Things haven’t gone well for the Yankee rotation since Saturday. First A.J. Burnett cut his pitching hand by punching a wall in the clubhouse and has to be removed in the third inning. Then Andy Pettitte went down with a groin injury that will have him out at least a month. Then, Tuesday night, Phil Hughes continued his recent struggles by coughing up six runs on nine hits, two of them homers, and three walks in five-plus innings while striking out just two.
Not that the Yankee offense helped much. After pushing across two first-inning runs again replacement starter Sean O’Sullivan, one of them on a Nick Swisher solo homer, the Yankees made ten straight outs and failed to get another hit, never mind a run, until a two-out Juan Miranda single in the seventh. They never did add to their tally. Meanwhile Jonathan Albaladejo, Chan Ho Park, and Chad Gaudin coughed up four more runs, two of them on a wall-scraping homer to right by old pal Hideki Matsui off Park.
Jorge Posada threw Bobby Abreu out stealing second twice, Miranda and Alex Rodriguez both had two-hits, Rodriguez with a double that was the Yankees’ only extra-base hit other than Swisher’s homer (heck they only had six all night), and Mark Teixeira walked twice and scored the other run. That was the sum total of highlights for the Yankees in a game that was a total team loss. 10-2 Angels.
Well, the Rays and Red Sox lost, so no harm, no foul.
[1] Both coughing up 4 runs leads to shitty teams no less.
1) well you know my view on this...but the other two teams losing sure makes last night,s loss seem less painful.
2) I don't believe you...losing to bad teams only happens to the Yankees. You know, because they are unprepared, lack moxy, etc.
nice work o's and a's. that is the way to start a pleasant morning.
[3] 2) Heh.
Another brick hot week out there.
Phil needs to go over and sit in the corner with Gary Bettman for a little while
/groggy Yankees and Devils fan this morning
Dust it off. Ivan Nova will be here soon. He went *8 innings last night: 1 run, no walks, 6 k, hit 96 on the minor league gun (generally a tick or two generous).
And here's a slice of kiwi in yer fruit salad this morning: Jesus Montero hit 2 home runs.
*hat tip to River Ave. for posting the numbers
Go git 'em Javy, and here's hoping Joel Pineiro gets hit by a speeding Score Truck this afternoon.
so, what do we think of the odds of a Montero September call-up?
[8] as much as we'd love to see him, I doubt we will. The Yanks have tended to be stingy/conservative with Sept. call-ups. They didn't bring up AJax last year, despite every fan's desire to see him. They tend to bring up pitchers, and 3rd catchers, and while Montero fits that description, I doubt they'd expose/audition him in that role.
Perhaps we'll see him later in September, after the minor league playoffs are over. But I wouldn't expect more than a few pinch hit at-bats, if even that.
I just hope they don't trade him at this point. I would have done the Cliff Lee deal, but in the aftermath of that excitement , Im so glad he's still ripening on the Yankee vine.
Granderson's making me miss AJax more and more every day. Not to rub salt in that wound, but I was against that trade from the first minute.
I wasn't so much down on Grandy, but thought AJax could be a younger, cheaper, and perhaps better model of him.
Poor Grandy looks lost these days. We know he's better than this, but he's been awful.
8) very very slim because it would use up an option and/or start his arbitration clock earlier, right?
10) do we know he's better than this? Look at his slash stats over the last four years including this one...scarily his numbers this season fit a perfect progression.
[11] good point, I didn't even think of that.
I figured it was slim anyway
[12] true, his numbers have been going south, but his slugging percentage shouldn't be anywhere near where it's at right now. Everybody projected a lot more home runs out of him at Yankee Stadium (his lefty bat slighty diminished my disappointment in the AJax trade)
Perhaps we don't "know" he's better than this, but I think we have good reason to "think"he's better than this.
[11] good point, but the option/arbitration clocks would not be factors if the Yanks had a clear need/use for him. One could argue that he could be needed at DH, but again, the Yanks don't tend to call-up DH types.
[15] clock, not plural.
[15] I don't know if you wanna break him in as a DH. His future most likely is there, but he should probably at least get his feet wet in the field at the start.
oh man, this should be good
http://amzn.to/dcpPYn
Hey youse. I'm in NY, and going to head up to the Stadium soon. I feel somewhat less unhappy that my game, which I expected to be a Hughes start, is going to be a JV start.
It better not rain.
14) i wonder how daunted was the assumption that his SLG would benefit from New Yankee Stadium. The park last year was a grea HR bitters park' though it's playing more neutral this year, but it is a pretty bad park for doubles and especially triples, which has been a pretty big part of Granderson's game.
[19] yup, and catching balls used to be part of his game too. Not a good play on that ball last night. But he's better than that we think.. right?!
[20] I should hope so!
Really, I'm just thinking out loud. Like you, I was against the trade from the start, but then I sort of changed my mind at the beginning of the season. Now, I am beginning to wonder if my initial negativity was well placed. I sure hope I'm wrong.