N.Y. YANKEES ~ ChiSox, Jeter and Hughes...Oh No!

From the desk of:  BLAME CARLOS MAY


new york YANKEES:  Getting Dusted With White Sox.
Chalk one up for the Front Office.  On tap, more woe courtesy of the relief pitcher Brian Cashman didn't want.  Rafael Soriano coughed up another game for the Bombers.  But he's looking really bad doing it; if not despondent.  But they say that's just him.  Ok then,   ....Uh Oh!

I guess pitching out of roll for relievers fails to trigger something in their brains that doesn't spark the appropriate chemical releases.  It seems former closers acquired to be Eighth Inning Men for another teams can't, or don't usually make the conversion.... Or shall we call it, the demotion?  While on the one-hand a team looks at such an acquisition as enhancing their bullpen,  the acquired pitcher sees it as a personal demotion from his former Alpha-Bullpen role.  It is what it is.  Just remember, Cashman didn't want him.

Paul Kornerko's blast was the latest reason for Soriano's melancholy.  Blowing a save and getting the loss....again, can do that.  But a right fielder named Brent Lillibrand was the reason the White Sox won last night.  Outside of two Bomber home runs by Gardner and Cano, Brent ended the Yankees best chances of winning by making two game saving catches.  The first was a catch while crashing into the wall off a deep fly to right by ARod, then two, making a diving catch off Robbie Cano's low sinking liner to end the game.

But, why did the Yankees lose?  Because they haven't been able to hit ChiSox pitching over the first two games of this four game series.  They Yanks were outdone by former Mets' farmhand Philip Humber, who no-hit the Bombers over the first six innings in game one of the series.  The Yankees managed four hits before losing 3-2 Monday night.  Then Tuesday night, The Bombers were held to the same numbers.  Two runs scored off four hits (two solo home runs) is all they managed off Gavin Floyd over eight innings.

Game three is Wednesday night.  Mark Buehrle faces off against Bartolo Colon.  For the moment, Bartolo Colon seems like the more effective of the two (remarkable), as Mark Buehrle is off to another sluggish start.



DEREK JETER:
I'll keep this brief because I've said it many times before.

Right now, Derek Jeter's 2011 batting average is at .259 and climbing.  He started the season with a lifetime batting average of .314, and twenty games into the Bombers 2011 season, he caused it to slip to .313 due to a rough start.  That may not seem like such a disaster, but when you think about him being signed for three more years, he may stick around too long and ruin his lifetime .300 average just like the legendary Mickey Mantle did.

What I'm about to say isn't Anit-Yankee of me.  I'm trying to protect him.  He is fifty-three hits away from the magical three-thousand plateau.  I say when he achieves that milestone, he should retire post-haste!  I mean that.  Unless he demonstrates he's capable of sustaining a .300 average for another 2 1/2 years...over the next three months, which I don't think he can, he should take his 3,000 hits and his lifetime .300 batting average and retire; get married; ride off into the sunset; and start a family while his greatness is at it's most legendary.

It is my sincere hope that he surprises everyone, and mostly the Yankees, by taking this step towards protecting what would be an attractive combination of  career numbers.  And he's actually that self-aware and cunning enough to do it while not let anyone in on the secret.  Do not forget the bitterness Derek Jeter expressed towards some of the negotiating tactics Cashman and the Yankees employed.  Maybe he was just playing hardball with the Yankees based on principle and though maybe he deserved the respect of an overly-representative offer.

Why else should he pull off such a startling move?  Because over most of his career, through the days of Tejada, ARod and Garciapara, Ripken,  etc....; and all the years of knocking Jeter's defense,  -  Derek Jeter has always had his naysayers.  And they'll never go away.  If Jeter ruins his .300 lifetime average, those same naysayers (writers and fans alike) will be emboldened to diminish what Jeter has accomplished even more.  If Derek can retire with over 3,000 hits and still end his career with a batting average above .300, that would be BLING for LIFE and make him, a without-a-doubt untouchable in the barber shop debates across America!

Think about it.


However, This IS...Yankee Bashing:
Again, this is something I've said many times before.  But things continually happen that reinforce my notion. 

What happened this time?  PHIL HUGHES.  But it's more than just about him.  This is about Joba, and if you can remember...Ian Kennedy also.

The Yankees acted like spoiled brats when they opened up all their gift prospects too early.  When it came time to open presents, all the Yankees had left were broken toys.  They should have left the three much-hyped pitchers below in the minors from the start.  Joba was promoted after only 88 minor league innings pitched.

That's Folly! 

No..., Brian Cashman’s whole plan for pitcher development has been complete folly!  All three pitchers?  All three injured?  All three rendered ineffective?  If I were those three, I'd hire a lawyer and sue Brian Cashaman for Wreckage of Career!  (I'm KIDDING!..of course.)

The truth remains, the new York Yankees don’t know how to groom pitchers, and  they never have in the last 36 years.  They'd rather pay the premium for another team's pitcher.  That's just the way it's been.  After Ron Guidry, Dave Righetti, and Andy Pettitte (I’ll be kind and throw in Wang, Doug Drabek, and Jose Rijo), name the home grown starter who has done anything credible in Pinstripes worthy of our mentioning?   I'll wait.

: /

Stumped, aren't you?

Right.

Like I was saying, three young, hurt pitchers is not a coincidence.  It's a pattern....of destruction.




First Game Of the Year:
Tuesday night was my first baseball game of the season.  But it wasn't my first opportunity.  Regardless, there I was, back at the Old Ball Game.  There is something very right about that, even if it was a Yankee game.  But then again, any game in any park is fine with me.  Now with the Rangers and Knicks out of the Playoffs, this was my Opening Day.  Let the Games begin!

YANKEE STADIUM

Mike.BTB

N.Y.YANKEES ~ JOBA Who?

Pitchers; and Catchers; and Cashman...Oh My!


NEW YORK YANKEES:  JOBA'less Chamberlain?

If I'm Joba Chamberlain, I'm retiring from the Yankees today, hiring a lawyer tomorrow and suing the pants off the Yankees the next day for "Decimation of Career". 

Why in Hilltop Park would Brian Cashman want to come out and publicly say Joba may not even have a job with the club this season?  With everything concerning Brian Cashman lately, you have to take him with a grain of salt regarding the manner with which he strings his words together during his Post-George reign.

If Joba's status is on thin ice, it's because the Yankees broke him due to their lack of skill at procuring home-grown pitching.  Since George Steinbrenner purchased the team, there have literally only been a handful of starting pitchers raised through the Yankees' farm who've achieved anything worth speaking of in a Yankee uniform.  Those names are Ron Guidry; Dave Righetti; Andy Pettitte....  I will be kind and include Chien-Ming Wang.  BUT That's It!  I defy you to name two more!  Right up until the much-hyped Big Three came up together; Joba; Hughes; and Kennedy, that's all the Yankees Farm ever supplied for the team's use on their mound.  In thirty seven years, that's an abysmal history of pitching development.

The fact is, historically, they have never had much use for rookies and prospects during the Old Boss Era (outside of all the work Stick Michael and Buck Showalter put in).  Doug Drabek and Jose Rijo are just two youngsters the Yankees traded away along with many more young position players who went on to have very substantial careers elsewhere.  The Yankees never had to procure minor league arms because their plan was always to buy someone else's starting pitching star.  Don't be fooled by any self-declared youth movements, development, and Farm System Ratings.  The signing of CC Sabathia and AJ Burnett and their pursuit of Cliff Lee reaffirms the fact they'd rather just pay the money for a ready made pitcher.

So once the Yankees finally thought they had a trio of promising pitchers, they very unwisely in my opinion, started calling them up in 2007.  Joba Chamberlain in particular, was now pitching in the major leagues after only throwing 88 innings in the minor leagues!  In calling up their baby arms, they imposed all kinds of unconventional pitch counts and innings limits.  Isn't that what the minor leagues are for; to let these guys pitch and develop?  Phil Hughes benefited from more innings pitched at the minor level that Joba did and the differences in their effectiveness bear that out.  With somewhere near 300 innings pitched in the minors, Phil Hughes is obviously a more accomplished pitcher and more learned of his craft than Joba at this point.  What the Yankees did  to Chamberlain was plain irresponsible.  He's been toyed with like a Yo-Yo since day number one.  And it now seems he's gone from the Joba Rules...To a Joba Ruse...To just being plain ol' JOBA REFUSE.

If you're asking me, the Yankees lack of a standard philosophy on how to develop pitching was all too apparent.  Evidence of a feeble plan lay everywhere.  So then, like little spoiled-rotten kids,  the Yankees opened up all their new presents before Christmas, and when the day to actually open presents came around, what the Yankees had on their hands were three already broken toys.  All three pitchers wound up hurt and thrown on the DL under the Yankee Plan.

The Joba Rules as well as the Hughes Rules were absurd in theory and application.  Like I said earlier...Isn't that what the minor leagues are for?

Joba Chamberlain showed so much ability coming out of the bullpen when he was first called-up and filled the 8th inning role marvelously and in dominating fashion. He was immediately dubbed Mariano Rivera's eventual successor.  What followed was a complete mismanagement and mishandling of Joba Chamberlain.   His effectiveness, his role, his health, his velocity and now his very viability are teetering on insignificance.  A once very promising career appears for the moment to have been torpedoed by the Yankees, and it sounds like Cashen wants no part of the blame.

How did it get to this?  The Yankee mismanagement of Joba is culprit number one.  From the Bullpen to starting, to ridiculous pitch counts and three inning starts and a bug-battle with midges; it all culminated with an arm injury suffered in Texas from which he hasn't seemed recovered from yet and was maybe precipitated by a very erratic work schedule.

Now, adding insult to his short career, the Yankees signed former Tampa Bay closer, Rafael Soriano and follow that with a comment hinting Joba's time in Pinstripes is now uncertain at best.

It was a JOBA RUSE all along!

I was always on the side of him being in the bullpen.  When he showed how much of a force he was in that role, it made me recall how it was the Yankees themselves who unwittingly created the 8th inning set-up man so commonly utilized in Baseball today.

Ron Davis is widely regarded as the first (un)official Set-Up Man.  He was a force in his own right setting up for Goose Gossage.  By being so effective, Ron Davis pretty much created the role.  But even before Ron Davis, the Yankees created an uncomfortable bullpen situation when Cy Young Award winner Sparky Lyle was relegated to the eighth inning when the Bombers originally signed Goose.

It was the Yankees who always used the 7th; 8th; 9th inning roles to their fullest advantage.  After Ron Davis opened up eyes to a successful formula, the Yankees had a failed starter who was sent to the bullpen to become John Wetteland's eighth inning man.  Mariano Rivera dominated the eighth inning like Ron Davis once did.  Then Gene Nelson and Mike Stanton filled those roles behind Mo's 9th inning shut-downs.  Recalling all that, I always thought Joba Chamberlain was a natural for the role and could dominate it like Ron Davis and Mo did once before.

If you also remember, when Goose Gossage hurt his arm and went on the DL (one of those years; 1980 maybe..) Ron Guidry volunteered to go into the bullpen and close games because he said; paraphrasing all these years later... - "I can help this team more by coming out of the bullpen three or four times a week, than I can pitching once every five days."   If Ron Guidry recognized the importance pitching plays at the end of a game, that's good enough for me.

That's why I always thought Joba should stay in the bullpen.  But now it appears, according to Cashman, he's just trying to remain relevant enough to stay on the team.  While I think the chances of the Opening Day roster not having Joba's name on it are very slim to doubtful, you still can not hide the fact that Joba has become a mere after-thought in Yankee plans.

The blame for the complete mishandling, mis-application, and mismanagement of Joba Chamberlain and his current state of ineffectiveness and/or relevance today falls solely on the lap of Brian Cashman.  Cashman literally had no patience to let Joba stay in the minor leagues and let him learn his craft there; 88 innings...that's all he had.

That's not gross mis-handling.  I think it's negligent.  Any lawyers out there?  What are the chances of suing your GM for ruining your career?

Supposedly there are many high-end prospects within the Yankees system at AA and the AAA levels as we speak.  Warn Them!  Tell Them Beware.  Because, if the Yankees aren't cutting a check for some other team's star pitcher, they have proven they have no idea what they're doing with young kids.  Where is the proof otherwise?

After Guidry; Rags; Andy; Wang (to be fair), and now Hughes (still to be determined).....  Where is the proof they know what they are doing?  Joba; Hughes; Kennedy; All Hurt.  Two are now near feeble and one so far seems up to pushing a rock up the hill.

Four credible starting pitchers in 37 years is hardly a record of proficiency. 

What they did to Joba is pathetic.  Sorry, it's the truth.  Not wanting to hear it is another matter.




Mike.BTB