Thoughts On Griffey

Good morning Fackers. Late last June, as the Mariners came to the Bronx for the only 2009 series at Yankee Stadium, we ran this post as sort of our unofficial goodbye to Ken Griffey Jr. After a ten year absence, Junior had returned to Seattle, and it was assumed that 2009 would mark his victory lap and retirement tour around the American League.

Despite posting a .214/.324/.411 batting line and .323 wOBA, Griffey elected to return for a 22nd Major League season. I won't begrudge any player who wants to hang on as long as he can. And I could certainly imagine why Griffey would want to return to the M's, who were the surprise team of 2009 and made significant improvements in the off season.

Thus far though, 2010 has been an unmitigated disaster, both the for the Mariners and Griffey. The team is just 12-19, good for last in the weak AL West. While their pitching has been good and their defense has been characteristically outstanding, the offense has been downright abyssmal, ranking last in the league in virtually every meaningful category. Milton Bradley, the off-season acquisition brought it to bring some pop to the lineup, had his annual meltdown early this year and is on the restricted list. Eric Byrnes, picked up for the league minimum in hopes he could rediscover his mojo, played poorly, blew a suicide squeeze play, and then rode off on his bicycle to go play keg league softball in California. I'm not making that up.

As for Griffey, part two of the farewell tour is not faring well at all. He's hitting just .208/.265/.234 with a wOBA of .234. He's had just two extra base hits, both doubles. He's played at half win below replacement level. And it leaves the Mariners in quite a bind. They're desperately in need offense and they have a punchless designated hitter. As they look to salvage their season, there's a very real possibility that the process will entail putting a premature end to the career of a future Hall of Famer and quite possibly the greatest player in franchise history.

Yesterday, Larry LaRue of the Tacoma New-Tribune reported that Griffey will retire or be released by the end of the month. Even with all the Griffey-centric promotions Seattle has scheduled this year that news is sad, but isn't very surprising. What's both sad and surprising is the allegation in the story that Griffey wasn't available for a pinch hitting appearance last week because he was napping in the clubhouse.

Part of the justification for keeping Griffey around for another year was that he was a positive presence in the clubhouse, a good teammate, and a mentor to the younger players on the team. But if that story is true, it goes beyond Bobby Bonilla and Rickey Henderson playing cards as the 1999 NLCS wrapped up and it goes beyond Rey Sanchez getting a haircut during the late innings of a game. At least those players were awake.

Regardless of the napping allegation, the end is near for Junior, and it's sad. It's sad to see what was once the top player in the game taken out of the race before he could even limp across the finish line. It's sad the feel-good atmosphere of his 2009 return to Seattle seemingly has vanished in the wind. And it's sad that, true or not, the Ken Griffey Jr story is going to end with the suggestion that a mid-game nap was one of the final acts of his career. Griffey wore #24 because Rickey Henderson was his favorite player; Rickey wore it because Willie Mays was his. Mays' final season is remembered for him stumbling about center field in the 1973 World Series. Griffey's will be remembered for taking a snooze in the clubhouse.

As uncomfortable as it is to ask, and as unthinkable as it seems at present, I have to wonder: will the Yankees face a situation like this in the years to come? Not so much the nap part, but the uneasy situation where a living legend has outlived his usefulness. Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, and Andy Pettitte will all be free agents at season's end. I can't possibly imagine any of them playing elsewhere in 2011. But they will 37, 41, and 39 years old, respectively, next year. Jorge Posada will be a 39 year old catcher in the final year of his contract. Alex Rodriguez will be 35 and will have seven years remaining on his monstrous deal.

While Pettitte and Mo may be content to go year-to-year from here forward, and while Posada may hang em up after 2011, Jeter and A-Rod aren't likely to be going anywhere in the near future. What happens if their skills abandon them early in their final season, or worse yet, with years remaining on their contracts? Would the Yankees dare cut ties with one of them if meant the difference between sinking or swimming in the pennant race? How would we as fans react if one of those players became a detriment on the field?

It's easy to say these guys wouldn't hang on when they are clearly done, but it happens all the time. World class athletes tend to be a very proud bunch. They also tend to be the last ones to realize it when their skills have left them. The club went through something similar with Bernie Williams, and even with Joe Torre's unending loyalty cushioning the blow, that didn't end well. I hope that's not a bridge we have to cross again in the coming years.

The Obligatory Andy Pettitte & Injuries Post

Entering his start against the White Sox last Friday, Andy Pettitte was cruising through the early goings of the 2010 season. He took the mound that night at 3-0 through four starts, with a 1.29 ERA. He had allowed just 31 baserunners through 28 IP, hadn't surrendered a home run, and was holding opposing batters to anemic .216/.287/.258 line.

Clearly Pettitte was due to come back to earth a bit, and that he did. The White Sox touched him up for four runs in the first two frames. He settled down from there, shutting the Pale Hose down the rest of the way and exiting with the score tied after six innings. It was his first non-quality start of the season.

Pettitte made his next start yesterday, and while he held the O's to a lone run, he pitched in and out of trouble all afternoon. He allowed eight baserunners through five, and was the beneficiary of a pair of inning ending double plays. His outing was done after just 77 pitches.

While I certainly won't complain about Pettitte's result in either game, both Yankee wins, but the two starts share a common bond beyond not measuring up to the standards of Pettitte's first four starts. In warming up for last Friday's outing, Pettitte felt stiffness in his forearm. Clearly, it wasn't enough for him to miss the start, and the Yankees responded by lightening his workload between Friday and yesterday. He had pain again during his warm up yesterday, this time more in the elbow and triceps area than in the forearm.

Pettite underwent an MRI following his exit. The results are encouraging for the most part, showing no structural damage, just inflammation in the elbow. As precautionary measure, Pettitte will likely miss his next scheduled start; Brian Cashman implied as much before the test results were even known. At this stage in the season, there's no reason to push it. Pettitte is going to be needed in September and October (and hopefully November too); may as well give him the rest and rehab he needs now.

The next scheduled start for Pettitte is Tuesday in Detroit. Relievers Alfredo Aceves and Sergio Mitre are candidates for spot duty. Scranton starters Ivan Nova and Romulo Sanchez are on the 40 man roster, though the Christian Garcia injury could conceivably open a spot for other starters Zach McAllister, Jason Hirsch, or Dustin Moseley. Currently, McAllister, Moseley, and Sanchez are lined up Monday through Wednesday.

Most likely though, the start will go to Mitre, and I think it should. As the long man in a seven man bullpen, Mitre hasn't been getting much work, particularly with how well the Yankee starters have been. Alf, coincidentally or not, suffered from arm issues and ineffectiveness after his spot start in Minnesota last July, and right now he's too important a piece in the bullpen to take him out of play for the upcoming Boston series.

Of course Pettitte's elbow issue is the latest in a string of bumps and bruises for the Yankees over the past week: Jorge Posada's knee and now his calf, Curtis Granderson's groin, potentially Alex Rodriguez' knee, Mariano Rivera's side, etc. There are rumblings throughout the media and blogosphere about the Yankees collective age, or even more tenuously, the SI Jinx.

As for me, I'm far from panicking at this point. Aside from Granderson's groin pull, none of these appear to be major issues, and since Granderson is the only one of the bunch on the right side of thirty, there's likely to be less concern about him moving forward. As for the others, these are the occupational hazards of professional athletes in their mid-thirties. None of this should be surprising or alarming. Yes, the Yankees have been extremely lucky that all these key contributors have remained relatively healthy through the years. But as unlikely as it is for all of these veteran players to avoid major injury year after year, it's equally unlikely that all will simultaneously suffer major setbacks.

And for that matter, all of these guys have dealt with injuries at one point or another, most within recent years. Posada missed nearly all of 2008 and spent a month on the DL last year. A-Rod spent time on the DL in 2008 and missed the first six weeks of last season. Mo seems to need to shutdown for a series here or there at least once a year; don't you remember his "cranky shoulder" early last September? Pettitte has dealt with elbow issues since early in his career, so yesterday's events aren't necessarily the product of his advanced age. None of this is anything new.

With an older roster like that of the Yankees, injuries are always going to be a looming concern. But there's nothing that has happened in the past several days that should ratchet up the level of concern all that much. If anything, perhaps we should be relieved that everything appears to be a minor issue. Of course, with the team currently sitting at 19-8 with the second best record and run differential in baseball, the tabloids need something to create alarm.

(Photo from Getty Images)

24 Days Until Spring Training: Robinson Cano

Robinson Cano isn't young for a baseball player anymore. He seems like a bit of a fledgling in comparison to the rest of the established stars on the Yankees but he turned 27 last October and is now entering his physical prime. Cano is slated to make $9M in 2010, so he is becoming less of an automatic bargain and more of a good value contingent on good performance.

With the departures of Melky Cabrera and Chein-Ming Wang this offseason, Cano alone now bridges the gap of home grown talent between the old guard of Jeter, Rivera, Posada and Pettitte and the newer generation of Joba Chamberlain, Phil Hughes and Brett Gardner. He's the only outstanding hitting prospect the Yankees have developed and retained in recent years and provides elite production at an important defensive position.

Cano's abilities at second base are tough to quantify, as Joe from River Ave. Blue pointed out before last season began. He possesses the ability to make plays on balls that are hit outside of his zone, but is also prone to making sloppy mistakes on relatively easy opportunities. UZR rated Cano as slightly below average last season (-5.2) which is close to his career norm. Fortunately, Robby hits more than enough to make up for any deficiencies he might have in the field.

After a terrible year at the plate in 2008, Cano rebounded last season with a .370 wOBA, the second best mark of his career. He set new career highs in home runs (25), doubles (48) and ISO (.199) without adversely affecting his batting average (.320). He batted significantly better at Yankee Stadium than on the road, but hit a fairly balanced 14 of his homers in the Bronx.

Cano's only real flaw as a hitter is his lack of patience, an attribute which is exacerbated by the fact that he is near the top of the league in contact percentage - both inside and outside of the strike zone. He made contact with 77% of offerings outside of the zone in 2009, a number which has increased every year he's been in the league. The percentage of pitches out of the zone he offers at has remained close to 30%, meaning that he's either getting more selective, getting better at putting the bat on the ball or some combination of the two.

Robby is also near the top of the league in first strike percentage, despite the fact that he only swings at the first pitch of the at bat 34% of the time. It's easy to understand why Cano or the coaching staff might take this tact - he's already near the bottom of the league in pitches seen per plate appearance - but it appears that pitchers are a little too comfortable grooving a strike in there and putting Cano in an unfavorable count. Clearly opposing hurlers are trying to exploit this tendency and Cano could benefit by being more aggressive on the first pitch.

As has been the case throughout his career, Cano struggled with runners in scoring position in 2009. Mike from River Ave. Blues identified BABIP as a major culprit for the discrepancy but clearly there is something in his approach that keeps him from racking up more RBIs. Similarly, Cano didn't fare very well in the 2009 postseason either, hitting a paltry .193/.266/.281 surpassed in futility on the Yankees only by Nick Swisher. But all's well that ends well.

Cano is probably my favorite Yankee. During a time when the farm system wasn't turning out many prospects, Robby emerged to fill a position that the Yankees have had very few stars at over the course of their history. He has plenty of flaws as a player, some of which we didn't even discuss, but those make Cano who he is.