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If you had any hopes for Sergio Mitre before tonight, I imagine tonight's performance finished those off.  Hopefully, tonight's performance finished off Joe Girardi's hopes as well.

I think they may have because Girardi chose to go to Robertson in the 4th with the game tied up again and Mitre sitting at "only" 75 pitches.  They will burn out the pen tonight, covering at least five innings, but what really matters is where they go from here.  Three Mitre starts are more than enough, let's get the next entrant in the "Who wants to be the fifth starter" contest up here ASAP. 

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 09:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

So the Yankees didn't pull off a big deal at the deadline.  That doesn't mean they can't do one later. 

As I talked about the other day,  with the financial climate the way it is, I think more players will pass through waivers than in past years.  I wouldn't expect Halladay to get through, but some of the other pitchers like Jon Garland, for example, would probably make it through.

The need remains the same, the Yankees need at least one and probably two starters.  I think Pete Abe is on to something with this post about Hughes.   I found it very curious that Hughes was brought out for the ninth inning last night after pitching most of the 7th and the entire 8th.  It would make sense because Joba is going to hit that innings limit and Hughes needs to throw more innings.  You can swap the two of them and hopefully the bullpen and rotation do not suffer.  But, even putting Hughes back into the rotation leaves you with Mitre and that is where Cashman needs to make a deal.

As for the deal they made today it is one of the ones that drives me a little batty.  Is Hairston an upgrade over Ransom?  I think he is, not by a lot, but a bit.  Is Hairston an upgrade over Pena?  That's my question because I don't think he is.  Why trade away a prospect, even one the Yankees will probably never use for a guy who essentially does the same thing as Pena, but at a higher cost?  

Stay tuned, Cashman is still on the clock.   

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 05:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Nick Swisher has been a frustrating player to watch this season.  For all the good he does with the bat, he goes into lengthy slumps and his defense in right can be frightening to watch.  Spurred on by some comments on various posts on this site, I decided to take a deeper look into his defensive play.  Here is what I found out.

Let me say up front that defense is a tough nut ot crack.  There are a lot of different ways to look at it, but I find the "Revised Zone Rating" method that Hardball Times uses to be the best.   Using their methodology, the average rightfielder mades 87% of the plays in his "zone" in 2007.

Swisher is well above-average in this category, making plays on 93.3% of the balls hit to his area.  Just for comparison sake, I looked at Abreu's defense in 2008 and found that he made only 87.2% of the plays in his zone.  Of further interest, Siwsher has made 31 "out of zone" plays in right this year- basically balls that he probably shouldn't get to.  Abreu made only a total of 32 all year in 2008. (I also compared Teixeria's defense in 2009 with Giambi's in 2008 and found that Teixeira made 80.8% of the plays compared to Giambi's 67.9%.)

While Swisher covers enough ground, it is his arm that is a weakness.  To date, he has only thrown out 1 runner.  This is a consistent problem for Nick, he only threw out 3 runners in 2007 and 2008 respectively. 

So, my conclusions are that despite his arm, Swisher makes the plays he should and when you factor in his bat, he is an above-average rightfielder.   

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 08:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (14)

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 05:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Lee is headed to the Phillies and Ian Snell is part of a package headed to Seattle.  That leaves Toronto without an obvious fit for their ace and the Yankees potentially out in the cold because it looks like Seattle is buying and not selling. 

If Toronto budges from it's rumored price of Joba and Hughes for Halladay, then I talk to them.  Otherwise, no thanks.  

I still think the play is to call Arizona and see what they want for either Davis or Garland.  Not flashy, but innings-eaters at the back of the rotation that shouldn't cost too much prospect-wise.   

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 03:17 PM | Permalink

Scranton has a 6:30pm game tonight and Austin Jackson is not in the starting lineup while Shelley Duncan and Ramiro Pena are.

I don't know how much it means, Scranton is playing in Toledo and it is certainly feasible for a player to get on a flight tonight or tomorrow morning down to Tampa, but it is curious. 

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 06:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (24)

Brett Gardner is headed for the DL with a broken thumb. 

Now the big question is who comes up from AAA?

The 40-man roster doesn't have any reserve outfielders on it, unless you count Ramiro Pena because he has played a few games in CF for Scranton. 

Pena would be the easiest move (no 40-man move needed) but that is a leap of faith assuming that he can play outfield.

Shelley Duncan could be a callup.  He has killed the ball in AAA and while he can't play center, remember that Swisher played center 70 times last year.  You could start Melky is center every game and you Shelly to cover the corners.  If something happened to Melky, Swisher could get you through the game.

Still not ideal, which brings me to what I think is the best solution, give Austin Jackson a two-week audition in center.  

The Yankees have a number of free agent decisions to make this offseason and they start with Hideki Matsui and Johnny Damon.  I don't think the Yankees should bring back either guy, but the decision becomes a lot easier if they know Jackson is up to the task of playing center next season and this could be a good trial period to evaluate him. 

This is really going to come down to what the scouts think.  If they think Pena can handle center, that will be the move.  If they feel Jackson is ready to make the jump, that will be.  We will learn what they think in the next 24 hours.   

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 12:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I have been thinking about Joba and what is in store for him and I think I have a guess at what the Yankees are up to. 

Al Leiter speculated on the pregame tonight that the innings number was 150 or so and I think he is right.  Now that includes postseason and I would bet that means the Yankees are looking for Joba to throw around 140 innings in the regular season.  I would guess that around 15 of those are reserved for the bullpen, so that leaves Joba with about 23 innings left as a starter.  

Now look at the schedule.  Joba will take the ball again on July 29th.  But, the Yankees have an off day on August 3rd, meaning they can skip his turn totally the next time around.  They could then start him August 8th and then again August 13th and 18th.   They then would not need a 5th starter until August 29th. 

So here's my guess.  The Yankees let Joba pitch those next four starts and at the same time start building up Hughes to go back into the rotation.  That's why Aceves stayed in the pen because he is going to get the 8th inning in the gap created when Hughes is stretching out and Joba is still in the rotation.  Once Joba is back in the pen, he hopefully picks up where he left off and Hughes goes back into the rotation with the confidence he earned from mowing down hitters as a reliever.   

Fingers crossed.... 

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 11:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

By that I mean of course "What Will Joe Do?".  The Yankees have a pretty unique situation in the upcoming three games because they face three lefties in a row.  Now, I hope I am wrong about this, but I have a funny feeling that Joe Girardi is going to look at the opposing pitcher and immediately put Cabrera in center.  Unless something changes between now and gametime he is 1-1 on that prediction.

Joe didn't seem to notice last season when it happened, so it is probably optimistic to expect him to recognize the fact that Melky has stopped hitting.  Here are his OPS figures from April-July .971/.777/.687/.644.  If we reproduced that visually it would look like a sinking line.  

Now someone will probably point out that Gardner isn't hitting in July either.  Very true, but Gardner has a better OBP for the season and he can steal his way into scoring position better than Melky can.  Could Joe at least give Brett a chance?

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 04:37 PM | Permalink

A week from tomorrow brings a trading deadline that may be unlike any other in recent history.  Unlike any other because the economic climate in baseball has drastically changed.  July 31st marks the "non-waiver" trading deadline, meaning teams can make a trade without having to pass the player(s) through waivers first.  In past years, that was a pretty serious deadline because teams could claim any player put through waivers after July 31st to block that player from being traded.  But, the risk that the claiming team always chanced was the possibility that the team putting the player on waivers would simply let the claiming team take him and assume all his salary.  This happened to the Yankees with Jose Canseco in 2000.

In today's economic climate, I think a lot of teams will be very, very careful before putting in a waiver claim.  While young and inexpensive players will still get claimed, anyone with a higher salary will be a risky bet for the claiming team.  Teams could use the waiver process to try and lower their payroll.  Take Ron Mahay for example, decent reliever but nothing specia,l earning $4 million this year.  Normally, I would expect him to get claimed in waivers because contending teams wouldn't want him traded to a competitor who had a hole in their bullpen.  But, with a $4 million salary, I would bet there is a big chance the Royals would let a claiming team take him and walk away from the $1.75 million or so left on his deal. 

So, with that out of the way.  What do the Yankees need to do between now and the deadline, whenever it truly is? 

I think if you honestly assess this team the biggest weakness remains starting pitching.  The offense is good enough to win and there are enough spare parts on the bench and in the minors to cover holes that spring up.  Ditto that with the bullpen. If the right deal came along, I would totally jump at it, but these areas should not be a prioirty.  

The rotation is another story.  From what I have read, Wang seems like a longshot to come back this year and even if he does, he wasn't exactly setting the world on fire before he got hurt.  Pettitte and Joba looked great their last time out, but I think they are question marks the rest of the way.  Mitre is not a guy I want to bet on and even more concerning, what happens if another starter gets hurt?  The probable answer is you see Kei Igawa in the rotation and I don't think any of us want that.

That's why it is imperative in my mind that Cashman goes out and gets another starter.  We need a guy to who can plug a hole in the back of the rotation and provide 6-7 innings each time out. That should be his focus and his only focus over the next eight days.   

Posted by Peter (Yankees) at 12:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)