Game 36: The Return

After Damaso Marte coughed up the lead with two outs in the top of the seventh last night, the Yankees got a massive boost from A-Rod's grand slam in the bottom half of the inning. The Bombers have their work cut out for them if they are going to carry any of that momentum over into today, as they'll be facing a resurgent Francisco Liriano.

If it seems like a long time ago that Liriano was tearing up the league and was tagged as the heir apparent to Johan Santana, well, that's because it was. Coming into August of 2006, Liriano had compiled a 12-3 record with a 2.16 ERA over 121 innings, striking out a robust 144. However, he was scratched from his start on August 1st with pain in his forearm and thus begun a downward spiral that culminated with Tommy John Surgery that November.

The Dominican left hander split the 2008 season between the Twins and their AAA affiliate in Rochester, logging 76 solid Major League innings and 118 very good ones in Triple-A. In 2009, he was added to the Twinkies' Big League roster out of Spring Training but the results were less than optimal. By the end of May his ERA was close to seven. Although he put together some better starts during the summer months, Liraino found himself primarily relegated to relief duty by the time September rolled around. He made the roster for the ALDS but pitched only two innings out of the bullpen.

This year, however, Liriano is showing flashes of the potential that everyone saw in him back in 2006. He threw three straight short shutouts against the Red Sox, Indians and Tigers, but has followed that with two more pedestrian efforts his last two times out. Still, he's carrying a 2.36 ERA and an even better 2.24 FIP through six starts and has yet to allow a home run. He's held lefties to an OPS (not a typo) of .333 and opponents on either side of the plate are slugging just .292 against him.

The Yankees got to Liriano for six runs in a start in Minnesota last July and two more in two innings during the ALDS, but it's apparent that they will be facing an entirely different pitcher this time around. He's throwing with more velocity and more movement and his results so far speak for themselves.

Andy Pettitte was actually off to a better start than Liriano is this season before he took a 10 day hiatus to allow some inflammation in his elbow to die down. Pettitte reportedly wasn't happy that his turn in the rotation was skipped, but the Yankees weren't about to take any chances with a 37 year old pitcher who has meant as much to the team as Pettitte has so far this year. If Andy really takes the skipping personally, will have a chance to show the world that he was fine all along.

Today's game feature returns of different types. Liriano has seemingly returned to his earlier form while Pettitte is back from a much shorter time in exile. As such we are treated to a matchup of two of the best left handers in the American League so far this year and the gloves are coming off. I'll take the guy rocking the NY colors.

I run through obstacles, take off my shackles,
Proper backing with the bangers and the rhyme singers,
I run with dem and others, rock NY in colors.

[Song notes: Vintage DJ Premier track behind this Brand Nubian joint. Props to Lord Jamar for rocking the Yankee hat, even though the verse we are quoting belongs to Sadat X.]

-Lineups-

Yankees: Swisher is in the two hole while Francisco Cervelli gets behind the dish, allowing Jorge Posada to DH.

Jeter SS
Swisher RF
Teixeira 1B
Rodriguez 3B
Cano 2B
Posada DH
Thames LF
Cervelli C
Brett Gardner CF

Twins:

Denard Span CF
Orlando Hudson 2B
Joe Mauer DH
Justin Morneau 1B
Michael Cuddyer RF
Delmon Young LF
Brendan Harris
Nick Punto 3B
Drew Butera C

Wrapping Up The Weekend

Good morning Fackers. I don't know about you, but the weekend came and went far too fast for my liking. It was a mixed bag for me. Saturday's Gov't Mule concert was a great one - featuring a nice birthday tribute to Jerry Garcia in the second set. The night was not without its casualties though, as I somehow managed to lose my beloved Yankee hat over the course of the night, leading me to retrace my steps repeatedly in a futile effort to find it. The dirty hippy jamband show claims another innocent victim. Oh, and my cousin somehow managed to score stage seating while I watched from the lawn with the rest of the massess. Then I managed to zonk out in the middle of the after party I was hosting. Not my finest hour.

Sunday involved a hungover trip to Old Sturbridge Village for a Revolutionary War reenacment. Dorky, I know. But it was fun to harass the Red Coats, telling those limey bastards they were going down. Finished the night with a victory in my hockey playoff game, so all's well that ends well. Besides, it beats last week's non-existent weekend for me.

For the Yanks, it was a bit of mixed bag as well. After ugly, ugg-lee losses on Friday and Saturday, they managed to avoid a four game sweep by winning Sunday. But that was about the only good news. Sergio Mitre continued to show he's not the answer for the fifth starter spot.

Down on the farm, uber prospect Jesus Montero broke his finger on Saturday, which will cost him the remainder of the minor league season. Not 20 until November, Montero absolutely crushed it this year, hitting .356/.406/.583 in High A and .317/.370/.539 in AA. Those are insane numbers. He's 19 years old. He's in his second full season. The Florida State League is a notorious pitcher's league. Trenton's park is a notorious pitcher's park. This guy raked all summer long, and bashed 17 home runs against competition a few years older than him. Hopefully this injury is just a bump in the road and won't have any long term effects.

In other injury news, single A pitcher Brett Marshall, last year's sixth round pick, needs Tommy John Surgery. He hadn't been doing especially well down in Charleston, throwing 87 1/3 innings of 5.67 ERA ball, but perhaps the injury was the cause of his poor performance. Marshall was drafted out of Sterling High School, just outside of Houston. He's 6' 0", 190 lbs and there were some concerns about his mechanics and in turn his durability. In addition, his high school coaches probably weren't looking out for his future when they left him in to throw 146 pitches in the State Championship game in his last outing as an amateur. The good news is that he's only 19 years old and even if his rehab takes more than a full year, he'll have plenty of time left to develop.

So, in all, not the best weekend you could draw up. But hey, it's the dawn of a new week. Maybe this one will be a bit better. We've got an off day today, but we'll be back with more stuff later on.

Wang Gets The Knife

Good morning Fackers. After a clunker of a game last night, we don't have much in the way of good news for you this morning. In case you hadn't heard, as you read this, or perhaps even prior to your reading this, Chien-Ming Wang is in Birmingham, Alabama undergoing surgery on his right shoulder at the hands of Dr. James Andrews, allegedly to repair a torn labrum.

This is the latest and hopefully the last in a series of professional misfortunes to beset Wang over the past 14 months: his lis franc injury, his improper offseason rehab regimen, his historically bad three starts to start the season, his dubious trip to the DL, his botched rehab assignment and panicked return to the Bigs, his relegation to mop-up man, his lackluster return to the rotation, and then his Fourth of July shoulder injury and subsequent trip to the DL, rehab set back, and now the operation that will cost him the remainder of this year and a good chunk, if not all, of next year. What concerns me is that even if this is the last bad break for CMW, it may also be the straw to break the camel's back.

Much of this is irresponsible speculation at this stage, but look at it this way: Wang will be 30 years old come next Opening Day. He had rotator cuff surgery as a minor leaguer, and then missed time during his rookie season with another rotator cuff injury. He's a sinkerball pitcher who has a very good track record in his career, but possesses neither the peripheral statistics nor the pitching repetoire that is predictive of future success. He missed more than half of last season following a foot injury, pitched very very poorly this year, and now is having his second shoulder surgery before the age of 30. Shoulder injuries are the scarlet letters of Major League pitchers. Few survive one; Wang has now had two, in addition to another shoulder injury that was rehabbed without the knife. Chien-Ming Wang's career, or at least his career as an effective pitcher, may well be over.

Jay pondered something similar nearly two months back, but I thought such speculation was premature at that point. Wang was the rare sinkerballer who had beaten the odds and been wildly successful, and after a very rough start to the season, I thought he was primed to get himself back on track. Now rather than the scenes in Casino that Jay recalled, I can't shake the thought of Andy Dufresne in The Shawshank Redemption:

Andy: I wound up here. Bad luck I guess.

Red: Bad luck? Jesus.

Andy: It floats around. Has to land on somebody. Say a storm comes through. Some folks sit in their living rooms and enjoy the rain. The house next door gets torn out of the ground and smashed flat. It was my turn, that's all. I was in the path of the tornado. I just had no idea the storm would go on as long as it has.

CMW has been in a shit storm of bad luck of late. I only hope it gets better for him, but I don't like his chances. The fact that his current situation reminds me of a conversation between one guy who's an avowed life-long Mets fan and another who's allegedly dating his step-granddaughter can't possibly be a good sign.

Of course, Wang is being operated upon by the most famous orthopedic surgeon in the world, someone who has salvaged the career of many an injured athlete . Yet, he's also the man that allegedly ruined the career of former Yankee (as well as middle finger enthusiast and sometime Pearl Jam punching bag) Jack McDowell. The fact that Wang's surgery comes the day after the McDowell story broke just about sums up the horseshit luck the poor guy has had of late.

In the short term, the Yankees need for another pitcher - particularly with Alf now having a sore shoulder - just went way up. Unfortunately, so did the price they'll have to pay for one - particularly with the non-waiver trade deadline just over fifty hours away. As much as I didn't like the now debunked rumored Bronson Arroyo deal on Monday, the one solace I took in it was that it would have been a preemptive move before the bad news on Wang could break. As noted linguist Omar Minaya might say, that train has now sailed.

Andy Dufresne said hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things. Hope is one thing, but right now optimism is quite another. Chien-Ming Wang is crawling through a river of shit. I don't like his chances of coming out clean on the other side.

Game 93: Solsbury Hill

The path that leads to playing Major League Baseball can be quite winding and treacherous, as both of tonight's starting pitchers (and former Cubs prospects) could probably tell you, although for very different reasons.

Despite being one year younger than Rich Hill, Sergio Mitre reached the Major Leagues two years earlier. Mitre enrolled in San Diego City College in 1999 and was taken in the 7th round of the 2001 Draft by the Cubs. He was the second player in the organization to reach the Big Leagues out of that draft, behind only the highly touted Mark Prior. He made two starts and a relief appearance in 2003, after being called up from Double-A West Tennessee and actually began the 2004 season on the 25 man roster before being sent down to Triple-A Iowa.

Hill, meanwhile, attended the University of Michigan and was chosen in the 4th round of the 2002 Draft, also by the Cubbies. A left-hander born in the Boston area, Hill was always known for his devastating curveball and gaudy strikeout rates, boasting double digit K/9 ratios at every level of minor league ball before being called up to the Bigs in 2005.

The two pitchers were briefly teammates on the '05 Iowa Cubs, when Mitre was being shuttled between Chicago and the farm team to fill in gaps in the rotation and Hill was a highly regarded prospect, striking out 190 batters in 130 2/3 innings between A, AA and AAA that year.

The following offseason, Mitre was part of a package sent to the Marlins, along with Ricky Nolasco and Renyel Pinto, in exchange Juan Pierre who had only one year left on his contract. Mitre made decent contributions to the Marlins, but both Nolasco and Pinto have outperformed expectations and became solid contributors at various times.

Hill spent the 2006 season between AAA and the Majors, throwing 95 innings to a 4.17 ERA, but seemed to truly break out in '07. Over 195 innings, he struck out 183 and had a WHIP of 1.195, compiling an 11-8 record. He began the 2008 season with the team, but after walking 18 batters in 19 2/3 innings, he was sent back to Iowa. Rich never made another appearance with the Cubs and was finally traded to Baltimore last offseason for the ever ubiquitous "player to be named later".

Mitre's issues can be traced back to one major injury, which lead to Tommy John surgery last year, after which he was released by the Marlins. On the other hand, Hill blames his struggles on a host of smaller things:

It's been incredibly frustrating. It just seems like I had all of my injuries all at once and there were little things. There were no tears or problems that required back surgery but just little things that messed with my delivery and my mechanics. I've also made some adjustments.

Mitre had his surgery just over one year ago, but has seemingly made a quick recovery. He's needed only 9 starts to ascend from Trenton to the Bronx. The sinkerballer issues few walks and doesn't collect many strikeouts either, but has had better results than ever since coming aboard with the Yanks.

The same can't be said for Hill, who has had a rough go thus far with the O's. He's walked 33 while striking out 43 in 52 1/3 innings (11 starts) leading to an ugly 7.22 ERA. His most recent start was solid, however, lasting 6 innings, giving up two runs and walking only one batter. Hill has never faced anyone in the current Yankee line-up.

Mitre hasn't pitched in the Big Leagues since 2007, and has never faced the Orioles. So it would seem like a good opportunity for each climb the hill and get a fresh start.

To keeping silence I resigned,
My friends would think I was a nut,
Turning water into wine,
Open doors would soon be shut.

So I went from day to day,
Though my life was in a rut,
'til I thought of what I'd say,
Which connection I should cut.