Yankees – Page 180 – Keefe To The City

Oct 21, 2015

2015 MLB Over/Under Wins Results

The Yankees’ season has been over for two weeks, so with the season in the books, let’s look at the results from my over/under predictions.

The baseball season has been over two weeks. Well, the Yankees’ season has been over for two weeks, and to me, that’s the baseball season. So with the season in the books, let’s look at the results from my predictions for 2015 MLB Over/Under Wins.

OVERS

San Francisco Giants – 82 (84-78, WIN)
I said, “I realize this is an odd-numbered year and that means that the Giants are likely to miss the playoffs and then bounce back and win the World Series next year the way they did in 2010, 2012 and 2014,” and the Giants didn’t make the playoffs and therefore won’t win the World Series, but they did win more than 82 games.

The Giants have only won fewer than 82 games once since 2009 and with the core of their World Series-winning team intact, it didn’t make sense that their line was this low. Unless Vegas thought that the departure of Pablo Sandoval was somehow going to make the Giants a bad team in a season in which he was asked to no longer switch-hit and became one of the worst everyday players in the league. (Good luck with that remaining $78 million, Boston!)

New York Yankees – 82.5 (87-75, WIN)
This was the easiest of them all. The last time the Yankees won less than 83 games was 1992 and even for as many question marks as they had in the spring training, they were never going to go 82-80 or worse.

This is the first thing I have written about the Yankees since they lost the wild-card game because I’m still not over them getting into the playoffs and then losing to the second wild card against the one pitcher in the world they couldn’t face. I will get over it eventually.

New York Mets – 83 (90-72, WIN)
Last season Sandy Alderson talked about the Mets winning 90 games and he was a year late. The Mets finished the season with Alderson’s magic number and won the NL East for the first time since 2006 and now they testing my patience as a baseball fan by being as close as they have been to the World Series since 2006.

The Mets can’t make the World Series, but if they happen to, they can’t win. The Blue Jays or Royals have to beat them. They have to. The Mets can’t win the World Series.

San Diego Padres – 84 (76-86, LOSS)
Whoops. I thought the addition of Matt Kemp, Wil Myers, Justin Upton, James Shields and Craig Kimbrel would change the Padres and improve them at least seven games with those five on the team. Instead, the Padres were one game worse than they were as a 77-85 team last season. Kemp did rebound and play in 154 games and had 100 RBIs, but Myers played in just 60, Upton didn’t play to his potential, Shields was OK as the only starter over .500 in the rotation and Kimbrel was good, but not great. The Padres made a lot of big moves and sacrificed a lot to put themselves in a position to compete with the Dodgers and Giants and instead they finished in fourth place in the NL West and ninth place in the NL.

Los Angeles Dodgers – 92.5 (92-70, WIN)
The Dodgers came within one game of covering and I can think of a lot of games that could have been the difference. Between the horrible bullpen and the weak lineup that Andrew Friedman put together, the Dodgers should have been a 100-win team with Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke. Friedman did nothing to change the bullpen in front of Kenley Jansen, built a shaky rotation after the Top 2 and created a lineup that had Justin Turner as its most feared hitter. But yeah, Don Mattingly deserves to be fired. It’s his fault the Dodgers lost to the Mets in five games.

UNDERS

Minnesota Twins – 73 (83-79, LOSS)
The Twins overachieved, and unfortunately for the Yankees, they didn’t overachieve a little more. The Twins missed the second wild card by three games and had they gotten that wild card it would have been the Twins the Yankees faced and not the Astros and most importantly, not Dallas Keuchel. The Yankees would have gotten the chance to play the team they have gone 12-2 in the playoffs against since 2003. I still don’t know how a rotation of Phil Hughes, Kyle Gibson, Mike Pelfrey, Tommy Milone and Ervin Santana won 83 games. But I guess that’s baseball, Suzyn.

Tampa Bay Rays – 79 (80-82, LOSS)
One game. One game! Like the Dodgers, the Rays screwed me by one game and it hurts. There’s not much to say about this one other than that Vegas did a great job making this line. The Rays were the typical Rays with a great rotation and a horrible lineup. If there is any doubt that pitching wins, the Rays are proof since they were able to win 80 games with an offense that scored the second-fewest runs in the AL and still had a plus-2 run differential.

Detroit Tigers – 84 (74-87, WIN)
I think everyone saw this coming except for maybe delusional Tigers fans. The Tigers lost Max Scherzer to free agency and traded Rick Porcello and Justin Verlander started the year on the disabled list and was nowhere near his normal self when he did pitch. Miguel Cabrera missed 43 games and had the lowest home run and RBI totals of his career and Victor Martinez went from finishing second in the 2014 AL MVP voting to showing his age as a 36-year-old .245/.301/.366 hitter. I don’t know when the Tigers will be good again, but it’s not going to be anytime soon.

Cleveland Indians – 85 (81-80, WIN)
The Indians tried to do their annual get-hot-in-the-final-weeks-of-September routine that they have made their thing under Terry Francona. Luckily, they didn’t get hot enough and finished four wins short of pushing this total and five short of losing it for me. The Yankees did their best to make this interesting by going 2-5 against the Indians, and those Indians series came right when the Yankees could have made their move to take the AL East for good.

Boston Red Sox – 86 (78-84, WIN)
The easiest pick in the entire league. The Red Sox had their third last-place finish in four years, fired their general manager, asked their $95 million third baseman to stop being a switch-hitter, told their $88 million left fielder to stop being a left fielder and watched their new $82.5 million starting pitcher pitch to a 4.92 ERA. The Red Sox likely won’t have a real rotation again next season unless they make big a play for either David Price, Zack Greinke or Johnny Cueto, all of which will be 30-plus when the 2016 season and that has been the magic age number the Red Sox have avoided. The only thing that can help the Red Sox at this point is if a team like the Dodgers can save them again and that better not happen.

Blogs • Yankees

Oct 6, 2015

The Wild-Card Game: Judgment Day

I went to bed on Monday night with a Christmas Eve-type feeling. That’s the feeling I haven’t gotten in three years.

I went to bed on Monday night with a Christmas Eve-type feeling because that’s the feeling I get the night before the Yankees’ first postseason game. That’s the feeling I haven’t gotten in three years.

All of the hours spent watching, writing, talking, reading and listening about this team all makes it worth it on Tuesday night. Well, that is if the Yankees win.

My confidence level for the wild-card game isn’t good. The Yankees will face the one pitcher (outside of 2009-2010 Cliff Lee showing up via the 4 train in the Bronx again) that I didn’t want them to face. They will face Cliff Lee 2.0, a pitcher who has dominated and beaten them twice without allowing a run in 16 innings this season. The only glimmer of hope in beating Dallas Keuchel is that he’s going to be pitching on three days rest for the first time in his professional career. Outside of that, the only positive I can get out of the Yankees and their left-handed heavy lineup against the best left-handed in the American League is looking at his line from Sept. 16 against Texas.

4.2 IP, 11 H, 9 R, 9 ER, 0 BB, 5 K, 3 HR.

I’m not sure what happened that day. I have no idea how Keuchel gave up 11 hits or nine runs or three home runs or how left-handed hitters Rougned Odor and Prince Fielder hit home runs off of him. That game, nearly three weeks ago, is the only thing keeping me from feeling any less confident about this game than I already do.

Masahiro Tanaka is going to have to be perfect or close to it on Tuesday night. I would gladly sign up for two runs against Keuchel right now and that means one run against Tanaka to hand the ball to the bullpen and let Dellin Betances and Andrew Miller get this season to the ALDS.

It took two months of bad baseball for the Yankees to end up in this spot when they had a seven-game divison lead (and eight-game lead over the Blue Jays) the week of the trade deadline. They chose not to mortgage the future of the team for a run this season, watched the Blue Jays completely turn over their roster for the better and run away with the division, settled for a wild-card berth and backed into the first wild-card spot in the most depressing way possible. None of that matters now. What matters is one game to extend the season and to get to where this team would be pre-2012 in the old playoff format: in the ALDS.

I wasn’t a fan of the new postseason format when it was implemented and am still not today. The only thing the new format has done for Yankees is given us a few extra “meaningful” games in 2013 and 2014, which were just a tease to get excited about two teams we all knew weren’t going anywhere. And now all it’s gotten us is a one-game playoff against the Yankees’ most-feared pitcher. Maybe someday the second wild card will actually benefit the Yankees and be the reason they reached the postseason, but in four years it hasn’t and this year it hurts them, so I’m still against it.

There’s a good chance the Yankees wouldn’t be in this spot if they never let Chris Capuano start three games in May and didn’t let Stephen Drew and Brendan Ryan get five months of at-bats that should have gone to Rob Refsnyder. They likely wouldn’t be in this spot if Joe Girardi didn’t keep handing the ball to Esmil Rogers or turn to Branden Pinder and Caleb Cotham, or think it was 2009 or 2010 when he would call on Andrew Bailey. But they are in this spot and now they have to get out of it.

Two months of being a .500 baseball team put the Yankees in this spot though on Tuesday night they have the chance to erase questionable managerial and front office moves and the decision to stand pat (aside from acquiring Dustin Ackley) at the trade deadline. They have the chance to make everyone forget about their horrible August and September and their embarrassing finish. They have the chance to win their first playoff game at Yankee Stadium since Game 5 of the 2012 ALDS and get back to the ALDS for the first time since that season. They have a chance to begin the kind of run the Royals went on last season and go to Kansas City to continue that run.

The Yankees have a chance to change how this season will be remembered with a win on Tuesday night. But to do so, they will have to get through Dallas Keuchel.

I think I’m going to throw up.

Blogs • Yankees

Sep 30, 2015

The Wild-Card Game Starting Pitcher Dilemma

Here are the most likely candidates I would love the Yankees to face to who I’m petrified at even the thought of them facing in the wild-card game.

Dallas Keuchel

The Yankees are going to the playoffs and the only thing left to do is secure home-field advantage for the one-game playoff. After winning three of four from the White Sox, the Yankees produced two ugly efforts against the Red Sox and their lead for the first wild card is dwindling. Once they secure home-field advantage, the last thing to do is figure out who they are going to face.

My hope is that the Astros, Angels and Twins will have to play right up until the final out of Game 162 on Sunday to determine who will head to Yankee Stadium for Tuesday, and as of right now, that scenario is playing out exactly as needed.

Wild Card Standings

With all three teams separated by 1.5 games in the standings and just one game in the loss column, the next five days is going to be everything Bud Selig and Major League Baseball dreamed of when they implemented this outrageous format for their postseason. I decided to not get greedy in asking for the teams to play right through Game 162 because had I gotten greedy, I would have asked for the teams to tie and produce an incredible tie-breaker scenario that could force a one-game playoff before the already scheduled one-game playoff. The reason the Yankees need these teams to go all out until Sunday afternoon is so they can’t line their best starting pitcher up for the one-game playoff and in some cases (Houston … cough … cough), it’s a huge disadvantage.

Not included in those standings is Texas, which is two games up in the AL West over Angels and 2.5 games up over the Astros. The Rangers are most likely going to win the West and avoid the one-game playoff, but there’s still a chance they could give the division away in the final days, so I have included the Rangers.

Whether the Yankees face an opponent’s ace or their No. 5 on Tuesday, it’s going to be an experience that will likely cause my heart rate and blood pressure to reach dangerous levels. I have already packed my One-Game Playoff Survival Kit to get me through the game and help me cope with the end of the finality of the season if it comes to that. But until then, I’m going to be scoreboard watching and trying to figure out which pitcher the Yankees will face. Here are the most likely candidates in order of who I would love the Yankees to face to who I’m petrified at even the thought of them.

1. Kyle Gibson
Where do I sign up for this? He’s the stereotypical right-handed Twins pitcher that has a record right around .500, an ERA right around 4.00 and is just plain average. In 10 1/3 innings against the Yankees this year, Gibson gave up 12 earned runs. Those aren’t average numbers, they’re horrible and they’re exactly what I’m looking for.

2. Mike Pelfrey
Pelfrey made throwing high-90s fastballs without striking anyone out a thing long before Nathan Eovaldi. The only Yankee with at least six at-bats against Pelfrey, who isn’t hitting at least .313 against him is Stephen Drew and that doesn’t matter since Drew isn’t going to be playing in the one-game playoff anyway. Here are some of the Yankees’ numbers against Big Pelf.

Brian McCann: 19-for-42 (.452)
Chris Young: 7-for-21 (.333)
A-Rod: 5-for-16 (.313)
Brett Gardner: 6-for-16 (.375)
Chase Headley: 4-for-12 (.333)
Brendan Ryan: 3-for-6 (.500)
Jacoby Ellsbury: 2-for-6 (.333)
Carlos Beltran: 1-for-3 (.333)

Some of those aren’t the greatest of sample sizes, but they’re enough to show that it’s Mike Pelfrey. The Yankees would be able to stack left-handed hitters in the lineup (like they would against righty) and the only right-handed hitter Pelfrey would see would be A-Rod. This is the Yankees’ ideal situation.

3. Tommy Milone
It’s another Twin. Even though Milone is a lefty, this is more about just facing the Twins. The Yankees beat them in four games in the 2003 ALDS. They beat them in four games in the 2004 ALDS. They swept them in the 2009 ALDS. They swept them in the 2010 ALDS. It doesn’t matter if it’s Milone pitching or Johan Santana or Francisco Liriano, my confidence is at an all-time high when the Yankees play the Twins in the ALDS.

4. Garrett Richards
Earlier this season, the Yankees rocked Richards for six runs in the first inning and he was out of the game after getting just two outs. In four career starts and one relief appearance against the Yankees, he’s 0-3 with a 6.55 ERA with all three of those losses and the four starts coming in Yankee Stadium. Give me, Garrett Richards.

5. Hector Santiago
The left-hander and first-time All-Star this season only faced the Yankees once this year and pitched 3 2/3 scoreless innings out of the bullpen in an 8-2 Yankees win. In his career against the Yankees, he’s 1-2 with a 6.30 ERA in six games and three starts with a 1.700 WHIP to go along with those ugly numbers. If it has to be a lefty, he might be the Yankees’ best option.

6. Jered Weaver
From 2010-2012, Weaver finished in the Top 5 in Cy Young voting all three years and won 20 games in 2012. Despite having a high-80s fastball, Weaver’s herky-jerky motion and control made him one of the league’s top pitchers, but I never saw him that way against the Yankees.

In 15 career regular-season starts against the Yankees, Weaver is 7-5 with a 5.83 ERA. (A-Rod is 12-for-32 with six home runs against him.) Weaver started Game 3 of the 2009 ALDS and allowed three earned runs on five hits, including three home runs, in five innings. He pitched 1 1/3 shutout innings in two relief appearances in Games 5 (1 IP) and 6 (0.1 IP).

There’s a chance he could turn back the clock and find his former self for one big game, but I’m willing to take that chance.

7. Yovani Gallardo
Gallardo just doesn’t scare me. He’s a good career with 101 wins and a 3.66 ERA, but he it wouldn’t be the worst thing if the Yankees saw him. He throws a lot of pitches and likely wouldn’t be around long in the game and there’s always the possibility of him getting wild and giving out free passes. He’s not my first choice, but he’s not my last choice, and I would be fine with the Yankees having to face him.

8. Derek Holland
The Yankees saw Holland in the 2010 ALCS when he threw 5 2/3 scoreless innings out of the bullpen for the Rangers. Since then, he became a front-end starter for the Rangers before getting hurt and missing most of last season and this season. For a hard-throwing lefty, Holland hasn’t been as good against the Yankees in the regular season as he was in the 2010 postseason with a 1-6 record and 6.59 ERA in 10 games and nine starts. It feels weird to not be scared of Holland in a situation like this, but I’m not.

9. Ervin Santana
The last time the Yankees saw Santana in the playoffs, he was a reliever for the Angels in the 2009 ALCS and held the Yankees to one run over 5 2/3 innings in four appearances. Before that, the Yankees saw him as a 22-year-old rookie out of the bullpen starting in the second inning in Game 5 of the 2005 ALDS.

After Bartolo Colon walked Robinson Cano to lead off the second inning of Game 5 of the 2005 ALDS, Mike Scioscia called on Santana to come in to relieve Colon. Cano was then caught stealing second for the first out of the inning since Cano always thought he was much faster than he was. Santana walked Bernie Williams and Jorge Posada and then Bubba Crosby singled to score Williams. A Derek Jeter sacrifice fly scored Jorge Posada and the Yankees had a 2-0 lead in the deciding game of the series.

I thought the Yankees would continue to build on their lead and chase Santana, but instead those two runs would be all they would get until the seventh inning. Starting with a strikeout of Alex Rodriguez to end the second, Santana gave up just three hits, all singles, until Derek Jeter homered to lead off the seventh. Kelvim Escobar and Francisco Rodriguez shut the door and ended the Yankees’ season and Santana got the win to send the Angels to the ALCS.

Here’s Santana’s career postseason line against the Yankees: 11.0 IP, 10 H, 6 R, 4 ER, 6 BB, 7 K, 1 HR, 3.27 ERA, 1.455 WHIP.

They aren’t impressive numbers, but seeing Santana take the mound will bring back unwanted flashbacks of Oct. 10, 2005.

10. Scott Kazmir
Kazmir has a 3.19 career ERA against the Yankees, but in the Bronx, he hasn’t been as good. At the old Yankee Stadium, he had a 5.04 ERA in 25 innings, and at the new Yankee Stadium, he has a 5.59 ERA in 19 1/3 innings.

The Yankees saw him in the 2009 ALCS when he started Game 4 and gave up four earned runs on six hits and four walks in four innings. They saw him again in the eighth inning of Game 6 out of the bullpen for two outs and five batters.

His history against the Yankees in the Bronx hasn’t been good and his left-handed power is scary against a lefty-heavy lineup, but it wouldn’t be the worst thing if Kazmir started the one-game playoff.

11. Lance McCullers
McCullers is just a 21-year-old rookie, who has never seen the Yankees, which certainly plays into his favor given their history against pitchers they have never seen before. But he is a righty, so that helps the Yankees.

McCullers has struck out 123 in 120 innings this season, and in 21 starts, he’s only allowed more than three earned runs once. Another reason to not to want to face McCullers is that he’s allowed just nine home runs all season and the Yankees live and die with the home run. This matchup reminds me too much of Jaret Wright against the Yankees in Game 5 of the 1997 ALDS.

12. Collin McHugh
McHugh is a right-hander, so that makes me more willing to want him on the mound. However, he hasn’t been a typical right-hander against the Yankees.

June 28: 8 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 8 K.

Aug. 26: 6.1 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 8 K, 1 HR.

Those are some impressive numbers, mainly the strikeout numbers, and for a team that strikes out a lot to begin with, this isn’t a matchup I would feel comfortable with.

13. Phil Hughes
Remember last season when in his first season not with the Yankees Phil Hughes was making history with his walk totals and leading the league in fewest walks per nine and most strikeouts per walks. Well, Phil Hughes sucks again just like he did on the Yankees. Hughes has given up 183 hits in 154 1/3 innings, leads the league in home runs allowed with 29 and has pitched to a 4.43 ERA. So why is he this high on the list? Because I spent a lot of time writing and talking about Phil Hughes from 2007-2013 and a lot of that wasn’t exactly shining a great light on Hughes.

This spot in the rankings isn’t about talent for Hughes. It’s about all of those postseason wins for the Yankees over the Twins coupled with Hughes’ tumultuous time with the Yankees. The Yankees overcame the Angels in 2009 like the Red Sox overcame the Yankees in 2004. If the Twins are going to overcome the Yankees, why wouldn’t it be in a one-game playoff with Hughes on the mound? If he were to pitch this game and win it would be the worst kind of disaster imaginable and the darkest moment for the Yankees since losing Games 6 and 7 at home in the 2004 ALCS.

14. Colby Lewis
Colby Motherf-cking Lewis. That’s how I refer to him in my apartment. Lewis has defined mediocrity in his career, except when it comes to pitching against the Yankees. In 2008 and 2009, he was pitching in Japan. In 2010, he was beating the Yankees in Game 2 of the 2010 ALCS (5.2 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 6 K, 1 HR) and Game 6 of the 2010 ALCS (8 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 7 K).

Lewis has already pitched against the Yankees with their season on the line and he ended it with that dominant Game 6 performance. He has spent his career going up and down from the majors to the minors to Japan and back. He has nothing to lose and absolutely no pressure if given the ball for this game. He’s not a star and he’s not a high-priced arm, who is paid to win a game like this. He’s just a 36-year-old who led the league in losses (14) last year waiting for the chance to end another Yankees season.

15. Cole Hamels
The second-biggest pitching acquisition at the trade deadline after David Price, Hamels has seen the Yankees in the playoffs before when he pitched the pivotal Game 3 of the 2009 World Series and got embarrassed. Hamels blew a 3-0 lead at home, gave up a two-run home run to A-Rod and a game-tying RBI single to Andy Pettitte(!) and lasted just 4 2/3 innings, giving up five earned runs. Hamels had been pretty bad all season and had talked about just wanting the season to end a year after he was NLCS MVP and World Series MVP for the Phillies. Now he is out of Philadelphia and in Texas for the next three years and possibly four as part of almost a second career.

Hamels is a hero in Philadelphia and was already one there when he fell apart against the Yankees in the 2009 World Series because he delivered the city their first World Series win since 1980. Now he can deliver Rangers fans their first World Series ever. That’s a pretty good carrot and stick to chase.

16. Dallas Keuchel
He’s Cliff Lee 2.0. If the Yankees see him on next Tuesday, it’s about as close to a guaranteed loss as you can get in this unpredictable game. The Yankees have enough trouble hitting left-handed pitching as is, but when you mix in the fact that they can’t take their walks and have to swing at quality strikes in the zone, it’s a recipe for disaster.

Keuchel has pitched twice against the Yankees this season and here are his lines:

June 25: 9 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 12 K.

Aug. 25: 7 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 9 K.

If you can’t do simple math, that’s no runs and 10 baserunners over 16 innings and 21 strikeouts.

Last year, Keuchel wasn’t as good as he is this year and even then he pitched once against the Yankees: 8 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 5 K.

If you want to relive Game 1 or Game 5 of the 2009 World Series or Game 3 of the 2010 ALCS then you should want the Yankees to see Keuchel in the wild-card game. If you’re a Yankees fan, he’s the last thing you want to see.

Blogs • Monday Mentions • Yankees

Sep 28, 2015

Monday Mentions: Bad Pitching, Hitting, Managing and Contracts

The good news is that the Yankees are going to the playoffs for the first time in three years. The bad news is they’re going to be in the one-game playoff.

The Yankees are going to be hosting the one-game playoff next Tuesday thanks to what happened last week in Toronto. The good news is that they’re going to the playoffs for the first time in three years. The bad news is they’re in the one-game playoff. The worse news is if they win the one-game playoff, they’re likely going to have to go to Toronto and not Kansas City for the first two games of the ALDS.

Here is another installment of “Monday Mentions” focused on questions and comments from Twitter about what happened over the last week to the Yankees.

Is girardi real life bringing shreve into this game?@NeilKeefe

— thomas denapoli (@tdenap8) September 22, 2015

I’m a Chasen Shreve fan, so it’s hard for me to talk badly about him, considering he was good for and only recently fell apart. I’m not sure if it’s fatigue or that the league has adjusted to him or a combination of the two, but something is certainly off with him. Look at these two pitching lines from him:

First 50 appearances: 53.1 IP, 33 H, 12 R, 11 ER, 27 BB, 60 K, 6 HR, 1.86 ERA, 1.125 WHIP.

Last seven appearances: 4.1 IP, 11 H, 6 R, 6 ER, 5 BB, 4 K, 3 HR, 12.46 ERA, 3.695 WHIP.

The guy was lights out for nearly the entire season and helped save the bullpen and essentially the summer when Andrew Miller was on the disabled list. Outside of Shreve and Dellin Betances, and I guess Justin Wilson, there was no one and I mean no one else who could get an out in the bullpen. That’s when Esmil Rogers and David Carpenter were still being asked to pitch regularly. Here’s to hoping Shreve bounces back quickly and these last seven appearances goes down as nothing more than a bad stretch at a bad time.

https://twitter.com/Thereal_ktex/status/646513736316923905

After playing in the one-game playoff, the next scariest part of the postseason is that Joe Girardi will sit down and try to decide which pitchers not named Masahiro Tanaka, Luis Severino, Michael Pineda, CC Sabathia, Andrew Miller, Dellin Betances and Justin Wilson he is going to carry in the playoffs. After those seven, there really isn’t anyone worthy of a spot, but five or six more pitchers are going to make it.

If the Yankees win the one-game playoff and reach the ALDS and trail in any of those games are in any of the games in the postseason at all, Girardi needs to realize the game is not lost. You would think this would be obvious, but in the 2011 ALDS, he brought in Luis Ayala twice before bringing in David Robertson once, in games the Yankees started to mount comebacks in. In the 2009 World Series, he brought in Brian Bruney and Phil Coke into the ninth inning of Game 1 and they gave up two runs to increase their deficit from 4-0 to 6-0. In the bottom of the ninth, the Yankees had two on with no outs to start the inning. They only scored one run, but they were one swing away from being back in the game. Don’t bring B and C and D relievers into a playoff game. The division was already lost partly because of this.

https://twitter.com/MattyinMaine/status/646467891886452736

I never wanted Jacoby Ellsbury. I wrote about it the second Robinson Cano signed with the Mariners and the Yankees turned around and threw their Cano money at Ellsbury. It was the exact type of signing the Yankees preached about avoiding in the future because they were going through the effects from the contracts given to Alex Rodriguez, Mark Teixeira and CC Sabathia and what they had previously endured with Jason Giambi. But that doesn’t mean I want to call Jacoby Ellsbury “The Thief”. I would much rather call him something that resembles him earning his $130,511.46 per game.

Outside of one great season in Boston, Ellsbury has been Brett Gardner. You could even say Gardner has been better than him. So why did the team give Gardner $13 million a season and give Ellsbury $21.1 million per season? They essentially bid against themselves since the Red Sox supposedly didn’t even make an offer to Ellsbury and none of the other big spenders were about to give that kind of money to a player whose entire game is based on speed and who is on the other side of 30.

It’s not out of the question that Ellsbury was given the worst contract in Yankees history. Everyone will always point to Carl Pavano, but he made his entire deal in less than two years of Ellsbury’s, and Ellsbury’s is a seven-year deal. If he’s this bad and this unproductive and this injury prone as a 32-year-old center fielder, what exactly is he going to be when he’s 36 and 37?

@NeilKeefe the thief must be reading your tweets. Tweet about everyone struggling NAOOoooOOOOooo

— nunie (@righteousjorge) September 22, 2015

Hey, if me calling Ellsbury “The Thief” and Chase Headley “The Bum” could in any way turn around their seasons with a week to go and the one-game playoff waiting next Tuesday, I will gladly create a negative name for every player on the team. Though it will be hard to think of one for Dellin Betances and Andrew Miller.

@NeilKeefe I would gladly pay all of chase headleys contract for him to never be seen again #disasteratthird #disasterattheplate

— Phrank (@Hanks_n_Beans) September 23, 2015

I gave Chase Headley the nickname “The Bum” recently because he perfectly fits the description of a “bum.” Well, so does Jacoby Ellsbury, but he’s already “The Thief,” so I have to spread the names around.

I remember the rumors that Headley’s agent started that he had an offer for five years and $65 million on the table. I know this was a rumor and never actually a real offer because his agent wouldn’t have had time to leak this number to the media because Headley would have been signing it as fast as humanly possible. Headley received four years and $52 million from the Yankees because they were desperate for a third baseman and there was nowhere else to turn on the free-agent market. If the team willing to spend the most money needed to fill a position and they gave you one year and $13 million less than you reportedly were offered, well, it never happened.

Headley has been horrible. He hasn’t hit for average, he hasn’t fit for power, he has played some of the worst defense in the league, he has no speed and his throws are wild. Is there an opposite of a five-tool player because that’s what Headley is.

https://twitter.com/Shane_Corey/status/646854052203102208

Joe Girardi definitely had a hand in the Yankees losing the division over the last week-plus when he turned to Triple-A relievers and made questionable decisions in the biggest games of the season. But for as bad as Girardi has been recently and for as much as I have crushed him, there are two real reasons why the Yankees lost the division:

Chris Capuano
The Yankees gave Capuano $5 million to return this season after he pitched to a 4.25 ERA in 65 2/3 innings last year for them (after he was released by the last-place Red Sox on July 1). You know who else got a one-year, $5 million deal? Stephen Drew. (We’ll get to him.) I guess a one-year, $5 million deal is the going rate for pitchers and players that aren’t good and that no one else wants. I’m pretty sure neither of those players was going to get that much money from any other team in baseball.

But it’s not about the money with Capuano. It’s about the fact that he was given three starts in May and lost all of them. And then he was brought into an extra-inning game against the Nationals on June 10 and lost that. And then in his next and what was his last start (to this point), he gave up five earned runs and got only two outs in the first inning in Texas, but luckily, the offense backed him with a 21-run game.

Second Base
All season we had to watch Stephen Drew and Brendan Ryan struggle to get base hits and at times struggle to field despite supposedly playing because of their defense. Everyone in the world had a theory as to why the two were being given unlimited chances to succeed while Rob Refsnyder kept on playing in Triple-A. Eventually, I gave up and just figured there was no chance Refsnyder would be given another chance, even after September call-ups, and had to settle for the idea he would have to win the job in spring training next year (though he should have won the job in spring training this year). Then, with a postseason berth on the line, Refsnyder started a game, and another one and another one and kept on starting. Between Refsnyder against left-handed pitchers (and sometimes against right-handed pitchers) and Dustin Ackley against right-handed pitchers, the Yankees suddenly had an unacceptable Major League platoon and weren’t giving up an out every time that spot came up in the order.

Now Ackley hadn’t been on the team all season and once he was traded to the Yankees at the deadline he instantly went on the disabled list after about 15 minutes. But Refsnyder has been with the organization and wasn’t allowed to play nearly the whole season until the stretch run with the team trying to clinch a playoff spot? How does that make any sense? If the Yankees really wanted him to wait until next season, they would be giving him at-bats here and there over these final weeks to continue to get his feet wet in the majors. But to make him the starting second baseman as part of a platoon with Ackley, while Drew and Ryan continue to sit goes against everything we have been led to believe by the Yankees this season.

Now that #GiveRobTheJob has worked and Capuano no longer hurts the team as a member of the rotation and barely a member of the bullpen, the Yankees are a better team. But they could have been this team all season and because they weren’t, they have to play in the one-game playoff.

Blogs • Yankees

Sep 24, 2015

The One-Game Playoff Survival Kit

I have come up with a survival kit to get through the one-game playoff and the potential letdown of the one-game playoff.

The day that Major League Baseball announced there would be a five-team playoff format with a one-game playoff for the wild card, I began to worry. I knew at some point this new system would backfire and force the Yankees into nerve-racking wild-card situation, and after Wednesday’s 4-0 loss to the Blue Jays, it’s official: the Yankees are going to the one-game playoff.

I have long been afraid of the game that’s going to take place at Yankee Stadium (if the Yankees don’t blow this lead as well) in 12 days. One game to determine the Yankees’ season. One game to decide if they will go on to play the Royals (or Blue Jays if they keep winning) in the ALDS, or if they will go home like the other 10 postseason-less AL teams after playing just one postseason game. If the game is anything like Tuesday and Wednesday in Toronto, I’m not sure if I’ll make it mentally, physically or emotionally. That’s why I have come up with a One-Game Playoff Survival Kit to get through the one-game playoff and the potential letdown of the one-game playoff.

Oxygen Tank and Mask

This is the most important item to have. Between panic attacks and hyperventilating, breathing into a brown paper bag isn’t going to cut it. I figure the one-game playoff will about three hours. That means I will need six 30-minute tanks to get through it. If it goes past three hours, it will probably have gone to extra innings and that means I will probably have passed out, so I won’t need additional tanks.

Bottles of Water

If the Yankees lose the one-game playoff, I plan on going off the grid and into hiding for an extended period of time because the season will be over and the Mets’ postseason won’t have even started yet. Since I don’t plan on leaving my bunker indefinitely, I’m going to need water and a lot of it to stay alive.

Flashlight and Batteries

I would like to think there will be light or electricity wherever I’m hiding, but you never know. Flashlights and batteries are always recommended in planning survival for natural disasters and after blowing an eight-game division lead and losing (if it happens) the one-game playoff, well that’s basically a natural disaster.

Old Cell Phone

I won’t be watching cable or going on the Internet or using technology of any kind and I will be cutting off my connection to the world. However, I might need to make a call here or there in the event of an emergency, so a flip phone that doesn’t have Internet capabilities will work.

Clif Bars

I’m not even sure if I’ve had one of these. If I have, I’ve had only one or part or one or a bite of one. They might taste awful for all I know, but I know they don’t go bad and astronauts eat them in space, so if they’re good enough for space, they’re good enough for me.

Cliff Lee Sad Songs Playlist

There’s a good chance the Yankees face the Astros in the one-game playoff, and if that happens, the Yankees are most likely going to face Dallas Keuchel. In two starts against the Yankees this season, Keuchel is 2-0 with this pitching line: 16 IP, 9 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 21 K. Keuchel is Cliff Lee 2.0 against the Yankees and this means the Astros need to not be in the one-game playoff.

The songs I used to cope with Cliff Lee choosing the Phillies over the Yankees in 2010 will help me deal with another enormous disaster. But once I have let all of the sad emotions run their course, I will need a pick-me-up and that is …

Christmas Music

I’m against listening to Christmas music outside of Christmas season, but Christmas music puts me in the best mood, so I’m all for breaking my own rule to overcome potential heartbreak and devastation.

2009 Yankees World Series DVD

Six years feels like forever. It might as well have been 60 years at this point. The 2010 ALCS loss thanks to Cliff, who should have been a Yankee. The 2011 ALDS loss thanks to no one getting a hit with the bases loaded in Game 5. The 2012 ALCS loss thanks to Mark Teixeira, A-Rod, Curtis Granderson and Nick Swisher. The 2013 and 2014 seasons thanks to injuries. 2009 was a long time ago, so it’s time relive it.

The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty by Buster Olney

Sure, the title sounds depressing, but the book actually takes you through the creation of the most recent Yankees dynasty. And when you’re stuck watching a team that includes Jacoby Ellsbury and Chase Headley, reading about and remembering a better time is necessary.

Alcohol … Any Kind

Beer, wine, whiskey, gin, rum, vodka, tequila, Twisted Tea, wine coolers, you name it and I will be sure to have it in stock to get through this. I have never been someone to just drink a glass of straight whiskey or tequila, but I think that’s going to have to change within the next two weeks.