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Post by chiyankee on Apr 11, 2019 21:21:21 GMT -5
"New York general manager Brian Cashman would prefer to “exhaust all of the alternatives” before pursuing Keuchel unless the former Cy Young winner’s price tag drops even further." Wonder what that means? We need pitching help pretty badly.But, do they really need pitching badly? If German can continue his early season run: Tanaka Paxton Happ CC German Paxton and Happ are better than what they've shown, so it will depend on what the get from CC and German, but I think this is still a good rotation. |
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Post by greatfatness on Apr 12, 2019 6:06:00 GMT -5
You mock Aaron Judge at your own peril Hey come on, I have Judge's jersey and like 3 Aaron Judge shirts. I've been following him since he was a prospect. I love Judge more than anyone. I just find awkward interviews funny, what can I do? Remember those Mike Mussina interviews? Don’t let Aaron Judge find you alone during daylight. There will be nothing left except a pile of ashes where Kaybli used to be. |
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Post by greatfatness on Apr 12, 2019 6:07:25 GMT -5
"New York general manager Brian Cashman would prefer to “exhaust all of the alternatives” before pursuing Keuchel unless the former Cy Young winner’s price tag drops even further." Wonder what that means? We need pitching help pretty badly.But, do they really need pitching badly? If German can continue his early season run: Tanaka Paxton Happ CC German Paxton and Happ are better than what they've shown, so it will depend on what the get from CC and German, but I think this is still a good rotation. Also. Keuchel has had no spring training. Maybe he’d be ready to pitch in games by June? We get Severino back in June and May have Montgomery back in July. |
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Post by pippsheadache on Apr 12, 2019 7:19:56 GMT -5
It seems as if the Yankees allegedly lockdown bullpen (and generally stupid and sloppy play) has been more of an issue than the starting pitching. At the same time, Boston's supposed strength of starters has been awful, but their bullpen, which was supposed to be a weakness, has not been that bad.
You can't explain baseball, Suzyn.
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Post by inger on Apr 12, 2019 9:35:04 GMT -5
Hey come on, I have Judge's jersey and like 3 Aaron Judge shirts. I've been following him since he was a prospect. I love Judge more than anyone. I just find awkward interviews funny, what can I do? Remember those Mike Mussina interviews? Don’t let Aaron Judge find you alone during daylight. There will be nothing left except a pile of ashes where Kaybli used to be. Like Sarge and Beetle Bailey... |
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Post by domeplease on Apr 12, 2019 9:55:58 GMT -5
mlb.nbcsports.com/2019/04/11/braves-sign-ozzie-albies-to-seven-year-35-million-contract-extension/
The way Teams are Extending their Best Players and that the Players are GOING FOR IT = Maybe a WEAK FA LIST in 2019/2020, etc.???
I think it is a DAMN SMART MOVE by both Parties:
1. Teams save $$$ = Which HOPEFULLY they use to Build Their YOUTH Farm System, Etc.
2. Players get BIG $$$ NOW and MONEY TODAY is always more valuable TODAY than tomorrow = Injuries, Inflation, etc.
With this in MIND; hoping that WE are putting in a lot of Resources, $$$, Coaching, Time, etc. into our Youth Farm System.
"FORM A BOX...hold, hold, hold the box; for the YOUTH are OUR Future!!!"
www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb/the-top-50-mlb-prospects-heading-into-2019-and-beyond/ss-BBV6Hqw?ocid=U147DHP#image=50 |
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Post by kaybli on Apr 12, 2019 12:42:58 GMT -5
Hey come on, I have Judge's jersey and like 3 Aaron Judge shirts. I've been following him since he was a prospect. I love Judge more than anyone. I just find awkward interviews funny, what can I do? Remember those Mike Mussina interviews? Don’t let Aaron Judge find you alone during daylight. There will be nothing left except a pile of ashes where Kaybli used to be.  |
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Post by kaybli on Apr 14, 2019 3:53:55 GMT -5
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Post by rizzuto on Apr 14, 2019 7:40:22 GMT -5
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Post by domeplease on Apr 14, 2019 8:16:13 GMT -5
www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb/craig-kimbrels-price-tag-appears-to-have-dropped/ar-BBVUGec?li=BBnba9I&ocid=U147DHP
www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb/the-yankees-are-decimated-by-injuries-but-their-issues-go-beyond-a-lengthy-injured-list/ar-BBVUgeX The 'Super Bullpen' isn't so super
On paper, the Yankees did not just have the best bullpen in baseball coming into the season, they had maybe the best bullpen in baseball history. Last year's bullpen was the second best ever by WAR, and this offseason the Yankees added Adam Ottavino and a full season of Zack Britton to their core bullpen group (they did lose David Robertson to free agency). It was not crazy to think this year's relief crew would be better than last year's.
Instead, 13 games into the new season, the bullpen has not been the overwhelming strength the Yankees and pretty much everyone else expected. In fact, it's been more of a liability. Here are the team's bullpen rankings in various categories going into Saturday's action:
ERA: 4.34 (15th)
WHIP: 1.43 (17th)
Strikeout rate: 10.0 K/9 (9th)
Win probability added: minus-1.22 (27th)
Shutdowns: 10 (21st)
Meltdowns: 13 (28th)
(Shutdowns are relief appearances that increase win probability at least six percent. Meltdowns are the opposite. They are relief appearances that decrease win probability at least six percent.)
According to YES Network researcher James Smyth, the Yankees have already lost seven games this season in which they held a lead. That includes two seventh-inning blown leads against the Astros earlier this week. Last season the Yankees did not suffer their seventh blown lead loss until June 13th, in their 64th game. Those blown leads aren't all on the bullpen, but yikes.
Ottavino has been nails while replacing Betances as Boone's high-leverage reliever of choice (one run and 11 strikeouts in seven innings), and long man Luis Cessa has been solid in low-leverage mop-up duty, otherwise the core Yankees relievers have all had some issues early this season. A partial list:
Aroldis Chapman's fastball velocity is at its lowest point in his career and he has a 10.8 H/9.
Zack Britton has more baserunners allowed (12) than swings and misses (10), which seems impossible.
Chad Green has allowed seven runs in 5 1/3 innings and has struck out only one of the last 21 batters he's faced.
Tommy Kahnle has not fully regained his 2017 velocity and has walked four in four innings.
Betances is not coming back to save the day anytime soon, and, really, no one player can fix a collectively struggling bullpen. For the Yankees to dig themselves out of this early season hole, they need Britton and Green to turn things around, Ottavino to stay razor sharp, and a young arm or two to come up from minors and give the team a shot in the arm. New York's vaunted bullpen has been a real weakness 13 games into 2019.
Paxton and especially Happ have struggled
Prized offseason pickup James Paxton is sitting on a 6.00 ERA through three starts and 15 innings. He's had one good start, one OK start, and one bad start. J.A. Happ has an 8.76 ERA and three bad starts in three tries to his name. That includes allowing six runs in four innings plus two batters against the White Sox on Friday.
Happ, who pitched to a 2.69 ERA in 11 starts with the Yankees after coming over in a trade deadline deal with the Blue Jays last year, has yet to complete even five innings in any of his three starts this season, and his opponents have been the Orioles (twice) and White Sox. He's been getting beat up by rebuilding teams. The underlying Statcast numbers suggest this isn't bad luck either. Happ's exit velocity and launch angle allowed point to bad results:
Expected batting average: .320 (ninth percentile)
Expected slugging percentage: .610 (ninth percentile)
Expected weighted on-base average: .417 (11th percentile)
Masahiro Tanaka has been excellent in all three starts this year. He has a 1.47 ERA in 18 1/3 innings. Yankees starters other than Tanaka have a 5.36 ERA and are averaging under 4 2/3 innings per start. Happ is the primary culprit, but Paxton has been OK at best and fill-in fifth starter Jonathan Loaisiga managed to throw only seven total innings in his two starts.
Getting Sabathia back Saturday should help -- he has a 3.67 ERA the last two seasons and is replacing the largely overmatched Loaisiga -- but, similar to the bullpen, the Yankees need their current players to perform better. Happ is healthy and Paxton is healthy; injuries are not an excuse for those two. They were brought in to solidify the rotation -- Paxton was brought in to be a co-ace alongside Severino, really -- and have done anything but.
Bird is blowing another opportunity
The Hicks injury opened the door for Greg Bird to make the Opening Day roster. He was likely ticketed for Triple-A coming out of spring training, but then Hicks went down, forcing Stanton to play the outfield and freeing up DH at-bats for Bird. The results have not been good.
On Friday night Bird went 0 for 3 with two strikeouts and was booed after each at-bat. It's not hard to understand why fans are unhappy with him. The Yankees love Bird and have given him opportunity after opportunity, yet over the last three seasons he's authored a .196/.290/.391 batting line in 518 plate appearances around various injuries. That's terrible for a light-hitting defense-first middle infielder. It is untenable for a bat-only first baseman.
The Yankees were very short on left-handed lineup punch coming into 2019. Gregorius is hurt and Brett Gardner doesn't contribute much offensively these days, so Hicks, a switch-hitter, was far and away the team's best threat from the left side of the plate. Bird's lefty swing is seemingly tailor-made for Yankee Stadium's short right field porch. Instead, he is striking out a ton (40.5 percent of his plate appearances) and making very poor contact when he does get the bat on the ball.
Average exit velocity: 85.8 mph (21st percentile)
Hard-hit rate: 31.3 percent (30th percentile)
Expected batting average: .192 (16th percentile)
Expected slugging percentage: .334 (25th percentile)
Expected weighted on-base average: .298 (33rd percentile)
The injuries have thinned New York's lineup considerably, so even though he has not played well at all this season, Bird has been a staple in the middle of the order, usually hitting fifth. He's done nothing to justify a lineup spot that prominent in three years now, but injuries are forcing the team's hand. Of all the injury replacements in the lineup, Bird is the one with the best chance to have an impact, and he's instead fallen flat again.
They've played very sloppy baseball
It can be difficult to quantify something as vague as "sloppy" play, but you know it when you see it. Consider Gleyber Torres on this DJ LeMahieu two-run single Friday night. For some reason Torres froze between second and third bases rather than continue to third to force the White Sox to make the perfect set of relay throws for the inning-ending out.
The Yankees have made 12 errors this season, fourth most in baseball, and they've made seven outs on the bases, sixth most in baseball. They rank 24th in defensive efficiency (68.6 percent) and 20th in baserunning (minus-1.4 runs). Their margin for error has been reduced by injuries, and the players on the roster are compounding things with careless mistakes in the field and on the bases.
"It's got to be better, especially when you're playing a really good team, and you're up against a really good pitcher. You've got to do the little things that allow you to win ballgames," said the perpetually optimistic Boone said following an especially sloppy game earlier this week. "The bottom line is, we're really close to playing a good brand and a complete game."
We have yet to see evidence the Yankees are "really close to playing a good brand and a complete game," but hey, this is something that could turn around in an instant, like Britton and Green getting outs, Happ and Paxton pitching effectively, and Bird getting locked in at the plate. Right now, the Yankees are decimated by injuries, and many of the healthy players on the roster aren't pulling their weight either. READ MORE...
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Post by chiyankee on Apr 14, 2019 8:21:38 GMT -5
Even Ellsbury would be better than Tauchman, at least the Ells from three years ago. |
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Post by inger on Apr 14, 2019 10:30:58 GMT -5
www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb/craig-kimbrels-price-tag-appears-to-have-dropped/ar-BBVUGec?li=BBnba9I&ocid=U147DHP
www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb/the-yankees-are-decimated-by-injuries-but-their-issues-go-beyond-a-lengthy-injured-list/ar-BBVUgeX The 'Super Bullpen' isn't so super
On paper, the Yankees did not just have the best bullpen in baseball coming into the season, they had maybe the best bullpen in baseball history. Last year's bullpen was the second best ever by WAR, and this offseason the Yankees added Adam Ottavino and a full season of Zack Britton to their core bullpen group (they did lose David Robertson to free agency). It was not crazy to think this year's relief crew would be better than last year's.
Instead, 13 games into the new season, the bullpen has not been the overwhelming strength the Yankees and pretty much everyone else expected. In fact, it's been more of a liability. Here are the team's bullpen rankings in various categories going into Saturday's action:
ERA: 4.34 (15th)
WHIP: 1.43 (17th)
Strikeout rate: 10.0 K/9 (9th)
Win probability added: minus-1.22 (27th)
Shutdowns: 10 (21st)
Meltdowns: 13 (28th)
(Shutdowns are relief appearances that increase win probability at least six percent. Meltdowns are the opposite. They are relief appearances that decrease win probability at least six percent.)
According to YES Network researcher James Smyth, the Yankees have already lost seven games this season in which they held a lead. That includes two seventh-inning blown leads against the Astros earlier this week. Last season the Yankees did not suffer their seventh blown lead loss until June 13th, in their 64th game. Those blown leads aren't all on the bullpen, but yikes.
Ottavino has been nails while replacing Betances as Boone's high-leverage reliever of choice (one run and 11 strikeouts in seven innings), and long man Luis Cessa has been solid in low-leverage mop-up duty, otherwise the core Yankees relievers have all had some issues early this season. A partial list:
Aroldis Chapman's fastball velocity is at its lowest point in his career and he has a 10.8 H/9.
Zack Britton has more baserunners allowed (12) than swings and misses (10), which seems impossible.
Chad Green has allowed seven runs in 5 1/3 innings and has struck out only one of the last 21 batters he's faced.
Tommy Kahnle has not fully regained his 2017 velocity and has walked four in four innings.
Betances is not coming back to save the day anytime soon, and, really, no one player can fix a collectively struggling bullpen. For the Yankees to dig themselves out of this early season hole, they need Britton and Green to turn things around, Ottavino to stay razor sharp, and a young arm or two to come up from minors and give the team a shot in the arm. New York's vaunted bullpen has been a real weakness 13 games into 2019.
Paxton and especially Happ have struggled
Prized offseason pickup James Paxton is sitting on a 6.00 ERA through three starts and 15 innings. He's had one good start, one OK start, and one bad start. J.A. Happ has an 8.76 ERA and three bad starts in three tries to his name. That includes allowing six runs in four innings plus two batters against the White Sox on Friday.
Happ, who pitched to a 2.69 ERA in 11 starts with the Yankees after coming over in a trade deadline deal with the Blue Jays last year, has yet to complete even five innings in any of his three starts this season, and his opponents have been the Orioles (twice) and White Sox. He's been getting beat up by rebuilding teams. The underlying Statcast numbers suggest this isn't bad luck either. Happ's exit velocity and launch angle allowed point to bad results:
Expected batting average: .320 (ninth percentile)
Expected slugging percentage: .610 (ninth percentile)
Expected weighted on-base average: .417 (11th percentile)
Masahiro Tanaka has been excellent in all three starts this year. He has a 1.47 ERA in 18 1/3 innings. Yankees starters other than Tanaka have a 5.36 ERA and are averaging under 4 2/3 innings per start. Happ is the primary culprit, but Paxton has been OK at best and fill-in fifth starter Jonathan Loaisiga managed to throw only seven total innings in his two starts.
Getting Sabathia back Saturday should help -- he has a 3.67 ERA the last two seasons and is replacing the largely overmatched Loaisiga -- but, similar to the bullpen, the Yankees need their current players to perform better. Happ is healthy and Paxton is healthy; injuries are not an excuse for those two. They were brought in to solidify the rotation -- Paxton was brought in to be a co-ace alongside Severino, really -- and have done anything but.
Bird is blowing another opportunity
The Hicks injury opened the door for Greg Bird to make the Opening Day roster. He was likely ticketed for Triple-A coming out of spring training, but then Hicks went down, forcing Stanton to play the outfield and freeing up DH at-bats for Bird. The results have not been good.
On Friday night Bird went 0 for 3 with two strikeouts and was booed after each at-bat. It's not hard to understand why fans are unhappy with him. The Yankees love Bird and have given him opportunity after opportunity, yet over the last three seasons he's authored a .196/.290/.391 batting line in 518 plate appearances around various injuries. That's terrible for a light-hitting defense-first middle infielder. It is untenable for a bat-only first baseman.
The Yankees were very short on left-handed lineup punch coming into 2019. Gregorius is hurt and Brett Gardner doesn't contribute much offensively these days, so Hicks, a switch-hitter, was far and away the team's best threat from the left side of the plate. Bird's lefty swing is seemingly tailor-made for Yankee Stadium's short right field porch. Instead, he is striking out a ton (40.5 percent of his plate appearances) and making very poor contact when he does get the bat on the ball.
Average exit velocity: 85.8 mph (21st percentile)
Hard-hit rate: 31.3 percent (30th percentile)
Expected batting average: .192 (16th percentile)
Expected slugging percentage: .334 (25th percentile)
Expected weighted on-base average: .298 (33rd percentile)
The injuries have thinned New York's lineup considerably, so even though he has not played well at all this season, Bird has been a staple in the middle of the order, usually hitting fifth. He's done nothing to justify a lineup spot that prominent in three years now, but injuries are forcing the team's hand. Of all the injury replacements in the lineup, Bird is the one with the best chance to have an impact, and he's instead fallen flat again.
They've played very sloppy baseball
It can be difficult to quantify something as vague as "sloppy" play, but you know it when you see it. Consider Gleyber Torres on this DJ LeMahieu two-run single Friday night. For some reason Torres froze between second and third bases rather than continue to third to force the White Sox to make the perfect set of relay throws for the inning-ending out.
The Yankees have made 12 errors this season, fourth most in baseball, and they've made seven outs on the bases, sixth most in baseball. They rank 24th in defensive efficiency (68.6 percent) and 20th in baserunning (minus-1.4 runs). Their margin for error has been reduced by injuries, and the players on the roster are compounding things with careless mistakes in the field and on the bases.
"It's got to be better, especially when you're playing a really good team, and you're up against a really good pitcher. You've got to do the little things that allow you to win ballgames," said the perpetually optimistic Boone said following an especially sloppy game earlier this week. "The bottom line is, we're really close to playing a good brand and a complete game."
We have yet to see evidence the Yankees are "really close to playing a good brand and a complete game," but hey, this is something that could turn around in an instant, like Britton and Green getting outs, Happ and Paxton pitching effectively, and Bird getting locked in at the plate. Right now, the Yankees are decimated by injuries, and many of the healthy players on the roster aren't pulling their weight either. READ MORE...
One simple reply: Small samples...Yanks bullpen was a bit rusty at the start of 2018 as I recall. Then they settled in and had a fine season... |
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Post by inger on Apr 14, 2019 10:36:53 GMT -5
I think I was in eighth grade that I stopped at my friend John's hall locker near the end of the school year while he picked something up he needed for class. There was a rotten banana hanging on the back of the door. He said he hung it there the first day of school to see how bad it would get by the end of the year. I wonder if Ellsbury had maybe a rotten banana, or maybe a shrunken head in there?... I also know a guy that got fired from a job and dropped a dead rat in behind the drawers of a filing cabinet in the office of the place on his last day... Anyway, it seems illogical to give away the locker if there is any reason to believe Ellsbury will ever play for the team again. Great sign that once he's eligible to return, he's getting DFA'd...Being eligible to return seems like it may never happen at this point... |
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Post by kaybli on Apr 14, 2019 17:31:19 GMT -5
James Paxton: Astros stole signs, ‘knew what was coming’
“I did find out I was tipping my pitches when there were guys at second base, so they knew what was coming,” the left-hander said Sunday before the Yankees faced the White Sox at the Stadium. “They were fouling off some pretty good pitches, taking some pretty good pitches. There were stealing some signs. So that’s didn’t help.”
Paxton wasn’t absolving himself of blame. He didn’t pitch well. He lived in the middle of the plate far too often, especially against as lethal an offense as the Astros boast. But he felt something was off during the game, and after watching video of the outing, it was obvious. Special adviser Carlos Beltran pointed it out to him Saturday. It revolved around his knuckle-curve. His knuckle was showing before each delivery, a tendency earlier in his career.
“So they could see if I was going soft or hard,” said Paxton, who will start the opener in the first Yankees-Red Sox meeting of the year Tuesday in The Bronx. “[Beltran] showed me some video. [He said], ‘Look at these takes, look at these swings. They wouldn’t be making these swings or these takes if they didn’t know what was coming.’ That being said, I also didn’t throw the ball very well. I was over the middle of the plate too much, even when there were guys not on second base. So I need to be better as well.”
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Post by kaybli on Apr 15, 2019 7:22:09 GMT -5
James Paxton: Astros stole signs, ‘knew what was coming’
“I did find out I was tipping my pitches when there were guys at second base, so they knew what was coming,” the left-hander said Sunday before the Yankees faced the White Sox at the Stadium. “They were fouling off some pretty good pitches, taking some pretty good pitches. There were stealing some signs. So that’s didn’t help.”
Paxton wasn’t absolving himself of blame. He didn’t pitch well. He lived in the middle of the plate far too often, especially against as lethal an offense as the Astros boast. But he felt something was off during the game, and after watching video of the outing, it was obvious. Special adviser Carlos Beltran pointed it out to him Saturday. It revolved around his knuckle-curve. His knuckle was showing before each delivery, a tendency earlier in his career.
“So they could see if I was going soft or hard,” said Paxton, who will start the opener in the first Yankees-Red Sox meeting of the year Tuesday in The Bronx. “[Beltran] showed me some video. [He said], ‘Look at these takes, look at these swings. They wouldn’t be making these swings or these takes if they didn’t know what was coming.’ That being said, I also didn’t throw the ball very well. I was over the middle of the plate too much, even when there were guys not on second base. So I need to be better as well.”
Why did it take special adviser Carlos Beltran (hats off to him) to tell Paxton that he was tipping his pitches? Larry Rothschild couldn't figure this out? |
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