Stephen Drew – Page 4 – Keefe To The City

Jun 2, 2015

I Still Miss Robinson Cano

Despite his early-season struggles and the eight-plus years and money left on his deal, I still miss want Robinson Cano and wish he were a Yankee.

I never wanted Robinson Cano to leave. I said as much on Dec. 7, 2013 when his signing a 10-year deal with the Mariners became real. Coming off an 85-win postseason-less year, the Yankees let the best player on the team, in his prime, leave for money. Just money. The one thing that is supposed to separate the Yankees from every other team.

Cano left the Yankees after a .314/.383/.516 season in which he hit 27 home runs and 107 RBIs when his protection varied between Travis Hafner, Vernon Wells, Ichiro Suzuki and Lyle Overbay. He left for a 10-year, $240 million offer the Yankees were never going to give him, left the New York City life for the Seattle life and left behind Yankee Stadium for Safeco Field. But what he really left was a big gaping hole at second base and in the middle of the Yankees’ lineup.

Despite missing 14 games total over the previous seven seasons, being a career .309 hitter with four consecutive Silver Sluggers, two Gold Gloves and finishing in the Top 6 in MVP voting in the last four years, the Yankees decided to lowball their homegrown star with a $175 million offer while gladly overpaying Jacoby Ellsbury with $153 million. So instead of Cano continuing to hit third for the Yankees for the next decade, the Yankees turned a Top 5 hitter in the game, the best all-around second baseman in baseball and a Hall of Fame candidate into Ellsbury, Brian McCann and Carlos Beltran.

Since Cano’s departure, second base has been played by Brian Roberts, Brendan Ryan, Yangervis Solarte, Dean Anna, Kelly Johnson, Stephen Drew and Gregorio Petit, a revolving door of reclamation projects and career bench players that have all failed and failed miserably. Roberts was designated for assignment after half a season; Ryan has been hurt and an offensive disaster; Solarte was traded for Brandon McCarthy; Anna may or may not be in baseball anymore (just kidding, he’s playing Triple-A for the Cardinals); Johnson was traded to the Red Sox in a garbage for garbage deal for Drew; Drew hit .150 for the Yankees last year and hasn’t seen .200 this year and hasn’t seen .190 since April 27; Petit was about as good as a 30-year-old with 62 career games entering this season could be. The Yankees remain too scared to permanently put Drew on the bench or move Drew to short and put Didi Gregorius on the bench and let either Jose Pirela or Rob Refsnyder become the full-time second baseman. This is due to stubbornness and also being worried that Drew might find his .253 career average stroke one of these days even if there’s a better chance of finding a section of seats between the bases at the Stadium completely filled.

The Yankees needed and still need Robinson Cano and Robinson Cano needed and still needs the Yankees. Unfortunately, both were too stupid to recognize this with the Yankees worried about pinching their pennies for their superstar and Cano worried about getting every last penny he could in free agency. Financially, both are better off in their current state, with the Yankees continuning to up the price of everything at the Stadium even without Cano at second and Cano making $24 million per year last year, this year and for the next eight years. But from an on-the-field product perspective and from a wins perspective, which is what every decision should be based upon, the Yankees are without their homegrown talent who was born to hit in the Bronx and their homegrown star is struggling for a second year to find his power stroke for a once-again underachieving team which is closer to last place than first place in the AL West.

In a perfect world, the Yankees would all go back to the beginning of the 2013 season and never let Cano hit free agency. They would never offer him a disrespectful $175 million, while gladly opening up the bank and handing a blank check to Jacoby Ellsbury based off one of his six-plus seasons in the league. Cano would be a Yankee right now, would have been one last year, and would continue to be one for the remainder of his career. Brett Gardner and either Martin Prado or Chase Headley could hit in front of him, Alex Rodriguez and Mark Teixeira behind him and either Stephen Drew or Didi Gregorius wouldn’t be on the team. (Just writing it out brought a smile to my face.)

Unfortunately, we don’t live in a perfect world. We live in one where the Steinbrenners and Brian Cashman have made a series of bad decisions based off finances and incorrect talent and scouting evaluations. As a result, we’re left with a Yankees team that is currently first place in a division that will likely be won by a team with a mid-80s win total. It’s not a great Yankees team and compared to other teams in recent years, it’s not even that good, but it’s good enough to win the AL East in a down year, something that AL East hasn’t experienced in forever.

Maybe one day Cano will be back in the Bronx the way Alfonso Soriano made his way back when the Cubs no longer wanted to pay him and the Yankees need a power presence. There will come a day when the Mariners no longer want to pay Cano and with him hitting .246/.290/.337 with two home runs and 16 RBIs, they probably don’t want to pay him now. Maybe that day will come soon when the Mariners need salary relief and the Yankees can do what they should have done all along and pay Cano for the rest of his career.

This week, Cano said, “I would never regret my decision,” but he must and the Yankees must regret theirs. They needed each other and still do. Cano must miss hitting at the Stadium for half the season and the Yankees must miss having the best second baseman in baseball in the middle of their infield and the middle of their lineup. I know I still miss him.

Podcasts • Subway Series • Yankees

Apr 23, 2015

Podcast: JJ Barstool Sports New York

After starting the season 1-4, the Yankees have won eight of their last 11 and are tied for first in the AL East with the first half of the Subway Series up next.

After the six-game homestand to open the season, it looked like the Yankees’ season could unravel before it really even began with a 10-game road trip to Baltimore, Tampa Bay and Detroit. But after starting the season 1-4 and being 3-6 after the first three games of the road trip, the Yankees have won six of their last seven and are tied for first in the AL East with the first half of the Subway Series up next.

JJ of Barstool Sports New York joined me to talk about the state of the Yankees after the first weeks of the season, the problems with the Yankees’ lineup, the hype surrounding the Subway Series and why the Yankees need to put an end to the Mets fans’ happiness this weekend.

Blogs • Yankees

Apr 14, 2015

Joe Girardi Needs to Stop with the Days Off

The Yankees just had six months off, but that hasn’t stopped Joe Girardi from deciding to give all of his everyday players days off in the first week of the season.

Joe Girardi must be stopped. The Yankees manager is out of control with giving his players days off just one week into the season. You would think the Yankees were banged up or undefeated or even at .500 to this point for Girardi to put together a different lineup each game. But no, Girardi has decided that October, November, December, January, February and most of March (I say most because a good part of March consists of playing two innings and then playing golf for the rest of the day) wasn’t enough time off for his under-.500 team coming off back-to-back postseason-less seasons.

Brian McCann played the first game of the season on a Monday, Tuesday was an off day, he played on Wednesday, had Thursday off, played 18 innings on Friday, had Saturday off, played on Sunday and then had Monday off. McCann has played in four of seven games this season. It would be more of an issue if John Ryan Murphy hadn’t been one of the two or three best hitters on the team so far, but why is the $85 million catcher making $17 million playing so little to start the season?

Brett Gardner played the first two games of the season before getting the third game of the Blue Jays series off. Why? Most likely because the Yankees were facing a lefty and I guess Girardi thought it would make the most sense to have his best or second-best all-around player as part of a platoon. (On Monday night in Baltimore, Gardner was hit on the wrist, which eventually forced him out of the games and to have X-rays taken, but not before Girardi let him go to bat unable to swing and bunt in the sixth inning of a tie game at Camden Yards.)

Jacoby Ellsbury played all three games against the Blue Jays and then played all 19 innings on Friday, so he was given Saturday off. Ellsbury is 31 years old and in the second year of a seven-year, $153 million contract and will make $21.1 million this year and $130,511 per game. So why was the player who is making the money that should have gone to Robinson Cano getting the day off after Friday’s long game while older and more injury-prone players played on Saturday?

In the first five games of the season, Chase Headley was 3-for-22 (.136). On Sunday night, he went 3-for-5 with one home run and 3 RBIs. Aside from his game-tying solo home run in the bottom of the ninth on Friday night, it was the first time he has shown any life with the bat in the first week of the season. So why was he on the bench on Monday night?

I didn’t want Stephen Drew on the Yankees last year. I didn’t want the Yankees to sign him to a one-year, $5 million deal this year. I wanted Rob Refsnyder or Jose Pirela to be the second baseman for 2015. I wanted him designated for assignment before the season began and I still want him designated for assignment. In the first five games of the season, Drew was 2-for-17 (.118), including a disastrous 1-for-8 night in the 19-inning game on Friday night. But on Sunday night, he hit a home run and had 2 RBIs. So why was he on the bench on Monday night?

Carlos Beltran has played in every game this season and has started six of the games. In the six games he has started, he has hit third. Beltran is 38 years old and will be 39 next Friday and looks more done than Alfonso Soriano looked last year. I would actually rather have Soriano right now, nearly a year removed from baseball, playing instead of Beltran. I have nicknamed Beltran “Going Through the Motions” for this season as he has shown no signs of life in the field or at the plate where he’s 4-for-28 (.143). I wanted Beltran as much as anyone else after 2013, but his Yankees tenure started nine years too late and has been a disappointment. Maybe instead of giving productive players in their prime days off, it’s time Beltran sits? Or at least take him out of the 3-hole and put him no higher than seventh in the order.

Mark Teixeira got the day off after the 19-inning game most likely because the Yankees were scared of him getting “tired legs” for the second consecutive season for standing around for too long. So who played first base for Teixeira that day after the 19-inning game? Number 13.

A-Rod is 39. He will be 40 in July. He has two surgically repaired hips and since 2011 he has played more than 100 games once (122 in 2012). He has played every game this season. He was pulled in the 11th inning of Friday’s game for a pinch runner that didn’t work out and the Yankees lost their best hitter for the remainder of the game. On either Tuesday or Wednesday against the Orioles, A-Rod will get the day off because the last 18 months off apparently wasn’t enough time off.

The lineup has been improperly constructed for the first seven games and the wrong people have been getting days off. I’m not sure why I thought this season might be different for Girardi when it comes to his excessive resting of his players since it certainly didn’t work the last two seasons.

So who’s going to get the next game off? Whichever Yankee is hitting the best or whichever Yankee is the youngest or most important or making the most money.

Blogs • Yankees

Apr 13, 2015

Yankees-Red Sox Weekend Diary

This weekend we got 37 innings and 13 hours and 26 minutes of baseball and also a 16-minute delay for a power outage and some sloppy and embarrassing play from the Yankees.

There’s nothing like a Yankees-Red Sox series. Even if that series comes in Games 4, 5 and 6 of the season and even if that series features pitching matchups of Nathan Eovaldi-Wade Miley, Adam Warren-Joe Kelly and Mashahiro Tanaka-Clay Buchholz.

The rivalry isn’t what it once was and the current rosters reflect that, but even when the seasons and personnel change, the games remain the same. This weekend we got 37 innings and 13 hours and 26 minutes of baseball and also a 16-minute delay for a power outage.

I decided to go to the diary format that I used for a Yankees-Red Sox series back in July 2012 and a Yankees-Red Sox series back in July 2013 for this past weekend. Just pretend like you’re reading this in one of those black-and-white Mead composition notebooks.

FRIDAY
The Yankees’ Twitter account jumped the gun a little by calling Nathan Eovaldi “Nasty Nate” before ever throwing a pitch on Friday night, and therefore, never having thrown a pitch for the Yankees to that point. Eovaldi ended up lasting 5 1/3 innings, allowed eight hits and three earned runs and striking out just one despite hitting a reported 101 mph on the radar gun, according to YES. A Mets fan friend of mine told me to be nervous that Eovaldi might be the next Mike Pelfrey as a hard-throwing righty that can’t strike anyone out and I dismissed that claim, but now I’m nervous it could be true.

The Yankees once again had one hit through five innings, so I think Joe Girardi made the right decision giving some regulars a day off after an off day on Tuesday and after having October, November, December, January, February and most of March off.

The Red Sox’ might have the best lineup in the AL East and the entire league, but their starting pitching is mediocre and their bullpen is terrible. I’m not sure how so many people can be sold on a team that doesn’t have a pitching staff looking for bounceback seasons or a pitching staff looking to stay healthy, but rather just a pitching staff that is really bad. Red Sox closer Edward Mujica proved he isn’t exactly Koji Uehara, or at least 2013 Koji Uehara, after allowing a two-out home run to Chase Headley in the bottom of the ninth to tie the game before 10 more innings of hard-to-watch baseball. Michael Kay had to go and ruin the moment by saying, “Holy Cow!” as a tribute to Phil Rizzuto in the Yankees’ return to PIX11 and it was as bad as Melissa McCarthy doing Matt Foley on the Saturday Night Live 40th Anniversary Show.

The game lasted 19 innings and there were 578 of pitches thrown and up until the last pitch I still had no idea what home-plate umpire Marty Foster was going to call on each pitch. Throughout extra innings, I kept offering Stephen Drew “Ladies and gentlemen” immunity if he could hit a walk-off home run or even just get a hit, but those thing never came. David Cone described a Stephen Drew foul ball as “probably one of the better swings we’ve seen Drew take.” A foul ball.

All Brian Cashman did this offseason (aside from berate the Yankees’ best player in A-Rod) is tell us how good of a defensive shortshop Didi Gregorius is. And so far, Gregorius has yet to make a play that Derek Jeter wouldn’t have made at 40 and hasn’t done anything with his glove to justify his embarrassing offensive start.

If the Yankees hadn’t decided that it would be a good idea to play second baseman Jose Pirela in center field in a spring training game, in which he got a concussion, then he would be on the Yankees right now and not Gregorio Petit. But playing a future everyday player for your team out of position makes a lot of sense, especially when Reggie Jackson called that player the best hitter in the organization. In 2013, Travis Ishikawa played one game for the Yankees and had two at-bats: a four-pitch strikeout and a three-pitch strikeout. The following year, he won the World Series with the Giants as their starting left fielder. I fully expect Petit to win the World Series somewhere next year.

I’m not sure why Brett Gardner can’t steal bases and I’m not sure how he got picked off by a right-handed knuckleball pitcher or why he was unable to steal against a knuckeball pitcher two different times. I’m also not sure why Jacoby Ellsbury was unable to steal against a knuckleball pitcher.

I don’t get the Yankees’ infatuation with Esmil Rogers. He’s 29 (will be 30 this season) and entered the game with a 5.52 career ERA. Who cares that he throws hard? You know who else throws hard? Nearly every pitcher in the majors and the minors. Find someone else to do his job because he can’t do it.

SATURDAY
This time it was one hit through seven innings for the Yankees. One hit against Joe Kelly. Cone said the Yankees “could tip their hat” to Kelly, which was an awful cop-out for a team that is full of excuses and doesn’t need any more opportunities to give them.

A three-error game for the Yankees to keep their games-with-an-error streak alive at five straight to open the season and bring the season total to 8. Brian Cashman told Mike Francesa on Friday that Rob Refsnyder could play in the majors right now, but that his defense isn’t there yet. If Refsnyder can give this team any additional offense, who cares about his defense? The rest of the team’s defense isn’t good, so why are we worried about the defense of someone who can actually hit?

Brock Holt getting credited with a three-run double that Garrett Jones dropped is an atrocity. Between Brett Gardner falling down in the second inning in left field and Jones not being able to catch a fly ball as a major leaguer is the 2015 Yankees. Forget “Our history. Your tradition.” or “Pride. Power. Pinstripes.” or whatever ridiculous slogan the Yankees try to sell. Let’s go with “Strikeouts. Errors. Pickoffs. Left on base.” for 2015.

SUNDAY
A must-win game in the sixth game of the season. The Yankees couldn’t afford to fall to 1-5 and head to Baltimore where they could easily lose another series or possibly be swept and be starting at a 2-7 or 1-8 record with trips to Tampa Bay and Detroit still go.

When I saw the lineup posted with A-Rod hitting sixth behind Carlos Beltran, Mark Teixeira and Brian McCann I almost threw up. How is the best hitter on the team, entering the game 5-for-18, hitting behind three hitters who have gone 2-for-20, 3-for-16 and 3-for-13?

A-Rod proved once again he is the best hitter on the team and should be the No. 3 hitter with a three-run double in the first inning to break the game open. But Joe Girardi should keep hitting him sixth because that makes a lot of sense.

Of course Beltran went 2-for-4 against the Red Sox’ embarrassing bullpen to bring his average up to .167 (.167! Woo!) since that will be good enough for Girardi to think 38-year-old Carlos “Going Through the Motions” Beltran should continue to be the team’s No. 3 hitter.

Even Stephen Drew hit a home run in the Yankees’ seven-run first inning for the fastest Yankees win over the Red Sox. It doesn’t change the fact that I want him off the team as soon as possible, but it was nice to see that his best swings don’t just result in foul balls.

It was a bad week, actually it was the worst possible week, but it ended well. The bad news is the Yankees are 2-4 and about to start a 10-game road trip. The good news is the hitting and defense can’t get any worse than it has been. At least I don’t think it can.

Blogs • Yankees

Apr 9, 2015

I’m Proud of Joe Girardi for Now

Joe Girardi made me proud in the second game of the season when he decided to not manage his bullpen for a stat, but rather for a win.

I’m proud of Joe Girardi. I don’t say that often, actually I don’t think I’ve ever said it, but I’m proud of him for at least today and it’s because of how he used the bullpen in the Yankees’ first win of 2015.

Sure, I would be even more proud of him if he started using this lineup every game:

1. Jacoby Ellsbury, CF
2. Brett Gardner, LF
3. Alex Rodriguez, DH
4. Brian McCann, C
5. Mark Teixeira, 1B
6. Carlos Beltran, RF
7. Chase Headley, 3B
8. Stephen Drew, 2B
9. Didi Gregorius, SS

But since I know that won’t happen (and the No. 1 reason it won’t happen is because Girardi will likely think his lineup is a winning combination even though the Yankees are 1-1 and not 0-2 because of a bloop double, two hit by pitches, a wild pitch and a double-play ball off a glove), I have to be happy with what I get.

Before the season started, I talked with Chad Jennings of The Journal News and we talked about how it would make the most sense for the 2015 Yankees to not have a closer (it would actually make the most sense for every team to not have a closer). The Yankees are better suited to use Dellin Betances and Andrew Miller in any inning and at any time rather than forcing them to have set innings and in Game 2 of the season we got our first look at what Girardi will do in the late innings of a close game. We joked that Girardi isn’t likely to be the guy that revolutionizes the game of baseball by not having a closer and by using his elite back-end arms in any situation, but then Girardi did just that. (I also talked with former Yankees reliever and setup man Steve Karsay about having set bullpen roles and he talked about relievers wanting to know when they will be used.)

Everyone assumed Betances would be the closer to start the season, but on Wednesday night with Russell Martin, Jose Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion due up, Girardi went to the right-handed Betances for the eighth inning. Two walks, a single, an error, an unearned run and 31 pitches later, the inning was over with the Blue Jays extending their lead to 3-1, but Girardi proved he isn’t scared of changing the way he manages games late.

If that had been a game in June or July, we probably wouldn’t have seen Betances in that spot, but with the Yankees’ offense having trouble scoring runs (two runs in 16 innings when Betances came in) and Girardi desperately not wanting to lose the first two games of the season at home, he went with his assumed closer in the eighth inning of a game the Yankees were trailing by one run and didn’t manage for a stat or a save situation. Sitting in the Stadium I felt a sense of pride overcome me that I imagine is the same feeling a parent has when their child speaks or walks or ties their own shoes for the first time.

Andrew Miller was dominant in the ninth, getting two ground outs and a strikeout for the save in his first appearance as a Yankee and proving the Yankees’ bullpen is the team’s strength and really the only reliable aspect of the entire team. Add in Chris Martin’s scoreless sixth inning and the bullpen’s line through two game is: 8 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 5 BB, 7 K. And if Justin Wilson didn’t do his best Shawn Kelley impression and walk the bases loaded on Opening Day and if Betances had any sort of control on his breaking balls then those numbers would look even better.

When asked about the end of the game, Miller (who impressed me with how intelligent and well-spoken he was in spring training) said, “They’re going to look at the lineup card and try to determine who has what portion of the lineup.”

The logic behind that idea made almost too much sense and I had to read it a few times.

“So it’s just however it falls,” Miller said. “If it had fallen that the eighth inning had been that 6 through 1 section, it would have been me in the eighth and Dellin would have gone out and closed the game.”

It really was a beautiful thing on Wednesday night. Using your best right-handed reliever in a non-save situation to keep a game close, not knowing that you will even come back, because the lineup at the time was right-handed heavy (the Blue Jays don’t even have a left-handed, non-switch hitter on their team)? I almost started crying in my seat the Stadium at the sight of it and they wouldn’t have been winter-weather, freezing-rain, cold-wind induced tears. They would have been tears of joy. Thankfully, I kept it together in front of the other 8,000 people at the game.

The season is only two games old and I would have thought I would be writing the latest Joe Girardi Show column questioning his decisions in the first week of the season rather than praising him for them. I’m not about to say that Giradi is in the clear from criticism because I know the second I do he will name Miller the closer, but for now, I’m on Joe’s side when it comes to the bullpen. Now about that lineup …

Tag: Stephen Drew

I Still Miss Robinson Cano

Podcast: JJ Barstool Sports New York

Joe Girardi Needs to Stop with the Days Off

Yankees-Red Sox Weekend Diary

I’m Proud of Joe Girardi for Now