the great majority of the chowderheads, i.e. Ireland. As the great Irish literature of the modern period tells us, byt the end of the Victorian age, if not before, sanctified defeat had become the semi-official ideology of the Emerald Isle. There was seen to be something holy in failure and something correspondingly vulgar in success. The Irish saw their geo-political struggles as at once fated and improving, soemthin beyond their control but something that both contributed and testified to their moral superiority. Such was the attitude of the Red sox fan during the long drought from the sale of Ruth to, roughly, the acquisition of Ortiz. As the ever tiresome, Dan O'Shaughnessy would mander in that insufferable accent of his, The Red Sox were a team of dark destiny, condemned to lose in bizarre and painful ways. But far from accepting this fate as a mark of organizational, let alone cultural inferiority, Boston fans took it as the sign of their purity as supporters of their team and devotees of the game. Losing somehow made them holier than thou, particularly if the thou was a Yankee fan. I would submit that it was not the losing itself that produced this defence mechanism. I come from Philadelphia and our franchise is the losingest in history, and yet I have never heard anyone even suggest the possibility of some moral uplift in that sad state of affairs. No, it was the Irishness of Boston, its infusion with the historical outlook endemic to that land, that gave rise to the single greatest loser-superiority complex in the history of American sport.
But now it is all about winning in Boston, the effect of a certain organizational commitment, the series of near misses after the acquisition of Pedro and Manny and the ultimate breakthrough in 2004. Now when the chowderheads preen themselves on their collective superiority, they do so on the same grounds that Yankee fans always have: the winning quality of their team. The Boston Red Sox are not, Hank is right, America's team. But they are now, at long last, a properly American team. For if, as has been said, America is the one country built not on a bloodline but an idea, that idea is not freedom or equality but winning. The chowderheads have not just joined the party, they have joined the country.
What the Sox have become, however, since the advent of John Henry's ownership, is an American team. Under the stewardship of the Yawkeys, the Sox remained at once an utterly provincial phenomenon, restricted to Boston, and a strangely international phenomenon, taking their ethos from the mother country of the great majority of the chowderheads, i.e. Ireland. As the great Irish literature of the modern period tells us, byt the end of the Victorian age, if not before, sanctified defeat had become the semi-official ideology of the Emerald Isle. There was seen to be something holy in failure and something correspondingly vulgar in success. The Irish saw their geo-political struggles as at once fated and improving, soemthin beyond their control but something that both contributed and testified to their moral superiority. Such was the attitude of the Red sox fan during the long drought from the sale of Ruth to, roughly, the acquisition of Ortiz. As the ever tiresome, Dan O'Shaughnessy would mander in that insufferable accent of his, The Red Sox were a team of dark destiny, condemned to lose in bizarre and painful ways. But far from accepting this fate as a mark of organizational, let alone cultural inferiority, Boston fans took it as the sign of their purity as supporters of their team and devotees of the game. Losing somehow made them holier than thou, particularly if the thou was a Yankee fan. I would submit that it was not the losing itself that produced this defence mechanism. I come from Philadelphia and our franchise is the losingest in history, and yet I have never heard anyone even suggest the possibility of some moral uplift in that sad state of affairs. No, it was the Irishness of Boston, its infusion with the historical outlook endemic to that land, that gave rise to the single greatest loser-superiority complex in the history of American sport.
But now it is all about winning in Boston, the effect of a certain organizational commitment, the series of near misses after the acquisition of Pedro and Manny and the ultimate breakthrough in 2004. Now when the chowderheads preen themselves on their collective superiority, they do so on the same grounds that Yankee fans always have: the winning quality of their team. The Boston Red Sox are not, Hank is right, America's team. But they are now, at long last, a properly American team. For if, as has been said, America is the one country built not on a bloodline but an idea, that idea is not freedom or equality but winning. The chowderheads have not just joined the party, they have joined the country.
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
THE LAST STRAW?
The injury to Joba will be widely seen as finishing off the Yankees this season. But the truth is their major problems have persisted even through the post All Star game surge, which ground to a dramatic halt over the last 11 games (4-7). They are still wildly inconsistent on offense, padding their statistics in routs only to surrender games without firing a shot. They still can't seem to beat the Baltimore Orioles. And of course they still leave too many men stranded, wasting chance after chance, even when they win.
In the absence of clueless Joe, two culprits have risen to the fore, Brian Cahsman for assembling this collection of losers and AROD for being the only man in recent baseball history that one could classify as both a superstar and a loser. ut I really have to give Cashboy props for his performance at the deadline. The Nady-Marte trade was brilliant. Whatever Karstens' success in Pittsburgh, he was never going to be given another chance to fail in New York and Nady is just the sort of hitter this lineup needs. As long as Giardi restricts Marte to the lefthanded specialist role--as he failed to do on Monday--he will be an unqualified boon. The Pudge trade wasn't bad either. An improved Farnsworth still wasn't all that dependable and with Bruney back he was also quite expendable. On the other side, the bill of indictments against AROD is getting longer all the time. His 3 homers since the break have all been meaningless; he has taken to hitting into rally killing double plays--one last night and one tonight (which could have been prevented had he bothered to run hard)--and he consistently founders in the late innings unless the Yanks are comfortably ahead. I saw where one wag noted that AROD should be lifted in the seventh for offensive purposes. One at bat really summed up AROD's chokiness for me. In the last game at Fenway the Yankees were down 7-0 in the middle innings, when suddenly they mounted a threat, loading the bases with noone out. Jeter got an infield hit, driving in one run and then a clearly laboring Jon Lester walked Abreu on four pitches. AROD strode to the plate and took the fifth and sixth straight balls from Lester, whose pitch count for the inning was now over 25. The situation clearly called for AROD to take a pitch, unless he got one in his zone. Lester threw a fasball borderline high and in, not the kind of pitch AROD typically drives for his meaningless roundtrippers, but he jumps at it here and hits a soft liner to third for the first out, advancing noone. It is the business of a Mays, a Williams, an Aaron, a Mantle, all the names that AROD is mentioned alongside of, to deliver in just that sort of a situation. It is the habit of AROD to fail, miserably, which makes one wonder why he is placed in their company. They had the nerves; he just has the nervousness.
Actually, AROD has been far worse in the clutch this year than last, when he was receiving such grief from the fans. While his woes have been remarked in print, they no longer prompt outrage at the park, where the faithful seems numbed into resignation or cowed by trhe pundits into accepting empty statistics as the genuine article. Either way the decision, be it Hank's or Cashman's, to sign this guy on for ten years at price that dwarfs the GDP of small nations is the single most destructive error committed by Yankee management in their storied history. Not the stupidest, but the most destructive. The decision may well condemn the Yankees to the longest and most expensive championship drought they have ever experienced. I said AROD did them a huge favor when he opted out and he has done nothing since to prove me wrong. If only they had accepted the gift he was offering them.
In the absence of clueless Joe, two culprits have risen to the fore, Brian Cahsman for assembling this collection of losers and AROD for being the only man in recent baseball history that one could classify as both a superstar and a loser. ut I really have to give Cashboy props for his performance at the deadline. The Nady-Marte trade was brilliant. Whatever Karstens' success in Pittsburgh, he was never going to be given another chance to fail in New York and Nady is just the sort of hitter this lineup needs. As long as Giardi restricts Marte to the lefthanded specialist role--as he failed to do on Monday--he will be an unqualified boon. The Pudge trade wasn't bad either. An improved Farnsworth still wasn't all that dependable and with Bruney back he was also quite expendable. On the other side, the bill of indictments against AROD is getting longer all the time. His 3 homers since the break have all been meaningless; he has taken to hitting into rally killing double plays--one last night and one tonight (which could have been prevented had he bothered to run hard)--and he consistently founders in the late innings unless the Yanks are comfortably ahead. I saw where one wag noted that AROD should be lifted in the seventh for offensive purposes. One at bat really summed up AROD's chokiness for me. In the last game at Fenway the Yankees were down 7-0 in the middle innings, when suddenly they mounted a threat, loading the bases with noone out. Jeter got an infield hit, driving in one run and then a clearly laboring Jon Lester walked Abreu on four pitches. AROD strode to the plate and took the fifth and sixth straight balls from Lester, whose pitch count for the inning was now over 25. The situation clearly called for AROD to take a pitch, unless he got one in his zone. Lester threw a fasball borderline high and in, not the kind of pitch AROD typically drives for his meaningless roundtrippers, but he jumps at it here and hits a soft liner to third for the first out, advancing noone. It is the business of a Mays, a Williams, an Aaron, a Mantle, all the names that AROD is mentioned alongside of, to deliver in just that sort of a situation. It is the habit of AROD to fail, miserably, which makes one wonder why he is placed in their company. They had the nerves; he just has the nervousness.
Actually, AROD has been far worse in the clutch this year than last, when he was receiving such grief from the fans. While his woes have been remarked in print, they no longer prompt outrage at the park, where the faithful seems numbed into resignation or cowed by trhe pundits into accepting empty statistics as the genuine article. Either way the decision, be it Hank's or Cashman's, to sign this guy on for ten years at price that dwarfs the GDP of small nations is the single most destructive error committed by Yankee management in their storied history. Not the stupidest, but the most destructive. The decision may well condemn the Yankees to the longest and most expensive championship drought they have ever experienced. I said AROD did them a huge favor when he opted out and he has done nothing since to prove me wrong. If only they had accepted the gift he was offering them.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
THIRTY TWO AND COUNTING
I know it's Roy Halladay and all, but he has lost 6 times this year, and the degree of Yankee futility on offense is just staggering--just two hits. What is more they wasted another good start (3 runs over 6.2 innings). The starting pitching over the last couple of weeks has been nothing short of stellar and somehow the Yankees have wasted a good deal of it. It won't last of course. Even though the Yanks' pitching is not as bad as advertised, it isn't this good either. By the time the bats wake up, if they wake up, the team will be finding another way to lose half their games.
The Rays are in collapse; the Red Sox aren't that great; the division is really there for the taking. but at this point, I'd say the Orioles are as likely an upstart candidate as the Yankees. Cashman's cure: Richie Sexton. Just what we need: another guy who can't make contact to save his life and sgtays in the league on the strength of the odd home run.
What we do need is a new GM.
The Rays are in collapse; the Red Sox aren't that great; the division is really there for the taking. but at this point, I'd say the Orioles are as likely an upstart candidate as the Yankees. Cashman's cure: Richie Sexton. Just what we need: another guy who can't make contact to save his life and sgtays in the league on the strength of the odd home run.
What we do need is a new GM.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
DO I HEAR THIRTY ONE?
Another game lost on offense--once more against a non-descript lefthander-- and to one of the sorriest teams in MLB. Actually the Yankees managed to lose the series to the Pirates this year--after sweeping them each of the last two. Only 2 runs scored, and you have to put part of this loss on Giardi. He seems to think that just putting nine players out there in pinstripes is sufficient to score and win. Given that you have neither Damon nor Matsui, can someone tell me why the single most productive bat in the lineup, Giambi, is sitting on the bench. I have in the past railed against the offensive futility of Jose Molina, complaingin that the crater sized hole in his bat disqualifies him as a viable back-up catcher. Can someone tell me when and why he became the Yan kees' number one catcher. Game after game Posada either DH's or plays first base, while Molina weakens the bottom of the order. Bad enough. But without the Dh, when playing no way Jose means sitting Giambi or Posada, when it means a bottom third that reads Christian, Molina, Mussina (who had one more hit than Molina by the way), then I don't see why Giardi dopesn't put Posada behind the plate. What's the worst that can happen? He commits a throwing error? Well Molina had one of those as well. Tonight the Yankees' failure to break the two run barrier (which should have a catchy name like the Mendoza line) was less about choking with RISP than fielding a really weak lineup.
Having said that, the weak line-up does put added pressure on the one superstar uniquely unable to handle it. I refer of course to AROD (Reggie had a candy bar named after him; I suggest Alex go with an ice cream treat: Mr. Softy. The last time I lambasted Mr. Softy, Anonymous complained that Abreu had failed just as badly in the same clutch situation. Since then, Abreu has hit a game winning double yesterday and driven in the only two runs tonight while AROD has done...nothing (Mussina had one more hit than he did too). In fact, once Abreu had tied the game in the seventh tonight, AROD cam up with two out and two on and a chance tto get the Yankees the lead or even bust the game open. He bounced out to raise his left on base number for the evening to four. He's just not the kind of superstar that lifts all boats, which is why you cannot surround him with a subpar line-up and expect him to deliver victories.
With the Rays losing again, the Yanks had a chance to get them selves right back in the East division race, and they blew it against a AAA level club. There are no real solutions here, easy or otherwise, but they really need right handed bats.
Last point: it didn't matter tonight, but when Giardi hhas noone to hit after the number six guy, he should bat Cano fifth and Posada sixth. Cano runs well enough to score on a Posada hit, Posada will still be out there on the bases after a Cano hit, waiting for the likes of Molina to push him home.
Having said that, the weak line-up does put added pressure on the one superstar uniquely unable to handle it. I refer of course to AROD (Reggie had a candy bar named after him; I suggest Alex go with an ice cream treat: Mr. Softy. The last time I lambasted Mr. Softy, Anonymous complained that Abreu had failed just as badly in the same clutch situation. Since then, Abreu has hit a game winning double yesterday and driven in the only two runs tonight while AROD has done...nothing (Mussina had one more hit than he did too). In fact, once Abreu had tied the game in the seventh tonight, AROD cam up with two out and two on and a chance tto get the Yankees the lead or even bust the game open. He bounced out to raise his left on base number for the evening to four. He's just not the kind of superstar that lifts all boats, which is why you cannot surround him with a subpar line-up and expect him to deliver victories.
With the Rays losing again, the Yanks had a chance to get them selves right back in the East division race, and they blew it against a AAA level club. There are no real solutions here, easy or otherwise, but they really need right handed bats.
Last point: it didn't matter tonight, but when Giardi hhas noone to hit after the number six guy, he should bat Cano fifth and Posada sixth. Cano runs well enough to score on a Posada hit, Posada will still be out there on the bases after a Cano hit, waiting for the likes of Molina to push him home.
THAT'S THIRTY GAMES
scoring 2 runs or less, while the pitching keeps getting better. The improvement points to the importance of Dave Eyland. We who complained about the incompetence of Mel Stottlemeyer may have been slow to recognize how much better the pitching coach is because Kennedy and Hughes started so slow and then injured themselves. But I think the manifest improvement in middle and set up relief, the salvaging of Moose and Sidney Ponson, the continued development of Joba all indicate that Eyland's promotion to the major league club is paying dividends. The hitting coach...not so much.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
A PAIR OF SURPRISING STATS
While the pudits continue to wring their hands over the Yankees pitching, the staff has quietly compiled nine shutouts already this season, as compared with five all of last year. They are not as bad as people think, and the new Joe is clearly superior to the old in one respect, his handling of the bullpen. He even has the big F looking decent. On the other hand the Yankees have already gone 29 games scoring 2 or fewer, as compared with 33 all of last year, testimony to the weak-mindedness of the lineup with men on base. As the trade deadline approaches, maybe the Yankees could use a big righthanded bat==see Matt Holiday--even more than a starting pitcher.
Sunday, July 6, 2008
THAT'S TWO
late inning, game-winning RBI's for Gardner on successive days. Does anyone on the team have that many for the entire season. Maybe Giambi. Certainly not AROD.
LOL
A nice win yesterday, almost undone by Mike Lowell. His RBI liner against Mo in the ninth was an utterly representative at bat for him. He is at this moment one of the five most important bats, as far as winning games is concerned, in the entire American League. And we could have had him. Well at least we have Brett Gardner to produce the game winning Ribbies.
Friday, July 4, 2008
UNHEIMLICH
It was uncanny that the day after I called for Hank to fire somebody or send people down, he gave the team a tonguelashing and a warning that players would be sent down soon. It worked for exactly one game, before the Yankees turned in perhaps their worst performance all year on Thursday night. Once again the failure to field (big error by Jeter) and the failure to hit in big spots did them in. Thew same thing today. And as always the poster child for the category of superstar loser is AROD. With the Yankees up 12-7 Wednesday night, AROD launches one of his typically pointless 3 run homers to pull him within one of Mickey Mantle, one fo the greatest clutch players in the history of the game. Last night, with the Yanks having given up 2 in the first on the Jeter error, AROD comes up with runners on first and third, one out. It is the type of situation in which you have to produce a run--to close the gap, to put pressure on Lester, to make him throw more pitches. Instead, Mr. Overrated gets impatient and swings at a ball eight inches wide of the strike zone for a K. It sets off a contagion of impatience on the Yankees part--they start swinging at every first pitch. Today, AROD comes up with the bases loaded, 2 outs, bottom of the seventh. The Yankees have chased Beckett, but thanks to a mike Lowell home run they trail 6-3. AROD proceeds to bounce out, killing the rally and consolidating the Yankees spot as the worst hitting team with the bases loaded in all of baseball.
This is no coincedence. With AROD's lifetime contract in place, the Yankees are his team and they have increasingly taken on his personality, or I should say gag reflex. No sooner is he installed as the permanent "man" on the team than their RISP numbers, never great, go through the floor. He is Mr. Unheimlich--in the sense of Mr. Uncanny, a superstar who not only doesn't make the players around him better but actually makes them worse--and in the sense of Mr. Unheimlich Maneuver, the man who just can't stop choking.
When AROD tried to do the Yankees the same favor slow Joe did by opting out of his contract, I said right off let him go and then overpay significantly to get Mike Lowell--knowing of course that even an obscene overpayment would still be dwarfed by the AROD contract. Well, I was right. Not only is Lowell much cheaper, not only is he one of the great clubhouse presences in all of baseball, not only is he a proven winner to AROD's proven loser, he is a better all-around baseball player than AROD: a better glove at third, a better arm at third, a much better hitter in big situations with men on base.
For whatever reason, the fans at the stadium have stopped making AROD's life miserable. Have they bought into the pundit's excoriation of their lack of taste or baseball knowledge, have they just gotten tired, have they been discouraged by the 10 year contract? I wish they would start again, because it is only by tormenting him that we can ever get rid of him. I've given up on the idea that he will ever be a winner as well as a superstar.
And frankly I don't see how his recent move from common whores to celebrity skanks can help.
This is no coincedence. With AROD's lifetime contract in place, the Yankees are his team and they have increasingly taken on his personality, or I should say gag reflex. No sooner is he installed as the permanent "man" on the team than their RISP numbers, never great, go through the floor. He is Mr. Unheimlich--in the sense of Mr. Uncanny, a superstar who not only doesn't make the players around him better but actually makes them worse--and in the sense of Mr. Unheimlich Maneuver, the man who just can't stop choking.
When AROD tried to do the Yankees the same favor slow Joe did by opting out of his contract, I said right off let him go and then overpay significantly to get Mike Lowell--knowing of course that even an obscene overpayment would still be dwarfed by the AROD contract. Well, I was right. Not only is Lowell much cheaper, not only is he one of the great clubhouse presences in all of baseball, not only is he a proven winner to AROD's proven loser, he is a better all-around baseball player than AROD: a better glove at third, a better arm at third, a much better hitter in big situations with men on base.
For whatever reason, the fans at the stadium have stopped making AROD's life miserable. Have they bought into the pundit's excoriation of their lack of taste or baseball knowledge, have they just gotten tired, have they been discouraged by the 10 year contract? I wish they would start again, because it is only by tormenting him that we can ever get rid of him. I've given up on the idea that he will ever be a winner as well as a superstar.
And frankly I don't see how his recent move from common whores to celebrity skanks can help.
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
IT'S TIME FOR HANK
rto fire somebody. Frankly, I don't care who it is. But somebody needs to go to show this team theis bair current level of play is not acceptable. And if the firing doesn't work, it's time to send some superstars down to double A and make them ride buses for awhile.
This is a team that supposedly has pitching problems holding down the best offense in baseball. And for the third consecutive game and the sixth time in recent memory, the Yanks offense wastes good to great pitching and loses a game that was there for the taking. Probably they'll wind up getting swept at home by a mediocre team, the second time that has happened this year. Why? Start with the familiar. They cannot hit with men on base. They left 15 this game. If you took the Yankees WHGP (walks and hits per game) and divided it by their RPG, I'm sure the number, the WQ or Wastage Quotient, would be higher than any team in the league. If you did the same division for just the 7th through 9th innings, it would be astronomically higher than any other team. Is this Giardi's fault? Not Really. But he can't be sitting important components--in this game Jeter and Matsui--when the team is misfiring this badly. Stop babying these guys. Let them play hurt once in a while, and let it be known, the more the team loses the less you give a damn about individual aches and pains.
I had really hoped that the hiring of Giardi would mean an end to the mollycoddling of Mama Joe. But in this, as in other areas discussed here, Giardi has been much less of a change agent than advertised. This team should be ashamed of itself, and the manager and owner, as well as the fans, should let them know it.
One more thing. Why doesn't Giardi understand at this point that you simply do not pitch Rivera in a tie game. Look at the stats: without a lead to protect, Rivera is not great, not good, not even average; he stinks, as his ERA, 4.oo, proves beyond doubt. In a tie game you are actually better off with Farnsworth.
This is a team that supposedly has pitching problems holding down the best offense in baseball. And for the third consecutive game and the sixth time in recent memory, the Yanks offense wastes good to great pitching and loses a game that was there for the taking. Probably they'll wind up getting swept at home by a mediocre team, the second time that has happened this year. Why? Start with the familiar. They cannot hit with men on base. They left 15 this game. If you took the Yankees WHGP (walks and hits per game) and divided it by their RPG, I'm sure the number, the WQ or Wastage Quotient, would be higher than any team in the league. If you did the same division for just the 7th through 9th innings, it would be astronomically higher than any other team. Is this Giardi's fault? Not Really. But he can't be sitting important components--in this game Jeter and Matsui--when the team is misfiring this badly. Stop babying these guys. Let them play hurt once in a while, and let it be known, the more the team loses the less you give a damn about individual aches and pains.
I had really hoped that the hiring of Giardi would mean an end to the mollycoddling of Mama Joe. But in this, as in other areas discussed here, Giardi has been much less of a change agent than advertised. This team should be ashamed of itself, and the manager and owner, as well as the fans, should let them know it.
One more thing. Why doesn't Giardi understand at this point that you simply do not pitch Rivera in a tie game. Look at the stats: without a lead to protect, Rivera is not great, not good, not even average; he stinks, as his ERA, 4.oo, proves beyond doubt. In a tie game you are actually better off with Farnsworth.
Monday, June 30, 2008
THE CURSE REVERSED
I don't believe in curses, Bamino or otherwise, but that doesn't stop me from thinking that those who do ought to at least respect the logic of the curse when speculating as to its origins.
There seems to be a view in Chowderville and its propaganda machine (ESPN) that the Red Sox reversed the curse of the Bambino in 2004, when they won 4 straight to take the ALCS. But if the curse were still in effect to that point, it stands to reason, then the feast itself would mhave been rendered impossible from the start. To suggest otherwise is to confuse cause and effect, the lifting of the curse with the proof of its having been lifted.
Others have pointed to the acquisition of AROD as the point of reversal and I think this is closer to the truth. AROD is after all as giant a disappointment ans the Babe was an unqualified boon. The Babe held the record for World series homers for 35 years until the Mick broke it in 1964 (interestingly, a Series that spelled the true end of the Yankees dynasty circa 1924-1964 (or Babe to Gehrig to Dimaggio to Berra to Mantle to Maris). AROD of course is the very reversal of that clutch proficiency--the incredible shrinking postseason performer. But still the logic isn't quite right. After all the curse started with the Yankees taking a star from the Sox; it should be reversed with the Sox taking one form the Yanks, or the Yanks not taking one from the Sox, i. e. failing to capitalize on the kind of opportunity that got the curse rolling.
And now we can see exactly where the curse got reversed. In 2002, the Red Sox grew fed up with the one modern day ballplayer who rivals Babe Ruth in hitting for average, hitting with power, hitting in the clutch combined with being a clown, being colorful, and being beloved for both. I refer of course to Manny Ramirez, whose signature epithet, it's Manny being Manny, could just as easily read it's Manny channeling the Babe. Now the Red Sox did something arguably as stupid as selling the Babe to finance No No Nanette. They put Manny on waivers with absolutely no intention of pulling him off if they could get someone to pick up his 18mil per year salary. It was widely understood at that point that only the Yankees would be willing to throw that kind of money around and Manny made his willingness to go to the Yankees no secret. For mere money, albeit a lot of money, the Yankees secured the Babe and became the most successful franchise in sports history. Fro mere money, albeit a lot of money, they could have secured Manny Ramirez and extended that 29th century success story into the new millenium. But they failed to secure the man who, more than Mantle or Dimaggio or Gehrig or Jackson is the heir to Babe Ruth as the premiere idiot savant hitter of his time, a man who doesn't know enough or care enough to feel pressure and so doesn't know enough or care enough to let his prodigious talents down. The Yankees let the Red Sox, no made the Red Sox keep the new Babe and made possible the reverse of the curse. As invincibly stupid as they had become, the Red Sox still looked to dump Manny for AROD and insead of letting them do it, the Yankees redoubled their error by swooping in and snatching up a man whose all around abilities as a ballplayers are exceeded only by his all around debilities as a loser. Of course had the Yankees taken the original gift, or rather the Ruthian sequel, the Red Sox would have had nothing to barter for AROD, the Yankees would have felt no need to pursue him, and he would still be putting up outrageous numbers in Arlington or some other backwater where nobody expects you to win or blames you for losing.
The Yankees reversed the curse themselves by failing to recognize in the Ranirez salary/attitude dump the second coming of the Ruth sale and all that went with it. Since then, it has been the Red Sox who get the decent players that just seem to fit in so well, the Orlando Cabreras, the Mike Lowells, the Bill Muellers. These are the modern day equivalents of a
Scott Brosius, Oscar Gamble, Bucky Dent, Mariano Duncan, the effects of a charmed baseball life.
Or they would be if curses really existed.
There seems to be a view in Chowderville and its propaganda machine (ESPN) that the Red Sox reversed the curse of the Bambino in 2004, when they won 4 straight to take the ALCS. But if the curse were still in effect to that point, it stands to reason, then the feast itself would mhave been rendered impossible from the start. To suggest otherwise is to confuse cause and effect, the lifting of the curse with the proof of its having been lifted.
Others have pointed to the acquisition of AROD as the point of reversal and I think this is closer to the truth. AROD is after all as giant a disappointment ans the Babe was an unqualified boon. The Babe held the record for World series homers for 35 years until the Mick broke it in 1964 (interestingly, a Series that spelled the true end of the Yankees dynasty circa 1924-1964 (or Babe to Gehrig to Dimaggio to Berra to Mantle to Maris). AROD of course is the very reversal of that clutch proficiency--the incredible shrinking postseason performer. But still the logic isn't quite right. After all the curse started with the Yankees taking a star from the Sox; it should be reversed with the Sox taking one form the Yanks, or the Yanks not taking one from the Sox, i. e. failing to capitalize on the kind of opportunity that got the curse rolling.
And now we can see exactly where the curse got reversed. In 2002, the Red Sox grew fed up with the one modern day ballplayer who rivals Babe Ruth in hitting for average, hitting with power, hitting in the clutch combined with being a clown, being colorful, and being beloved for both. I refer of course to Manny Ramirez, whose signature epithet, it's Manny being Manny, could just as easily read it's Manny channeling the Babe. Now the Red Sox did something arguably as stupid as selling the Babe to finance No No Nanette. They put Manny on waivers with absolutely no intention of pulling him off if they could get someone to pick up his 18mil per year salary. It was widely understood at that point that only the Yankees would be willing to throw that kind of money around and Manny made his willingness to go to the Yankees no secret. For mere money, albeit a lot of money, the Yankees secured the Babe and became the most successful franchise in sports history. Fro mere money, albeit a lot of money, they could have secured Manny Ramirez and extended that 29th century success story into the new millenium. But they failed to secure the man who, more than Mantle or Dimaggio or Gehrig or Jackson is the heir to Babe Ruth as the premiere idiot savant hitter of his time, a man who doesn't know enough or care enough to feel pressure and so doesn't know enough or care enough to let his prodigious talents down. The Yankees let the Red Sox, no made the Red Sox keep the new Babe and made possible the reverse of the curse. As invincibly stupid as they had become, the Red Sox still looked to dump Manny for AROD and insead of letting them do it, the Yankees redoubled their error by swooping in and snatching up a man whose all around abilities as a ballplayers are exceeded only by his all around debilities as a loser. Of course had the Yankees taken the original gift, or rather the Ruthian sequel, the Red Sox would have had nothing to barter for AROD, the Yankees would have felt no need to pursue him, and he would still be putting up outrageous numbers in Arlington or some other backwater where nobody expects you to win or blames you for losing.
The Yankees reversed the curse themselves by failing to recognize in the Ranirez salary/attitude dump the second coming of the Ruth sale and all that went with it. Since then, it has been the Red Sox who get the decent players that just seem to fit in so well, the Orlando Cabreras, the Mike Lowells, the Bill Muellers. These are the modern day equivalents of a
Scott Brosius, Oscar Gamble, Bucky Dent, Mariano Duncan, the effects of a charmed baseball life.
Or they would be if curses really existed.
WITH APOLOGIES TO ALANIS MORRISETTE
Everyone is still talking about the Yankees weakness in the starting rotation, which the huge injury to Wang has so magnified. but if you look at the times the bats let down the starters just this month, you are looking at the difference between a first place club, believe it or not, and what they are (i.e. bums). Giese should have won one he lost, Rasner two, and Mussina tonight. They are currently 5 games over 500. Switch those games and they are 13 over and tied with the Sox if not the Rays. In the game they lost for 'rasner in cincy, they put 18 men on base and brought not a single one home, thereby confirming themselves as world class gag-meisters. They just lost two games in a row, in which they only got 1 run and 4 hits in each against 2 of the crappiest pitchers in baseball. The Red sox are way overrated this year, but at least they eat guys like Feldman and Perez for breakfast, instead of choking on the opportunity. And once again you hear nothing from the new Joe but the same old. "well, we had our chances..." You know, I don't expect him to rip the likes of Geise or Ponson or even Moilina or Betemit. But when you let your stars let the team down in the clutch night after night, I expect him to light a fire under them, the burning sensation of shame. Right now, he's acting as torpid as the old Joe in his last days.
Here's the weird thing: if the Yankees' bats were as good as advertised, they could probably make it to the playoffs in a year when parity reigns in the AL. And if they made it to the playoffs, they'd be in a better position to win it all than at any time since at least 2004, maybe 2002. They would at last have a power number 1 (Joba), a battle tested and suddenly rejuvenated number 2 (Pettite) and a fully rested number 3 (Wang). On the other hand, as things currently stand, no improvement in their supposedly awful starting pitching would make much difference. Santana would probably be 7-7 just as he is with the Mets, and I don't think sabathia would fare all that much better. This is lppking more and more like the lost season it was always cracked up to be, but the names on the futility are Cano and Jeter, Posada and Abreu, Molina and, most of all AROD, who has quietly continued his penchant for getting the hits when they need them least and, as the reigning superstar, has cast the entire team in that mold.
Here's the weird thing: if the Yankees' bats were as good as advertised, they could probably make it to the playoffs in a year when parity reigns in the AL. And if they made it to the playoffs, they'd be in a better position to win it all than at any time since at least 2004, maybe 2002. They would at last have a power number 1 (Joba), a battle tested and suddenly rejuvenated number 2 (Pettite) and a fully rested number 3 (Wang). On the other hand, as things currently stand, no improvement in their supposedly awful starting pitching would make much difference. Santana would probably be 7-7 just as he is with the Mets, and I don't think sabathia would fare all that much better. This is lppking more and more like the lost season it was always cracked up to be, but the names on the futility are Cano and Jeter, Posada and Abreu, Molina and, most of all AROD, who has quietly continued his penchant for getting the hits when they need them least and, as the reigning superstar, has cast the entire team in that mold.
Monday, June 9, 2008
THIS IS JUST SICKENING
The Yankees split a 4 game series at home against the single worst road team in baseball. and once again, it came down to the fact that these are the anti-Yankees, a team that is at its worst when things are on the line. After another miraculous performance by a man with literally no stuff at all, the Yankees had a chance to win in the 8th and again in the 9th and failed to bring anyone home. Two lousy runs against mediocre Royal pitching is just plain unacceptable. And look Matsui is near the top of the baatting table, so is Damon, so is AROD, Giambi is on fire etc and still they don't score whe n they need to. And now a sad and intractable contradiction has become all too clear. I've been saying the Yankees need to play small ball for years, but now that they have a manager willing to do it--Giardi sacrificed at the perfect time in the eighth, they have a team so overtaken by therir own gag reflex that they can't cash the opportunites that brand of baseball survives. After the game, Giardi said, with a futility that recalled that other Joe, "We had our chances and we just kept battling." Translation: we just kept creating opportunites for ourselves to fail, and fail we did.
Thursday, June 5, 2008
UPON FURTHER REVIEW,
this team really is that bad. Despite Giambi improving his batting average by 100 points and Canoeimproving his by 65, despite Damon going from 250 to 320, and despite the return of AROD and Posada, this team still can't reach the 500 mark. Why is that? Two reasons.
1.There is no clutch in this team. The RISP number continues dreadful. They got 15 hits in a 6-5 loss to Minnesota and it took them 12 hits to get 5 runs the other night. No team does less with more than the Yankees offensively. A comparative sabremetric can pretty reliably tell you how clutch your team it is. It is the reverse of what we called the "differential" in past years. Take your BA, OBP and OPS with no RISP and with RISP and compare the numbers. This is the everday equivalent of hitting in May vs. hitting in September, or hitting in the regular season vs. hitting in the playoffs. When you look at how poorly the Yankees have fared in this comparison over the past three years, it is no wonder they can't advance in the playoffs. I used to think this was a function of having too few contact hitters. But at least 2/3 of this lineup would qualify. Tasking their cue, as teams usually do, from their reigning "MVP", they are simply awful clutch performers. It is interesting to note that the heart of this lineup has four stars and 2 sometime superstars (Abreu, Matsui, AROD, Giambi),who are all veterans past thirty, who have not a single ring among them, who are all likely to retire ringless in fact. That says something about the temper of this lineup. So when you hear the Yankee players interviewed after a loss, saying as they alway do, that they had their opportunities, please believe them. They did. And then do the necessary translation. "We choked--again."
Update proving my point. Last night the Yankees got 9 hits, three of them doubles and scored just one run, wasting a great outing from Rasner. They don't make productive outs, they don't move runners, they don't come through. Simple as that. They are talented, but they suck!
2. This team has perhaps the worst GM in baseball. The only time the Yanks look at all hopeful this year is when they are playing the Mariners at the Stadium, where the visitors are even more hapless than usual. the last time this happened the Yanks had a legitmate chance to build around that homestand and fashion a ten game winning streak, the kind of run that can't really kindle a season. They didn't, of course, and one man was the reason. That man was the latest addition to the Yankees bullpen, the latest free agent RP signing-disaster. I bring you, in the tradition of Felix Heredia, Kyle Farnsworth, Scott Proctor, the other guy from the Reds whose name I have repressed he was so fucking bad, Cris Britton, Luis Vizcaino, even Tom Gordon...yes its Latroy Hawkins. Rasner goes to the seventh giving up one run, Hawkins gives up three in one inning and they blow game one to the Orioles. The next night, Hawkins enters in the tenth with a one run lead, gives up to in a third of an inning, and they blow game 2 to the Orioles. Now allergic to Hawkins, Giardi leaves Pettite in an inng too long and he gives up the tying run to Minnesota, the 8th is now Farnsworth's and he gives up the winning run. This is the bullpen that the Cashboy built. This is his legacy.
Update proving my point. Giardi now has so little faith in his bullpen that in the 7th inning of a 6-6 game, with the bases loaded and Guillen, who has already homered at the plate, he leaves in Pettite, even though he's already thrown 110 pitches and hasn't been sharp at all. The 111th is a grand slam to make it a 10-6 game. The Yankees are about to lose their second in a row to the Royals at the Stadium--the Royals, mind you, who just finished losing 11 in a row on the road, including being swept at Fenway.
This team is fucking pathetic, and Giardi shouldn't wait for Hank to say so. He should rip them publically for the overproiced underachievers they are, he and do it now. He should make it clear we're not dealing with your father's Joe anymore.
And since Hank is making noise about re-signing Cashboy, Giardi should make it clear he won't stay on under the current General Managership. There's no reason he should have to fight his own pitching staff for the next three years. As a former catcher, I'm certain he recognizes just how inept Cashboy has always been in evaluating pitching talent.
1.There is no clutch in this team. The RISP number continues dreadful. They got 15 hits in a 6-5 loss to Minnesota and it took them 12 hits to get 5 runs the other night. No team does less with more than the Yankees offensively. A comparative sabremetric can pretty reliably tell you how clutch your team it is. It is the reverse of what we called the "differential" in past years. Take your BA, OBP and OPS with no RISP and with RISP and compare the numbers. This is the everday equivalent of hitting in May vs. hitting in September, or hitting in the regular season vs. hitting in the playoffs. When you look at how poorly the Yankees have fared in this comparison over the past three years, it is no wonder they can't advance in the playoffs. I used to think this was a function of having too few contact hitters. But at least 2/3 of this lineup would qualify. Tasking their cue, as teams usually do, from their reigning "MVP", they are simply awful clutch performers. It is interesting to note that the heart of this lineup has four stars and 2 sometime superstars (Abreu, Matsui, AROD, Giambi),who are all veterans past thirty, who have not a single ring among them, who are all likely to retire ringless in fact. That says something about the temper of this lineup. So when you hear the Yankee players interviewed after a loss, saying as they alway do, that they had their opportunities, please believe them. They did. And then do the necessary translation. "We choked--again."
Update proving my point. Last night the Yankees got 9 hits, three of them doubles and scored just one run, wasting a great outing from Rasner. They don't make productive outs, they don't move runners, they don't come through. Simple as that. They are talented, but they suck!
2. This team has perhaps the worst GM in baseball. The only time the Yanks look at all hopeful this year is when they are playing the Mariners at the Stadium, where the visitors are even more hapless than usual. the last time this happened the Yanks had a legitmate chance to build around that homestand and fashion a ten game winning streak, the kind of run that can't really kindle a season. They didn't, of course, and one man was the reason. That man was the latest addition to the Yankees bullpen, the latest free agent RP signing-disaster. I bring you, in the tradition of Felix Heredia, Kyle Farnsworth, Scott Proctor, the other guy from the Reds whose name I have repressed he was so fucking bad, Cris Britton, Luis Vizcaino, even Tom Gordon...yes its Latroy Hawkins. Rasner goes to the seventh giving up one run, Hawkins gives up three in one inning and they blow game one to the Orioles. The next night, Hawkins enters in the tenth with a one run lead, gives up to in a third of an inning, and they blow game 2 to the Orioles. Now allergic to Hawkins, Giardi leaves Pettite in an inng too long and he gives up the tying run to Minnesota, the 8th is now Farnsworth's and he gives up the winning run. This is the bullpen that the Cashboy built. This is his legacy.
Update proving my point. Giardi now has so little faith in his bullpen that in the 7th inning of a 6-6 game, with the bases loaded and Guillen, who has already homered at the plate, he leaves in Pettite, even though he's already thrown 110 pitches and hasn't been sharp at all. The 111th is a grand slam to make it a 10-6 game. The Yankees are about to lose their second in a row to the Royals at the Stadium--the Royals, mind you, who just finished losing 11 in a row on the road, including being swept at Fenway.
This team is fucking pathetic, and Giardi shouldn't wait for Hank to say so. He should rip them publically for the overproiced underachievers they are, he and do it now. He should make it clear we're not dealing with your father's Joe anymore.
And since Hank is making noise about re-signing Cashboy, Giardi should make it clear he won't stay on under the current General Managership. There's no reason he should have to fight his own pitching staff for the next three years. As a former catcher, I'm certain he recognizes just how inept Cashboy has always been in evaluating pitching talent.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
HANK SAID
he'd be the next Billy Martin, and tonight Joe looked the part, kicking dirt, his hat, and anything else in sight. And while he said he did not have firing up his listless troops, whose offensive had once again gone completely in the tank, the results say otherwise.
By the way, a classic AROD at bat in the ninth inning. Man on first, noone out, and a run wins the game. So many ways to help the team out in that situation, but all AROD can think is home run, so of course he strikes out. There out to be a statistic: in clutch situations what is your ratio of hits, walks, sacrifices, sac flies, or productive outs to your total at bats under those circumstances. Scary to think what a low average the half-billion dollar man puts up.
Well, at least Kennedy looked like last year for once. I wonder if knowing Joba was coming on board so he doesn't have to carry the youth corps burden alone helped take the pressure off.
By the way, a classic AROD at bat in the ninth inning. Man on first, noone out, and a run wins the game. So many ways to help the team out in that situation, but all AROD can think is home run, so of course he strikes out. There out to be a statistic: in clutch situations what is your ratio of hits, walks, sacrifices, sac flies, or productive outs to your total at bats under those circumstances. Scary to think what a low average the half-billion dollar man puts up.
Well, at least Kennedy looked like last year for once. I wonder if knowing Joba was coming on board so he doesn't have to carry the youth corps burden alone helped take the pressure off.
HANK SAYS
THERE IS NO USE KEEPING JOBA FOR THE 8TH IF YOU CAN NEVER USE HIM. WOULD THE RED SOX SAVE BECKETT FOR THE 8TH INNING?
For all the shit Hank takes, he actually knows something about baseball.
For all the shit Hank takes, he actually knows something about baseball.
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
ONE STEP FORWARD AND
ONE STEP BACK.
Back on April 30, I suggested the Yanks might as well move Joba to the rotation since they didn't have enough chances to win by the eigth inning to make his presence there worthwhile. So I'm glad they've started the process. as a true power pitcher, he will be less dependent on their pathetic excuse for a defense than the other starters. He also might, if successful, take some of the pressure off hughes and Kennedy. Still, this will make things harder on the veterans. If the big F moves to the eighth, more games will undoubtedly be blown there, and what's more, Hawkins suddenly becomes the main man in middle relief, and I'm not certain he is good enough to be a mop up guy anymore. The problem I outlinewd in the last post will only be exacerbated. That is particularly true when you consider that pitch to contact guys like Pettite and particularly Mussina are very easy to foul off. Every defensive mistake forcing them to face an extra batter means 5-7 added pitches, driving up their counts, shortening their outings, making them more liable to error and even more dependent upon a non-existent middle relief corps. Maybe they should try bringing someone up from the minors and hoping he works out. How about that Patterson who pitched 23 scoreless innings in the spring. Desparate times.
Well, AROD has his last place swagger going doesn't he?
Last night I bemoaned the Yankees lack of an offensive philosophy. After further thought, I realized this is even more a product of bad team composition than I originally imagined. Last year, the Yanks had a clear identity: run up pitch counts, exhaust starters, score off of middle relievers; hold on with Mo. But last year they had a stronger veteran comoponent to the rotation. Baseball as we all know is not just an athletic competition, it is a strategic battle. But that strategic battle is not just cognitive: it is psychological warfare. When you have young pitchers, you need to get them run support early in the game. When Hughes and Kennedy have been left without runs into the fourth they press and then they collapse. But it is not just them. Look at the Red Sox. When the youngsters Lester and Bucholz get early run support, they pitch well; when they don't, they typically lose their composure and the game between the third and fifth inning. The patience of last year will not work as a strategy of support for these young pitchers. The Yankees need quick runs, which means they need not just to be more aggressive at the plate, but on the bases as well.
To this end, I think Jeter ought to be hitting lead-off, Abreu second, and Cano third, a position which will force him to stay back on the ball and go middle-left. Matsui could bat fourth since he's still your most reliable RBI guy, AROD can bat fifth, where he can swing for the fences all he wants, Posada can bat sixth when he returns (and they should bring him back as a DH as soon as his time on the DL is up), Cabera could bat seventh, and after that I really don't care. If there is someone in the minors who can actually play first base well, maybe they could bring him up. I'm certain he could hit the 180 or so that Giambi is hitting. Lastly, now that I have established in a perfectly respectable sabremetric way that Molina is even more hapless than previously believe, I notice that Moeller is hitting 262 or 80 points better than Giambi, 70 points better than Duncan, 62 points better than Molina and 50 or so points better than Cano. So let him play awhile. You can't do worse than the alternative.
Baseball is such a team game, all appearance to the contrary, that htere is even a hidden interactivity between offensive philosophy and pitching success. The Yankees have to start thinking the gestalt of baseball if they are to avoid disgacing themselves this year.
Back on April 30, I suggested the Yanks might as well move Joba to the rotation since they didn't have enough chances to win by the eigth inning to make his presence there worthwhile. So I'm glad they've started the process. as a true power pitcher, he will be less dependent on their pathetic excuse for a defense than the other starters. He also might, if successful, take some of the pressure off hughes and Kennedy. Still, this will make things harder on the veterans. If the big F moves to the eighth, more games will undoubtedly be blown there, and what's more, Hawkins suddenly becomes the main man in middle relief, and I'm not certain he is good enough to be a mop up guy anymore. The problem I outlinewd in the last post will only be exacerbated. That is particularly true when you consider that pitch to contact guys like Pettite and particularly Mussina are very easy to foul off. Every defensive mistake forcing them to face an extra batter means 5-7 added pitches, driving up their counts, shortening their outings, making them more liable to error and even more dependent upon a non-existent middle relief corps. Maybe they should try bringing someone up from the minors and hoping he works out. How about that Patterson who pitched 23 scoreless innings in the spring. Desparate times.
Well, AROD has his last place swagger going doesn't he?
Last night I bemoaned the Yankees lack of an offensive philosophy. After further thought, I realized this is even more a product of bad team composition than I originally imagined. Last year, the Yanks had a clear identity: run up pitch counts, exhaust starters, score off of middle relievers; hold on with Mo. But last year they had a stronger veteran comoponent to the rotation. Baseball as we all know is not just an athletic competition, it is a strategic battle. But that strategic battle is not just cognitive: it is psychological warfare. When you have young pitchers, you need to get them run support early in the game. When Hughes and Kennedy have been left without runs into the fourth they press and then they collapse. But it is not just them. Look at the Red Sox. When the youngsters Lester and Bucholz get early run support, they pitch well; when they don't, they typically lose their composure and the game between the third and fifth inning. The patience of last year will not work as a strategy of support for these young pitchers. The Yankees need quick runs, which means they need not just to be more aggressive at the plate, but on the bases as well.
To this end, I think Jeter ought to be hitting lead-off, Abreu second, and Cano third, a position which will force him to stay back on the ball and go middle-left. Matsui could bat fourth since he's still your most reliable RBI guy, AROD can bat fifth, where he can swing for the fences all he wants, Posada can bat sixth when he returns (and they should bring him back as a DH as soon as his time on the DL is up), Cabera could bat seventh, and after that I really don't care. If there is someone in the minors who can actually play first base well, maybe they could bring him up. I'm certain he could hit the 180 or so that Giambi is hitting. Lastly, now that I have established in a perfectly respectable sabremetric way that Molina is even more hapless than previously believe, I notice that Moeller is hitting 262 or 80 points better than Giambi, 70 points better than Duncan, 62 points better than Molina and 50 or so points better than Cano. So let him play awhile. You can't do worse than the alternative.
Baseball is such a team game, all appearance to the contrary, that htere is even a hidden interactivity between offensive philosophy and pitching success. The Yankees have to start thinking the gestalt of baseball if they are to avoid disgacing themselves this year.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
WELL, AROD REALLY IS BACK,
LAUNCHING THE MEANINGLESS 2 RUN HOMER WITH THE TEAM DOWN 10-0 IN THE SIXTH.
I hit the pause on blogging for the past week or so since the Yankees were so completely vindicating The Yankees Suck post as to make further comment redundant. But now they've sunk a couple of more layers into the quagmire of complacency and defeatism, and Michael seems to think things are not as bad as they seem, that AROD will actually make a difference, and that Cashman is not a candidate for feckless and incompetent baseball executive of the decade (see comments on last post). So I have decided to declare war on whatever continuing state of denial might exist among the Yankees faithful (lest they begin to appear Yankees cultists or, worse, Yankees dupes).
My contention is that the Yankees of 2008, unlike the Yankees of 2007, are not underperforming. They're just horrible. That is why a) there will be no comeback this year, at least none that will get them into the playoffs, b) they stand a very good chance of finishing behind the Rays (who have better starting pitching, better middle relief, better team speed, better fielding, better situational hitting--hey, I guess they're just plain better!) and c) Hank is right, the blame lies not with the manager but the GM.
Let us clear out the first line of excuse the Yankees have essayed: the injuries. Well, first of all the injuries are merely a symptom of why this team is so bad. When my 90 year old Grandmom in law was lying fatally ill in the hospital, my father-in law--a great guy by the way--listened to her bemoan her fate for about twenty minutes before bursting out, "Well your old, that's what happens when you get old, you die." So true. And that's what happens when you get baseball old, you get hurt. The Yankees rely on a team that is filled with people over 30, over 35, and they will come down with injuries. The Yankees are not bad because they are hurt; they are hurt because, as team composition goes, they are bad. I mean if you think losing a 36 year old catcher to injury is a rough break, then I guess you think losing a 12 year old car to transmission problems is terrible luck.
Will the yankees dramatically improve with the return of AROD and Posada? No, they won't. Tonight told us all we need to know about AROD. He'll put up spectacular numbers while they're in last place--look at all he did for the Rangers in this regard--but the hits, homers and RBI's will be insufficiently meaningful (he's the master, after all, of the insufficiently meaningful) to transform their destiny. As for Posada, he was hitting a solid 270 with pop when he went down, and that's probably what he'll do when he returns. That is the offensive player Posada has, with the exception of last year, always been. Anyone who doesn't understand that last year was an outlier would be really stupid, and might do something really stupid, like I don't know, giving him a huge 3 year contract that begins at the very age when Mike Piazza, the greatest offensive catcher in MLB history was hanging them up. Posada will be fine, but he won't be transcendent and so he won't be able to bring this crew back to the top. Let's face it, when they were both in the lineup, the Yankees were a 500 team, with just AROD they're a game under 500, and without both of them, they were 4 games under 500. Not a game changer as Hillary would say. Yes, the Yankees looked significantly worse without these two, but that's only because Brian Cashman has used his record breaking payroll to assemble perhaps the worst bench in the history of supposedly elite teams. As the comments section below proves, Molina is one of the worst, if not the worst offensive back-up catchers in the game today. Letting the Sox get O'Casey for nothing, when we needed a first baseman and settled for the pathetic third sackers Betemit and Ensburg, is in itself a firing offense. When healthy, the Yankees have no pinch hitters worthy of the name; when injured they have no replacements that should even be in the major leagues. Evaluating talent, especially second line talent, and then acquiring it, this is what you pay a GM to do. That Cashman has so utterly failed, despite having the resources other teams can only envy, means that he should no longer be drawing a paycheck.
What is wrong with the Yankees is not just who is missing from the order, but who is out there in the field. And not just individually, as an interactive unit. The Yankees have few contact hitters, which is why they are so bad with men on base. AROD strikes out too much and pops up too much. He doesn't make quality outs and he doesn't deliver key singles and doubles. Giambi cannot hit at all with two outs. Over last year and this year Damon has ceased to be a lead off man of any credibilty: his on base percentage is dismal for that spot in the line-up. But beyond the individual deficiencies, this is not a batting line-up with a plan or strategy. Are they patient, are they aggressive? Whatever they are they should be so as a team. Abreu never puts the ball in play until he has a full count; Cano swings at the first pitch every time. Are they a team that will pressure you with speed: Damon seems to want to, Jeter maybe a little bit as well but after that nothing.
But of course they don't have a plan because the line-up hasn't been assembled to produce a coordinated effort, that blend of contact hitters, walk-takers, power properly placed, that gives you an offensive machine. Right now the Yankees are the Denver Nuggets of baseball: a collection of big names that don't have a clue how to work together, how to do the little things, how to become more than the sum of their parts. To the contrary, I don't know if I have ever seen a team so much less than the sum of its parts. And here again, it is the role of the GM, to evalute talent with an eye to its interrelation, its mutually reinforcing properties. Mike Lowell is not really a great hitter, but he is a dogged one, and after a pitcher has gotten through the meat grinder of Ortiz and Ramirez, whether scathed or unscathed, Lowell's doggedness is a much more dangerous proposition than the greater talents of another hitter (say a Soriano or Ryan Howard) would be. That is what constructing a line-up is about. Epstein has done it, Gene Michaels did it, and Cashman has decidedly not.
Nowhere is the failure of compostion more striking than in the field. Listen, the Yankees planned a rotation with 4 pitchers who pitch to contact (Pettite, Wang, Kennedy, and Mussina--who pitches to really good contact) yet they have assembled perhaps the most porous infield in the league, virtually guaranteeing that this type of pitcher will have limited success. Not one of their infielders is above average: Giambi is a disaster, he can't go right, can't charge the bunt, can't throw to any base accurately, and rarely saves the errant throw; Cano spaces out regularly, fails to cover bases, blows routine plays even while making spectacular ones; Jeter has no range at all anymore, his arm has become increasingly erratic, he makes more than his share of errors, and he has even started blowing the routine plays. AROD doesn't have an accurate enough arm to play third and is an error machine as a result. Bottom line, when these pitchers induce the grounders you are asking them to induce, the chances of the ball getting through or being bobbled, or throws going awry are far too high. Rallies start; the unfortunate pitcher is asked to throw more pitches, to keep hitting his spots, increasing the statistical probability of a mistake, a long ball, a gapper, a big inning. And no middle relief in sight. It is the business of the GM to assemble the team so that the tendencies of its pitchers coincide with its defensive strengths. Cashman has not done this; I'm not even sure Cashman knows he is supposed to do this.
These are just some of the nuts and bolts of the Frankenstein machine that Dr. Cashman has perpetrated upon an increasingly desperate fan base. Just think, the first 207 million dollar payroll in the history of baseball, exceeding the nearest payroll by more money than the entire payroll of several teams, and the team is not only in last place but deserves to be there, really is ineffective and ill-assorted enough to be there. This is a team that awards one player, one world class choke artist more money than the entire Marlins franchise, which by the way is in first place in a division that includes the Mets, Phillies and Braves, all with winning records. What can one say of the stewardship that would pay 200 plus million to construct a team this bad, a team without one power starting pitcher, a team with one starter clearly over the hill, a team without a middle relief corps, a team whose fifth place hitter, sixth place hitter, and ninth place hitter are all at or below the mendoza line, a team without any real speed, without any superior infielders, with only one player hitting over 300, and a lead off man below 250? Ladies and gentlemen, I implore you, isn't this simply the worst management dollar for dollar in the history of the game? It has to be.
To leave the cathedral of baseball, home to the most successful franchise in the recorded histroy of sport, on such an extravagantly dismal note can only be expiated with blood. And since we are not allowed to fire at Brian Cashman, though his crimes against baseball and Yankeedom are clearly capital, then we must at least demand that he be fired. Soemthing tells me Hankus will be happy to oblige.
I hit the pause on blogging for the past week or so since the Yankees were so completely vindicating The Yankees Suck post as to make further comment redundant. But now they've sunk a couple of more layers into the quagmire of complacency and defeatism, and Michael seems to think things are not as bad as they seem, that AROD will actually make a difference, and that Cashman is not a candidate for feckless and incompetent baseball executive of the decade (see comments on last post). So I have decided to declare war on whatever continuing state of denial might exist among the Yankees faithful (lest they begin to appear Yankees cultists or, worse, Yankees dupes).
My contention is that the Yankees of 2008, unlike the Yankees of 2007, are not underperforming. They're just horrible. That is why a) there will be no comeback this year, at least none that will get them into the playoffs, b) they stand a very good chance of finishing behind the Rays (who have better starting pitching, better middle relief, better team speed, better fielding, better situational hitting--hey, I guess they're just plain better!) and c) Hank is right, the blame lies not with the manager but the GM.
Let us clear out the first line of excuse the Yankees have essayed: the injuries. Well, first of all the injuries are merely a symptom of why this team is so bad. When my 90 year old Grandmom in law was lying fatally ill in the hospital, my father-in law--a great guy by the way--listened to her bemoan her fate for about twenty minutes before bursting out, "Well your old, that's what happens when you get old, you die." So true. And that's what happens when you get baseball old, you get hurt. The Yankees rely on a team that is filled with people over 30, over 35, and they will come down with injuries. The Yankees are not bad because they are hurt; they are hurt because, as team composition goes, they are bad. I mean if you think losing a 36 year old catcher to injury is a rough break, then I guess you think losing a 12 year old car to transmission problems is terrible luck.
Will the yankees dramatically improve with the return of AROD and Posada? No, they won't. Tonight told us all we need to know about AROD. He'll put up spectacular numbers while they're in last place--look at all he did for the Rangers in this regard--but the hits, homers and RBI's will be insufficiently meaningful (he's the master, after all, of the insufficiently meaningful) to transform their destiny. As for Posada, he was hitting a solid 270 with pop when he went down, and that's probably what he'll do when he returns. That is the offensive player Posada has, with the exception of last year, always been. Anyone who doesn't understand that last year was an outlier would be really stupid, and might do something really stupid, like I don't know, giving him a huge 3 year contract that begins at the very age when Mike Piazza, the greatest offensive catcher in MLB history was hanging them up. Posada will be fine, but he won't be transcendent and so he won't be able to bring this crew back to the top. Let's face it, when they were both in the lineup, the Yankees were a 500 team, with just AROD they're a game under 500, and without both of them, they were 4 games under 500. Not a game changer as Hillary would say. Yes, the Yankees looked significantly worse without these two, but that's only because Brian Cashman has used his record breaking payroll to assemble perhaps the worst bench in the history of supposedly elite teams. As the comments section below proves, Molina is one of the worst, if not the worst offensive back-up catchers in the game today. Letting the Sox get O'Casey for nothing, when we needed a first baseman and settled for the pathetic third sackers Betemit and Ensburg, is in itself a firing offense. When healthy, the Yankees have no pinch hitters worthy of the name; when injured they have no replacements that should even be in the major leagues. Evaluating talent, especially second line talent, and then acquiring it, this is what you pay a GM to do. That Cashman has so utterly failed, despite having the resources other teams can only envy, means that he should no longer be drawing a paycheck.
What is wrong with the Yankees is not just who is missing from the order, but who is out there in the field. And not just individually, as an interactive unit. The Yankees have few contact hitters, which is why they are so bad with men on base. AROD strikes out too much and pops up too much. He doesn't make quality outs and he doesn't deliver key singles and doubles. Giambi cannot hit at all with two outs. Over last year and this year Damon has ceased to be a lead off man of any credibilty: his on base percentage is dismal for that spot in the line-up. But beyond the individual deficiencies, this is not a batting line-up with a plan or strategy. Are they patient, are they aggressive? Whatever they are they should be so as a team. Abreu never puts the ball in play until he has a full count; Cano swings at the first pitch every time. Are they a team that will pressure you with speed: Damon seems to want to, Jeter maybe a little bit as well but after that nothing.
But of course they don't have a plan because the line-up hasn't been assembled to produce a coordinated effort, that blend of contact hitters, walk-takers, power properly placed, that gives you an offensive machine. Right now the Yankees are the Denver Nuggets of baseball: a collection of big names that don't have a clue how to work together, how to do the little things, how to become more than the sum of their parts. To the contrary, I don't know if I have ever seen a team so much less than the sum of its parts. And here again, it is the role of the GM, to evalute talent with an eye to its interrelation, its mutually reinforcing properties. Mike Lowell is not really a great hitter, but he is a dogged one, and after a pitcher has gotten through the meat grinder of Ortiz and Ramirez, whether scathed or unscathed, Lowell's doggedness is a much more dangerous proposition than the greater talents of another hitter (say a Soriano or Ryan Howard) would be. That is what constructing a line-up is about. Epstein has done it, Gene Michaels did it, and Cashman has decidedly not.
Nowhere is the failure of compostion more striking than in the field. Listen, the Yankees planned a rotation with 4 pitchers who pitch to contact (Pettite, Wang, Kennedy, and Mussina--who pitches to really good contact) yet they have assembled perhaps the most porous infield in the league, virtually guaranteeing that this type of pitcher will have limited success. Not one of their infielders is above average: Giambi is a disaster, he can't go right, can't charge the bunt, can't throw to any base accurately, and rarely saves the errant throw; Cano spaces out regularly, fails to cover bases, blows routine plays even while making spectacular ones; Jeter has no range at all anymore, his arm has become increasingly erratic, he makes more than his share of errors, and he has even started blowing the routine plays. AROD doesn't have an accurate enough arm to play third and is an error machine as a result. Bottom line, when these pitchers induce the grounders you are asking them to induce, the chances of the ball getting through or being bobbled, or throws going awry are far too high. Rallies start; the unfortunate pitcher is asked to throw more pitches, to keep hitting his spots, increasing the statistical probability of a mistake, a long ball, a gapper, a big inning. And no middle relief in sight. It is the business of the GM to assemble the team so that the tendencies of its pitchers coincide with its defensive strengths. Cashman has not done this; I'm not even sure Cashman knows he is supposed to do this.
These are just some of the nuts and bolts of the Frankenstein machine that Dr. Cashman has perpetrated upon an increasingly desperate fan base. Just think, the first 207 million dollar payroll in the history of baseball, exceeding the nearest payroll by more money than the entire payroll of several teams, and the team is not only in last place but deserves to be there, really is ineffective and ill-assorted enough to be there. This is a team that awards one player, one world class choke artist more money than the entire Marlins franchise, which by the way is in first place in a division that includes the Mets, Phillies and Braves, all with winning records. What can one say of the stewardship that would pay 200 plus million to construct a team this bad, a team without one power starting pitcher, a team with one starter clearly over the hill, a team without a middle relief corps, a team whose fifth place hitter, sixth place hitter, and ninth place hitter are all at or below the mendoza line, a team without any real speed, without any superior infielders, with only one player hitting over 300, and a lead off man below 250? Ladies and gentlemen, I implore you, isn't this simply the worst management dollar for dollar in the history of the game? It has to be.
To leave the cathedral of baseball, home to the most successful franchise in the recorded histroy of sport, on such an extravagantly dismal note can only be expiated with blood. And since we are not allowed to fire at Brian Cashman, though his crimes against baseball and Yankeedom are clearly capital, then we must at least demand that he be fired. Soemthing tells me Hankus will be happy to oblige.
Friday, May 9, 2008
THE YANKEES SUCK! THEEEE
YANKEES SUCK! Red Sox fans always said this and I never understood why. They would say it when the Yanks were champions, when they won the division year after year, when they were in the post-season. I mean it was stupid. They not only didn't suck, Chowderheads hated them because they didn't suck. But now the cry rings all too true.
This is a bad team folks, I mean a really bad team. The Sox provide an easy measure. They are not as good as they were last year: Beckett's no ace so far, Lester and Bucholz are not very good, Matsuzaka never gets out of the sixth inning (he's a rich man's Jared White), their bullpen is increasingly stressed, Okee-Dokee is nowhere near as dominant, Papelbon's going through a bad patch, Papi misses the roids, Drew is still nothing special, Varitek's another year older and that much easier to run on, Lugo looks like Renteria in the field (but not at bat), and for all that the distance between them and the Yankees is much greater than it was last year. The Sox can still hit their way through a bad pitching performance and pitch their way around anemic offense. But the Yankees have to have both working well to be competitive. Outside of Wang, the pitchers need significant run support and this offense can never get more than 6 runs and usually scores less than 4. What is more, and perhaps more important, the pitchers get no help in the field (3 errors tonight alone) and the hitters get no help on the bases (still as timid as they are slow). They can't lock down in the field and they can't play small ball. They can only seem to win when they homer multiple times, which makes for generally passive, tedious and above all losing baseball. It also leads to damaging habits when it comes to getting men home. The Yankees remain one of the worst teams with RISP and they left another 17 on the pond tonight.
I'm sorry to have to say this but Giardi has thus far changed nothing in the culture of this team.
But with all of this, there is a still bigger problem, and that problem is not Giardi's fault. This is a bad team, a bad collection of 25 guys, with too many players who do the same thing (poorly) and the worst, I mean the worst, reserves in all of baseball. And that my friends is the fault of Brian Cashman, who manages to spend over 200 million a year on a team that, in May, still has three regulars below 200 and another three at 200. When the Red sox lost Lowell and Ortiz at the same time, I didn't hear them whining about injuries; when they lost Drew, they remained quiet. But when the Yankees lost Jorge and AROD oh the wailing and gnashing of teeth. And for good reason. While Epstein was picking up the always solid O'Casey for peanuts this off-season, Cashman was sticking with Betemit, auditioning Ensburg, relying on Duncan etc. Boston has a bench: Crisp, Cora, Moss, Cash, O'Casey. The Yankees do not. The same lack of depth afflicts the pitching staff, which is why we were treated tonight to the return of Kei Igawa (3IP, 6 runs, 0 KO's), despite the knowledge everywhere in baseball that thos guy is not a major league pitcher. When this is your reserve of choice, you are committing yourslef to surrendering games before they begin. Now that the team Stick Michael put together and molded into a dynasty is all but gone, we can see just how lousy a GM Brian Cashman is. Torre was a good manager who went to seed. Cashman was a seedy GM basking in the sunshine of another man's work. I would fire him yesterday.
These then are the general problems the Yankees face, problems which may leave them not only out of the playoffs but below 500. Let's look at some specific areas of concern.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH ROBBY?
Cano has had a couple of decent games, but his habits uncorrected spell trouble. I have said before there has to be a technical solution and forwarded Vina's analysis of Cano's footwork. I think there is a psychological underpinning to the slump that will help explain this and other symptoms. Late last year, when Cano started to show some serious pop, the Yankees organization let it be known that they felt they could expect 25-30 homers a year out of him. Why does everyone on this fucking team have to hit home runs? Everybody celebrated Damon's 20+ in 2006 and look how bad he stunk last year. In any event, Robby was listening because this year he has been trying to pull almost everything, presumably in an effort to reach the fences as they expect. I myself have been marvelling at how poorly he has been going while displaying the kind of patience I always wished for him in the past. Since coming up, he has been prone to chase high-outside fastballs and low and away sliders. This year I have applauded his willingness to take those pitches. Yet for some reason he has been seeing fewer pitches than ever. Then I realized he was laying off the outside stuff because he couldn't imagine pulling it. But other teams quickly adjusted and fed him alot of hard stuff off the inside corner. He has been jumping at these apparently pullable pitches to no effect. Last year his characteristic outs were KO's and pop flies to left, this year it's the slow roller to second. He is just rolling over on pitches. If they get him back into the Rod Carew slap hit mode, he'll be fine.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH GIAMBI?
Whether he homers or not, he's an idiot (and not in the honorific sense).
WHAT IF WE HAD SANTANA?
The Yanks would be no better off and maybe worse. When pundits and people reflect on that non-deal, they tend to wonder, Should the Yankees have traded Hughes for Santana? I don't pretend to know the answer to that question and I don't give it any thought--mainly because the Twins were not willing to trade Santan for Hughes. That wasn't the option. They turned down Hughes and Cabrera for Santana and in Cabrera you have the Yankees single best fielder and single best arm playing a key position and hitting the ball pretty well. But what the Twins wanted, and there was no indication they would accept less, was Hughes and Kennedy and Cabrera for Santana. So right away, because of all the Yankees depth issues, major difficulties emerge. You have to put Damon back in center where he's not catching up to balls in the gap, where runners are scoring from first on a deep single, where he's getting minor injuries (and then who do you run out there) and where the stress is taking a toll on his offensive production. Not only that, you are down to a four man rotation plus Rasner and you are probably seeing alot more of Mr. Igawa. Plus, Mussina and Pettite will be gone next year, which leaves you with Wang, Santana and a list of question marks and ciphers. But the main reasons for not giving up the store for Santana: 1, he'd be wasted here; this team isn't good enough to go anywhere even if they had him. He's not good enough to take them there anyway; he's not the ace he used to be. Santana is currently 3-2 in New York, with a nice ERA (2.91) which would certainly be significantly higher in the AL East. He's averaging 6.5 innings perstart, which makes him dependent on the middle as well as the late relievers. I don't see that he would be as good as Wang at this point and maybe not that much better that Pettite. Remember on the Mets he has some decent gloves behind him (Wright, Beltran Reyes) on the Yankees he'd have Jeter, who really can't play SS anymore, Cano, who is still just adequate, and at first base Giambi, need I say more. Finally, at no point in his fine career has Santana ever been a stone cold postseason killer. That's why he's never won a ring, even when he had Radke, the brilliant Loriano and Joe Nathan on the staff with him. One thing I'll say for Hughes, his performance against Cleveland last year suggests that if he does pan out he'll be at his best when it counts.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH JETER?
We have crossed an age boundary with both his legs--he now gets to nothing not hit right at him--and his arm, which is increasingly responsible for unforced errors. This has to be his last year at that position. Damon will probably retire after this season and I'd put Jeter in left.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH AROD?
His quad supposedly, but I think the delivery room story is far more telling, as is his wife's eagerness to tell it.
LASTLY (FOR NOW) WHAT'S WRONG WITH GIARDI?
In addition to managing almost as cautiously as slow Joe, he leaves his pitchers in too long. When does Joba ever walk the first 2 batters? Never! Joe should have known something was wrong. If he takes Igawa out tonight as soon as he began collapsing, they could have won the game. Certainly he should have been yanked when the score went 4-1 in the third.
Every time Damon gets hot and puts together three nice games in a row, Giardi sits him, and so far he has always come back cold.
He keeps trotting Duncan out there and batting him cleanup even though there are still no signs of productivity to be found. If he must be played he should bat eighth.
He won't give Gonzalez a decent chance despite the solid play he has delivered so far.
This is a bad team folks, I mean a really bad team. The Sox provide an easy measure. They are not as good as they were last year: Beckett's no ace so far, Lester and Bucholz are not very good, Matsuzaka never gets out of the sixth inning (he's a rich man's Jared White), their bullpen is increasingly stressed, Okee-Dokee is nowhere near as dominant, Papelbon's going through a bad patch, Papi misses the roids, Drew is still nothing special, Varitek's another year older and that much easier to run on, Lugo looks like Renteria in the field (but not at bat), and for all that the distance between them and the Yankees is much greater than it was last year. The Sox can still hit their way through a bad pitching performance and pitch their way around anemic offense. But the Yankees have to have both working well to be competitive. Outside of Wang, the pitchers need significant run support and this offense can never get more than 6 runs and usually scores less than 4. What is more, and perhaps more important, the pitchers get no help in the field (3 errors tonight alone) and the hitters get no help on the bases (still as timid as they are slow). They can't lock down in the field and they can't play small ball. They can only seem to win when they homer multiple times, which makes for generally passive, tedious and above all losing baseball. It also leads to damaging habits when it comes to getting men home. The Yankees remain one of the worst teams with RISP and they left another 17 on the pond tonight.
I'm sorry to have to say this but Giardi has thus far changed nothing in the culture of this team.
But with all of this, there is a still bigger problem, and that problem is not Giardi's fault. This is a bad team, a bad collection of 25 guys, with too many players who do the same thing (poorly) and the worst, I mean the worst, reserves in all of baseball. And that my friends is the fault of Brian Cashman, who manages to spend over 200 million a year on a team that, in May, still has three regulars below 200 and another three at 200. When the Red sox lost Lowell and Ortiz at the same time, I didn't hear them whining about injuries; when they lost Drew, they remained quiet. But when the Yankees lost Jorge and AROD oh the wailing and gnashing of teeth. And for good reason. While Epstein was picking up the always solid O'Casey for peanuts this off-season, Cashman was sticking with Betemit, auditioning Ensburg, relying on Duncan etc. Boston has a bench: Crisp, Cora, Moss, Cash, O'Casey. The Yankees do not. The same lack of depth afflicts the pitching staff, which is why we were treated tonight to the return of Kei Igawa (3IP, 6 runs, 0 KO's), despite the knowledge everywhere in baseball that thos guy is not a major league pitcher. When this is your reserve of choice, you are committing yourslef to surrendering games before they begin. Now that the team Stick Michael put together and molded into a dynasty is all but gone, we can see just how lousy a GM Brian Cashman is. Torre was a good manager who went to seed. Cashman was a seedy GM basking in the sunshine of another man's work. I would fire him yesterday.
These then are the general problems the Yankees face, problems which may leave them not only out of the playoffs but below 500. Let's look at some specific areas of concern.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH ROBBY?
Cano has had a couple of decent games, but his habits uncorrected spell trouble. I have said before there has to be a technical solution and forwarded Vina's analysis of Cano's footwork. I think there is a psychological underpinning to the slump that will help explain this and other symptoms. Late last year, when Cano started to show some serious pop, the Yankees organization let it be known that they felt they could expect 25-30 homers a year out of him. Why does everyone on this fucking team have to hit home runs? Everybody celebrated Damon's 20+ in 2006 and look how bad he stunk last year. In any event, Robby was listening because this year he has been trying to pull almost everything, presumably in an effort to reach the fences as they expect. I myself have been marvelling at how poorly he has been going while displaying the kind of patience I always wished for him in the past. Since coming up, he has been prone to chase high-outside fastballs and low and away sliders. This year I have applauded his willingness to take those pitches. Yet for some reason he has been seeing fewer pitches than ever. Then I realized he was laying off the outside stuff because he couldn't imagine pulling it. But other teams quickly adjusted and fed him alot of hard stuff off the inside corner. He has been jumping at these apparently pullable pitches to no effect. Last year his characteristic outs were KO's and pop flies to left, this year it's the slow roller to second. He is just rolling over on pitches. If they get him back into the Rod Carew slap hit mode, he'll be fine.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH GIAMBI?
Whether he homers or not, he's an idiot (and not in the honorific sense).
WHAT IF WE HAD SANTANA?
The Yanks would be no better off and maybe worse. When pundits and people reflect on that non-deal, they tend to wonder, Should the Yankees have traded Hughes for Santana? I don't pretend to know the answer to that question and I don't give it any thought--mainly because the Twins were not willing to trade Santan for Hughes. That wasn't the option. They turned down Hughes and Cabrera for Santana and in Cabrera you have the Yankees single best fielder and single best arm playing a key position and hitting the ball pretty well. But what the Twins wanted, and there was no indication they would accept less, was Hughes and Kennedy and Cabrera for Santana. So right away, because of all the Yankees depth issues, major difficulties emerge. You have to put Damon back in center where he's not catching up to balls in the gap, where runners are scoring from first on a deep single, where he's getting minor injuries (and then who do you run out there) and where the stress is taking a toll on his offensive production. Not only that, you are down to a four man rotation plus Rasner and you are probably seeing alot more of Mr. Igawa. Plus, Mussina and Pettite will be gone next year, which leaves you with Wang, Santana and a list of question marks and ciphers. But the main reasons for not giving up the store for Santana: 1, he'd be wasted here; this team isn't good enough to go anywhere even if they had him. He's not good enough to take them there anyway; he's not the ace he used to be. Santana is currently 3-2 in New York, with a nice ERA (2.91) which would certainly be significantly higher in the AL East. He's averaging 6.5 innings perstart, which makes him dependent on the middle as well as the late relievers. I don't see that he would be as good as Wang at this point and maybe not that much better that Pettite. Remember on the Mets he has some decent gloves behind him (Wright, Beltran Reyes) on the Yankees he'd have Jeter, who really can't play SS anymore, Cano, who is still just adequate, and at first base Giambi, need I say more. Finally, at no point in his fine career has Santana ever been a stone cold postseason killer. That's why he's never won a ring, even when he had Radke, the brilliant Loriano and Joe Nathan on the staff with him. One thing I'll say for Hughes, his performance against Cleveland last year suggests that if he does pan out he'll be at his best when it counts.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH JETER?
We have crossed an age boundary with both his legs--he now gets to nothing not hit right at him--and his arm, which is increasingly responsible for unforced errors. This has to be his last year at that position. Damon will probably retire after this season and I'd put Jeter in left.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH AROD?
His quad supposedly, but I think the delivery room story is far more telling, as is his wife's eagerness to tell it.
LASTLY (FOR NOW) WHAT'S WRONG WITH GIARDI?
In addition to managing almost as cautiously as slow Joe, he leaves his pitchers in too long. When does Joba ever walk the first 2 batters? Never! Joe should have known something was wrong. If he takes Igawa out tonight as soon as he began collapsing, they could have won the game. Certainly he should have been yanked when the score went 4-1 in the third.
Every time Damon gets hot and puts together three nice games in a row, Giardi sits him, and so far he has always come back cold.
He keeps trotting Duncan out there and batting him cleanup even though there are still no signs of productivity to be found. If he must be played he should bat eighth.
He won't give Gonzalez a decent chance despite the solid play he has delivered so far.
Monday, May 5, 2008
NO CRYING IN BASEBALL II
A Yankees fan walks into a bar in Nashua. Gets into a beef with a chowderhead over their respective teams. The chowderhead appeals to his fellow New England lowlifes to join in and abuse the Yankeegirl verbally. When they leave the bar she runs over him with her car, killing him. I don't want to say serves him right....
but I still feel a helluva lot worse for the horse.
but I still feel a helluva lot worse for the horse.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
LAGGING INDICATORS,
UNDESERVED FATE
Third straight win, a nice offensive performance, and once again Giambi goes hitless, leaves 4 on, and Cano, while homering, goes one for four. On the Cano front, Giardi sounds like old Joe, which can't be good. He says his work habits are good, he just needs to get going, he just needs to hit them where they ain't, there's no need to bench him. Hey, I don't want to see him benched either, but let's ackowledge there is a technical problem, let's set him to work fixing it, and let's admit that he's not going to "get going" until the problem has been addressed.
As for Giambi, when Jorge began to hurt, he said he wan't going to play first because "we already have 7 first basemen." Well, at the moment they have none who can hit, some who can't field, none who suffice as an everyday player. So my question is this, since it will be 5-6 weeks before Jorge can catch again, is there a time prior to that--after the 15 day list for example--when he could hit effectively without risk and play a position where one only makes a throw or two a game? And can Jorge, who played first one game already, field well enough to do so regularly? If so, my feeling is they should give Giambi whatever time there is before Jorge can do these things to start hitting the ball the other way and putting up some productivity, and if he doesn't send him down to AAA, like they threatened to do last time and make Jorge the first baseman. Right now Giambi is a huge void in the middle of the lineup. The Yanks would be so much better with Posada following AROD (yes he should hit fifth so Matsui could bring in Damon, Jeter and Abreu and AROD can do what he does best--crush the ball with the bases empty) and Moeller or Molina bringing up the rear.
Great outing from Rasner today. He always did pretty well until he got hurt last year. He might help shore things up. But I think the Yankees are pressing their luck bringing up Igawa to replace Kennedy. I think the odds of Ian returning to form are better than Kei finding the form he never had.
Proverb of the day: There's no crying in baseball--and I never do. Strangely however I can be brought to tears by horseracing. I admit to crying when I saw Secretariat run the Belmont--the only time in my life I have ever witnessed complete, indisputable perfection--and I cried when Eight Belles went down on Saturday. For a filly to turn in that kind of performance against the best 3 yr. old colts in the world under the kind of structural distress she must have been in--well it merited something better than death. Far more tragic, to my mind, than Barbero, and I couldn't tell my wife what had just transpired without weeping.
Third straight win, a nice offensive performance, and once again Giambi goes hitless, leaves 4 on, and Cano, while homering, goes one for four. On the Cano front, Giardi sounds like old Joe, which can't be good. He says his work habits are good, he just needs to get going, he just needs to hit them where they ain't, there's no need to bench him. Hey, I don't want to see him benched either, but let's ackowledge there is a technical problem, let's set him to work fixing it, and let's admit that he's not going to "get going" until the problem has been addressed.
As for Giambi, when Jorge began to hurt, he said he wan't going to play first because "we already have 7 first basemen." Well, at the moment they have none who can hit, some who can't field, none who suffice as an everyday player. So my question is this, since it will be 5-6 weeks before Jorge can catch again, is there a time prior to that--after the 15 day list for example--when he could hit effectively without risk and play a position where one only makes a throw or two a game? And can Jorge, who played first one game already, field well enough to do so regularly? If so, my feeling is they should give Giambi whatever time there is before Jorge can do these things to start hitting the ball the other way and putting up some productivity, and if he doesn't send him down to AAA, like they threatened to do last time and make Jorge the first baseman. Right now Giambi is a huge void in the middle of the lineup. The Yanks would be so much better with Posada following AROD (yes he should hit fifth so Matsui could bring in Damon, Jeter and Abreu and AROD can do what he does best--crush the ball with the bases empty) and Moeller or Molina bringing up the rear.
Great outing from Rasner today. He always did pretty well until he got hurt last year. He might help shore things up. But I think the Yankees are pressing their luck bringing up Igawa to replace Kennedy. I think the odds of Ian returning to form are better than Kei finding the form he never had.
Proverb of the day: There's no crying in baseball--and I never do. Strangely however I can be brought to tears by horseracing. I admit to crying when I saw Secretariat run the Belmont--the only time in my life I have ever witnessed complete, indisputable perfection--and I cried when Eight Belles went down on Saturday. For a filly to turn in that kind of performance against the best 3 yr. old colts in the world under the kind of structural distress she must have been in--well it merited something better than death. Far more tragic, to my mind, than Barbero, and I couldn't tell my wife what had just transpired without weeping.
Saturday, May 3, 2008
THE RIGHT AND THE WRONG
Everybody contributed to today's solid win against the Mariners except Cano and Giambi, who remained in their respective death spirals. Baseball Tonight addressed thier problems and provided confirmation, positive and negative, of what I said in the next to last post. Little Buster Brown asked Fernanado Vina if could explain what is going wrong with Robby, and he provided a quite compelling analysis that made one wonder what the Yankees hitting instructor is doing. According to Vina, Cano is not getting his front foot down quickly enough so that he has a split second moment of equipoise during which he can read the spin on the pitch. He is trying to step and read the pitch in the same motion, which Vina said is impossible. A very small adjustment will fix matters spake the Vina and I must say I believed him. If I were the Yankees, the week probation for the hitting coach just became 5 days. If Cano is not hitting by the end of the Cleveland series...
Giambi was more interesting, at least as a testament to the blind spot people have concerning the shift.. Olney showed a lot of Yankee hits, all of which, he noted, went the other way or up the middle. Vina supplied the technical commentary on what a batter does with his body to keep inside of the ball. All very edifying. But then Olney took over the analysis of Giambi, claiming the Yankees are actually happy with the way he is swinging the bat, though they might lose all patience with him should the results not improve, particularly as he is a contractual lame duck anyway. He then showed Giambi rolling over on one pitch and hitting the ball smartly to second on another. He is just being defeated by the shift Olney proclaims. But that begs the question is the key to hitting a hard thrower like King Hernandez is to go the other way, and if that rule holds for the Jeter, Abreu, Damon, Cabrera and Matsui, why doesn't it hold for the one man whom the defense is daring to hit the other way? Olney made no mention of the obvious fact that if Giambi did what the other hitters did, he would have collected knocks without even hitting the ball well. With Cano, you have three consecutive years telling you he will surely hit eventually, but I just don't see how they can accomodate in Giambi a stubborness that might keep him at or below the Mendoza line for the entire series, especially not with his inability to field, throw or run the bases.
Observation of the Day: Have you noticed the ESPN visual advertising Sunday Night baseball? It is a portion of the left field wall at Fenway, a strange unconscious concession that they are indeed Red Sox Network. The same sort of brazen obtuseness characterized their pre-season reaction to Hank Steinbrenner's claim of bias on their part. They trotted out Peter Gammons, aka Theo Epstein's bathroom attendant, to mock Steinbrenner by likening him to Joseph McCarthy. Yeah, like anyone would need a "secret list" to establish that Gammon of all people is the biggest Chowderville homer since Johnny Most (who once claimed Wilt Chamberlain had bludgeoned Bill Russell in the elbow with his eye). The salient difference being of course that Most was in fact a home town announcer, while the Dali Lama as they call him (why exactly, do they mistake his triteness for profundity, his vacuousness for wisdom--a gross insult to Tibetan Buddhism in any case) purports to be a national commentator.
Giambi was more interesting, at least as a testament to the blind spot people have concerning the shift.. Olney showed a lot of Yankee hits, all of which, he noted, went the other way or up the middle. Vina supplied the technical commentary on what a batter does with his body to keep inside of the ball. All very edifying. But then Olney took over the analysis of Giambi, claiming the Yankees are actually happy with the way he is swinging the bat, though they might lose all patience with him should the results not improve, particularly as he is a contractual lame duck anyway. He then showed Giambi rolling over on one pitch and hitting the ball smartly to second on another. He is just being defeated by the shift Olney proclaims. But that begs the question is the key to hitting a hard thrower like King Hernandez is to go the other way, and if that rule holds for the Jeter, Abreu, Damon, Cabrera and Matsui, why doesn't it hold for the one man whom the defense is daring to hit the other way? Olney made no mention of the obvious fact that if Giambi did what the other hitters did, he would have collected knocks without even hitting the ball well. With Cano, you have three consecutive years telling you he will surely hit eventually, but I just don't see how they can accomodate in Giambi a stubborness that might keep him at or below the Mendoza line for the entire series, especially not with his inability to field, throw or run the bases.
Observation of the Day: Have you noticed the ESPN visual advertising Sunday Night baseball? It is a portion of the left field wall at Fenway, a strange unconscious concession that they are indeed Red Sox Network. The same sort of brazen obtuseness characterized their pre-season reaction to Hank Steinbrenner's claim of bias on their part. They trotted out Peter Gammons, aka Theo Epstein's bathroom attendant, to mock Steinbrenner by likening him to Joseph McCarthy. Yeah, like anyone would need a "secret list" to establish that Gammon of all people is the biggest Chowderville homer since Johnny Most (who once claimed Wilt Chamberlain had bludgeoned Bill Russell in the elbow with his eye). The salient difference being of course that Most was in fact a home town announcer, while the Dali Lama as they call him (why exactly, do they mistake his triteness for profundity, his vacuousness for wisdom--a gross insult to Tibetan Buddhism in any case) purports to be a national commentator.
RISP WATCH
About 4 games ago, I remarked that the Yankees had left 18 men on base, a ridiculous number by any standard. Well after not even getting on base the following game, they came back with a 20 LOB game to finish the Tigers series and then a 16 LOB game in the Wang-win last night, for an average of 18 per game. This simply cannot continue. One remedy might be to sit Giambi, who seems unable to lift that 160 batting average. The other might be to play Chad Moeller for awhile, if his defense suffices. He seems a much better hitter than Molina. Finally, I'll repeat, play Gonzalez at third for now (Ensberg can play first with Duncan). I will keep a running account of the RISP situation.
PARADOXES, PARADOXES
Going into the season, many people, myself included, felt that the Yankees' major problem might be that they had no true ace at the start of their rotation. Well, it looks like they have one alwright. Too bad they have little else.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
CAN'T BUY ME FUNDAMENTALS; OR UNSOUND
AT ANY PRICE.
With the Yankees payroll, one would expect that the rudiments of the game at least would be well attended to: you know bunting, the hit and run, putting the ball in play, hitting the other way, taking the extra base and, oh yes, lest we forget, FIELDING YOUR FUCKING POSITION.
The state of the Yankee starting rotation and their anemic offense has so far occupied us that we have forgotten a major bugaboo of Torre: The Late Years. I refer of course to their awful glovework. Putting Melky in center on a regular basis had amended matters some, but tonight was proof that they are still able to lose games entirely on their ineptitude in the field. The box score will say that Ian Kennedy failed to hold up again, but if Damon doesn't misplay a flyball in the most amatuerish manner possible and if Abreu doesn't allow his wall-phobia to prevent from tracking down an eminently catchable ball in right, Kennedy takes his lead lead into the 6th and maybe beyond, the Yankees don't have to rely on their pathetic middle relief--send Albajendo back down, please--but can go directly to the back end, and they probably win the game. Instead they get Tiger-swept in the Stadium for the first time since 1966, which may well be an index of exactly how crapulent this team can be if they really apply themselves.
Bad fielding is always a demoralizing proposition, but when you have young inexperienced hurlers (Kennedy, Hughes, Chamberlain, Ohlendorf), supersensitve pitchers (Mussina, Fahrnsorth), control-put the ball in play pitchers (Pettite, Wang, Mussina)--well that's everyone but Mo--then poor fielding is fatal, even when the offense is as good as the Yankees' reputation (as opposed to their performance).
People are stupid moment of the day: Many Yankee haters are already crowing in the wake of theHughes injury, that they should have shipped him off for Santana. This piece of obtuseness overlooks 2 salient points. First, the Twins were unwilling to trade him for Hughes even up, or even for Hughes and Cabrera. They wanted Hughes, Kennedy and Cabrera, which would have left the Yankees with a huge hole in center and in their rotation. Second, this team isn't good enough for Santana to help, particularly if the woeful Damon were in center. Santana is only 3-2 with the Mets, a much better team than the Yankees, particularly relative to their competition. His ERA is over 3, which is over 4 translated into AL stats, andn the Yankees are typically not getting 4 runs a game anyway. Santana would have been wasted on this team; better he should be where he can do some good, and the Yankees keep a purchase on the future. They have none on the present regardless.
With the Yankees payroll, one would expect that the rudiments of the game at least would be well attended to: you know bunting, the hit and run, putting the ball in play, hitting the other way, taking the extra base and, oh yes, lest we forget, FIELDING YOUR FUCKING POSITION.
The state of the Yankee starting rotation and their anemic offense has so far occupied us that we have forgotten a major bugaboo of Torre: The Late Years. I refer of course to their awful glovework. Putting Melky in center on a regular basis had amended matters some, but tonight was proof that they are still able to lose games entirely on their ineptitude in the field. The box score will say that Ian Kennedy failed to hold up again, but if Damon doesn't misplay a flyball in the most amatuerish manner possible and if Abreu doesn't allow his wall-phobia to prevent from tracking down an eminently catchable ball in right, Kennedy takes his lead lead into the 6th and maybe beyond, the Yankees don't have to rely on their pathetic middle relief--send Albajendo back down, please--but can go directly to the back end, and they probably win the game. Instead they get Tiger-swept in the Stadium for the first time since 1966, which may well be an index of exactly how crapulent this team can be if they really apply themselves.
Bad fielding is always a demoralizing proposition, but when you have young inexperienced hurlers (Kennedy, Hughes, Chamberlain, Ohlendorf), supersensitve pitchers (Mussina, Fahrnsorth), control-put the ball in play pitchers (Pettite, Wang, Mussina)--well that's everyone but Mo--then poor fielding is fatal, even when the offense is as good as the Yankees' reputation (as opposed to their performance).
People are stupid moment of the day: Many Yankee haters are already crowing in the wake of theHughes injury, that they should have shipped him off for Santana. This piece of obtuseness overlooks 2 salient points. First, the Twins were unwilling to trade him for Hughes even up, or even for Hughes and Cabrera. They wanted Hughes, Kennedy and Cabrera, which would have left the Yankees with a huge hole in center and in their rotation. Second, this team isn't good enough for Santana to help, particularly if the woeful Damon were in center. Santana is only 3-2 with the Mets, a much better team than the Yankees, particularly relative to their competition. His ERA is over 3, which is over 4 translated into AL stats, andn the Yankees are typically not getting 4 runs a game anyway. Santana would have been wasted on this team; better he should be where he can do some good, and the Yankees keep a purchase on the future. They have none on the present regardless.
WHY NOT
Joba? With Hughes out until July with a fractured rib, you have to slot somebody as the number 3, and I'm thinking it might as well be Chamberlain. The sad fact is the yankees don't need an eigth inning set up man because they aren't going to have the lead often enough to support his activity. Might as well promote Farnsworth and see if Joba can be the starter they hope. This is not a team with a back end of the rotation, a consistent offense or any real character. Giardi would have to blow them up and do a miraculous reconstruction job just to get them to the playoffs. Forced to rebuild, they might as well do what rebuilding teams do: take inventory. This is Mussina's last year (one hopes) , Pettite's last year (almost certainly), and it is now unclear when and whether Kennedy and Hughes will be reliable starters. you might as well begin refashioning the rotation for next year right now. Let's take a look at Joba.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
AND NOW THEY ARE EXTINGUISHED
I'm not sure the Yankees can afford a lost nine game homestand and still make the playoffs, but that is what they are looking at. I believe AROD not being in the line-up, taken on its own, can actually help the offense. There is a tendency for the other guys to wait for him to produce the fireworks and not to fight through their own at-bats. And since he remains the most gifted choke artist in the history of the game (well, that's something!), the tendency is a losing one. But with Posada out as well, they not only lose one of their few clutch performers, they also get to luxuriate in excuses for the inevitability of their failure--which quotes from new Joe, Andy Petite and others indicate they have already begun to do. With the exception of Wang (and last year's Hughes), this is not a pitching staff that can pull off the 1-0 or 2-1 win very often, if ever, and this Yankee team remains every bit as bas at scratching out runs as they were under slow Joe. Last night they left 18 men on base, which is egregious even by last year's standards, and they are poised perilously close to the bottom of the league in RISP batting average, which is just unforgiveable when you realize Posada and Arod have really been gone all that much yet.
Part of the problem is that only 2 guys on the team, Matsui and Cabrera are at 300, and part of it is that 2 guys in the middle of the line-up, Giambi and Cano, are not even within shouting distance of 200, and this with a full month of the season gone. How much I wonder is remediable by devoting some thought to the problem? I would guess some. Clearly you can tell Giambi that for every game he doesn't hit a grounder through the left side of the shift, he doesn't play a game. That would get his attention, and some compliance with what has to be the most obvious imperative in the whole Yankee offensive picture. And for a hitter of Cano's ability to still be looking like the second coming of Phil Linz begs questions about technique, bad habits etc. If the hitting coach can't fix Cano in the next week, I would think he should be fired, with extreme prejudice.
But the larger RISP problem is probably unsoluble by the head, it goes to the heart and the nerve of the team. And so far they haven't showed any more of those qualities for Giardi than they did for Torre. Nor have they played with any greater sense of urgency than they did last year. And that really is a surprise to me and a disappointment. Frankly, they are playing much as I would have expected them to under Mattingly, which is why I was so opposed to his hire. And at the end of the day--or maybe at the beginning of the day--I do blame Giardi. Because he is not managing this team, or commenting on their performance, in the same mode that he did with the Marlins. HE IS MANAGING THIS TEAM AS IF HE WERE MANAGING THE NEW YORK YANKEES. And that's the problem, because he isn't. These aren't the Yankees at all. Consider--with Jorge on the shelf, only two position players on the team, Jeter and Damon, have rings. Only one starter does (Petite) and only one reliever (MO). When you consider Andy is only on the field once every 5 days and Mo is only on the field when (and if) the game is in hand, there is virtually noone regularly in pinstripes this year who knows a damn thing about winning, and some of these Yankees have had long and distinguished careers (e. g. Giambi, Abreu) without ever winning it all, as if that was somehow normal or acceptable. Giardi needs to wake up and recognize his present yankees are no more winners than his erstwhile Marlins, that they, like those Marlins, need to be taught how to win or, if you like, to refuse to lose. And he'd better wake up soon, because the season is rapidly slipping away. And if it goes as badly as it could, Hank won't keep him around to see another April with its new rays of hope.
Proposal of the day: With AROD out, try Gonzalez at third. He's the best infielder on the team, easily, and while he has modest offensive skills, he fights for every at bat.
Part of the problem is that only 2 guys on the team, Matsui and Cabrera are at 300, and part of it is that 2 guys in the middle of the line-up, Giambi and Cano, are not even within shouting distance of 200, and this with a full month of the season gone. How much I wonder is remediable by devoting some thought to the problem? I would guess some. Clearly you can tell Giambi that for every game he doesn't hit a grounder through the left side of the shift, he doesn't play a game. That would get his attention, and some compliance with what has to be the most obvious imperative in the whole Yankee offensive picture. And for a hitter of Cano's ability to still be looking like the second coming of Phil Linz begs questions about technique, bad habits etc. If the hitting coach can't fix Cano in the next week, I would think he should be fired, with extreme prejudice.
But the larger RISP problem is probably unsoluble by the head, it goes to the heart and the nerve of the team. And so far they haven't showed any more of those qualities for Giardi than they did for Torre. Nor have they played with any greater sense of urgency than they did last year. And that really is a surprise to me and a disappointment. Frankly, they are playing much as I would have expected them to under Mattingly, which is why I was so opposed to his hire. And at the end of the day--or maybe at the beginning of the day--I do blame Giardi. Because he is not managing this team, or commenting on their performance, in the same mode that he did with the Marlins. HE IS MANAGING THIS TEAM AS IF HE WERE MANAGING THE NEW YORK YANKEES. And that's the problem, because he isn't. These aren't the Yankees at all. Consider--with Jorge on the shelf, only two position players on the team, Jeter and Damon, have rings. Only one starter does (Petite) and only one reliever (MO). When you consider Andy is only on the field once every 5 days and Mo is only on the field when (and if) the game is in hand, there is virtually noone regularly in pinstripes this year who knows a damn thing about winning, and some of these Yankees have had long and distinguished careers (e. g. Giambi, Abreu) without ever winning it all, as if that was somehow normal or acceptable. Giardi needs to wake up and recognize his present yankees are no more winners than his erstwhile Marlins, that they, like those Marlins, need to be taught how to win or, if you like, to refuse to lose. And he'd better wake up soon, because the season is rapidly slipping away. And if it goes as badly as it could, Hank won't keep him around to see another April with its new rays of hope.
Proposal of the day: With AROD out, try Gonzalez at third. He's the best infielder on the team, easily, and while he has modest offensive skills, he fights for every at bat.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
RAYS OF HOPE
I HATE TO BE OPTIMISTIC, BECAUSE IT'S THE KISSING COUSIN OF DISAPPOINTMENT. (McGready wasn't his cousin too was she; I mean 15 years old is bad enough.)
But I do see a couple of trends I like. One is Farnsworth. I think he just might prove to be a decent 7th inning pitcher. He's more relaxed that far back, and so he gets his breaking pitch over more consistently, making the fastball much more effective. If the Big F turns out alright, the Yankees have perhaps the best bullpen in the league after the sixth inning. Now if the starters could just last that long.
I also am liking the way Matsui is swinging the bat. He's not pulling off the ball as much as he did late last season.
After that road marathon,, with AROD misssing for some games, Posada for others, Jeter for others, and with Kennedy and Hughes so hopeless, it really is amazing that they are only one game back. They have to get better than this, right?
The Red Sox are just not that good this year. their strting pitching is mediocre, their bullpen less than great before Papelbon, and with Ortiz sitting or sucking their offense is really kind of anemic, at least outside of Fenway. you can now walk Manny knowing that most of the other hitters are singles guys and will have to string them together and are also slow white guys (Varitek, Lowell, Youkilis, Drew) who are just as likely to hit into a DP. I don' think the Rays sweeping them was a fluke. It shows what a fast team can do to an over the hill Varitek and what a team with good pitching can do to their line-up, at least outside of Fenway. Last year the Sox were as good away form home as in Boston, reversing the trend of the year before when they could only win at home and finished third. They look to me like they're reverting.
On the down side, they should never have signed Posada to a long term deal, a point I made at the time repeatedly. He's just too old and the breakdown has now begun, 4 years before the end of the deal. Also, is it just me or does Shelly Duncan look totally overmatched this year? He seem to be guesssing fastball on every pitch and swinging entirely too hard.
Of the many things I thought and hoped Giardi would do is force Giambi to bunt, to hit the other way, to take advantage of the gaping left side. I don't get it, he's so willing to take a walk when offered; why won't he take a single. In Abreu and Jeter, you have two of the better inside-out slap hitters in the game. Can't they teach him how? It'll only be for a month or so, then teans will take the shift off and his average will go up pulling the ball. Is this too obvious a remedy for his mendoza line problems to be put into effect?
Proverb of the Day: It takes the Yankees to make an all time great a cheater, but it takes the Sox to make him a registered sex offender.
But I do see a couple of trends I like. One is Farnsworth. I think he just might prove to be a decent 7th inning pitcher. He's more relaxed that far back, and so he gets his breaking pitch over more consistently, making the fastball much more effective. If the Big F turns out alright, the Yankees have perhaps the best bullpen in the league after the sixth inning. Now if the starters could just last that long.
I also am liking the way Matsui is swinging the bat. He's not pulling off the ball as much as he did late last season.
After that road marathon,, with AROD misssing for some games, Posada for others, Jeter for others, and with Kennedy and Hughes so hopeless, it really is amazing that they are only one game back. They have to get better than this, right?
The Red Sox are just not that good this year. their strting pitching is mediocre, their bullpen less than great before Papelbon, and with Ortiz sitting or sucking their offense is really kind of anemic, at least outside of Fenway. you can now walk Manny knowing that most of the other hitters are singles guys and will have to string them together and are also slow white guys (Varitek, Lowell, Youkilis, Drew) who are just as likely to hit into a DP. I don' think the Rays sweeping them was a fluke. It shows what a fast team can do to an over the hill Varitek and what a team with good pitching can do to their line-up, at least outside of Fenway. Last year the Sox were as good away form home as in Boston, reversing the trend of the year before when they could only win at home and finished third. They look to me like they're reverting.
On the down side, they should never have signed Posada to a long term deal, a point I made at the time repeatedly. He's just too old and the breakdown has now begun, 4 years before the end of the deal. Also, is it just me or does Shelly Duncan look totally overmatched this year? He seem to be guesssing fastball on every pitch and swinging entirely too hard.
Of the many things I thought and hoped Giardi would do is force Giambi to bunt, to hit the other way, to take advantage of the gaping left side. I don't get it, he's so willing to take a walk when offered; why won't he take a single. In Abreu and Jeter, you have two of the better inside-out slap hitters in the game. Can't they teach him how? It'll only be for a month or so, then teans will take the shift off and his average will go up pulling the ball. Is this too obvious a remedy for his mendoza line problems to be put into effect?
Proverb of the Day: It takes the Yankees to make an all time great a cheater, but it takes the Sox to make him a registered sex offender.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
CLASSIC AROD
One down, top of the 6th, the Yanks nursing a 1 run lead for Wang. Jeter on third after a long double and a beautiful piece of hitting by Abreu to move him up. The Yankees big man at the plate, needing only to push the ball through a drawn in infield or loft a fly to bring home a little bit of insurnace. And he strikes out on three fastballs, not one more than 94 and the last one right down the middle of the plate. Needless to say, they don't score--now 2-19 this series with RISP. Yes folks, just like last year--only worse.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
THE NEW YANKEES,
INDEED.
There has been talk of how the Red Sox have become the new Yankees and in one dubious respect they have. Win or lose this season, they have depended on a potent offense to mask a weaker than expected starting rotation with the inevitable consequences that has for the bullpen: Beckett's been so-so, Lester blows, Bucholz is uneven, Wakefield has begun his mid-season decline early and Dice-K's been pretty good, but only for 5-6 innings a game. The result is that with the exception of Papelbon, their relievers are already stressed. During their current losing streak, the bullpen blew up in one game and Francon is so concerned with their workload, he left Bucholz in way too long tonight, costing them another one.
Considering how truly putrid the Yankees have been in almost every phase of the game (noone can hit with men on base but Jeter, and he's well under 300 overall, AROD has been anemic so far, Canohas been unbelievably bad at the plate and little better in the field, Jeter has no range at all anymore, Giambi is still a disaster at first, Posada can't throw, Hughes can't find the strike zone, ditto Kennedy, Mussina has become a slow-pitch softball pitcher, and not a very good one, team speed is non-existent etc. etc.), it is telling that they are only 2 games behind the Red Sox, who have just come off a long home stand.
Right now I would venture to say there is only one really good team in baseball and they don't play in the American League.
There has been talk of how the Red Sox have become the new Yankees and in one dubious respect they have. Win or lose this season, they have depended on a potent offense to mask a weaker than expected starting rotation with the inevitable consequences that has for the bullpen: Beckett's been so-so, Lester blows, Bucholz is uneven, Wakefield has begun his mid-season decline early and Dice-K's been pretty good, but only for 5-6 innings a game. The result is that with the exception of Papelbon, their relievers are already stressed. During their current losing streak, the bullpen blew up in one game and Francon is so concerned with their workload, he left Bucholz in way too long tonight, costing them another one.
Considering how truly putrid the Yankees have been in almost every phase of the game (noone can hit with men on base but Jeter, and he's well under 300 overall, AROD has been anemic so far, Canohas been unbelievably bad at the plate and little better in the field, Jeter has no range at all anymore, Giambi is still a disaster at first, Posada can't throw, Hughes can't find the strike zone, ditto Kennedy, Mussina has become a slow-pitch softball pitcher, and not a very good one, team speed is non-existent etc. etc.), it is telling that they are only 2 games behind the Red Sox, who have just come off a long home stand.
Right now I would venture to say there is only one really good team in baseball and they don't play in the American League.
BEING THE YANKEES MEANS...
no excuses.
We are already getting the word from Giardi that the season may be in jeopardy because they just couldn't afford to lose, as they apparently have, Brian Bruney. Huh? If your season depends on the health of Brian Bruney, you are already completely screwed.
Their response has so far been to bring up Chris Britton, whose gotten so fat I swear it looks like he ate Curt Schilling. What about Patterson, who pitched something like 25 scoreless innings in spring training? Bruney really wasn't all that great, it's just that Hawkins and Farnsworth made him look that way. My advice for new Joe is to stop whining about the inevitable injuries and bring people up until you get someone who can get the ball to Joba.
We are already getting the word from Giardi that the season may be in jeopardy because they just couldn't afford to lose, as they apparently have, Brian Bruney. Huh? If your season depends on the health of Brian Bruney, you are already completely screwed.
Their response has so far been to bring up Chris Britton, whose gotten so fat I swear it looks like he ate Curt Schilling. What about Patterson, who pitched something like 25 scoreless innings in spring training? Bruney really wasn't all that great, it's just that Hawkins and Farnsworth made him look that way. My advice for new Joe is to stop whining about the inevitable injuries and bring people up until you get someone who can get the ball to Joba.
WHERE HAVE YOU GONE BILLY MARTIN,
the empire turns its lonely eyes to you, ooh, ooh, ooh.
The secret to playing small ball, otherwise known as Billy Ball, is to be relentless, to press every opportunity. In the midst of trying to separate himself from the passivity of the old Joe, the new Joe showed he just isn't there yet. In the top of the ninth in a tie gae today against Cleveland, Girardi took adavantage of having Damon on first with one out tohit and run Melky. The result, first and third with one out, and Jeter at the plate. Now you have a couple of options, with Cleveland playing half-way in the infield. One is to send Melky, either on a straight steal or a hit and run. Remeber, the man behind the plate, Victor Martinez, has a notoriously bad arm. This would be one way of protecting against the one outcome that can kill you, the double play. Jeter fouls off the first pitch and noone moves on the bases. Now a second and even better option present itself--the suicide squeeze. And I'm screaming at the TV to do just that. With Jeter's skill at the bunt, only a pitch out would prevent him from getting his bat on the ball, and with Eric Wedge already ejected, it seems unlikely that anyone in the Cleveland dugout is thinking on those lines. What's more, even if the surprise element doesn't actually score Jeter a hit, one run scores, Melky's on second and AROD is at the plate. That is, you've made sure they have to beat Mo in the ninth, and you still have a chance for a bigger inning. Instead (sigh!) Giardi plays it safe, lets Jeter hit an easily buntable ball, and he hits it hard, smokes it in fact, right into a DP. Ohlendorf, who is noone's idea of a late inning pitcher, comes in to give the game away in the ninth. And we have another game lost by Yankees management.
The secret to playing small ball, otherwise known as Billy Ball, is to be relentless, to press every opportunity. In the midst of trying to separate himself from the passivity of the old Joe, the new Joe showed he just isn't there yet. In the top of the ninth in a tie gae today against Cleveland, Girardi took adavantage of having Damon on first with one out tohit and run Melky. The result, first and third with one out, and Jeter at the plate. Now you have a couple of options, with Cleveland playing half-way in the infield. One is to send Melky, either on a straight steal or a hit and run. Remeber, the man behind the plate, Victor Martinez, has a notoriously bad arm. This would be one way of protecting against the one outcome that can kill you, the double play. Jeter fouls off the first pitch and noone moves on the bases. Now a second and even better option present itself--the suicide squeeze. And I'm screaming at the TV to do just that. With Jeter's skill at the bunt, only a pitch out would prevent him from getting his bat on the ball, and with Eric Wedge already ejected, it seems unlikely that anyone in the Cleveland dugout is thinking on those lines. What's more, even if the surprise element doesn't actually score Jeter a hit, one run scores, Melky's on second and AROD is at the plate. That is, you've made sure they have to beat Mo in the ninth, and you still have a chance for a bigger inning. Instead (sigh!) Giardi plays it safe, lets Jeter hit an easily buntable ball, and he hits it hard, smokes it in fact, right into a DP. Ohlendorf, who is noone's idea of a late inning pitcher, comes in to give the game away in the ninth. And we have another game lost by Yankees management.
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Meet the New Joe, Same as the Old Joe?
I can't say I have really good feelings about Giardi's reign so far, and it has nothing to do with their mediocre record. He looks an awful lot like Torre in his reliance on long-ball instead of small ball. They are not running all that much and there still seems to be too little respect for contact hitting. How else does one explain the continued play of Giambi, who in addition to his mediocre glove and lack of arm strength, cannot make contact at crucial moments against any pitcher not named Timlin. He continues doggedly to pull the ball into a shift that smothers his chances for getting on base. If giardi is going to insist on playing his G-buddy despite the 125 BA, then he should at least make him bunt, half-bunt and push the left side until teams pull the shift off. Of course once on base Giambi cannot move around them with any celerity and combines with Posada and Matsui to make the middle of the line-up a station to station nightmare. ensberg, i n case noone has noticed, is hitting the ball for average quite smartly, runs better than Giambi, fields better than Giambi, oh what the hell, is better than Giambi.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)