Baseball Toaster was unplugged on February 4, 2009.
Kei Igawa makes his third Yankee start tonight hoping to get the Yankees a series win over the Indians. Igawa's last start in Oakland looked a heckuva lot like Chase Wright's outing last night:
Igawa 4/13: 5 1/3 IP, 3 H, 3 R, 1 HR, 2 BB, 3 K, 95 pitches
Wright 4/18: 5 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 1 HR, 3 BB, 3 K, 104 pitches
Is that a compliment to Wright, a fresh-faced rookie out of double-A? An insult to Igawa, a seasoned Japanese veteran whose line above actually represents a significant improvement over his MLB debut a week earlier? A little of each? Curiously Igawa and Wright are both lefties whose best pitch is a changeup. Does that mean the Indians will benefit from seeing similar pitchers two nights in a row or that Igawa should have similar success against the Cleveland lineup because of his similar stuff, with hope for improvement because his Opening Day jitters are now two starts behind him?
So many questions.
Then there's Cleveland starter Jeremy Sowers, a 23-year-old lefty in his first full season in the majors. Taken out of Vanderbilt with the sixth overall pick in the 2004 draft, Sowers shot all the way to triple-A in his first professional season in 2005 and joined the major league rotation in late June of last year, finishing the season with a 7-4 record and a 3.57 ERA in 14 starts, two of which were shutouts. In Sowers' second major league outing, he faced the Yankees at Jacobs Field and held them to two runs over seven innings, those two runs coming on a first-inning Jason Giambi homer. Sowers is a finesse pitcher who fits the description of "crafty lefty" to a T and conjures up comparisons to Jamie Moyer and Tom Glavine, but his rate stats are troubling. In sixteen major league starts between last year and this, Sowers has struck out just 3.46 men per nine innings (Moyer and Glavine's career K/9 rates are both about 5.35). Seeing as he lacks the extreme groundball tendencies with which Chien-Ming Wang has survived a similarly miniscule strikeout rate, it would seem Sowers is going to have to figure out a way to miss more bats in order to keep winning. Indeed, his .257 opponents' batting average on balls in play last year is bound to snap back to league average (around .300), taking his ERA with it. Still, he's excelled in his two starts thus far this year, holding the White Sox to just one hit (but two runs on five walks) over six innings in his first start and the Angels to one run over seven innings in his last. Just because a correction seems inevitable doesn't mean it will happen tonight.
Iggy! Need ya to go six tonight!
Farnswacker! Drop the crayons, yer workin' tonight.
2 Or is it in the HOF?
It stands for "Unfamiliar Rookie Pitcher"
or Unheralded, Unknown, Unbelievable, Undocumented, Unconstitutional or UnPavanoish ;-) if you prefer
https://bronxbanter.baseballtoaster.com/archives/421158.html
"Who is URP?"
1 & 2 Good ones, Sliced.
Mats has been a quiet, but consistantly clutch .850 OPS performer. With Melky in there, we give up 100-150 pts of OPS, 20 HRs and many RBIs. Yet I hear little about us 'missing' Matsui.
Are we that in love with his youth?
The better glove and great arm?
We're happy to suffer Giambi's defense for (hopefully) better offense. We would never replace Jeter and his poor glove with AGon, even though SS is a more important defensive position the LF.
Matsui seems invisible. Am I wrong? He seems to be forgotten.
Okay, I have to work. It's safe to come back to the computer >;)
"Here is the plan for Hideki Matsui:
Thursday: Hard workout.
Friday: Class A game.
Saturday: Class A game
Sunday: Extended spring game or simulated game
Monday: Play left for the Yankees against Tampa.
Here is the plan for Chien-Ming Wang:
Thursday: Pitch in Class A game.
Sunday: Bullpen
Tuesday: Start for the Yankees against Tampa Bay."
So, they are both coming back very soon.
Now, the Indians don't suck, right? Because if they don't suck, then I'm very encouraged by the way our hurlers are handling them.
Uh, also the way the Injuns catch fly balls.
Cripes, Torre is even more diabolical than I thought. First he tortures all of us by making us sit through Minky's 0-April then the day after he actually plays decent, he benches him!
42 I was just thinking that.
Why the hell good is getting EI if a bunch of games gets blacked out? Rot in hell, Bud Selig.
And nice catch by Delluci to make up for the Jeter misplay
And like that, a hit!
Sigh, maybe I'll go to the basement & do some woodworking, listen to the game on the radio.
Selig is a dumbass.
But MLB is "overexposed."
Very interesting play...good thing the umps didn't rule he threw the glove on purpose.
VERY nice DP there. Didn't think they had a chance.
Mr. Lightning needs a staff meeting to discuss 0-2 pitches. An 0-2 pitch is for chasing, not hitting.
Now if only somebody besides Donuts can get a RBI, we're gonna be sailing.
What are you, Ron Gardenhire? He gives away outs, too.
Of course, I love them.
Dougie, get comfortable, my boy, you'll be sitting for a while.
(Well, I can dream, can't I?)
Posada is so so so slow and funny of a runner
Phelps is making his case, no? Now he just has to work on his scooping skills.
Come on, Melky. Dang, crummy swing.
Okay, here comes a dinger from Damon.
Yeah, here all week...
Standing in the OF for 2 innings is no big deal, but catching is work every minute of the game. I hate seeing him in the game late in blowouts.
Opinions?
Phelps has 3 ab vs. RHP
while Minky has 29.
In Torre's defense, Phelps doesn't have a hit.
But yes I agree, that he should get more of a break, but then again he needs to be there to catch proctor everyday ;)
Thoughts?
Well, nice start, no doubt about it. Quality start. Let's get a couple more runs to make Proctor feel confident.
Now we have a LOT of good young arms, and hopefully 2 stars ny 2010 (Tabata and that catcher... whats his name). And there are a few others, including maybe Duncan.
I think, as long as Cashman is around, our future is bright.
My guess is Torre sends out someone else. Maybe Henn?
OH YEAH!!!!!
Arod is officially ridiculous...that ball almost bounced!
Go, A-Rod, Go!!!
Sorry, I'm a bit drunk.
Sumbich, this 3B's a keeper. Seriously, this is incredible. It's scary. It's touching. It makes me want to watch every damn game.
...
... I was just typing that when he hit the dinger.
If Giambi has found his groove, we're gonna be scoring a lot of runs.
ARod hits another selfish, stat padding, meaningless HR.
Giambi! CLUTCH HR!
186 Good discussion-starter, OldYanksFan. And (I guess this was partly your point), the pundits are now saying, "The Yankee system used to be depleted but now they are building it back up." Instead of admitting that they simply were wrong about the system two years ago.
m.
I am no longer going to watch Yankee games.
From now on, I'm gonna watch ARod and those other guys.
JOE WE ARE UP 9-2!!! LET IGGY PITCH UNTIL HE HITS 102 OR SO. WTF ARE YOU DOING?
That's it, Torre is killing me. I am going to go to bed and channel surf until Lost is on. Unless something goes badly, statistically-unlikely wrong, this game is won.
NoMaas is right about Torre. Here's to Donnie B as our manager come June.
I want to make a prediction, given the A-Rod mania (which I believe in).
I predict that A-Rod will, this year, be the first hitter to ever hit a home run OUT of Yankee Stadium. And I mean, clear out of the Stadium (it's okay if it bounces out).
You heard it here first.
G'night.
Jason Smith pinch hitting fans, three pitches, three swinging strikes. Papelbon just needs to get Adam Lind.
Kid can throw.
Shit, is Arod the new Chuck Norris?
Oh yeah, Cairo, thankfully, I had forgotten about him
I propose the SOJ award.
The 'Sleeping Over at Jeters'.
Tonight's winner: Iggy-san
Tonight's latenight snack: Sushi w/tahini sauce
258 Well, someone has told the American broadcasters that you don't pronounce that syllable. We should ask Mike Plugh. My bet is that it's a barely audible syllable in Japanese, an unstressed and collapsed vowel.
264 Huh. I bet he regrets walking Sammy Sosa in the fifth.
The proper pronunciation of Ranger's pitcher Akinori Otsuka is "Oat-ska", for example...
Glad to.
Anyone catch Hughes line tonight? Seems he's adjusted to AAA:
6 IP, 2H, 0R, 0 BB, and 10 Ks!
This included at one point retiring 15 in a row (8 on strikeouts).
Comment status: comments have been closed. Baseball Toaster is now out of business.