Daily Archives: May 22, 2006

Curt Schilling’s season thus far has been defined by his 133-pitch outing against the Indians on April 25. Prior to that outing, Schilling was 4-0 with a 1.61 ERA, allowing 17 hits and four walks and two homers while striking out 23 in 28 innings. The Indians worked him over in that April 25 game, scoring five runs on nine hits and two walks and forcing him to throw 133 pitches in just 6 2/3 innings. Since then he’s 2-2 with a 6.46 ERA, allowing 31 hits, three walks and seven homers while striking out 21 in 23 2/3 innings. The good news for Sox fans is that Schillings walk and strikeout rates remain excellent. The bad news is that six of those seven homers came in his last two starts, the first of which was a 7-3 loss to the Yankees.

Chien-Ming Wang’s season also took a turn around April 25, though his was for the better. Before that date, Wang had a 5.48 ERA and had surrendered 30 hits and seven walks in 23 innings. Since then he’s gone 3-0 with a 2.65 ERA by holding the opposition to 25 hits in 34 innings. Wang’s only non-quality start during that span was a five-inning outing against the Red Sox in Boston, the Yankees’ only game in Fenway this year prior to tonight. Wang allowed three runs on six hits and four walks in the first five innings of that game, but appeared to have settled down by the end of the fifth. Despite the fact that Wang had thrown just 77 pitches to that point, Joe Torre decided to replace him with the newly activated Aaron Small, leading to yet another game lost to poor bullpen management.

Unlike Schilling, Wang has yet to throw 100 pitches in a game this year and needed just 166 tosses to get through sixteen innings over his last two starts. Here’s hoping these trends continue tonight as the Yankees head to Fenway for a three game series against the Red Sox, who, save for a bullpen move that will allow them to activate David Riske prior to tonights game, look just like they did two weeks ago in the Bronx.

Just when it seemed the Yankees injury woes couldn’t get any more woeful, things went from bad (a DL stay for Gary Sheffield) to worse (losing Hideki Matsui for the bulk of the season) to epidemic (season-ending surgery for Sturtze and Pavano and a DL trip for Bubba Crosby) to the point at which the players started searching for hidden cameras in the trainer’s room, sure that Ashton Kutcher is behind all of this.

As the Yankees headed across town to meet the Mets last Friday, it was revealed that a comebacker off Shawn Chacon’s left shin in the same game against Boston in which Matsui broke his radius was responsible for Chacon’s subsequent poor performance and would cause him to miss his scheduled start in the subway series finale. In the first game at Shea, Jorge Posada was pulled in the second inning due to back spasms and did not play for the remainder of the series, not even coming to bat on Sunday for Kelly Stinnett with the bases loaded and two out in the top of the seventh with the Yankees trailing by two. Friday’s game ended with Kyle Farnsworth also complaining of back problems. He did not pitch for the remainder of the series. And just to add insult to injury, Bernie Williams pulled a muscle in his behind (the second backside injury on this team this year) and was forced to skip Saturday’s game save for a pinch-hit appearance in which he was hit with the only pitch he saw and then promptly forced out at second on the next play.

Meanwhile, the Columbus shuttle has been in full effect, dropping off new arrivals such as Melky Cabrera, Kevin Reese, Scott Erickson, Mitch Jones, and Colter Bean. Yes, the answer to the question “how many guys have to go down before they’ll finally give Colter Bean a shot” appears to be eight (or four pitchers: Sturtze, Pavano, Chacon, and Farnsworth). Bean was called up Saturday because the injuries to Chacon and Farnsworth and the resulting move of Small into the rotation had limited the Yankees to a five-man bullpen, with Scott Erickson (a.k.a. The Thing That Wouldn’t Die) and the overworked Scott Proctor being two of the five, and two of the remaining three being left-handed. Bean replaced Mitch Jones, who had replaced Bubba Crosby the day before and saw no action in his one day in the major leagues. That transaction reduced the Yankees to a four man bench under NL rules at Shea. The bench was then further reduced to three men–Miguel Cairo, Andy Phillips and Kevin Reese–by Posada’s inability to play.

That bench situation has been rectified, but only technically. Shawn Chacon was placed on the DL this morning as the hematoma on his left shin is healing, but slowly. To fill his spot and flesh out the bench to four men under AL rules (here’s hoping Phillips gets the call at DH) the Yanks have promoted outfielder Terrence Long. The only encouraging thing about Long’s promotion is that the Yankees didn’t feel the need to promote a catcher, which suggests that Jorge Posada’s back is not a major concern. Indeed, Posada will supposedly be “available” for tonight’s series opener in Boston, though that doesn’t mean Stinnett be starting his third straight game.

As for Long himself, he’s an abysmal baseball player. He basically has the same skill set as the Ghost of Bernie Williams (can’t hit, can’t run, can’t field, is increasingly unlikely to draw a walk), except that Long is eight years younger and lacks the borderline Hall of Fame credentials to keep his career afloat. Last year, as the starting left fielder of the major leagues’ worst team, the Kansas City Royals, Long hit a Bernie-like .279/.321/.378. The Royals declined to offer him a contract for this year and he landed with the Reds triple-A farm team in Louisville where he hit just .229/.260/.292 in April, earning his release. The Yankees, desperate for triple-A outfielders with Cabrera and Reese in the majors and Kevin Thompson down with a hamstring injury, signed Long a week ago today. He’s since hit .353/.421/.588 in 17 at-bats with Columbus, numbers which include two walks and two extra base hits and thus define small-sample fluke.

The good news is that Terrence shouldn’t be here for long.

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I’ve got to be brief this morning. The Mets beat the Yankees 4-3 on a blustery Sunday night in Queens. The Bombers had plenty of hits and walks but they simply could not get anything done with men on base. Tom Glavine was not great but he was good enough. He made big pitches when he had to (see Jeter’s double play in the sixth).

Alex Rodriguez came to bat with the bases loaded twice and came away with nothing but his lingering reputation for pressing in tough spots. To be fair, he crushed a line drive in the first situation, but with the tying run at third and the bases juiced with just one out in the eighth, Rodriguez tapped into a 6-4-3 double play. Try sleeping on that. I know it took me awhile to stop muttering to myself and hey, I like rooting for Rodriguez. I can only imagine what else was being said about him after that.

Long balls from Carlos Delgado and David Wright proved to be all the offense the Mets would need. The Yankees’ pitching was as good as can be expected under the circumstances. Billy Wagner made it interesting in the ninth, once again, but recorded the save all the same.

The Bombers face Schilling tonight up at Fenway. But hey, there is hope on the way. What? You say that Scott Erickson doesn’t fill you with that Barton Fink feeling? How about Terrance Long, Richard Hidalgo or Mr. E. Durazo?