Baseball is a game of failure, and a game of redemption
-I think we can stop calling Joe Nathan a big time closer and every bit as good as Mariano over the course of his career. After last night’s performance, he goes into the Trevor Hoffman bin of guys with great stats who fold in big spots for whatever reason. I hate to use the word ‘choke’ to explain away a poor performance, I think it’s grossly overused and often a poor substitute for real analysis, but he looked nervous out there to me.
-The Phil Cuzzi play was an obvious fair ball, to the naked eye, in real time. I don’t know what else you can say about it, other than the blow to the Twins was softened somewhat by the fact that he hit a single a few pitches later. Don’t assume he would have scored if he was on 2nd base, the Yanks might have played things differently if he was.
-Looks like Tex got the monkey off his back last night with the 9th inning line drive single and game winning HR. We saw him break out of slumps in April that got him going for a few weeks. With Alex already looking great (3-4 with RISP) if Tex gets hot as well then playoff pitchers are going to be in for many long October nights.
-Many wondered how Joe Girardi would manage in his first post season, whether he would get tight in big spots and over manage when a more experienced skipper would know to just leave things be. But that didn’t happen last night. I thought he managed that game not just good, but perfectly last night. His bullpen moves were by the numbers, he used the Brett Gardner weapon at a perfect time, and he got Posada back in the lineup ASAP. Hughes and Marte didn’t perform, but that’s on them. When they were brought in was the right call in both cases. I wouldn’t have stuck with Joba any longer than he did, though I will admit I thought about it. But we’re still not 100% sure where Joba is right now. I think relievers will earn bigger roles as they perform, and Joba and D-Rob did that last night.
-If Morneau is playing, we lose that game 6-2, if not 10-2. We didn’t get Justin out all year and AJ walked a tightrope all night. It would have forced the Yanks to pitch to Mauer, and in so many situations that would have been deadly. I was thinking about that all night, the way Moreau’s presence would have changed things in situation after situation.
-Dave Robertson moved up a notch in the bullpen pecking order last night. As a rookie, you just don’t know how he’s going to respond in those spots, but he was masterful. I can see him getting a batter or two earlier in a game going forward.
-Both sides of the Posada-Molina debate bolstered their arguments last night. AJ was teetering on the brink all night, so having Molina out there to calm him down and guide him through was essential. But the Yanks were no-hit for the first 5 innings, so Posada’s bat was clearly missed. If/when this situation comes up again in Game 5 or the ALCS/WS, I fully expect Molina to catch AJ again. Minimizing the damage with him is key.
-Nice job by the home crowd giving AJ a big ovation last night when he came on the field. You didn’t know which way that would go, given that the media pitted him against a beloved long-time Yankee in Posada. But it just goes to show, the majority of fans are smarter than we think in deciphering news analysis and sports talk radio.
-Don’t count out the Red Sox just yet. The Angels running game doesn’t play well in Fenway with the Green Monster and the short Left Field. The Sox also owned the 2nd best Home record in Baseball this year (Behind you know who). Don’t be surprised if this thing gets sent back to Anaheim.
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25 Responses to Random Thoughts-ALDS Game 2
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TIQ IQ
All good thoughts – except – “he was masterful” – when referring to Roberston. He came in and gave up a single to load the bases and then a hard line drive to Tex…three feet either way and two runs score. He was hardly masterful. I do agree he may contribute more this playoffs. I do like his makeup and stuff; sometimes all a young pitcher needs is a break to gain some confidence. He got it – and then got the last two guys in solid fashion…very promising but again – hardly masterful.
It’s certainly a semantic argument, but anytime you come into a tied playoff game in extra innings with 2 on and no one out and get out of it is masterful in my book, unless something lucky/fluky happens like with Gardy on 3rd. I don’t think it’s crazy to use that word at all. Again, though, it’s semantics.
I don’t like “masterful” He got a lot of help from Mark’s quick thinking and D, if we had Giambi at first or maybe even Swisher we lose that game with Robertson on the hill.
Small sample size, but in 4 postseasons, Nathan has an ERA over 8, a WHIP in the 2s and a BB/9 over 8. It’s safe to say he’s no Mo
I don’t think anyone put Nathan in the “Mariano level” truthfully, he is one of the greatest closers in the game right now but Mo is the greatest closer to ever live and no one is close to him… New York fans are spoiled because we know we have Mo at the end of the game for an almost guaranteed 1-2-3 9th. Once he leaves we will really have some problems replacing him just because no other closer is as shut down as he is!
Historically as well the Yankees just own Nathan, we have beaten him every year just about in some scenario and he blew at least one save to us in the regular season.
If the Red Sox series goes 5 the Sox will win it but the Angels have a chance to take the field against what is basically a rookie in Clay and with the whole series on his shoulders at this point look for his confidence to be tested early, if he can’t handle the fire that comes with this pressure it could be an Angels sweep.
It’s odd – I know from past experience, that the playoffs are a different animal, and what happens here doesn’t necessarily reflect anything that happened in the regular season, buuuut…. It certainly seems like the Yanks are playing with exactly the same mystique and panache that they had during the season while the Sox are looking just as lackadaisical and inconsistent as they did all year.
The Sox have been come as complacent as the Yankees did recently… after 2001 they started going down hill, getting older, relying more on the HR, expecting to win but not trying on every single play. But they only won two title in 3 years so it’s a little early to be complacent…
What about Cervelli’s play at the plate. That kid is a heady player.
He will do great getting a chance to be Posada’s back up next year, once he gets a chance to play and get regular at bats at the major league level he should develop into a very good back up catcher with great D and a serviceable enough bat.
I seem to remember Dave Robertson doing this same thing during the season, at least once–coming in and getting out of a bases loaded, no out situation.I remember Joe G. saying that he brought him in there because of his ability to get a strikeout. So Dave R. has demonstrated, numerous times, his ability to get out of a chilling situation.
A lot of small market teams are going to be calling Brian C. over the winter to get this youngster as their (future) closer. Keep him Brian!!
Tom G.
Robertson walks to many batters to be considered a closer yet, I think people are really starting to hype him up to much. I’m not saying he can’t be a closer I’m just saying be careful with how you bill him because he still has a lot of developing to do and the closer position is a different part of the pen than middle relief, and even though he may strike out almost as many per 9 as Broxton but he doesn’t throw nearly as hard so you have to be aware that eventually his speed may no longer be deceptive.
Yes, I agree that he is not a ML closer at this time. But, you have to look at it from the perspective of a lot of the other teams out there. A large number of them would love to have him to develope into their closer. Just look at the high priced, shaky, retreaded, etc. closers that some teams are running out there. To get a cheap young fella with the ability to get out of jams, etc. would be nirvanna to a lot of teams. Robertson closed in the minors to very good effect. His high # of walks in the big show is a little surprising to me.
Anyway, its great that some of our young guys are getting to show themselves well on the national stage, and this is my main point.
Regards,
Tom G.
Still his high number of walks if nothing else is a reason to keep him for at least another year, if he can develop his control to an acceptable level then you can keep him or have more trade value in the long run so either way we agree on keeping him.
Also, my point is this…. Dave R. is only Joe G’s 4th or 5th “go to” relief guy, right now.A few GM’s, I’m sure,are looking at this and thinking “Humm, I wonder if we can get this guy from the Yankees cheap?”
I’m saying that I like having him as our deeper depth relief guy, this year and next. He has shown his ability to me numerous times, before he was hurt. He can strike out a guy when he needs to–at least before he was hurt. He is not all the way back, yet, to this earlier form.
Boy, I still feel great after last night’s game.
Go Yanks!
I really doubt GMs are looking at a developing young pitcher like Robertson striking out 13/9 and thinking cheap… If anyone wants Robertson it would have to be as a part of a real big chip like a Felix Hernandez or maybe as a part of a BJ Upton deal… Actual considering that the Rays have no “closer” and that Robertson can play in the bigs now at a big level could make the deal for Upton a cheaper one, maybe even a Austin Jackson and Robertson with a 3rd player involved in turn allowing us to keep Zach McAllister.
Wow, Felix H. traded to the Yanks—-now there’s a thought that makes me feel good inside.
Yeah, to bad it probably won’t ever happen :( We have the pieces to acquire him I’m sure even keeping a hold of Montero we could get the deal done at this point but the Mariners do have the money necessary to re-sign Felix long term so the only real danger of losing him is if they don’t have a winning team moving forward and he thinks he can win more easily somewhere else, and if they do think that they can still choose to just take the draft picks they would get for someone else signing him.
If I were the Yankees I would call in the winter and make one offer and see where they stand on that offer… I would offer them Hughes, McAllister, Robertson, Austin Jackson(or Melky if they prefer) and Romine for Hernandez… There i actually a lot of potential in that trade for the M’s because in a best case scenario they could end up with two starting pitchers, a back of the bull pen guy to go along with Aardsma, a starting catcher and a starting LF/CFer to go along with Gutierrez and Ichiro. For the Yankees I think it’s obvious that you have to give talent to get talent and I would be willing to offer all these players and maybe one more toss in prospect to get the deal done because almost nothing short of Montero is to much for a 23 year old Cy Young contender who is one of the top 5 pitchers in baseball right now and he isn’t even close to entering his prime really.
Rotation going into next year with Hernandez…
Sabathia
Hernandez
Burnett
Pettitte
Chamberlain
Even if Joba was nothing more than average all year we would have the best rotation in the league no doubt… Two Cy Young contenders, Burnett’s A+ stuff and Pettitte’s experience in the 4th spot and Joba this year would make one of the best 5th starters in the AL.
I could see a BJ Upton trade happening more easily actually… The Rays are a smart team and won’t let something like “trading to the Yankees” get in the way of getting what they “need” and what they need is young players who can play for cheap and young players who can develop and take over at position they may have to lose some players at. Now BJ Upton is a player who has underperformed but even still has shown a lot of talent (and always seems to come up big against the Yankees) but the Rays don’t want to pay him long term to be what he has been thus far so he is the most likely to be traded from their team this winter (I think they traded Kazmir to pick up Crawford’s option and then re-sign him long term) in order to acquire young players and save money. The Yankees have Austin Jackson who can eventually in a year probably take over in CF for the Rays and until then they seem to like Fernando Pérez to be a stop gap in between Upton and the next Rays CFer. I could see a number of trades involving Austin Jackson (or Melky if for some reason they want him instead) and a ton of different other pieces, you could put Zach McAllister and Jackson together with a lower level prospect or if you want to keep McAllister (and I do) you could make a deal with Jackson, David Robertson and Ivan Nova and possibly get a deal done. Since you are already trading Jackson I would try to stay away from adding other position players like Romine or Russo and I would try and stick to adding 2 pitching pieces to make the deal, however pitchers who shouldn’t even come up in the Upton deal would be Banuelos, Noesi or D.J. Mitchell(Hughes and Joba are obvious) Zach McAllister I would trade in a deal for BJ but I would try and avoid it if I could but other than that I would say everyone else is free game.
I would love to see the young Felix H. in a Yankee uniform, but I think we may have missed a window, about 1 year ago, or so, when his stock was much lower.
I agree with you that the Mariners will try hard to keep him now. Maybe this is for the best, right now, because if the M’s put him on the market,this winter, the team that would probably go after him the hardest, and need him the most, would be the Sox. Theo would want to erase the smell of the wildcard, this early exit season, losing Tex, etc. in one fell swoop. Boston would drool at the thought of Felix, Lester, and Beckett, and would open the young talent vault big time to do this. Heck, Theo went after him hard at this yr’s trade deadline. Also,if the Yankees win the championship this year maybe they would feel that they wouldn’t be as needful of doing such a big move. I don’t know how such a competition would work out, but the Yankees usually can win, if they really want to. (Remember, the Yanks even had first shot at Beckett and Okijima, but let them go to the Sox-for whatever reasons.)I feel that the Yanks will go after a good, dependable starter for next year, but I don’t know how high they will set their sights–maybe it will depend on how this postseason ends.
On CF, I would like to get a good look at Austin Jacson at the ML level before they think of trading him. He may be a slick item. But then again, maybe the Yanks have more inside info.
It shows that you’ve put a lot of time into thinking about these things. It’s a lot of fun to do this. Of course, being Yankee fans, good big things are always happening in our universe.
Regards,
Tom G.
You would think when the Sox get in on someone the Yankees are usually somewhere trying to make a deal behind Boston’s bat, and I have a feeling that Cashman wasn’t to pleased that Theo put the waiver claim in for Wagner before the Yankees had a chance to and getting Felix out from under Theo might be the kind of pay back he would be willing to wheel and deal for.
If the Yankees win I don’t see that affecting them going after a Hernandez if he was to become available… Most likely the Yankees will lose at least one of Matsui and Damon and even if Pettitte comes back you could sure up the rotation some more with the unknown that is Joba Chamberlain and I would even say Phil Hughes (not to mention his innings limit he will have) and we never really did get a 5th starter to go forward with besides Hughes into next season.
If the Yankees go into free agency to get a pitcher I would want it to be Rich Harden because he would come cheap enough and wouldn’t require a long term contract because of his injury history and inconsistency but with that said he also posses some really excellent stuff and for a 5th starter forget about it, he would be the best 5th starter in the AL easy.
Then of course comes the wild card… Aroldis Chapman… The Yankees are figured to be high bidders and while I don’t expect him to be able to start in the majors until after the all star break (if not 2011) at least I do expect him to get a big enough contract to affect the ability of the Yankees to go out and spend any money on big name free agents (Aka Lackey, Holliday, Bay) but I don’t think they will target any of them anyway so it really doesn’t matter that much, but he is a huge risk who could be anything from a great 1-2 pitcher or great closer all the way down to a middle reliever in the same mold as Jose Veras.
I like Austin a lot more than most seem to anymore (I think his power will be the last thing to develop) but if you can get a chance to buy low on an Upton you have to take the chance when it is given to you… Austin could potentially develop into a .300 hitter with slightly above average overall D and anywhere from 15-20 HRs a year but BJ Upton offers all of that plus right now in a much more highly developed player with better long term upside. Jackson projects as a solid starter in CF, BJ can be projected to an all star every year who contends for the gold glove in CF hitting 25 HRs and stealing anywhere from 20-50 bases a year. I also don’t see this year as anything more than a blip on the screen and next year he will start his development back again, the Rays really abused him by putting him at lead off all the way until the last month… he should have started off around 7 or 8 in the line up so the pressure would be off and he could work on taking pitches and making contact instead of having to come to bat feeling like he has to get on base every time for the team to win the East (not to mention they had Bartlett hitting .300 in the bottom of the line up. With our line up Upton would feel no pressure to perform and he could grow under the tutelage of some of the best hitters in the game.
Very many great points.
I’d like for the Yanks to “win” Chapman, but I am a little leery of what I read about him so far–he seems a little immature and I’m not sure about his training habits, but I like his 100MPH raw talent.
Here’s an item for the Yankees to dream about if they were to take a risk on a injured pitcher–Brandon Webb.
His contract is up, but Arizona has a $8M option, which they said that they’re going to exercise.
IF they don’t–hope the YANKEES JUMP ON HIM! Or even attempt to trade for him.
Tom G.
His Fastball fluctuates so much it’s a little scary he can go all the way down to 90 and back up to 97 in the same inning but hey give him some real training facilities in Scranton and coach him up every day and you could end up with a very scary pitcher in the future, it’s a risk I would be inclined to take based on him being a lefty with that kind of velocity, even if he only throws 96 consistently that is more than CC.
I really don’t want Webb he is also coming off of Shoulder surgery and it’s a real risky move to sign someone coming off that kind of unknown (and trading for him out of the question to me) because he doesn’t want an incentive deal. He has already said he won’t sign a contract that has anything to do with “pay based on performance” and if the Dbacks don’t pick up his option he won’t re-sign with them for anything less than a long term deal at more than 8 mil per. If I was going to trade for a Diamondback pitcher it would be the younger one with possible Cy Youngs in his future and that is Dan Haren but there is almost no chance he gets traded.
If the Yankees get Chapman it probably takes a few moves away from the Yankees as I assume they don’t want to add to the payroll and depending on what goes down with Matsui and Damon money comes off the book but you need to find a LFer who can play every day (unless you trade for BJ Upton in which case you turn Gardner into a LFer during spring training and Melky becomes the 4th outfielder) and a DH unless you bring one of them back to DH in which case you still need a LFer.
I agree about Dan Haren. I don’t know why the Yankees didn’t get in on him when he was traded from the A’s to Arizona. I never saw anything in print on why the Yankees didn’t go after him then. I remember the Yankees being on the lookout for a starting pitcher, (or two). Then all of a sudden, it’s Haren to Arizona (for what i don’t remember, but it didn’t seem like a lot). I was never able to figure that one out. Is there a backstory to that? Was everyone asleep in the front office or on vacation that week?
Blanton went to the Phillies about the same time, but I didn’t want him.
Maybe if the Snakes go into rebuilding mode next year? That Upton brother in Arizona has good stats/skills, too.
The Yankees didn’t have near the farm system that the Diamondbacks had at the time so even if they wanted in they didn’t have near the players to get him, and the A’s Raked off that deal…
The Diamondbacks sent Brett Anderson, Dana Eveland and Greg Smith all left handed starters and Brett Anderson is the future ace of there staff… They also received Chris Carter, Aaron Cunningham and Carlos Gonzalez, and Gonzalez in now with the Rockies as apart of the Huston Street to the Rockies in return for Matt Holliday and Matt Holliday was in turn traded to the Cardinals for another Rake in minor league talent. The A’s always do well in trades and they almost always get the better of the deal in the long run.
I doubt Haren ever ends up on the block! They already said he is off limits this season and he would have more value now then next year so he will Dback no matter how bad they are.
Justin is a personal favorite of mine and is en route to being one of the top 5 players in this leauge but I imagine the Yankees will have to wait until he is a free agent at like age 25 or 26 and sign him to a big deal because the Diamondbacks couldn’t justify the trade without getting Montero from us… One 20 year old stud for another and I just don’t value a RF with 35 HR power over a possible 50 HR guy at catcher/LF/DH/1B.