fbpx

Tag: A.J. Burnett

Blogs • Yankees

May 14, 2014

Subway Series 2014 Diary: Yankee Stadium

The Yankees lost the first two games of the 2014 Subway Series and have now lost six straight to the Mets, so let’s look at what went wrong in the Bronx.

Vidal Nuno

The Rangers overcame a 3-1 series deficit to beat the Penguins and advance to the Eastern Conference finals and the Yankees lost two games in a row at home to the Mets and have now lost six in a row to the Mets going back to last year. Is it 2014? Is this real life?

Two years ago I did a Subway Series Diary for the Yankee Stadium portion of the rivalry to recap what I watched over the three-game series and I said:

I feel weird calling this a diary since I have never had a diary before. I remember in elementary school when we were forced to have a “journal” in one of those black-and-white Mead notebooks.

Well, here we go again.

MONDAY
With the Mets losing eight of their last nine and looking ripe for their annual free fall, I didn’t think there was a chance the 2014 Subway Series could go the way the 2013 Subway Series went. But when Monday started off with Mark Teixeira not being in the lineup due to “fatigue” and “tired legs” and the $23.5 million-per-year and $138,888-per game first baseman said, “I was on the bases a lot this week. Just a little tired. I’ll be fine,” doubt started to creep in. When the Mets took a 1-0 first inning lead and held that lead into the second and the Yankees loaded the bases with no one out only for Kelly Johnson and Brian Roberts to fail to drive a run in, the doubt grew larger. Then Brett Gardner saved Johnson and Roberts by hitting a grand slam to give the Yankees a 4-1 lead and I was relieved that order had been restored in the Subway Series. I thought “The Mets are the Mets” and started to think about winning three of four in the series, if not sweeping the series. And then the seventh inning started.

Alfredo Aceves’ second tour with the Yankees is going about as well as Javier Vazquez’s second tour with the Yankees went. Sure, Alfredo Aceves 2.0 is averaging 9.3 K/9 and 2.8 BB/9, but he’s ruined the last two games he pitched in (he blew Saturday’s game in Milwaukee and Monday’s game) and he’s only pitched in four games (he did pitch 5 1/3 scoreless innings against Tampa Bay on May 4 and maybe that’s the sign the Yankees need to put him in the rotation). But Aceves wasn’t the only wrong button that Joe Girardi pushed with a 7-5 lead and nine outs to go in the game. Here are the lines for the bullpen:

Alfredo Aceves: 0.2 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 2 K

Matt Thornton: 0.2 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 0 K

Preston Claiborne: 1.2 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 3K

Everyone loves to praise Girardi for how he uses his relievers and how he manages their workloads (he did a great job giving Mariano Rivera extended rest in his final season last year, so he could throw pitches to WFAN’s Craig Carton this week at Yankee Stadium), but Girardi’s biggest bullpen problem this season hasn’t necessarily been managing workloads as much as it has been determining who should pitch when. It’s not completely his fault since the entire league has dictated the idea of set bullpen roles, so that someone like David Robertson can no longer be the escape artist he once was when it comes to escaping jams for others. Because Robertson is the closer, he can now only escape his own jams. And that’s why Robertson was standing in the bullpen on Monday night ready to enter the game, but because it wasn’t the ninth inning and because the Yankees weren’t winning or the game wasn’t tied, he stayed in the bullpen watching the 2014 version of The Goof Troop light the game on fire like my great grandmother burning her trash in the backyard as if it were no big deal. If there are going to be set bullpen roles (and there are), then David Robertson pitches the ninth, Dellin Betances pitches the eighth and Girardi can mix and match the other innings and outs with his binder. That is the only acceptable pecking order after six weeks.

Even after watching the bullpen punch out early and after giving up nine runs, the Yankees had a chance to tie the game in the ninth with Derek Jeter on first with one out for pinch hitter … Mark Teixeira!

“All year long, they looked to him to light the fire, and all year long, he answered the demands, until he was physically unable to start tonight — with two bad legs.”

That’s how Vin Scully started his famous call of Kirk Gibson’s 1988 World Series home run and I thought Michael Kay might start to rattle something similar off, not because Kay likes to overdo it with drama more than any other baseball play-by-play man (which he does), but because it was nearly a miracle that hours after taking a seat on the bench due to tired legs, Mark Teixeira was hitting in the ninth.

And Teixeira got the job done with a single to right to put the tying run on base and the winning run at the plate in Brian McCann. But then McCann hit into the predictable game-ending double play and the Subway Series picked up right where it left off last May.

TUESDAY
For someone fighting for their job, Vidal Nuno basically did the equivalent of showing up to work an hour late wearing shorts and a T-shirt, streaming Netflix in your cube, taking a two-hour lunch, scrolling through Facebook pictures for the remainder of the post-lunch day and then accidentally forwarding an email containing a pornographic link to a company-wide list at 4:02 p.m. before leaving for the day. Nuno was given a golden opportunity to make a case that he could be a reliable starter in the rotation and replace Ivan Nova this year and also to throw his name in the mix for a spot in the rotation next year when Hiroki Kuroda leaves or if Nova still isn’t health. But Nuno has followed up every promising start with an A.J. Burnett-like egg and if it weren’t for CC Sabathia also landing on the disabled list, Nuno would probably be getting his seat back in the bullpen. Here is how Nuno has done over the last three weeks since joining the rotation:

April 20 at TB: 5 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 6 K

April 26 vs. LAA: 4.1 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 4 K

May 2 vs. TB: 4.2 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 3 BB, 2 K

May 7 at LAA: 6.1 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 3 K

May 13 vs. NYM: 3.1 IP, 4 H, 7 R, 5 ER, 4 BB, 1 K

Sean Henn would have been proud of Nuno’s performance on Tuesday night, letting the Mets hang a 4-spot before the Yankees could even bat for the first time and then continuing to let the Mets add on to their lead with the offense trying to erase the deficit. The problem isn’t just Nuno, it’s that the Yankees needed two starters to replace Nova and Michael Pineda and Nuno and David Phelps have proven to be coin flips in their short stints in the rotation. And now the problem is even bigger with Yankees asking Chase Whitley to take CC Sabathia’s spot in the rotation on Thursday. The last time someone named Chase started a game for the Yankees, I was sitting at Fenway Park wondering if I wanted to watch baseball ever again.

After watching Aceves blow Saturday’s game and then Monday’s game, there he was again on Tuesday being called upon to stop the bleeding and give the offense a chance to get back in the game and there he was again ruining a game. Aceves gave up four earned runs in 1 2/3 innings before handing off the ball to Matt Daley, who actually did his job this time after taking part in the April 19 disaster in Tampa Bay.

Standing between a four-game losing streak and a seven-game Subway Series losing streak is Masahiro Tanaka and I’m happy he’s standing there. Right now, Tanaka’s not only the one Yankees’ starter who can be trusted, he’s the only Yankees’ starter who can win.

Read More

Blogs • Yankees

Feb 13, 2014

The Derek Jeter Five Stages of Grief

This isn’t goodbye to Derek Jeter. It’s the preparation for the goodbye.

I thought the day Cliff Lee chose the Phillies over the Yankees would be the worst day of my life, but I was wrong. It’s this. And the only reason I thought the day Lee chose the Phillies over the Yankees would be worse is because I thought this day would never happen. But like a kid watching the summer wind down with the inevitability of the school year approaching, this day was going to come.

And when I was a kid watching the summer wind down, Derek Jeter was the shortstop of the Yankees. On April 2, 1996, I was in Miss Ryan’s fourth-grade class when Jeter hit a home run on Opening Day on his first day as the Yankees’ starting shortstop. Fourth grade. I’m now 27. So Jeter’s career spanned elementary school, middle school, junior high, high school, college and now the first five-plus years after college of my life. And during these 18 years, Jeter has kept getting penciled in as the starting shortstop of the Yankees every day in April to October of every year.

In the last 25 months, the Core Four has become just Derek Jeter and in eight-plus months, there won’t be a connection to the ’90s dynasty on the team unless you count Joe Girardi. After the 2014 season, there will never be another Yankee to wear a single-digit number aside from during Old-Timers’ Day.

Derek Jeter is going to retire at the end of the season and leave behind baseball and a whole generation of fans that have come to expect him to be the starting shortstop every day of every summer. So to cope with this, I have turned to the Five Stages of Grief to help me analyze and get through this devastating news in hopes that come October, I will be prepared to move on and accept Mark Teixeira ushering in the next chapter of Yankees baseball. Hang on … Sorry I just threw up in my mouth.

DENIAL
Sometimes I forget that Derek Jeter is 39 and isn’t a 24-year-old shortstop anymore the same way I forget that Eddie Vedder is going to be 50 this December and won’t be climbing a three-story beam to stage dive off of during “Porch” (but I’m happy settling for him swinging on a light fixture to “Porch” like he did in October). And that’s because sometimes I forget that I’m 27 now.

Jorge Posada left and everything was fine. Andy Pettitte left and came back and left again and came back again and is now leaving again and everything will be fine. I got a taste of what life without Mariano Rivera would be like in 2012 after his knee injury, so I am prepared to accept “Sweet Home Alabama” over “Enter Sandman” in the ninth inning at the Stadium. But last year was the first time I was forced to watch the Yankees without Derek Jeter for a very extended period of time and it was weird. There was comfort knowing that he would be back and wasn’t gone forever, but now that there is an actual countdown clock on his career and not just an estimate, it changes everything.

ANGER
When you find out that your favorite player and the last sports icon from your childhood is leaving for business and philanthropy work it doesn’t seem fair. I think Jesse Katsopolis summed it up perfectly in the 1994 Full House episode when following Papouli’s death he said, “I’m so helpless. It’s like if I could have been there, I could have done something. I could have helped him.” I just need Lori Loughlin here to tell me, “There was nothing that you could do. There was nothing that any of us could do.” Since really, Derek Jeter was always going to leave the Yankees and baseball on his own terms.

It’s hard to be angry at Jeter considering at 39 and turning 40 in June, he plays a position that no one plays at his age. No one. When he won the World Series in 2009 as a 35-year-old shortstop, everyone thought that was bananas and I’m sure it led to computers like Carmine to crash, but Jeter has defied odds and logic his entire career and has risen to the occasion and created fairytale-esque stories for every big moment he has been a part of. Whether it was hitting a home run on Opening Day in 1996 or hitting the ball that Jeffrey Maier would pull in or the 2000 World Series or the Flip Play or becoming Mr. November or the catch and dive into the stands or the 3,000th hit day or something as simple as ending the Yankees’ right-handed home run drought last season, Jeter has always done everything in a way that Disney or ABC Family would find too over-the-top and fake life to build a movie storyline around.

BARGAINING
There isn’t really anything for me to bargain with about this unless the Baseball Gods want to take Eduardo Nunez from me instead and force him into retirement. I mean the Baseball Gods have already done me enough favors by having Nick Swisher leave for Cleveland, having A.J. Burnett get traded to Pittsburgh, having Phil Hughes sign with Minnesota, having Boone Logan sign with Colorado and having A-Rod suspended for an entire season to free up $25 million. So I guess letting Robinson Cano leave for Seattle and Jeter retire after two decades makes it all equal.

While awful, the announcement was actually timed perfectly for everyone. For Jeter, it gives the media a firm date for when he will leave the game, so he doesn’t have to answer relentless questions about his contract or how many years he wants to play for and the status of his health. For the Yankees, it gives them time to plan for the future and how they will draft, acquire or sign their first new everyday shortstop in 20 years (and it also gives them time to cash in on all the farewell merchandise and apparel, which I’m sure has Randy Levine dancing around his home to “Shout” in Risky Business-like attire while spraying champagne all over his furniture). And for the fans, it gives them time to plan a trip to the Stadium this summer to see Jeter and not be taken by surprise with a postseason retirement announcement without one last in-person memory of Number 2.

DEPRESSION
Thanks for those who sent the sympathy texts, emails and tweets and also to those who sent the “Get Well Soon” cards.

You’re supposed to keep busy during this period so I have been watching The Wire every free second I have and thankfully there’s Team USA’s quest for the gold medal to watch and look forward to. And the Rangers will be back in a couple weeks and then there’s March and March Madness and nice weather not too far away. See, everything is going to be fine. I’m going to be fine. It’s going to be fine.

ACCEPTANCE
We are a long way from this. I’m talking years. Maybe one day when I have kids of my own and they have a favorite Yankee (sorry, Brittni, they won’t be Dodgers fans), maybe then I will learn to accept that Derek Jeter isn’t a Yankee. The more concerning thing is if this is how I feel after he announces his retirement, how will I feel once he actually retires? Hopefully I have more than eight months to find out.

The good thing about this announcement is that it isn’t goodbye, yet. I wanted to write something about this announcement because I felt it made sense to, but I didn’t want it to drag on in a 5,000-word sappy goodbye letter. But don’t worry, I will have those 5,000 words (at least) in October. I will save my best and most deserving goodbye for Jeter when he actually leaves. It will be way more over the top than the ones I gave to Jorge Posada in January 2012 and Andy Pettitte this past October and the one I plan on giving to Mariano Rivera prior to Opening Day and the first year without Number 42 in the bullpen.

For now, I will soak it all in. Every walk-up to the plate with Bob Sheppard’s voice pouring out of the Stadium and echoing onto River Ave. for everyone at The Dugout and Billy’s and Bald Vinny’s House of Tees to hear. Every immediate glove wave to Section 203 before the first “DER-EK JE-TER” of roll call can even be completed. Every boo (or now appreciate applause) he receives on the road. Every Boston fan wearing a “Jeter Drinks Wine Coolers” or “Jeter Sucks A-Rod” shirt. Every emphatic clap while standing on first or second after a big hit. Every over-the-top first pump in the field after the game-ending play. Everything. And then when that final game comes, I will be ready to say goodbye.

Read More

Blogs

Dec 24, 2013

My Christmas Wish List

I won’t be getting playoff football this year, so that means I will have to ask for some other things this Christmas.

When I put together my Christmas list for this year, I didn’t bother to ask for anything to do with the New York Football Giants. At 6-9, their season has been lost since their Week 12 loss to the Cowboys and this season marks the fourth time in five years the Giants won’t play in the postseason.

After reaching the playoffs in each of the first four years of Eli Manning’s career as the full-time starting quarterback (2005-08), the Giants’ lone playoff trip since their loss in the 2008 divisional round as the No. 1 seed was in 2011 when they won the Super Bowl. I’m very grateful for the two Super Bowls since 2007 and that Eli Manning and Tom Coughlin prevented Tom Brady and Bill Belichick from being 5-0 in the Super Bowl and football immortality as the best quarterback-coach combination in history. But at this time of the year with the Cowboys and Eagles playing for the NFC East title and the Bears, Packers, Panthers, Saints, Seahawks, 49ers, Cardinals, Patriots, Dolphins, Bengals, Ravens, Steelers, Colts, Broncos, Chiefs and Chargers all playing for something this Sunday, it’s not fun being on the outside looking in.

Yes, it’s another Week 17 of wondering what could have been, but I’m not going to let the Giants ruin Christmas since they already ruined October and November (the Yankees ruined September). And if I can’t have playoff football this year, which I can’t, then this is what I want.

Something That Resembles A Starting Rotation That Can Compete In the AL East
If it seems like I have asked for that before, it’s because I have. Back in 2010, I asked for the same exact thing after the Yankees lost out on Cliff Lee and I was staring at a potential rotation of CC Sabathia, Phil Hughes, A.J. Burnett, Ivan Nova and at the time no one else. (That’s right, Phil Hughes, coming off an 18-win season, was going to be the Yankees’ No. 2 starter.) Thankfully Bartolo Colon decided to get some “help” and Freddy Garcia reinvented himself and the Yankees won 97 games and the AL East before the heart of the order went missing in a five-game series loss to the Tigers in the ALDS.

So far this offseason the Yankees have signed Jacoby Ellsbury, Brian McCann, Carlos Beltran and Brian Roberts and lost Robinson Cano to the Mariners. The November 2013 Yankees are better than the September 2013 Yankees were and are better in theory than the 2013 Yankees were ever going to be at their healthiest point. But the rotation is still a problem just like it was at this time last year and the year before that.

The best free-agent options for the rotation are Matt Garza, Ervin Santana, Ubaldo Jimenez, Bronson Arroyo, Paul Maholm and …. wait for it …. wait for it …. wait for it … A.J. Burnett! The only one of these six options I would be OK with would be Garza, but even then he’s going to command (and receive) a ridiculous contract in this market for someone who has a career .500 record (67-67), a 3.84 ERA and has started only 42 games over the last two years.

Brian Cashman said going into this winter that he was going to have to find 400 innings from somewhere and I don’t think the Yankees are going to sign one of the “top” free agents just because they are the best available right now like they would have in the past with Carl Pavano or Jaret Wright or Burnett. That means that “somewhere” will likely be from within the organization and some combination of the current favorites Michael Pineda, David Phelps and Adam Warren. Unless, the Yankees can give me the next thing on my list …

Cliff Lee
Yes, three years later I’m still asking for Cliff Lee. I don’t need to explain it. Just read this. But since Lee isn’t exactly realistic, I will ask for someone who is …

Masahiro Tanaka
I know nothing about Masahiro Tanaka other than from searching “Masahiro Tanaka” on YouTube and watching a video titled “Best of Mashahiro Tanaka” that is synced to what sounds like nearly four minutes of an instrumental version of a song by The Offspring. But I’m going to guess that the only knowledge most North American “experts” who talk about how good Tanaka is happens to be this same exact video. No one knows for sure how Tanaka’s Japanese success will translate to the majors and given the history of highly coveted Japanese pitchers coming to North America, there’s a better chance that Tanaka will be more like Daisuke Matsuzaka than Yu Darvish. But as long as he’s not Kei Igawa (I haven’t typed that name in so long), I’ll take him.

2013-14 Henrik Lundqvist To Be 2011-12 Henrik Lundqvist
Since signing his seven-year extension, Henrik Lundqvist is 2-4-2. I’m not sure if you want your franchise player, who you recently locked up through 2020-21 to be saying he “kind of expected” that a rookie backup would be starting in place of him for the second consecutive game and night. And after recording two wins and allowing just two goals combined in 48 hours, I’m not sure that Alain Vigneault is necessarily going to go back to Lundqvist over Cam Talbot on Friday night in Washington.

Lundqvist has admitted to over-anticipating plays and being jumpy and it has shown this season. While it’s hard to fault him for a five-goal loss to the Islanders on Friday night when you consider they were getting shorthanded breakaways and odd-man rushes left and right, he isn’t bailing out the team that way he used to. And because Lundqvist isn’t bailing out his team the way he used to, it brings me to the next thing I’m asking for …

A New Rangers Defense
I asked for this last because this is going to be the most unrealistic of them all. It would be like asking for Xbox One and PlayStation 4 this year.

Since 2008-09, the Rangers’ problem has been scoring goals, but now with Lundvist struggling and having a down year so far, preventing goals is even more of a problem. And if Lundqvist is going to be more human-like than King-like this season, the Rangers aren’t going anywhere because they don’t have the defense (especially with Marc Staal injured) many thought they did. Through the first 46 percent of the season, Lundqvist hasn’t been bailing out the incompetence of the Rangers defense the way he has through his entire career. But rather than focus on his entire career, let’s focus on since 2011-12 when the current Rangers defensive core started to become the foundation of the defense.

We all know that I don’t think the 2011-12 Rangers were worthy of the Eastern Conference’s No. 1 seed or as close as “two wins away from the Stanley Cup Final” as they technically were. They earned the top seed and won two series in Game 7 before losing the Devils in six because of Henrik Lundqvist. Not because of their offense and certainly not because of their defense. Lundqvist made everyone believe Dan Girardi was an All-Star and that Michael Del Zotto could be trusted in his own zone the same way Sidney Crosby has made everyone believe Chris Kunitz is some kind of superstar despite his career season-high in goals being 26 and now as a linemate of Number 87, he has 20 goals in just 39 games.

Prior to Lundqvist signing an extension, there was a worrying sense that overpaying Lundqvist would cost the Rangers a chance at re-signing Girardi this offseason. But right now I’m not sure anyone would want to sign Girardi. When he’s not falling down or giving the puck away, he’s busy scoring goals against his team, a stat which he must lead the league in by at least 15.

As for Del Zotto, it’s pretty obvious his time with the Rangers is dwindling. When the Rangers beat the Maple Leafs on Monday night at the Garden, I watched Del Zotto intently as the Rangers saluted from center ice and wondered if Del Zotto was thinking it could be one of the last times he would salute the MSG crowd. If it is, the Rangers will be a better team.

Merry Christmas!

Read More

Blogs • KTTC Classics • Yankees

Sep 25, 2013

I Believe CC Sabathia Because I Have To

CC Sabathia’s 13 losses are a big reason the Yankees won’t be playing in October, but he promises to be back in 2014.

The Yankees had to give CC Sabathia an extension. Coming off a 19-8 season with a 3.00 ERA in 2011 and 59-23 record with a 3.18 ERA in his first three seasons with the Yankees, he had been the first free-agent pitcher to truly live up to his hype and billing during the Brian Cashman era (unless you consider Mike Mussina the first to, which I don’t). Even if he was the biggest reason (aside from the runners in scoring position debacle) the Yankees lost to the Tigers in five games in the ALDS, the team had to re-sign him.

If Sabathia had opted out and signed somewhere else, the Yankees rotation entering 2012 would have been A.J. Burnett (thankfully he was eventually traded), Ivan Nova and Phil Hughes and who knows who else since Hiroki Kuroda had yet to sign and Andy Pettitte was still retired. Just a year after we were believed to be looking at a rotation of Sabathia, Cliff Lee, Pettitte, Burnett and Hughes before Lee ruined the Christmas season, if the Yankees didn’t extend Sabathia, they would have most likely had the worst rotation in the American League and I would have had to dust off the Cliff Lee Sad Songs Playlist.

The season after getting that extra year worth $25 million in 2016 and the $25 million vesting option for 2017, Sabathia started 28 games, his lowest total since 2006 (when he also started 28), posted his highest ERA since 2005 with 3.38, won his fewest amount of games since 2006 with 15 and allowed the most home runs in a season in his career despite the missed starts. He bounced back in the postseason by beating the Orioles in Games 1 and 5 of the ALDS (17.2 IP, 12 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 3 BB, 16 K), but then looked 2007 ALDS Chien-Ming Wang against the Tigers in Game 4 of the ALCS (3.2 IP, 11 H, 6 R, 5 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, 2 HR). Still there wasn’t any reason to be worried about the Yankees’ ace since.

And there wasn’t any reason to be worried even when the Red Sox beat him on Opening Day since he had been beaten up by the Orioles on Opening Day in 2009, the Red Sox in 2010 and the Rays in 2012. Three starts later, Sabathia was 3-1 with a 2.57 ERA, the Yankees had a 1.5-game lead in the AL East and everything seemed to be going according to the plan the way it had the previous four seasons with Sabathia at the front of the rotation. Even when he entered his final start of the “first half” with a 9-7 record and 3.99 ERA, Sabathia was going to go on his “second half” run after the break because that’s what he does.

But then the Twins torched him in that final start (4 IP, 8 H, 8 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, 1 HR), in the most embarrassing loss of the season, the Red Sox lit him up in his first start after the break (5 IP, 9 H, 7 R, 7 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, 2 HR), the Rays knocked him around five days later (5 IP, 9 H, 7 R, 7 ER, 3 BB, 6 K), and the Padres (the Padres!!!) roughed him up six days after that (5.2 IP, 11 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 3 BB, 4 K, 1 HR). After losing to the Padres on Aug. 2, Sabathia was 9-10 with a 4.78 ERA and the Yankees were just 12-11 in games started by him. Five days later he later the White Sox creep back from a 4-1 deficit to make it 4-3 in the eventual double blown save game. The day after that I wrote that the Yankees’ season was over.

Sabathia won’t pitch again in 2013 and rightfully so. There’s no point in running $76 million of guaranteed money out there to face the Astros in an exhibition game when it’s likely that he’s only one of two returning current starting pitchers in 2014. And because only Sabathia and Ivan Nova are likely to return to the rotation next season, it’s important, no it’s imperative that CC Sabathia return to the 2009-2012 CC Sabathia or something pretty freaking close to it to avoid a chase for the second wild-card spot a year from now.

Sabathia finished the 2013 season at 14-13 with a 4.78 ERA and somehow won five of his final eight starts despite pitching to a 4.94 ERA over that span. He won’t pitch again in a real, meaningful game until April 2 in Houston on Opening Day 2014, when he will earn the same nearly $700,000 he earned per start in this lost season. But even though a little over six months separate Sabathia and the bottom of the first inning in Houston that doesn’t mean he isn’t already thinking about finding himself on the mound or finding a new way to be successful on the mound and he talked about it on Tuesday. Let’s analyze what Sabathia had to say about his 2013 season and what he expects in 2014.

On it being hard to make adjustments.

“Yeah, it is (difficult). It’s me being stubborn, too, and not wanting to change and thinking that I’ve got stuff figured out. It was a lot of different things. Of course, you want to have more time to work on things, especially when you’re trying to change things in your delivery. I’ll have the whole offseason to work on my throwing and my mechanics and be back right.”

I’m not sure “stubborn” is powerful enough for a starting pitcher who rejects change and midseason adjustments while losing 13 games. Sabathia was asked to carry the team (along with Robinson Cano) through injuries and earn his $23 million, but he failed to do so. At least he has an extra month to work on his mechanics! So I guess it’s a good thing the Yankees won’t be playing in October!

On if he can return to being a dominant pitcher.

“I don’t think I’m ever going to be that same guy again. I’m 33 this year, but pitching against San Francisco the other night, I felt like back to myself more so than any other start. It wasn’t velocity — I was 90 to 93 — but just pitching inside, being aggressive, throwing fastballs in hitters’ counts. Just going out there and being a bully. That’s something I feel like I was before and kind of lost that this year.”

The Giants suck. You know this, right? They haven’t seen .500 since June 24 and are 24th in runs score in MLB, 29th in home runs and 27th in slugging percentage. Being a “bully” against the Giants shouldn’t make you feel like yourself. It’s the Giants! The Giants!

“I feel like at certain times, I kind of fell in the same pattern, pitching the same way. Hitters watch video and they know what to expect out of me, so it’s only right for me to do the same thing. … I’ve always been a guy that never watched video and that’s something that I need to change.

You mean guys like Mike Napoli? Yeah, I would say watching video might be something you want to change if it’s going to result in career .258 hitters like Mike Napoli turning into Manny Ramirez vs. Andy Pettitte (36-for-92, five home runs, 23 RBIs) against you.

On changing the way he prepares for games.

“My preparation for games probably needs to get a little better in that way. That’s something me and Larry talked about, and going forward will be better.”

At what point did you and Larry talk about changing your preparation? Was it before or after (or possibly during) your winless six-game stretch from July 9 to Aug. 9 (36 IP, 49 H, 33 R, 28 ER, 12 BB, 27 K, 7 HR)? I’m going to hope it was sometime after this since losing to the Royals, Twins, Rays and Padres and picking up no-decisions against the Red Sox and White Sox over the course of 31 days isn’t a good look for the “ace” of the staff. Even Phil Hughes can shake his head at that disappointing stretch, which helped ruin the Yankees’ season.

On what went wrong this season.

“I’m just talking about going out and pitching like I did the other day (against the Giants). Grinding games out. That’s something I feel like I didn’t do a good job of this year. Getting runners on base and being able to get a double play. Giving up a run or two, and being able to shut the inning off. I feel like I gave up too many big innings and big situations. We come out and score a couple of runs off a tough pitcher, and I come back and give the lead right back. That’s stuff that I didn’t do, or I don’t do, and it happened this year. I think that’s what I say when I talk about coming back and being right.”

I would have to say I trust Sabathia the least when it comes to pitching a shutdown inning right after the Yankees get on the board. It got so frustrating this season watching him give up leads or increase deficits that actually became funny. It became funny because it got to the point that all you could do was laugh as CC built picket fences on the scoreboard for the opposition, put the Yankees in early holes and blew late leads. I’m just glad he realizes what he was doing and didn’t just go to into A.J. Burnett “Eff It” mode when things unraveled even if it looked like he went into that mode.

On what will change in 2014.

“I think I’ll be back to myself. I know a lot of people have written me off and said I’ve thrown too many innings and whatever, whatever, but I’ll still be here and still be accountable and still be the guy that signed up in 2009.”

That quote made me go back and watch CC Sabathia’s press conference from December 2008 when he was introduced with A.J. Burnett 10-plus months before they would help end the eight-year World Series drought. And in that press conference CC said, “I want the ball every day if they’ll give it to me.” There was a time when I wanted him to have the ball every day. If he holds true to his promise, I will want him to have the ball every day next season.

Read More

Blogs • Yankees

Mar 25, 2013

Welcome Back, Chien-Ming Wang

Once upon a time Chien-Ming Wang saved the Yankees and now he’s back with the organization.

Since I was seven years old, the Yankees have missed the playoffs once: 2008. I refer to that year as the Year Without October the way I refer to the 2004 baseball season as the Season That Never Happened. (There was a strike that season and no games were played. Don’t you remember?)

I remember the 2008 Yankees for being miserable and making my summer miserable. And because I relate specific years to how that Yankees season went, when I hear “2008,” I think, “That’s the year I graduated from college and the year the Yankees ruined my summer” and sometimes I think of those two things in reverse order. (OK, I always think of them in reverse order, but I didn’t think it would be a good look to put the Yankees ahead of college graduation.) The truth is that the 2008 Yankees didn’t suck and weren’t even bad. And given their circumstances they were actually pretty good.

That Yankees team went 89-73, which would have been enough to play in a one-game playoff if they were in the AL Central and would have been enough to win the NL West by five games. Their 89 wins were the fourth most in the AL and more than the 2000 Yankees had (87-75) and that team won the AL East by 2 ½ games and won the World Series. But the 2008 Yankees ended the run of 13 straight playoff appearances and because of that I remember them as a failure even if they really weren’t.

That season the rotation featured Darrell Rasner and Sidney Ponson for 35 combined starts. Andy Pettitte posted career worsts in losses (14) and ERA (4.54) pitching through injuries the entire year in the only .500 season of his 17-year career. Jorge Posada didn’t play in one game in May and played in his last game of the year on July 19. Jose Molina had 297 plate appearances, Chad Moeller had 103 and Ivan Rodriguez had 101. Pettitte, Posada, Jonathan Albaladejo, Wilson Betemit, Chris Britton, Brian Bruney, Joba Chamberlain, Johnny Damon, Dan Giese, Phil Hughes, Jeff Karstens, Ian Kennedy, Hideki Matsui and Alex Rodriguez all landed on the disabled list at least once. LaTroy Hawkins was in the bullpen and so were Billy Traber, Jose Veras and Edwar Ramirez. Richie Sexson got to put on pinstripes. So like I said, “Given their circumstances, they were actually pretty good.”

Even during the Murphy’s Law season with all of those things happening during the same year in which the Yankees cared more about Jobamania and his transformation from the best setup man since 1996 Mariano Rivera to starter (which became a circus), the season really ended on June 15 in the sixth inning at Minute Maid Park.

The season ended when Chien-Ming Wang and his .000 career on-base percentage reached base on a fielder’s choice after a failed sacrifice bunt attempt and suffered a lisfranc injury running home on his way to scoring his first career run. The Yankees won that game 13-0 and Wang earned his second-to-last win as a Yankee to this day (the other coming on June 28, 2009 against the Mets), improving to 8-2 on the year with a 4.07 ERA.

To that point in the season, Wang had averaged 6 1/3 innings per start in 15 starts and the Yankees were 12-3 in games he started.  He had won 19 games in both 2006 and 2007 and looked to be a lock for that number again in 2008. With the win over the Astros he improved to 54-20 in five seasons with the Yankees and had become the “ace” of their staff even if Chris Russo strongly believed otherwise.

(To me, Wang was an “ace” during the regular season where his heavy sinker worked the majority of the time over 33 starts. But come postseason time when you didn’t know if Wang’s sinker would sink or not, he was a disaster when it didn’t. He didn’t have strong enough secondary pitches to get outs and would be stubborn on the mound trying to find the sinker because he had to be stubborn about it. He couldn’t really grind his way through starts without his pitch and because of it I consider him a “regular-season ace.” His playoff numbers would consider him that too: 4 GS, 1-3, 7.58 ERA, 19 IP, 28 H, 19 R, 16 ER, 5 HR, 5 BB, 7 K, 1.737 WHIP. The same pitcher who allowed nine home runs in 116 1/3 innings in 2005, 12 home runs in 218 innings in 2006 and nine home runs in 199 1/3 innings in 2007 somehow allowed five in just 19 postseason innings. “Regular-season ace.”)

The Yankees missed the playoffs by six games in 2008 with Rasner and Ponson starting 22 percent of the season and with Dan Giese, Brian Bruney, Carl Pavano and Kei Igawa also getting starts. Six games ended up separating the Yankees from the Red Sox for the wild card (and eight games separated the Yankees from the Rays for the division). You can’t tell me Chien-Ming Wang wouldn’t have made up that difference if he hadn’t been injured. He would have.

Wang saved the 2005 season (along with Robinson Cano’s emergence, Tino Martinez emptying the tank and Jason Giambi turning back the clock or possibly reverting to undetectable performance-enhancing drugs). Wang picked up the only win in the 2006 ALDS against the Tigers (Game 1) and from April 30, 2005 until June 15, 2008 (minus the two months he missed in 2005), he was the closest thing the Yankees had to a guaranteed win every five days before CC Sabathia came to town.

I eventually got used to Wang’s painfully slow windup and let the way he curved his hat go because when you win those things become trademarks and cool and mimicked by others. There isn’t any young baseball player trying to mirror A.J. Burnett’s herky-jerky, inconsistent windup. At least I hope there isn’t. (If A.J. Burnett used Wang’s windup or curved his hat the way Wang did, I would have had enough material for at least three or four more columns from 2009-2011. That’s the difference between winning and losing.)

But if I’m going to mention his 55 wins with the Yankees and his calm and collected demeanor and his victory in Game 1 of the 2006 ALDS then I’m afraid I’m going to have to mention how he single-handedly lost the 2007 ALDS with this majestic pitching line for two games: 5.2 IP, 14 H, 12 R, 12 ER, 4 BB, 2 K, 3 HR, 3.174 WHIP. With that WHIP, Wang essentially loaded the bases every inning he was on the mound in Games 1 and 4 on his way to a 19.06 ERA for the series, which I thought would never be touched, but Phil Hughes made a run at those numbers with his 2010 ALCS performance against the Rangers. (I won’t put his numbers here for fear of having a nervous breakdown remembering that series, knowing it could have ended differently if Hughes had just been atrocious and not disastrous.) And also 2009 when Wang was supposed to be the Yankees’ No. 2 start, but instead was the worst statistical pitcher in Yankees history.

During the last half of the aughts, when Brian Cashman was trading for a 41-year-old Randy Johnson, giving $39.95 million contract to Carl Pavano and $21 million to Jaret Wright, begging a 45-year-old Roger Clemens to unretire and make 17 starts for the Yankees for $28 million and paying $26 million for the rights to give $20 million to Kei Igawa, Chien-Ming Wang was busy winning 68 percent of his starts for the Yankees while being grossly underpaid.

Wang is back where it all began on a minor-league deal with the Yankees that will have him start the season in Triple-A, a place that five years ago you never thought he would never have to pitch again unless it was a rehab start. When asked about Wang’s return to the team, Joe Girardi said, “He was a very good pitcher for the New York Yankees.” But he’s wrong. For four seasons, he was the best pitcher for the New York Yankees.

So welcome back, Chien-Ming Wang. You were never thanked for what you did. Here’s to hoping you get the chance to do some more.

Read More