As Chris H posted yesterday, the Yanks have adjusted the innings limitations plan for Joba Chamberlain. Instead of giving him long stretches (6-8 days) between starts, the new plan calls for him working every 5 days, but limiting his innings in each start to the point where he won’t exceed the 165 IP target they have for him this year.
Personally, I’m a big fan of this move. There’s no issue with blowing out the bullpen, the rosters will expand in a few days and there will be plenty of pitchers around to absorb the innings that Joba won’t be working. I know the Yanks may seem like they’re feeling their way without a road map on Joba, and the truth is they are. Every pitcher is different, and they’re simply moving towards their goal by doing whatever works best. It was perfectly understandable that they thought Joba liked extra rest after his outstanding performances following the long layoff at the All Star break. But apparently it was too much of a good thing for him. The experience they’re gaining with Joba will also help inform them on how to deal with Phil Hughes next year, who will be ticketed for the rotation and dealing with similar innings restrictions next year.
I also like the idea of giving him 3-4 inning stints. It’s akin to working out of the bullpen. With a limited goal in mind, Joba can simply go out there and let it all hang out, reprising his 07 bullpen role. The mentality he had as a reliever is something that can be useful to him as a starter. You can’t air it out for 7 innings straight, but when he gets into trouble he can go into reliever mode and look for strikeouts in short stints. David Cone often discussed on Yankee broadcasts how working out of the bullpen was key to his development early on in his career, where he would take on the “warrior mentality” when he got in trouble. I’d like to see Joba remind himself of the pitcher he was in 07, and short work can help him get back there.
The main thing is giving him less work than he can handle. Young pitchers (really all pitchers) tend to get hurt when they’re worn out. As a pitcher tires, the weakened muscles handle less of the workload and the tendons and ligaments take over, leading to injury. That’s the whole idea behind pitch counts for individual games and innings limits for the season. If you’re interested in reading an excellent article explaining how pitchers get hurt, check this out this piece interviewing Dr James Andrews.
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0 Responses to Two Thumbs up for the revised Joba plan
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Have to disagree with you about this Steve. Starting a game and then being limited to 2, 3, or 4 innings puts a burden on the pen and also serves to shorten Joba’s arm – as opposed to keeping it stretched out, to use Girardi’s terms. It should have been fine to run him out there every 7 days or so. There’s also an assumption that the extra rest caused Joba’s recent poor showing – which may very well NOT be the cause of his recent struggles.
I’ll be curious to see which September callups, if any, are used to fill the innings gaps. Having to rely on Gaudin and Mitre to fill those gaps is an unwelcome thought.
His velocity was up, his slider was sliding and he had everything you could have asked for except for the control and it looked and I say looked but it did look very clear that the control was due to lack of pitching to actual hitters, because I don’t care how many “side sessions” you throw with Eiland as ump it’s not the same as throwing to swinging major leaguers and reading bats is almost more important than stuff. You could see on Chamberlain’s face that he was doing what he could to get it where it was suppose to go but he just couldn’t, and it is very un-Joba like to not go hard and finish when he has 2 outs, say what you will about him but when he gets in trouble for the most part he grits it up locks down and limits the damage against him and he just was unable to do that against the Rangers.
I think most of Joba’s starts won’t go less than 5 inning and I would think 4 would be the lowest he would go (for pitch count fears anyway) and I think even that will be decided by how long he goes in this next start which shouldn’t be limited at all considering he needs to find a groove after struggling lately on scattered rest. Pitching every 5 days is the right way to do it, you don’t want Chamberlain in his own head approaching playoff time you want him in that just back from Nebraska mind set he had after the all star break and he was dominate.
“I think most of Joba’s starts won’t go less than 5 inning and I would think 4 would be the lowest he would go ”
That’s not what they were saying yesterday. Girardi spoke about treating his starts going forward like Spring Training. That means he would throw around 50 pitches in the beginning, and then build his innings back up over the course of September. It’s very possible he’ll only work 3 innings on Sunday, and again I’m fine with that.
If he is only going 3 innings at the beginning of the game you might as well put him in the pen and make him and Hughes a bridge, because either way you aren’t developing a starter and either way I think you are hurting him. I totally disagree with you “bullpen mind set” for starting pitchers, he doesn’t need to be who he was in 07 because if he thinks that way it will lead to over throwing pitches and trying to blow everyone away and he will start throwing up hanging curves and over throwing his fastball either out of the zone on high pitches or up over the plate on pitches. The best thing for Joba at this point would be to limit him to 5 innings every start but any lower than 4 and I really do not like what is going on with the s called “plan”. I also don’t understand how they can keep reassuring us that a plan has been in place since before the season started yet Joba doesn’t know much until happens and the plan it’s self changes constantly. I don’t really think they know what they are doing and they are using Chamberlain like a rat in an experiment to be better at developing arms going forward, if anything all the stress and changing of the pitching schedule and side sessions and lack of control because of changing of the schedule is building up more of a likely hood that he will injury himself going forward. I like the idea of limiting pitches or “starts” on young arms but not with a fly by night plan that makes a starting pitcher into a starting reliever and ruins everything built up over a season of starts right before the playoffs. I hope everything works out but making Joba spend all his time thinking like a starter and then just telling him be a reliever who starts is detrimental to his mind set… they are toying with a young pitchers mind which may be more deadly to his future than toying with his arm for a guy like Joba.
So does everyone still agree that the 5th starter spot is still up for grabs even with this one good performance by Mitre? I still believe for consistency and more importantly innings pitched Penny is a better bet for a 5th starter than Mitre.
I can’t imagine the Yanks will pull Mirte out of the rotation coming off a 1-hitter, with Brad Penny as the alternative.
BTW-Penny has the worst ERA in the AL.