Baltimore is a bad baseball team.
Down 6-1 and then 7-3, the Yankees came back with the help of 3 throws from the OF that were 3 of the worst throws you will see from a professional OF'r.
It was 7-3 in the 7th inning when the Yankees had 1st and 3rd with one out. After a single made it 7-4 Baltimore brought in Armstrong to pitch to Hicks. Hicks lofted a shallow fly ball to right field , so shallow that Maybin couldn't try to score. However, Dwight Smith Jr. "threw" home like he was trying to hit a bird. Not only was the throw embarrassingly high, it was way off target (in between catcher and 1B (remember he was close). This allowed Maybin to score and LeMahieu to go all the way to 3rd from 1B.
The score is now 7-6 entering the 9th and Gardner leads off with a line drive single to LF after a really good AB fouling off pitches. Maybin then hits a line drive to RF where Rickard makes a very soft and off target throw to 3rd base with no chance to get Gardner and also no chance to cut the ball and get Maybin going to 2nd...It was one of the softest and ill advised throw from a RF. With 2nd and 3rd. Down 1 with 2nd and 3rd LeMahieu grounded out on the 1st pitch and the runners had to hold (weak swing on a first pitch where he pulled an outside pitch). Then Hicks lofted a fly ball to normal depth LF, definitely deep enough to score Gardner, but Dwight Smith Jr decided to airmail another throw way over the cut to allow Maybin to move to 3rd (and possibly score on a wild pitch). With 2 outs and the game tied at 7 Voit popped out to the catcher, except the catcher misjudged the ball so badly he never got near it and by the dumber laws of baseball did not get an error for it. (I don't want to get too far off base here, but that IS what an error is in my book. Misjudging a ball is an error and after then allowing Luke to walk, Sanchez hit a 3 run HR that shoudl never have happened.
Nice comeback scoring the last 7 runs, but Baltimore is bad.
Last night the Yanks continued their HR parade and German kept Baltimore in check before allowing a 3 run HR after being up 9-0.
Some overall notes:
Sanchez homered in each game with Torres hitting 2 HR's in the first game and Frazier hitting 2 HR's in the second game. Both Frazier homers were fastball on the outside corner that he drove to dead center field that were a few feet beyond the fence. It was good to see as the shots to CF are legit, the power alleys in Baltimore are too short, kind of like ours is short in RF.
Happ was very weak in his game. He was throwing about 91-92 MPH and his change was coming in at 88 usually. He got it to 85 a few times and that was more effective, but he didn't control it well. His ERA is now 5.16; not good!
Gardner is slowing down. He had two plays in LF that in his prime he would have made both and he missed both. One he turned into a triple as he couldn't beat the ball to the spot (not an error) where in his prime he would have. the other was a bad route to the ball and he didn't make a play on it. BTW, I wouldn't consider either of those an error because taking a slightly bad route because you misjudged the ball off the bat is not the same in my book as running in and then the ball goes over your head as you leap up and just miss it...or the catcher pop up example.
Speaking of dropped popups, Voit, Alberto and Severino (their catcher) all dropped routine popups.
I want a sweep of Baltimore. Tonight CC goes against a guy with an 8 ERA and this is a game we should win. Thursday, Tanaka goes against Bundy who has had a good month, but as long as Tanaka is healthy, we should win.
Wednesday, May 22, 2019
Monday, May 20, 2019
First Place Battle
The first two games of the Tampa series were very good pitching duels. You can see why Tampa is a legit team with their very good pitching and modern day understanding of using statistics to give you an edge.
I wrote my update on the first two games of the series before I watched the Sunday game
The Friday night game saw CC pitch a solid 6 innings where he had pretty solid command and held TB to one run in 6 innings. The outcome was good, only allowing a solo HR, but I thought he could have used his change a little more as he was getting a lot of swinging strikes on it (something he hasn't been getting a lot of). After the 6th inning, I didn't understand the flow of pitchers? I have a philosophy of getting as much as you can from your pitchers when the game is close, because you never know when you will go into extra innings. Also, I like to leave an effective pitcher in the game because you never know when the "other" guy just doesn't have it. That being said, there are matchups that you have to take into account and when your righty stud gets 3 righties out and looks great, it does make sense to bring in your lefty stud to get the next 3 lefties coming up (as an example)...
In this case, Ottavino was chosen to start the 7th inning, after 2 outs and a walk he was replaced by Kahnle. 10 pitches and Ottavino was pulled in a 1-1 game? Kahnle allowed a single and then K'd the guy for the 3rd out and then after 9 pitches he was replaced with Chad Green for the 8th inning. This entire sequence made little sense to me. For one, you are playing against the first place team, therefore, you are playing a little more for the win, but how do you only get 1 inning out of Kahnle and Ottavino combined??? This game could go to extra innings! Further, Green had been awful all year before being sent down and then coming back up he had ONE good outing. I don't have faith in Green yet. Green, of course, allowed 3 hits in 1 inning as 2 runs scored. Honestly, Green didn't pitch that poorly, but he allowed a double on an 0-2 pitch that was on the corner (not a bad pitch) and Torres made an error (he has been mediocre defensively at SS). But now we were down 3-1 because of poor use of the pitchers. In the bottom of the 9th, we got to Alvarado with a HR from Voit and then ripped single by Sanchez. After a strikeout to the newly acquired Morales (who homered for our 1st run), Torres just missed a HR, but got a double putting us at 2nd and 3rd with one out. After Frazier was intentionally walked, Maybin pinch hit for Gardner and Alvarado threw a wild pitch that allowed us to tie the game. Maybin grounded into a FC where they threw home to get Torres. Urshela then delivered the game winning 3 run comeback with a bullet to CF that beat Kiermaier over his head for a hit. Really exciting and rewarding comeback! First place!
Saturday saw another pitchers duel with Tanaka shutting out Tampa for 6 innings while we salvaged one run off of the excellent stuff delivered from Snell. Tanaka came out a little early in the game because he took one off his shin to end the 6th inning (the ball luckily ricocheted off of Tanaka directly toward first base).
Neither team got much going, but once again, if a reliever has a good 10 pitch inning, I am OK extending them for another batter or 2 to get more of our better pitching, especially in a close game against one of the 2 teams you are battling the division for. Kahnle threw 11 and Britton threw 10 pitches. I understand that pitches aren't the only factor, in fact, the rest between innings is worse than an additional 5 pitches or so, but 10 pitches is not a lot. It ended up where Holder and Cessa pitched the 10th and 11th innings and Meadows got to Cessa in the 11th.
The Yankees rallied in the 11th. Alavarado came in again for Tampa (he threw 26 pitches in allowing 3 runs the night before) and he was met with a bullet single by Voit. Estrada pinch ran for Luke. Here is where I was annoyed. It was a 3-2 count on Hicks and Hicks was on Alavarado's fastball and because of this, I wanted to send Estrada. If Alvarado threw a breaking ball it would make it easier to steal the base and hopefully stay out of the DP. Tampa felt Hicks was on the fastball as well and threw a slider and Hicks swung and missed it while Estrada stayed at first base. Poor coaching there! Unfortunately, it hurt us as Sanchez then hit into a DP to end the game. I was very annoyed at this, especially when you scored so few runs, you need to take advantage of the situations and try to create something (or avoid the DP)
Back in second place
The Sunday game:
The Yankees took a page from the Tampa and started Green. I think the part that Tampa does differently is that they usually take one of their top guys in the pen to start, not their 5th best (or so) guy.
Predictably, Green allowed 2 HR's in 1.2 innings.
Cortes Jr. came in and pitched 4 innings and allowed 3 runs. He showed very good control of his fastball, hitting spots very consistently but his stuff isn't outstanding. He does have a sneaky fastball and has movement on his other pitches, but e needs his control. He hung a slider and that allowed all 3 of his runs. However, it was pitch selection that had me ticked. Cortes is a lefty and he was facing a righty. on a 2-1 pitch Sanchez asked for a fastball inside and his target was way inside for a ball and Cortes hit the target, but it was a ball. Now at 3-1 he went away with a change and the batter swung threw/over it. Now at 3-2 what do you throw? Your fastball is 90/91. My son was in the room with me (notice I didn't say watching with me) and when Sanchez lined up inside again I said,
"this is a bad idea." Sanchez called for the fastball on the inside corner and Cortes would have hit the glove perfectly, unfortunately the bat crushed the ball for a double down the line. Very poor choice of location and I also thought the pitch. I thought a change away was the pitch, even a change for a strike was ok, but not the fastball inside as the pitched didn't want to walk him and there was a good chance the fastball would leak out over the plate. As it turned out he delivered the pitch exactly as the catcher wanted it and it was still drilled.
Down, 5-3 going into the bottom of the 4th Morton had great stuff against us, but outside of Sanchez swinging at the first pitch twice (and making an out), the rest of the lineup was really working him. he had about 70-75 pitches going into the 4th inning. Hicks tied the game on a hanging changeup that he jumped all over. and we got Morton out of the game after 4 innings and 88 pitches.
Working the count against the good pitchers is so important. Morton has a fantastic curve ball and a 95 MPH fastball that has great movement. Fortunately, he didn't control it well against us. He also throws a slider and a change, but neither is as good as his curve or FB.
Their pen didn't throw strikes either and we walked and had some help from their poor defense as we put up a 7 spot in the 6th inning (they walked us 5 times in that inning).
Back in 1st Place!
A few notes:
The Kendry Morales signing - I don't have all the financial details, but it appears we don't have to pay much at all of the 9 mil he is owed and the player to be named later leaves it open ended. That being said, I think he gives us a professional batter to use until we get some more players back. I would rather someone who was a stronger platoon type of player (very strong against righties) as Morales is pretty equal for his career and actually has been a little better from the right side of the plate the past 2 years (which surprised me). I say this was a good low risk signing though as he works the count.
Hicks has been taking a lot of pitches and you can see hitting a fastball (or something straight) has been easier than the breaking balls. Having him play CF and work the count and be productive is a huge plus for us. Gardner being able to rest will make him better as well.
Frazier has been more off balance of late and defensively he is more of a LF'r as his arm isn't RF quality. He had a good chance to throw a batter out and his throw was not even close...Then again, we are spoiled with Judge out there. I am not down on Frazier as a player, he has tools and his overall OPS of .756 is acceptable right now.
Urshela has been a great pickup and while his offense was a huge surprise, his defense has been steady and very solid. Last night he was way out in front of a pitch and just got a piece of it and the ball fouled down and toward the backstop and when it came up it hit him right in the groin. Urshela went down in pain and it took awhile for him to be able to continue the AB. I am not sure it was intentional or not but Michael Kay then said, "Urshela will resume the AB with NO balls and two strikes." OK, maybe that is just my stupid humor, but I thought enough of it to write it here.
Sanchez hit his first career triple with nobody out and we left him there. It was not because of poor hitting either, we drilled two balls with the infield in and both were excellent plays by the Rays infielders. Even with the infield back our last grounder was struck well...that was some good defense.
Enjoy your week!
I wrote my update on the first two games of the series before I watched the Sunday game
The Friday night game saw CC pitch a solid 6 innings where he had pretty solid command and held TB to one run in 6 innings. The outcome was good, only allowing a solo HR, but I thought he could have used his change a little more as he was getting a lot of swinging strikes on it (something he hasn't been getting a lot of). After the 6th inning, I didn't understand the flow of pitchers? I have a philosophy of getting as much as you can from your pitchers when the game is close, because you never know when you will go into extra innings. Also, I like to leave an effective pitcher in the game because you never know when the "other" guy just doesn't have it. That being said, there are matchups that you have to take into account and when your righty stud gets 3 righties out and looks great, it does make sense to bring in your lefty stud to get the next 3 lefties coming up (as an example)...
In this case, Ottavino was chosen to start the 7th inning, after 2 outs and a walk he was replaced by Kahnle. 10 pitches and Ottavino was pulled in a 1-1 game? Kahnle allowed a single and then K'd the guy for the 3rd out and then after 9 pitches he was replaced with Chad Green for the 8th inning. This entire sequence made little sense to me. For one, you are playing against the first place team, therefore, you are playing a little more for the win, but how do you only get 1 inning out of Kahnle and Ottavino combined??? This game could go to extra innings! Further, Green had been awful all year before being sent down and then coming back up he had ONE good outing. I don't have faith in Green yet. Green, of course, allowed 3 hits in 1 inning as 2 runs scored. Honestly, Green didn't pitch that poorly, but he allowed a double on an 0-2 pitch that was on the corner (not a bad pitch) and Torres made an error (he has been mediocre defensively at SS). But now we were down 3-1 because of poor use of the pitchers. In the bottom of the 9th, we got to Alvarado with a HR from Voit and then ripped single by Sanchez. After a strikeout to the newly acquired Morales (who homered for our 1st run), Torres just missed a HR, but got a double putting us at 2nd and 3rd with one out. After Frazier was intentionally walked, Maybin pinch hit for Gardner and Alvarado threw a wild pitch that allowed us to tie the game. Maybin grounded into a FC where they threw home to get Torres. Urshela then delivered the game winning 3 run comeback with a bullet to CF that beat Kiermaier over his head for a hit. Really exciting and rewarding comeback! First place!
Saturday saw another pitchers duel with Tanaka shutting out Tampa for 6 innings while we salvaged one run off of the excellent stuff delivered from Snell. Tanaka came out a little early in the game because he took one off his shin to end the 6th inning (the ball luckily ricocheted off of Tanaka directly toward first base).
Neither team got much going, but once again, if a reliever has a good 10 pitch inning, I am OK extending them for another batter or 2 to get more of our better pitching, especially in a close game against one of the 2 teams you are battling the division for. Kahnle threw 11 and Britton threw 10 pitches. I understand that pitches aren't the only factor, in fact, the rest between innings is worse than an additional 5 pitches or so, but 10 pitches is not a lot. It ended up where Holder and Cessa pitched the 10th and 11th innings and Meadows got to Cessa in the 11th.
The Yankees rallied in the 11th. Alavarado came in again for Tampa (he threw 26 pitches in allowing 3 runs the night before) and he was met with a bullet single by Voit. Estrada pinch ran for Luke. Here is where I was annoyed. It was a 3-2 count on Hicks and Hicks was on Alavarado's fastball and because of this, I wanted to send Estrada. If Alvarado threw a breaking ball it would make it easier to steal the base and hopefully stay out of the DP. Tampa felt Hicks was on the fastball as well and threw a slider and Hicks swung and missed it while Estrada stayed at first base. Poor coaching there! Unfortunately, it hurt us as Sanchez then hit into a DP to end the game. I was very annoyed at this, especially when you scored so few runs, you need to take advantage of the situations and try to create something (or avoid the DP)
Back in second place
The Sunday game:
The Yankees took a page from the Tampa and started Green. I think the part that Tampa does differently is that they usually take one of their top guys in the pen to start, not their 5th best (or so) guy.
Predictably, Green allowed 2 HR's in 1.2 innings.
Cortes Jr. came in and pitched 4 innings and allowed 3 runs. He showed very good control of his fastball, hitting spots very consistently but his stuff isn't outstanding. He does have a sneaky fastball and has movement on his other pitches, but e needs his control. He hung a slider and that allowed all 3 of his runs. However, it was pitch selection that had me ticked. Cortes is a lefty and he was facing a righty. on a 2-1 pitch Sanchez asked for a fastball inside and his target was way inside for a ball and Cortes hit the target, but it was a ball. Now at 3-1 he went away with a change and the batter swung threw/over it. Now at 3-2 what do you throw? Your fastball is 90/91. My son was in the room with me (notice I didn't say watching with me) and when Sanchez lined up inside again I said,
"this is a bad idea." Sanchez called for the fastball on the inside corner and Cortes would have hit the glove perfectly, unfortunately the bat crushed the ball for a double down the line. Very poor choice of location and I also thought the pitch. I thought a change away was the pitch, even a change for a strike was ok, but not the fastball inside as the pitched didn't want to walk him and there was a good chance the fastball would leak out over the plate. As it turned out he delivered the pitch exactly as the catcher wanted it and it was still drilled.
Down, 5-3 going into the bottom of the 4th Morton had great stuff against us, but outside of Sanchez swinging at the first pitch twice (and making an out), the rest of the lineup was really working him. he had about 70-75 pitches going into the 4th inning. Hicks tied the game on a hanging changeup that he jumped all over. and we got Morton out of the game after 4 innings and 88 pitches.
Working the count against the good pitchers is so important. Morton has a fantastic curve ball and a 95 MPH fastball that has great movement. Fortunately, he didn't control it well against us. He also throws a slider and a change, but neither is as good as his curve or FB.
Their pen didn't throw strikes either and we walked and had some help from their poor defense as we put up a 7 spot in the 6th inning (they walked us 5 times in that inning).
Back in 1st Place!
A few notes:
The Kendry Morales signing - I don't have all the financial details, but it appears we don't have to pay much at all of the 9 mil he is owed and the player to be named later leaves it open ended. That being said, I think he gives us a professional batter to use until we get some more players back. I would rather someone who was a stronger platoon type of player (very strong against righties) as Morales is pretty equal for his career and actually has been a little better from the right side of the plate the past 2 years (which surprised me). I say this was a good low risk signing though as he works the count.
Hicks has been taking a lot of pitches and you can see hitting a fastball (or something straight) has been easier than the breaking balls. Having him play CF and work the count and be productive is a huge plus for us. Gardner being able to rest will make him better as well.
Frazier has been more off balance of late and defensively he is more of a LF'r as his arm isn't RF quality. He had a good chance to throw a batter out and his throw was not even close...Then again, we are spoiled with Judge out there. I am not down on Frazier as a player, he has tools and his overall OPS of .756 is acceptable right now.
Urshela has been a great pickup and while his offense was a huge surprise, his defense has been steady and very solid. Last night he was way out in front of a pitch and just got a piece of it and the ball fouled down and toward the backstop and when it came up it hit him right in the groin. Urshela went down in pain and it took awhile for him to be able to continue the AB. I am not sure it was intentional or not but Michael Kay then said, "Urshela will resume the AB with NO balls and two strikes." OK, maybe that is just my stupid humor, but I thought enough of it to write it here.
Sanchez hit his first career triple with nobody out and we left him there. It was not because of poor hitting either, we drilled two balls with the infield in and both were excellent plays by the Rays infielders. Even with the infield back our last grounder was struck well...that was some good defense.
Enjoy your week!
Monday, May 13, 2019
Post Mothers Day Post!
Been a little bit since I posted, but I have watched almost every game.
Without getting into each game, I want to make a few comments about the Tampa series and then some stats.
German allowed 2 HR's but held it together long enough to get the win (now 7-1) with one scoreless inning each from 4 different relievers. Kahnle, continued looking excellent and only Ottavino struggled but pitched his way out of 2 walks and a hit to not allow a run. The Yanks held onto a 4-3 win.
The second game is what happens a lot in baseball. A 2-2 game going into the bottom of the 6th, turned a close game into a blowout as we used our "lesser" pitchers. Holder, did not live up to his name as he allowed 2 runs in his inning and Nestor Cortes Jr, allowed 3 runs in 2 innings as we let the game get away from us. While this is still early in the season, Tampa is a team to take serious and with a tie game, I would have either stuck with CC (he had only 76 pitches and had gotten out of the previous 2 innings without a run even if his control was awful all game) or I would have used my better pitchers. Getting into a teams weaker bullpen pitchers is very key these days and thus why I like to work pitchers and get their pitch count high.
Game 3 saw a good pitchers dual between Snell and Tanaka. Each of them was dominant. Snell struck out 12 in 5.2 innings and showed a very live 96 MPH fastball that he spotted well to go along with a moving changeup. Tanaka matched him by throwing really good strikes and having better movement on his splitter (which has floated a lot this year). Tanaka went 7 innings allowing only a HR on a low pitch (probably a ball) that was over the heart of the plate. He threw only 73 pitches and I thought he would come out for the 8th inning, especially after we scored another run to go up 3-1, but Boone went with Britton. Brittion had good stuff but allowed a single in a good AB and then an inside out single to make it 1st and 3rd with 1 out. After a pitch got far enough away from Romine they had 2nd and 3rd with 1 out, but Britton struck out Choi and Diaz to get out of the inning. The Yankees then returned the favor beating up on weaker pitching by adding 4 more runs in the 9th including putting the game out of reach with a 2 run double from Urhsela, who had struck out in his previous 4 AB's.
Some observations/stats:
In game 2 Voit got hit after a HR and then Sanchez was hit a few batters later on a breaking ball. While the Voit's HBP was eye raising right after the HR and it was a fastball, their pitcher was wild and the game was too close to be throwing at someone there. I didn't think it was intentional
In Game 3, the Yankees were up 3-1 in the 9th when Estrada led off with his 2nd HR of his career. Then, after 2 singles, Boone had LeMahieu sacrifice to move 2 runners up. Noting was said by the announcers, but then after they intentionally walked Voit, Michael Kay said that this was not a good move as you lose Voits bat and the sac is not used much. While in some cases that is correct, Michael wasn't taking the situation into account. Up 4-1, you want to give yourself the best chance to score 1 more run as that should be enough. Further, bases loaded with 1 out has a higher run expectancy than 1st and 2nd with nobody out. Therefore, it is a better move normally to do that and with the goal to just get one more across, I thought it was a good move. I do agree that if we were down by 2 or so I probably would not do that as I would want Voit's stick to get an AB there. All that being said, when you can move 2 runners up on a sac it is twice as worthwhile as one runner.
Also, in game, 2, LeMahieu had his worst game defensively. He didn't get any errors, but he got one for Sanchez when he didn't field a low throw form Sanchez that was really right where he could have caught it and tagged at the same time, but he was late to cover. He also missed a play that the scorer gave a hit to. DJ has been great two way player so far so no complaints at all, but he did not have a good game there.
Gardner has a .694 OPS as he is in a slump
Andujar has been awful so far. His OPS is under .300...that is his OPS! 47 AB's is not just a few either. They need to give him more time as he will hit, but the shoulder is probably bothering him and I would find some days off for him.
Torres has his OPS up to .779!
Sanchez is leading us with a .960 OPS thanks to his HR's, Urshela is next at .918 and then DJ and Voit at .831 and .830 respectively
We have won 7 out of last 8 Series'
The Red Sox have started their winning ways (on a 8-1 run). I think we all expected that as they do have a solid team. Tampa is competitive as well, but I don't see as good of a team as The Red Sox and of course the Yankees. Tampa did win 90 games last year and many people forget that.
Without getting into each game, I want to make a few comments about the Tampa series and then some stats.
German allowed 2 HR's but held it together long enough to get the win (now 7-1) with one scoreless inning each from 4 different relievers. Kahnle, continued looking excellent and only Ottavino struggled but pitched his way out of 2 walks and a hit to not allow a run. The Yanks held onto a 4-3 win.
The second game is what happens a lot in baseball. A 2-2 game going into the bottom of the 6th, turned a close game into a blowout as we used our "lesser" pitchers. Holder, did not live up to his name as he allowed 2 runs in his inning and Nestor Cortes Jr, allowed 3 runs in 2 innings as we let the game get away from us. While this is still early in the season, Tampa is a team to take serious and with a tie game, I would have either stuck with CC (he had only 76 pitches and had gotten out of the previous 2 innings without a run even if his control was awful all game) or I would have used my better pitchers. Getting into a teams weaker bullpen pitchers is very key these days and thus why I like to work pitchers and get their pitch count high.
Game 3 saw a good pitchers dual between Snell and Tanaka. Each of them was dominant. Snell struck out 12 in 5.2 innings and showed a very live 96 MPH fastball that he spotted well to go along with a moving changeup. Tanaka matched him by throwing really good strikes and having better movement on his splitter (which has floated a lot this year). Tanaka went 7 innings allowing only a HR on a low pitch (probably a ball) that was over the heart of the plate. He threw only 73 pitches and I thought he would come out for the 8th inning, especially after we scored another run to go up 3-1, but Boone went with Britton. Brittion had good stuff but allowed a single in a good AB and then an inside out single to make it 1st and 3rd with 1 out. After a pitch got far enough away from Romine they had 2nd and 3rd with 1 out, but Britton struck out Choi and Diaz to get out of the inning. The Yankees then returned the favor beating up on weaker pitching by adding 4 more runs in the 9th including putting the game out of reach with a 2 run double from Urhsela, who had struck out in his previous 4 AB's.
Some observations/stats:
In game 2 Voit got hit after a HR and then Sanchez was hit a few batters later on a breaking ball. While the Voit's HBP was eye raising right after the HR and it was a fastball, their pitcher was wild and the game was too close to be throwing at someone there. I didn't think it was intentional
In Game 3, the Yankees were up 3-1 in the 9th when Estrada led off with his 2nd HR of his career. Then, after 2 singles, Boone had LeMahieu sacrifice to move 2 runners up. Noting was said by the announcers, but then after they intentionally walked Voit, Michael Kay said that this was not a good move as you lose Voits bat and the sac is not used much. While in some cases that is correct, Michael wasn't taking the situation into account. Up 4-1, you want to give yourself the best chance to score 1 more run as that should be enough. Further, bases loaded with 1 out has a higher run expectancy than 1st and 2nd with nobody out. Therefore, it is a better move normally to do that and with the goal to just get one more across, I thought it was a good move. I do agree that if we were down by 2 or so I probably would not do that as I would want Voit's stick to get an AB there. All that being said, when you can move 2 runners up on a sac it is twice as worthwhile as one runner.
Also, in game, 2, LeMahieu had his worst game defensively. He didn't get any errors, but he got one for Sanchez when he didn't field a low throw form Sanchez that was really right where he could have caught it and tagged at the same time, but he was late to cover. He also missed a play that the scorer gave a hit to. DJ has been great two way player so far so no complaints at all, but he did not have a good game there.
Gardner has a .694 OPS as he is in a slump
Andujar has been awful so far. His OPS is under .300...that is his OPS! 47 AB's is not just a few either. They need to give him more time as he will hit, but the shoulder is probably bothering him and I would find some days off for him.
Torres has his OPS up to .779!
Sanchez is leading us with a .960 OPS thanks to his HR's, Urshela is next at .918 and then DJ and Voit at .831 and .830 respectively
We have won 7 out of last 8 Series'
The Red Sox have started their winning ways (on a 8-1 run). I think we all expected that as they do have a solid team. Tampa is competitive as well, but I don't see as good of a team as The Red Sox and of course the Yankees. Tampa did win 90 games last year and many people forget that.
Friday, May 3, 2019
Arizona Games
Just a quick read on the two games in Arizona:
1st Game:
Greinke shut down our mostly minor league lineup with Greg Maddux type of control. His slider was just off the plate and his 89 MPH fastball was placed in great spots and then he ran his change-up in to righties and away from lefties. He then had a really slow curveball that was a true 12-6 one that dropped like crazy. He was making really good pitches. Lost 3-1
2nd Game:
I was ornery from the start as Gardner led off with a single (not ornery yet)...Voit works a 3-2 count and Gardner is not running and what do you think happens? DP by Voit. How is Gardner not running there? It didn't get better for me (or the Yankees) as Tanaka really struggled with his control for his 4 innings and I agreed to pull him when he did as he just didn't have it. Cessa, Kahnle and Ottavino went 4 scoreless innings but the Yankees couldn't score the 3 runs Tanaka allowed.
Other notes on game 2: Tauchman overthrew the cutoff on a possible play at the plate allowing the batter to get to 2nd base. I expect more from major leaguers! The announcer, who was not Singleton, (not sure who he was but he was not good), made a lot of comments I didn't agree with and was just wrong at times. One time, he was talking about a wild pitch that was a tough block, and the announcer went out of his way to say how that was "not Sanchez' fault as he did everything he could to stop the ball from getting away." While that can be true and Sanchez has been much more active this year at blocking balls, this was not "doing everything he could." First, the way Sanchez setup made it harder for him to move quickly (to his right) and 2nd he didn't move quickly and 3rd, because he wasn't able to get outside the ball he wasn't able to turn (block) the ball back toward home plate and the pitch got outside of him and away from him for a wild pitch. It was one of those plays that pros fairly routinely block and you say, that was a nice block...and it saves two baserunners from moving up; a pretty substantial difference when one scores.
There was a bunt play with a man on 3rd for Arizona where the bunt went straight up off the plate and Sanchez hopped out grabbed it and threw him out. The ump behind home plate immediately called it fair but after Arizona asked the ump at 3rd (not a challenge) as an appeal they overturned it. I think the ball was still over the plate and fair and should not have been overturned. Boone had challenged a play at 2nd base where Arizona in the act of turning a DP (we hit into 2 tough ones) the fielder might have come off the bag early, but while Boone felt this was a "head scratcher" it is one of those plays I would rather them not overturn (very close). Later, Wade had a pitch graze him and without a challenge, Boone asked to appeal it. Boone seemed very calm and even covered his mouth his hand as he requested help and the ump tossed him very quickly if you ask me. I thought the ump did a poor job there as Boone did not show him up and later Boone said it was "pretty harmless
comment."
Maybin had a really good feel for the strike zone for us as he walked twice with one of those AB's showing great control of some tempting 2 strike pitches. He has been a very good pickup for us and is performing better than we could have hoped. My hope is we won't need him later in the year, but we need to win some ball games in the meantime.
Lost 3-2
Congratulations to CC! 3000 k's is a really remarkable achievement because it shows you have enough quality stuff and longevity to reach that goal. When only 17 players have done it, it says a lot.
Back home with 3 against Minnesota starting Friday as we should be seeing Frazier, LeMahieu, and Andujar pretty soon. Then, we will only be without Judge, Stanton, Hicks, Didi, Severino, and Betances :-)
1st Game:
Greinke shut down our mostly minor league lineup with Greg Maddux type of control. His slider was just off the plate and his 89 MPH fastball was placed in great spots and then he ran his change-up in to righties and away from lefties. He then had a really slow curveball that was a true 12-6 one that dropped like crazy. He was making really good pitches. Lost 3-1
2nd Game:
I was ornery from the start as Gardner led off with a single (not ornery yet)...Voit works a 3-2 count and Gardner is not running and what do you think happens? DP by Voit. How is Gardner not running there? It didn't get better for me (or the Yankees) as Tanaka really struggled with his control for his 4 innings and I agreed to pull him when he did as he just didn't have it. Cessa, Kahnle and Ottavino went 4 scoreless innings but the Yankees couldn't score the 3 runs Tanaka allowed.
Other notes on game 2: Tauchman overthrew the cutoff on a possible play at the plate allowing the batter to get to 2nd base. I expect more from major leaguers! The announcer, who was not Singleton, (not sure who he was but he was not good), made a lot of comments I didn't agree with and was just wrong at times. One time, he was talking about a wild pitch that was a tough block, and the announcer went out of his way to say how that was "not Sanchez' fault as he did everything he could to stop the ball from getting away." While that can be true and Sanchez has been much more active this year at blocking balls, this was not "doing everything he could." First, the way Sanchez setup made it harder for him to move quickly (to his right) and 2nd he didn't move quickly and 3rd, because he wasn't able to get outside the ball he wasn't able to turn (block) the ball back toward home plate and the pitch got outside of him and away from him for a wild pitch. It was one of those plays that pros fairly routinely block and you say, that was a nice block...and it saves two baserunners from moving up; a pretty substantial difference when one scores.
There was a bunt play with a man on 3rd for Arizona where the bunt went straight up off the plate and Sanchez hopped out grabbed it and threw him out. The ump behind home plate immediately called it fair but after Arizona asked the ump at 3rd (not a challenge) as an appeal they overturned it. I think the ball was still over the plate and fair and should not have been overturned. Boone had challenged a play at 2nd base where Arizona in the act of turning a DP (we hit into 2 tough ones) the fielder might have come off the bag early, but while Boone felt this was a "head scratcher" it is one of those plays I would rather them not overturn (very close). Later, Wade had a pitch graze him and without a challenge, Boone asked to appeal it. Boone seemed very calm and even covered his mouth his hand as he requested help and the ump tossed him very quickly if you ask me. I thought the ump did a poor job there as Boone did not show him up and later Boone said it was "pretty harmless
comment."
Maybin had a really good feel for the strike zone for us as he walked twice with one of those AB's showing great control of some tempting 2 strike pitches. He has been a very good pickup for us and is performing better than we could have hoped. My hope is we won't need him later in the year, but we need to win some ball games in the meantime.
Lost 3-2
Congratulations to CC! 3000 k's is a really remarkable achievement because it shows you have enough quality stuff and longevity to reach that goal. When only 17 players have done it, it says a lot.
Back home with 3 against Minnesota starting Friday as we should be seeing Frazier, LeMahieu, and Andujar pretty soon. Then, we will only be without Judge, Stanton, Hicks, Didi, Severino, and Betances :-)
Monday, April 29, 2019
The West Was Not Lost - In Fact Kind
Wednesday's Game:
The Yankees found themselves down 5-0 as CC had a rough time keeping the ball in the yard. He allowed 3 dingers in 5 innings. The Yankees were fortunate that the Angels allowed us to peck away at them by walking our guys and playing poor defense (their catcher is very weak). We scored 2 in the 6th and then tied in the 7th before winning it in the 9th. Loaisiga pitched a scoreless 3 innings to get teh win and Chapman got the save (still not hitting 100 very often if at all). In the 9th, Wade did a good job by getting on base and then stealing 2nd and then scoring.
Thursday's game:
Tanaka was given a 4 run lead going into the bottom of the 5th and he couldn't hold it. He gave up two 2-run HR's in the 5th Then in the 6th got a pop out followed by a walk and then got another pop out followed by another walk on 3-2. This is where Boone had a tough decision. Tanaka was not sharp in the 5th and was pitching carefully in the 6th. He had only 89 pitches and I have a lot of faith in Tanaka to reach back when he needs to as he tends to be good in key spots. That being said, with what should be a good bullpen, I can understand taking him out after allowing 4 runs the previous inning. I took notes and wrote I would stick with Tanaka here for another batter as he had easily handled Fletcher in his 2 previous AB's. Unfortunately, after Sanchez had a passed ball (he still is a bad receiver and gets crossed up too much - but has been much better at blocking balls and threw out a runner on a perfect throw), Fletcher got a single and both runners scored. Holder got the next out but we were down 6-5. In the 7th, Boone took out Holder to use Tarpley against the lefties and Tarpley was awful walking two batters and Harvey continued the poor bullpen pitching as 5 runs scored in the 7th and the game was over.
Friday's Game
Paxton started and did fairly well, while the offense had 15 hits led by Luke and Lemahieu who had 6 hits combined. The Yankees hit Bumgarner well and cruised to a 7-3 victory.
Saturday's game:
Happ did a great job as he hit his spots extremely well right on the inside part of the plate and also top of the zone and then worked down with his offspeed pitches. He went 7 innings without allowing a run. Sanchez hit a bomb for a grand slam and we had a 6-0 lead until the 9th where Cessa gave back 4 runs before Chapman had to come in and get the final out. It is amazing how bad our bullpen has been. This game was in the bag until the 9th.
SF had a terrible LF'r that cost them a few times in the series and their normally reliable SS booted an easy DP ball with the bases loaded and nobody out and once he picked it up he looked at 2nd and the double clutched before throwing late to 1st. Once he booted the ball, if he would have just picked up the ball and thrown to 1st he would have gotten Sanchez by a step; instead, everyone was safe. That was a huge play.
Sunday's game:
We scored 2 runs in each of the first 3 innings and then tacked on 2 more for a 8-0 lead. In the bottom of the 6th, German who was pitching great, lost it, and they scored 4 runs off of him. We ended up winning 11-5.
What I noticed:
The Yankees found themselves down 5-0 as CC had a rough time keeping the ball in the yard. He allowed 3 dingers in 5 innings. The Yankees were fortunate that the Angels allowed us to peck away at them by walking our guys and playing poor defense (their catcher is very weak). We scored 2 in the 6th and then tied in the 7th before winning it in the 9th. Loaisiga pitched a scoreless 3 innings to get teh win and Chapman got the save (still not hitting 100 very often if at all). In the 9th, Wade did a good job by getting on base and then stealing 2nd and then scoring.
Thursday's game:
Tanaka was given a 4 run lead going into the bottom of the 5th and he couldn't hold it. He gave up two 2-run HR's in the 5th Then in the 6th got a pop out followed by a walk and then got another pop out followed by another walk on 3-2. This is where Boone had a tough decision. Tanaka was not sharp in the 5th and was pitching carefully in the 6th. He had only 89 pitches and I have a lot of faith in Tanaka to reach back when he needs to as he tends to be good in key spots. That being said, with what should be a good bullpen, I can understand taking him out after allowing 4 runs the previous inning. I took notes and wrote I would stick with Tanaka here for another batter as he had easily handled Fletcher in his 2 previous AB's. Unfortunately, after Sanchez had a passed ball (he still is a bad receiver and gets crossed up too much - but has been much better at blocking balls and threw out a runner on a perfect throw), Fletcher got a single and both runners scored. Holder got the next out but we were down 6-5. In the 7th, Boone took out Holder to use Tarpley against the lefties and Tarpley was awful walking two batters and Harvey continued the poor bullpen pitching as 5 runs scored in the 7th and the game was over.
Friday's Game
Paxton started and did fairly well, while the offense had 15 hits led by Luke and Lemahieu who had 6 hits combined. The Yankees hit Bumgarner well and cruised to a 7-3 victory.
Saturday's game:
Happ did a great job as he hit his spots extremely well right on the inside part of the plate and also top of the zone and then worked down with his offspeed pitches. He went 7 innings without allowing a run. Sanchez hit a bomb for a grand slam and we had a 6-0 lead until the 9th where Cessa gave back 4 runs before Chapman had to come in and get the final out. It is amazing how bad our bullpen has been. This game was in the bag until the 9th.
SF had a terrible LF'r that cost them a few times in the series and their normally reliable SS booted an easy DP ball with the bases loaded and nobody out and once he picked it up he looked at 2nd and the double clutched before throwing late to 1st. Once he booted the ball, if he would have just picked up the ball and thrown to 1st he would have gotten Sanchez by a step; instead, everyone was safe. That was a huge play.
Sunday's game:
We scored 2 runs in each of the first 3 innings and then tacked on 2 more for a 8-0 lead. In the bottom of the 6th, German who was pitching great, lost it, and they scored 4 runs off of him. We ended up winning 11-5.
What I noticed:
- We were playing 2 teams that simply didn't play well against us. It is amazing that we are playing on a pace to win 98 games when we are missing more starters (almost twice as many) than any team since modern day stats have been tracking them. (For those stat junkies, our WAR on the IR was twice what any other team had.) BTW, WAR has some limitations and defensive stats are still flawed, even if getting better.
- The Angels had no lefties in their pen...that amazes me as it makes managing against them so much easier
- When Andujar comes back I would DH him and maybe play some 1B and 3rd base. Urshela has been playing well and we should continue to ride that. I would send Ford down when Andujar comes back. I also know that Urshela got hit on the hand and left the game so I hope he is OK?
- I said in the preseason blog that I thought Voit was for real as a hitter and he is not disappointing. He uses a leg kick (in his case a sweep) for timing, but he is able to adjust for offspeed pitches by keeping his hands back and still unloading on breaking pitches. This is why he is less off-balance than our other big righties who look very bad on low and away pitches more frequently. (He has a .935 OPS now). His weakness is up and in fastballs, but if a pitcher makes a mistake he can turn on it and he also has been able to muscle the balls up the middle by pulling his hands in.
- Paxton was tipping pitches so he is moving his hand around in the glove a lot now from the stretch. He has to watch though as he is slowly dropping his hands after his stop from the stretch and good base stealers will take advantage of that. One did and he stole without a throw. For clarity, he comes set and then fiddles around in his glove and before he starts up again, he has been slowly moving downward which would give the runner a head start.
- Romine was setting up too early with runners on 2nd base and guys can give the location. He knows better than that or needs to fake it sometimes.
- Britton's stuff has been outstanding, but he struggled to throw strikes the other night. He was throwing 94-96 with amazing sink on his ball, but he needs to throw more strikes as 7 walks in 11 innings are too many.
- Chapman has not had his good fastball yet; I am hopeful it is the cooler weather still?
- Kahnle has been getting his changeup in good spots and has been very effective with his 96 MPH fastball. Somebody needs to step up
- Voit got thrown out at 3rd base tagging up on a great throw. The key was the fielder surrounded the ball and had momentum toward 3rd base and got rid of the ball on 2 steps rather than the 3-5 some people take.
- Urshela has a .925 OPS right now and has been a huge reason for our success.
- The other guys like Ford and Tauchman are not hitting for avg, but have worked the counts well and gotten on base. Their OPS's are 708 and .711 which is as much as we could hope for considering both guys are hitting in the high .100's. I don't see Ford staying in teh majors. I don't expect Tauchman either but at least he could be a serviceable weak hitting corner OF.
- Maybin was brought in for defense. He hits equally to both sides and I think it would be better if we get some more specialized guys to fill in, but it made sense when Frazier got hurt. It seems like a long time ago, but we could have used Ellsbury against righties if he could have gotten himself healthy.
- Wade still doesn't have an extra-base hit and still has not shown enough, but he has been decent in his last 20 AB's with a .263 BA and a .417 OBP (which for him is important as he turned 5 singles into doubles stealing bases). We could use him to step up. He also has covered ground in the OF making a long running catch into the corner.
- Both LeMahieu and Urshela left the game but X-rays were clean...thankfully
- Off today and on to Arizona
Wednesday, April 24, 2019
West Coast Trip
These west coast games can be brutal on OUR sleep. I almost always record the games and then try and watch either late at night or very early. The first game (Monday night), I was working late and went to bed at midnight and ended up getting up at 3 am and the work day didn't allow me to watch the game until last night (while the Tuesday night game was being recorded. The irony is that when I got up at 3 am the game was just finishing up...
Anyway, getting you a quick lunch time update...the Monday late night game was a fairly wild one. It was mostly a pitchers dual, but mostly because of weak hitting. It was 2-2 after the 3rd and that held all the way to the 12th inning where we pushed a run across on a double by Frazier (who didn't slide and almost was out) and then Tauchman moved him to 3rd and Urshela came through with a sac fly.
Unfortunately, Chapman was not able to secure the one run save and we ended up winning it in the 14th as Urshela came through again with a single to knock in our run with 2 outs. An interesting move happened where Holder got the 1st two outs in the 14th and Calhoun ( a lefty was up) and because the Angels lost their DH earlier their pitcher was up afterward. Boone elected to intentionally walk Calhoun to pitch to the pitchers spot as the Angels had no other position players to pinch hit. I am not sure I would have done that, just because with a 1 run lead you could allow a SB and a fluke hit and the game is tied and then you don't have the pitcher leading off the next inning. It is an interesting call but Calhoun doesn't even have amazing lefty righty stats as his OPS against righties last year was .670 and he is a mediocre hitter. Anyway, it worked, but I have to give you my opinion and sometimes bad moves work and good moves don't (and this move wasn't crazy)
In Tuesday's game, German pitched really well again only allowing 1 run that was caused by his own error in 6.2 innings. He left with us cruising to a 7-1 lead until Green came in and was horrible once again (His ERA is now 16.43 in 7.2 innings). He allowed 4 runs to score without getting an out in the 8th inning and Cessa came in and was able to get us to 9th with a 2 run lead. Britton closed this time and had his sinker working great and he got 3 straight groundouts to make it a more relaxing 9th inning. Even though has has not been great for us, if he continues to get his feel back, I would not be shocked if he regained the closer job.
Urshela has really played well for us. His defense has been excellent and he has supplied reasonably good offense. He is providing well above replacement level performance with great defense and a .740 OPS.
Torres - We could use Gleyber to step up for us. He went through a short hot streak, but his OPS is only .708...
Congratulations to Ford who got his 1st Major league HR and has his OPS up to .776 showing a good eye and mediocre stick. WE need guys like this to have one of their career stretches.
Another congratulations to Thairo Estrada who got his 1st major league hits as well and has sacrificed perfectly, walked and got 2 hits in 4 AB's.
Meanwhile Wade looks to still be over-matched at the plate with an sub .500 OPS
LeMahieu has been struggling at the plate as well as his OPS has plummeted to a .713 OPS having a 2-28 run. I would not be leading him off and never liked him there to begin with. Of course, the guy who was supposed to be on his final year for us and be our occasional leadoff guy batted 3rd for us and has been on a hot streak with an OPS now at .851. Of course, I am talking about our LF who is playing CF and now batting 3rd...Gardner.
Go figure...then again we have won the first 2 games on the west coast trip starting these 5 juggernaut names: Tauchman, Ford, Estrada, Wade and Romine.
Lets win at least one of these last 2 against the Angels.
Anyway, getting you a quick lunch time update...the Monday late night game was a fairly wild one. It was mostly a pitchers dual, but mostly because of weak hitting. It was 2-2 after the 3rd and that held all the way to the 12th inning where we pushed a run across on a double by Frazier (who didn't slide and almost was out) and then Tauchman moved him to 3rd and Urshela came through with a sac fly.
Unfortunately, Chapman was not able to secure the one run save and we ended up winning it in the 14th as Urshela came through again with a single to knock in our run with 2 outs. An interesting move happened where Holder got the 1st two outs in the 14th and Calhoun ( a lefty was up) and because the Angels lost their DH earlier their pitcher was up afterward. Boone elected to intentionally walk Calhoun to pitch to the pitchers spot as the Angels had no other position players to pinch hit. I am not sure I would have done that, just because with a 1 run lead you could allow a SB and a fluke hit and the game is tied and then you don't have the pitcher leading off the next inning. It is an interesting call but Calhoun doesn't even have amazing lefty righty stats as his OPS against righties last year was .670 and he is a mediocre hitter. Anyway, it worked, but I have to give you my opinion and sometimes bad moves work and good moves don't (and this move wasn't crazy)
In Tuesday's game, German pitched really well again only allowing 1 run that was caused by his own error in 6.2 innings. He left with us cruising to a 7-1 lead until Green came in and was horrible once again (His ERA is now 16.43 in 7.2 innings). He allowed 4 runs to score without getting an out in the 8th inning and Cessa came in and was able to get us to 9th with a 2 run lead. Britton closed this time and had his sinker working great and he got 3 straight groundouts to make it a more relaxing 9th inning. Even though has has not been great for us, if he continues to get his feel back, I would not be shocked if he regained the closer job.
Urshela has really played well for us. His defense has been excellent and he has supplied reasonably good offense. He is providing well above replacement level performance with great defense and a .740 OPS.
Torres - We could use Gleyber to step up for us. He went through a short hot streak, but his OPS is only .708...
Congratulations to Ford who got his 1st Major league HR and has his OPS up to .776 showing a good eye and mediocre stick. WE need guys like this to have one of their career stretches.
Another congratulations to Thairo Estrada who got his 1st major league hits as well and has sacrificed perfectly, walked and got 2 hits in 4 AB's.
Meanwhile Wade looks to still be over-matched at the plate with an sub .500 OPS
LeMahieu has been struggling at the plate as well as his OPS has plummeted to a .713 OPS having a 2-28 run. I would not be leading him off and never liked him there to begin with. Of course, the guy who was supposed to be on his final year for us and be our occasional leadoff guy batted 3rd for us and has been on a hot streak with an OPS now at .851. Of course, I am talking about our LF who is playing CF and now batting 3rd...Gardner.
Go figure...then again we have won the first 2 games on the west coast trip starting these 5 juggernaut names: Tauchman, Ford, Estrada, Wade and Romine.
Lets win at least one of these last 2 against the Angels.
Sunday, April 21, 2019
The Walking Wounded
I want to start with last night’s game (Sunday). Paxton was excellent as he had an excellent
breaking ball and great control. His fastball
hit 97 once but most of the night was around 95/96 (less than the 98 he was
dealing against the Red Sox), but he located it very well. He worked in changing speeds and elevations
great. After 6 innings we had a 5-0 lead
(thanks to a 3 run bomb by Frazier) and Paxton was throwing well but threw 95
pitches. I felt that he should come out
of the game and save him as at most you would get another inning out of
him. Instead, Boone stuck with him and he
allowed a double and a walk and then took him out. While pitches are important, starting another
inning is a lot to me, when you have to rest and go back out there when you are
near your end, I just thought it was time to shut him down. Fortunately, Kahnle did a good job (his
control was very good and his change had good movement) and got us out of the
inning with no runs. He had thrown 17
pitches and I felt it was fine to take him out.
Unfortunately, Green was awful again allowing a cheap popup (that a
better fielding 1B, or at least one with more speed, might have caught, but
Ford was playing there) a walk and a single.
Britton was warming up prior, but for some reason, Boone went with Ottavino with
a switch hitter who is equal both ways and then a lefty in Gordon? The matchups were one reason, but also the
fact Britton was up made me wonder why he didn’t go with him? I could see if the matchups were more
righties than that could override it.
Regardless, Ottavino had nothing and allowed a double and then a HR to
Gordon to tie the game at 5. Then he
allowed a HR to Dozier and we were now down by 1. Really terrible job by Ottavino, but also
Boone messed that up.
In the bottom of the 8th, Tauchman led off with a
double, but Urshela and Ford got out moving Tauchman to 3rd. Romine came through with a big 2 out single
tying the game! He was fortunate to get
a fastball in the inside part of the plate but perfect height.
Chapman pitched the 9th and looked pretty good; he
allowed a single and 2 SB’s, but he got out of the inning. The odd thing was he threw 18 straight
fastballs. Part of that was the speedy
Hamilton was on the base, but he stole the bases anyway and you have to get the
batter.
Britton came in anyway to pitch the 10th and got
the job done, he did tweak his groin when he covered on a rundown, but he
stayed in the game…hopefully he won’t be yet another on the IL (BTW, when did
the DL become the IL, I must have missed that memo?)
In the 10th the Royals brought in a lefty who
threw hard but could not find the plate and he walked Tauchman and Urshela to
start the inning and now the lefty Ford was up.
I would have brought Ford up to the plate to see if he would leave the pitcher
out there as a righty was up there. In
my opinion, there was no way they would leave this guy in there even to face a
lefty, but Boone just made the move to bring Thairo Estrada for his first major
league AB. Kennedy was brought in to
face him and Estrada put down a perfect bunt.
Based on the hitter we had, I was OK with bunting, but I would have
tried to bluff the Ford AB. Regardless,
it worked as Romine came through again with what would have been a deep fly
out, but with the OF correctly in, it beat the OF for a deep single and the victory.
Overall, the only bad move was not bringing in Britton and
it ended up hurting us today. The other
moves were only my preference and could be debated.
Switching to the Friday game, CC struggled with is control
but fought through it walking 4 but not allowing an ER. Gardner had a good game, but we saw some bad
fielding by CC and then a few bad plays by Voit of which one earned him an
error and the other gave a guy a hit. The
bullpen did a good job and held onto the 6-2 win.
Saturday, Voit let another ball go under his glove for a
triple and that should have been an error if you ask me. Tanka worked his way through that and gave us
7 good innings without his best stuff.
We hit 4 HR’s, but the big news was Judge being added to the injured
list and I think this could be a month.
It is crazy the amount of injuries we have. Our 8 position players out are: Judge, Hicks
and Stanton in the OF, and our infield that is out would be Bird at 1st, we
will put Tulo at 2nd base, Didi at SS and Andujar at 3rd
base and we round out the team with Sanchez out. Of course, we still have Betances and
Severino out as well.
Onto 4 games against the 9-14 Angels.
Thursday, April 18, 2019
Game 2 Against the Red Sox
Happ was a little off early and had trouble spotting his changeup. He wasn't able to expand the strike zone inside (which is important to him), but they were balls and when he leaked a fastball over the plate Martinez hit a HR to CF. Martinez is an excellent hitter as he is able to pull his hands in to get the barrel on the ball but not lose much power. The big blow was the 2 run HR he gave up to Vazquez who is a very weak hitter.
Now we are down 3-0 early against Eovaldi, who has been lit up this year, but has pitched very well against us.
In the 4th we got a leadoff walk by Voit on a 3-2 count and then Torres got on with a fielders choice where Nunez dropped the ball at 2nd base. Nunez was always weak with the glove and he played out his rear for the Red Sox last year. After LeMahieu was called out on strikes (good pitch), Frazier ripped a double down the line scoring 1. With 2nd and 3rd and 1 out, Tauchman struck on a 3-2 pitch that landed in front of home plate (ruining what was a decent AB and would have been very good if he worked the walk). He should have expected something off the plate with 1B open. Urshela hit a line drive that Steve Pearce made a 2-run saving dive on to end the inning.
In the 6th and still down 3-1, the ump started giving the Red Sox the pitches off the plate and while we went down 1,2,3 in the 6th, Voit shoudl have walked on a 3-2 count but was called out on a pitch off the plate and as teh leadoff guy, the inning could have been much different where Eovaldi was closing in on 100 pitches and woudl have been from the stretch.
Meanwhile, Happ settled in and kept the Sox off the board, but did allow Devers to get a single that Luk probably should have turned into an out. He made the stop on a half sliding dive and then stumbled a bit and from his knees threw very low to Happ and Happ couldn't corral the bad throw. It wasn't an easy stop so they gave him a hit, but I wouldn't have had an issue with an error either as a smooth 1B gets that. Kahnle came and after allowing a SB, he pitched out of trouble, pumping a 98 MPH fastball by Bradley to end the inning.
Now we got into the weak Red Sox pen. Frazier lined a single on the first pitch and Tauchman walked. The ump again called a first pitch curve a strike to Urshela that was a ball and he ended up striking out. Romine walked to load the bases and Workman was pulled for not throwing strikes. Brasier came in and threw 2 curveballs to Gardner for strikes (one taken and one fouled off). Down 0-2, I was expecting another curve in the dirt or a very high fastball, but Brasier threw a fastball down the middle of the plate and Gardner hit perhaps the most meaningful hit of the year as he ripped a Grand Slam for what was also his 100th HR! It was a bad pitch but gave us a 5-3 lead and Gardner was pumped (as was the crowd, myself and I am sure some of you who watched it) and you could see him open-mouthed going "woo" around the bases. What a great way to get your 100th HR, with a slam against the Sox!
With only a 5-3 lead the game was far from over, and I was annoyed when Judge was called out on a pitch across his shins. The box showed this to be a little low, possibly just touching the box, but the review showed it was 5 inches low. This is one of the reasons I really don't like the box live. It is not adjusted to the size of the batter and just isn't that accurate. For those reasons and the fact it blocks the view of the catcher some and the perspective that we have of the plate. Finally, they have now changed the color inside the box so it is lighter than the rest. It is annoying to me and I am fine superimposing the pitch after every live pitch, in fact, they should do that, but give me the live feed without disrupting the view.
Ottavino came in for the 8th and his first pitch was a slider closer to the strike calls that we had called against us but it was called a ball. Interestingly, he did strike out Betts on a fastball in the same spot. Ottavino made us sweat by loading the bases with a very inconsistent slider, sometimes just spinning, but he got Nunez to fly out on the 1st pitch to end the inning.
Chapman had a good 9th and we swept the two-game series!
Other Notes:
At 14-4 should we start to take Tampa seriously? Any time a team is off to a good start you have to look at them, but they are very young and almost everyone is playing above their expected level. That being said, this is not a fluke team; they won 90 games last year and very close to division winners last year (Cleveland 91, Dodgers 92 and Atlanta 90). They are also very forward thinking, using that one inning starter at times. There are pros and cons to it but now that they are not doing it all the time, I think it has merit. I had written in this blog a few times that in a postseason game if I had a lefty and righty, I would have started the tough lefty to get their lineup with the righties in it (or vice versa) and then at the first sign of trouble bring in the starter I wanted anyway. This way, you have better matchups.
Onto KC where German pitches against Homer Bailey(who has not been good since 2014).
Now we are down 3-0 early against Eovaldi, who has been lit up this year, but has pitched very well against us.
In the 4th we got a leadoff walk by Voit on a 3-2 count and then Torres got on with a fielders choice where Nunez dropped the ball at 2nd base. Nunez was always weak with the glove and he played out his rear for the Red Sox last year. After LeMahieu was called out on strikes (good pitch), Frazier ripped a double down the line scoring 1. With 2nd and 3rd and 1 out, Tauchman struck on a 3-2 pitch that landed in front of home plate (ruining what was a decent AB and would have been very good if he worked the walk). He should have expected something off the plate with 1B open. Urshela hit a line drive that Steve Pearce made a 2-run saving dive on to end the inning.
In the 6th and still down 3-1, the ump started giving the Red Sox the pitches off the plate and while we went down 1,2,3 in the 6th, Voit shoudl have walked on a 3-2 count but was called out on a pitch off the plate and as teh leadoff guy, the inning could have been much different where Eovaldi was closing in on 100 pitches and woudl have been from the stretch.
Meanwhile, Happ settled in and kept the Sox off the board, but did allow Devers to get a single that Luk probably should have turned into an out. He made the stop on a half sliding dive and then stumbled a bit and from his knees threw very low to Happ and Happ couldn't corral the bad throw. It wasn't an easy stop so they gave him a hit, but I wouldn't have had an issue with an error either as a smooth 1B gets that. Kahnle came and after allowing a SB, he pitched out of trouble, pumping a 98 MPH fastball by Bradley to end the inning.
Now we got into the weak Red Sox pen. Frazier lined a single on the first pitch and Tauchman walked. The ump again called a first pitch curve a strike to Urshela that was a ball and he ended up striking out. Romine walked to load the bases and Workman was pulled for not throwing strikes. Brasier came in and threw 2 curveballs to Gardner for strikes (one taken and one fouled off). Down 0-2, I was expecting another curve in the dirt or a very high fastball, but Brasier threw a fastball down the middle of the plate and Gardner hit perhaps the most meaningful hit of the year as he ripped a Grand Slam for what was also his 100th HR! It was a bad pitch but gave us a 5-3 lead and Gardner was pumped (as was the crowd, myself and I am sure some of you who watched it) and you could see him open-mouthed going "woo" around the bases. What a great way to get your 100th HR, with a slam against the Sox!
With only a 5-3 lead the game was far from over, and I was annoyed when Judge was called out on a pitch across his shins. The box showed this to be a little low, possibly just touching the box, but the review showed it was 5 inches low. This is one of the reasons I really don't like the box live. It is not adjusted to the size of the batter and just isn't that accurate. For those reasons and the fact it blocks the view of the catcher some and the perspective that we have of the plate. Finally, they have now changed the color inside the box so it is lighter than the rest. It is annoying to me and I am fine superimposing the pitch after every live pitch, in fact, they should do that, but give me the live feed without disrupting the view.
Ottavino came in for the 8th and his first pitch was a slider closer to the strike calls that we had called against us but it was called a ball. Interestingly, he did strike out Betts on a fastball in the same spot. Ottavino made us sweat by loading the bases with a very inconsistent slider, sometimes just spinning, but he got Nunez to fly out on the 1st pitch to end the inning.
Chapman had a good 9th and we swept the two-game series!
Other Notes:
At 14-4 should we start to take Tampa seriously? Any time a team is off to a good start you have to look at them, but they are very young and almost everyone is playing above their expected level. That being said, this is not a fluke team; they won 90 games last year and very close to division winners last year (Cleveland 91, Dodgers 92 and Atlanta 90). They are also very forward thinking, using that one inning starter at times. There are pros and cons to it but now that they are not doing it all the time, I think it has merit. I had written in this blog a few times that in a postseason game if I had a lefty and righty, I would have started the tough lefty to get their lineup with the righties in it (or vice versa) and then at the first sign of trouble bring in the starter I wanted anyway. This way, you have better matchups.
Onto KC where German pitches against Homer Bailey(who has not been good since 2014).
Wednesday, April 17, 2019
Game 1 against Boston
First, it was great to see the Yankees and Red Sox honor the Genius Maker by wearing his number for this game!
...And it worked as the Yankees breezed to victory
...And before I get a lot of mail, yes, I know it was for Jackie Robinson.
Paxton came out throwing 98 and hitting spots well. Sale came out and threw roughly 96 (harder than he has thrown this year) and was mixing his pitches well.
The difference was Paxton kept hitting spots and even threw a great pitch 99 MPH up and in and barely out of the box and then followed with a perfectly placed slider just off the plate to get us out of a key moment of the game. This moment was set up by a poor play by Judge who cruised after a high fly ball and misjudged it enough where he jumped and didn't get to the fly and hit on top of the wall for a double making it 2nd and 3rd with nobody out in the 4th inning. Judge then made up for it with his arm as two shallow flyballs were not tested because of his arm; someone with a lesser arm would have been tested on the 1 out fly. That set up the K by Paxton on the great slider after the 99 MPH fastball.
The Yanks kept tacking on runs. Frazier hit a HR on a slider that was similar to the Judge play, but Betts play was harder because he was running faster, didn't have the home field advantage of knowing the stadium as well and just couldn't get there.
Even Tauchman got into the offense with a double on a slider right down the middle and later hit a HR on a slider. He has his OPS at .773 and maybe this will get him some confidence, but he has not looked good at the plate to me. The fact we are starting him in LF against a tough lefty (the HR was off a righty) shows how injured we are.
A few other notes:
Judge was heavily involved today. Outside of the above, he got 2 hits, a well-earned walk, a SB and then got to 3rd on the bad throw to go along with 2 not heads up plays. One was on a line drive by Voit with 1st and 2nd and Judge was on first. Bradley retrieved the ball and then threw weakly to 2nd base where Judge had rounded the base and dived back safely because the throw bounced away from the 2nd baseman. The throw beat him and he would have been out ending the inning before the run scored. Could have been a really bad play, but we got lucky the Red Sox didn't execute. Later, he should have tried to score on a shallow fly ball to JD Martinez, who doesn't throw well, and he would have scored if he tagged up correctly; he ended up leaving too early and stopped (not sure what happened there?) The outcome ended up being a blowout but any of those could have been bad.
CC came back and looked good. He may have some "old age games" but he looked just like CC and that was very encouraging
Bird went on the DL. Bird is actually one of those guys that could make us a better team if he could give us some sild lefty protection in the lineup, but he has not played well (.550 OPS) and he only hurt our depth based on his lack of production
Urshela has really helped us a lot at 3rd base. Not only has he played really well defensively, but he has also hit well in his 27 plate appearance (.867 OPS)
Paxton was excellent!
Gardner has his OPS above .700, as he has been more productive of late (.742 OPS over his last 15 games)
...and Congrats to the NY Islanders for sweeping Pittsburgh!
...And it worked as the Yankees breezed to victory
...And before I get a lot of mail, yes, I know it was for Jackie Robinson.
Paxton came out throwing 98 and hitting spots well. Sale came out and threw roughly 96 (harder than he has thrown this year) and was mixing his pitches well.
The difference was Paxton kept hitting spots and even threw a great pitch 99 MPH up and in and barely out of the box and then followed with a perfectly placed slider just off the plate to get us out of a key moment of the game. This moment was set up by a poor play by Judge who cruised after a high fly ball and misjudged it enough where he jumped and didn't get to the fly and hit on top of the wall for a double making it 2nd and 3rd with nobody out in the 4th inning. Judge then made up for it with his arm as two shallow flyballs were not tested because of his arm; someone with a lesser arm would have been tested on the 1 out fly. That set up the K by Paxton on the great slider after the 99 MPH fastball.
The Yanks kept tacking on runs. Frazier hit a HR on a slider that was similar to the Judge play, but Betts play was harder because he was running faster, didn't have the home field advantage of knowing the stadium as well and just couldn't get there.
Even Tauchman got into the offense with a double on a slider right down the middle and later hit a HR on a slider. He has his OPS at .773 and maybe this will get him some confidence, but he has not looked good at the plate to me. The fact we are starting him in LF against a tough lefty (the HR was off a righty) shows how injured we are.
A few other notes:
Judge was heavily involved today. Outside of the above, he got 2 hits, a well-earned walk, a SB and then got to 3rd on the bad throw to go along with 2 not heads up plays. One was on a line drive by Voit with 1st and 2nd and Judge was on first. Bradley retrieved the ball and then threw weakly to 2nd base where Judge had rounded the base and dived back safely because the throw bounced away from the 2nd baseman. The throw beat him and he would have been out ending the inning before the run scored. Could have been a really bad play, but we got lucky the Red Sox didn't execute. Later, he should have tried to score on a shallow fly ball to JD Martinez, who doesn't throw well, and he would have scored if he tagged up correctly; he ended up leaving too early and stopped (not sure what happened there?) The outcome ended up being a blowout but any of those could have been bad.
CC came back and looked good. He may have some "old age games" but he looked just like CC and that was very encouraging
Bird went on the DL. Bird is actually one of those guys that could make us a better team if he could give us some sild lefty protection in the lineup, but he has not played well (.550 OPS) and he only hurt our depth based on his lack of production
Urshela has really helped us a lot at 3rd base. Not only has he played really well defensively, but he has also hit well in his 27 plate appearance (.867 OPS)
Paxton was excellent!
Gardner has his OPS above .700, as he has been more productive of late (.742 OPS over his last 15 games)
...and Congrats to the NY Islanders for sweeping Pittsburgh!
Thursday, April 11, 2019
Houston; Problem Not Solved
It is tough to beat a team when your starting C, SS, 3rd, CF and DH are missing along with your best starter and one of your top relievers. But, we had a lead in every game and held a lead later in games twice.
Excuses aside, we have to play better
Gardner showed he is a step slower just missing a few balls and those were big plays. He is still a really good LF'r defensively, but he has always been just avg in CF and now is weaker there. Gardner playing every day is not good for us. We need another CF'r
Wade just does not seem to be a major league player. he bounced a ball on a routine DP and is overmatched at the plate.
Romine has been awful in his time playing this year. He does have a HR which was hit off a 2nd baseman who came into pitch, but outside of that, he is 2-14 with no walks or extra base hits. his defense has also been poor, but he made a good play yesterday when he blocked a ball with 1st and 2nd and while the ball got away from him a little he quickly dissected the opportunity to not throw to 3rd, but to throw to 1st base and pick off the runner and he nailed him. Not an easy play.
I don't believe Paxton threw a strike with his breaking ball or change until his 40th pitch. His change was awful all night, but later he started to get better with his curve. He was not sharp and so far has not pitched well (he will get better, although that is not going out on a limb as he has a 6 ERA now)
Kahnle was awful yesterday and has allowed 4 hits and 4 walks in 4 innings.
LeMahieu has really been great so far. He has shown to be very good at 3rd, excellent at 2nd base and has a .993 OPS.
Bird had his first good game in a while, this is very important to us as we need some lefty in the lineup. He was only 1-2 but he had very good AB's and walked twice. Hopefully he gets going
Judge had his head up his rear his 1st 2 AB's (he k'd his first 3 AB's), but the first 2 were simply terrible AB's taking 3 curves for strikes and swinging at 3 curves that were balls. the last AB featured all curves also, but at least he took a few balls and just swung through a curve that was a strike. he has a very odd approach to the plate in that he seems to sometimes have his mind made up that he is taking a pitch no matter what, but he is immensely talented. I guess the point is that there is room for improvement which is really exciting for a guy who has been tremendous so far.
Turn the page
Excuses aside, we have to play better
Gardner showed he is a step slower just missing a few balls and those were big plays. He is still a really good LF'r defensively, but he has always been just avg in CF and now is weaker there. Gardner playing every day is not good for us. We need another CF'r
Wade just does not seem to be a major league player. he bounced a ball on a routine DP and is overmatched at the plate.
Romine has been awful in his time playing this year. He does have a HR which was hit off a 2nd baseman who came into pitch, but outside of that, he is 2-14 with no walks or extra base hits. his defense has also been poor, but he made a good play yesterday when he blocked a ball with 1st and 2nd and while the ball got away from him a little he quickly dissected the opportunity to not throw to 3rd, but to throw to 1st base and pick off the runner and he nailed him. Not an easy play.
I don't believe Paxton threw a strike with his breaking ball or change until his 40th pitch. His change was awful all night, but later he started to get better with his curve. He was not sharp and so far has not pitched well (he will get better, although that is not going out on a limb as he has a 6 ERA now)
Kahnle was awful yesterday and has allowed 4 hits and 4 walks in 4 innings.
LeMahieu has really been great so far. He has shown to be very good at 3rd, excellent at 2nd base and has a .993 OPS.
Bird had his first good game in a while, this is very important to us as we need some lefty in the lineup. He was only 1-2 but he had very good AB's and walked twice. Hopefully he gets going
Judge had his head up his rear his 1st 2 AB's (he k'd his first 3 AB's), but the first 2 were simply terrible AB's taking 3 curves for strikes and swinging at 3 curves that were balls. the last AB featured all curves also, but at least he took a few balls and just swung through a curve that was a strike. he has a very odd approach to the plate in that he seems to sometimes have his mind made up that he is taking a pitch no matter what, but he is immensely talented. I guess the point is that there is room for improvement which is really exciting for a guy who has been tremendous so far.
Turn the page
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