It is overcast and breezy in the Bronx today. Rain is the the forecast. It’s the kind of day that makes me nostalgic for the summers I spent with my mother’s family in Belgium as a kid.
Good day for a cup of tea.
Yanks and Sox don’t go until tonight, so hopefully, the rain will be done by then.
In the meantime, check out this article in today’s New York Times magazine by Ron Berler about young pitchers and arm injuries. My question is this: Do young pitchers–high school, college, minor leagues–have TJ surgery on purpose? Do they take the risk hoping that they can add 5 mph on their fastball? I wonder.
It may be overcast and breezy, but my eyes just see the sun shining through. Though it might be the start of monsoon season in Boston.
I'm sure glad that CC came up big, like "beating you know who big!"
And I'm not referring to Lord Voldemort either, but both do have quite a kinship with Dark Magic!
: )
Did anyone see the ESPN story on Cuban defector, Aroldis Chapman, this morning? WOW that kid is awesome; he supposed can hit 102 on the gun, and his curve appeared to absolutely drop off the table. AND, he's a lefty...Oh, and he's thin and very young (I don't see how he could be much older than his reported age of 21..if he is older he's under 25).
I hope the Yanks back up the truck and give him big bucks. If we lose out to the Sox, like we did in the daisuke sweepstakes, that would be bad.
I once heard Dr. Jobe, the surgeon who originated TJ surgery, say that pitchers don't gain velocity from the procedure. He said that because there is usually a chronicity to the injury, pitchers are able to throw pain free for the first time in years, which enables them to throw harder than they have been prior to the surgery, which accounts for any observed increase in velocity.
From a practical perspective, the Yankees have not had great recent success with TJ surgery. Humberto Sanchez hasn't really recovered, JB Cox retired as a result of an incomplete recovery, Chris Garcia has sustained other injuries post-surgery, and Andrew Brackman is currently throwing about 10 mph slower than he did pre-surgery.
There will be a larger sample to assess in the near future, as Kontos, Marshall, and Betances will have undergone the procedure this season.
[0] scary stuff. I feel like this abuse is a work around of child labor laws. We'd probably send a father to jail if he had his kid doing this amount of pre-professional work in lumbering or carpentry. I'm probably stretching it a bit there.
I needed to and loved playing year around across each of the seasons sometimes in two simultaneous sports with, when they overlapped, four hours a day of practice. My only major injuries were from straight impact, which still seems unavoidable to me.
The kids who did just one thing year around never seemed happy to me, and honestly, most of them weren't even that much better than us seasonal guys. We were more athletic, which had it's advantages at game time.
Last I saw, Cox hadn't officially quit, but he's contemplating it. I don't think Garcia's injuries have anything to do with his arm. Meanwhile, Jon Lieber was a success, Sergio Mitre is back making major league starts with moderate success, which is about all he'd done before the surgery. Octavio Dotel blew up in their faces because they didn't add a post-recovery year to his deal, but he's still contributing in the White Sox's bullpen (he's not the dominant reliever he was, but he's not young anymore either). Eric Milton and Victor Zambrano weren't worth keeping past their recovery. Sanchez, Cox, and Brackman haven't come through well, but none of them had really done much (or in Brackman's case, anything) pre-surgery either.
What a perfectly beautiful photograph, sez the native Bronxite and tea drinker.
[3] Sarcasm? Beautifully bold if it is... >;)
@ #0: Welcome to Oregon, Alex.
it is hot and sunny here but I would love for it to be rainy for some reason. So long as I could sit by the window and read a book instead of work.
not your typical Sunday lineup. But Arod gets the rest. Which I like given how he grabbed that hip the other day.
Jeter SS
Damon LF
Teixeira 1B
Rodriguez DH
Posada C
Swisher RF
Cano 2B
Cabrera CF
Hairston 3B
What I'd like tonight is a come-from-behind victory. The Red Sox think they've finally got one in the bag then the Yanks rip their heart out in the bottom of the ninth.