With the recent moves by the Los Angeles Dodgers (Scott Kazmir and Kenta Maeda), the starting pitching market continues to narrow. Check out a good rundown by Harlan Spence at Pinstripe Alley: “Why haven’t the Yankees been able to acquire any starting pitching?” But are they getting nervous up in Beantown?: After Aroldis Chapman trade, are Yanks the AL East favorite, will they add starter?
While GM Brian Cashman recently stated “Our rotation is full…”, catcher Brian McCann is optimistic on the status quo:
“You get Nova back, second year off of Tommy John, which usually is the year that pitchers start feeling a lot better off that surgery. You’ve got Severino. Eovaldi took huge steps forward and I think his ceiling is as high as it gets. Pineda is filthy. CC, pitching with that new knee brace and being able to drive and get through the ball and work both sides of the plate, was huge.” (h/t: Bryan Hoch / MLB.com)
Also see some rumblings regarding Ivan Nova by Brendan Kuty of NJ.com: MLB trade rumors: Yankees, Miami Marlins talk Ivan Nova?
TRADE ANALYSIS : A great read by LoHud’s Chad Jennings can be found here: Six new guys: System impact of Yankees’ trade acquisitions.
And don’t miss YES Network’s Jack Curry‘s interview with Didi Gregoruis, as the Yankee shortstop talks about preparing for the upcoming season and his thoughts on teaming up with new second baseman Starlin Castro. That is a tandem I can’t wait to see in action:
MEDIA FAIL : ‘Guess what, haters, Mickey Mantle flipped his bat too‘ from Yahoo! Sports. I don’t even know where to start one this one. See it for yourself and apologies in advance for linking to it. Yikes.
Moose vs BWAA — Round 3
Here’s a gentleman who has it right. Scott Miller, covering MLB for Bleacher Report, shares his reasoning on the Hall of Fame Ballot he recently submitted. Of particular interest naturally was his inclusion of Mike Mussina, for the exact theory most Yankee fans share. Miller writes:
“I know, I know: Wins are passe. They’re not a meaningful stat for starting pitchers anymore in this modern age of bullpen usage, yadda, yadda, yadda. But I look at Mussina’s pitching his entire career in the beastly AL East in an age of fierce sluggers, steroids and bloated payrolls producing All-Star lineups and see his 270 wins, and it resonates. The guy produced 11 seasons of 15 or more victories. There are plenty of other numbers to back his cause, too. But I’ll leave it to my sabermetric friends to fill you in with all of those (wink, wink).”
Check out the rest of his picks here: Scott Miller’s Starting 9: PED Era Makes for Clear Choices in Hall of Fame Vote.
How did our friends in the Boston press vote? Of the 6 writers who cast ballots for The Boston Globe, all but one — Dan Shaughnessy — indeed voted for Mussina.
An article in today’s Wall Street Journal by Brian Costa centers on Oakland A’s fan Ryan Thibodaux, who has been keeping track of all BWAA ballots posted online, and the projections as of yesterday afternoon can be seen here. While a sampling of only 25% or so of the ballot total, it shows Mussina with a 55.5% share of the voting — which is an increase over last year’s final tally of 24.6%. Let’s see if that holds, which if nothing else is at least encouraging.
POST UPDATE (January 6, 2016) : As the voting results were announced today, Moose garnered 43%, a significant increase over last year. Here’s a nice piece written by Eduardo A. Encina of The Baltimore Sun, published prior to the results being announced, but continues to make the case. Hopefully next year we’ll get even closer.
MEMORY LANE : On today’s date in 1999, Yogi Berra and George Steinbrenner finally made their peace after almost 15 years of hard feelings, and Yogi’s absence from Yankee Stadium. Sixteen games into the 1985 season, the Yankees were floundering with a 6-10 record, and The Boss had seen enough, firing Berra and replacing him with Billy Martin. Martin would end up steering the Yankees to a second place finish with a 97-64 record, playing at a 20-games over .500 clip in the second half.
But on this day in ’99, George made the trip from his home in Tampa to visit Berra at The Yogi Berra Museum, where the two hugged it out, and all was right again.
From a report in the New York Times by Harvey Araton, the encounter went like this: This evening, Steinbrenner walked up to the front entrance of the museum, where Berra awaited him with his hand outstretched. “Hello, Yogi,” Steinbrenner said, cautiously. “You’re 10 minutes late,” Berra quipped.
The man known as the Boss and the Hall of Fame catcher then ducked into a small office, accompanied by Berra’s wife, Carmen. According to Mrs. Berra, Steinbrenner took Berra’s hand, looked him in the eye and said: “I know I made a mistake by not letting you go personally. It’s the worst mistake I ever made in baseball.”
Berra replied, “I made a lot of mistakes in baseball, too.”
Two great men. And a moment in time that you just can’t dream up. Such is the case with Yankee lore.
(h/t: Baseball-Reference.com, Today in Baseball History)
Thanks, Coach!
Just a quick word on another franchise that is near and dear to my heart — the New York Football Giants. Since I can ever remember, my rapt attention to sports after the Yankees were finished — World Series title or not — went right to the Jints. I go back to the Allie Sherman days myself, and lived and died with those terrible squads in the 1970s and early 80s.
My father was a 100% baseball guy, had no patience for any other sport, let alone football. Never played it, had no compulsion to even understand it. Thankfully I had an uncle who by today’s standards could be diagnosed as clinically insane by virtue of his passion for the Giants. I wasn’t there at the time, but family lore has it that he threw a 90mph fastball in the form of a beer can — Rheingold, if I’m not mistaken — through the family television set after Pete Gogolak missed a potential game winning field goal. He got me into football, and took me to every Giants home game at the old Yankee Stadium he could.
That said, this season was a disaster on many levels. They finished 6-10, but woulda, shoulda, could’ve have been 14-2. 11-5 and in the playoffs at worst. They lost 8 games when leading in the 4th quarter, most with a minute or so on the clock. Is that on the head coach? Spags? The players? I dunno, but it was one for the books.
Hate to think the players would quit on Coach Coughlin, and I don’t think that was the case by any means. It was just a circumstance of everything going wrong that could possibly go wrong, and there was no end to it.
Sad to see him go. While many said it was time for a change, I was hoping he would stick it out for one more year. Like Eli Manning stated — “We let him down”. Which sucks. But no matter what, if TC is not in the Hall Of Fame, why bother having that thing at all.
