He went 0-for-4, lowering his average to .143. He is now 1 for his last 15. He fanned thrice, including in the ninth, looking overmatched, short-circuiting a mini-rally. Meanwhile, his spring training competitor, Oswald Peraza, is hitting .292 at Scranton. Volpe's last SB came a Sunday ago. And on the road, nobody chants his name, unless it's derisively.
That said, across the Yankiverse, you'll not hear a peep from anyone calling for Volpe to be benched. Our lone recourse is to cross fingers and toes, and hope the kid survives the most stressful period yet in his short baseball career.
When the Death Barge flew him to NYC - and bussed Peraza to Central Pa. - the brain trust seemingly committed itself to a rarely followed Yankee policy: "Patience. " The Yankees must give Volpe the month of April and beyond. If on Mother's Day he's still looking like a tourist without a translator, the grand experiment of 2023 will have exploded in the garage, and the most celebrated Yankee prospect since Aaron Judge might be psychologically wounded. But that's for May. Right now, nobody else on the roster can play SS for an extended period, unless we want an Isiah Kiner-Falefa reenactment of 2022.
Listen: Yesterday brought the kind of excruciating Yankee loss we normally associate with the dead zone of August. We rallied from a four-run deficit, prompting Michael Kay to bloviate about our bullpen advantage. Then, one by one, our pitchers failed to hold Baltimore. In the end, didn't we all secretly know that if the Yankees scored the tying run, it would only lead to an O's walk-off victory in the ninth?
Other ponderings yesterday.
1. In Scranton, Peraza rested. Our most intriguing Triple A prospect might be a left-fielder named Elijah Dunham, who was signed off the dirt leagues, and who is said to be a moose-in-china-shop hulk with speed, size, power and the willingness to run through walls. He went 1-for-3, now batting .310 in a micro-sample. Also, Greg "Bad Body" Weissert threw a scoreless inning of frisbee toss. Guy looks like a Carvel store manager. He might be up soon.
2. In the Double A opener at Somerset - gateway to Piscataway! - The Martian - aka Jasson Dominguez - went 0-for-3 with a walk and a run scored. He was the king of spring training. Let's hope that by - say - August 30, either he or Dunham is ready to take left field and spare us from another trade deadline of Cashman's follies.
3. Clarke Schmidt's line score shows 4 earned runs in 3.1 innings. Lost in that line is Gleyber Torres' botched DP grounder, which led to two runs. Schmidt deserved better. That said, he has trouble with lefty-bats. Until Carlos Rodon returns - ETA: Unknown - we're sucking air.
4. The days of the Yankees manhandling Baltimore are over. That was last year. The Orioles are for real. They are not mere contenders for a wild card. They could win the AL East.
5. Keep repeating: It's April. It's April. It's April. Remember: April is April.
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12 comments:
Here's a good story on Dunham from The Athletic:
He's kind of a Clint Frazier type of outfielder by which I mean he will go through walls. Let's hope he doesn't get too many concussions. Below is a clip of him in the outfield making a great diving catch.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1643787234745765892
One thing is certain: When he makes the jump to the majors from Scranton he will not be wearing his current number.
No, I swear, here is the story!
https://theathletic.com/3302200/2022/05/12/yankees-elijah-dunham/
Dunham was really good in "Girls." Looking forward to this new stage of her career.
If the grand experiment of 2023 explodes in the garage, I think we should ask where Chapman was when it did. My gut tells me that his ignominious end with the Yankees has graduated him from shooting up the garage to bombs of some kind.
Boone is an idiot. Not that anyone needs the reminder, but it should be said, and often.
I had Volpe at .215 and being sent down by the All-Star Game. I could be way off on the number now but I don't think anyone else had him below the Mendoza level either. I've seen way too many hyped up baby bombers to have much faith at when the next one comes around.
JM, do you mean Bumbling, Bubbling, Seed-Spitting Boone?
Give Volpe at least a couple of months. What's the rush? They gave Joey Gallo two half seasons, a combined full year!
Have they put Donaldson on the injury list yet? They should bring up Peraza and play him at 3B.
Along with failing to develop new players quickly, and bringing back losers for second and third go-rounds, another Dumbass Cashman thing that drives me nuts is that he does not put injured players on the IL quickly. For some reason, he waits, sometimes for a week or even longer, while the team plays a man short. Why, what the hell?
Baseball fans want Everything Everywhere All At Once, but Baseball is really Some Things In Some Places Sometimes. Amazed at all the hot takes I see everywhere about how this is Gleyber’s year, Volpe is overwhelmed, all after exactly one week.
Same goes for the minors, where a fast start gasses up the ol’ hypemobile. But I do love seeing the kids prosper, especially players like Sweeney and Jones whose 1st round selections were met with derision in certain quarters. Eli Dunham has potential and is one of the few actual prospects likely to see regular playing time on a SWB roster loaded with 28 y/o castoffs.
Yesterday’s loss was disappointing, but the O’s are no longer pushovers. Hope for another strong effort tonight from Brito. Over the last 3 seasons I’m afraid Schmidt, already 27, hasn’t shown enough to be anything more than a back of the bullpen type. Not much pitching in the minors to look forward to. Of course the team can bash its way into the watered down playoffs, but nobody wins in October without pitching.
Enjoy the day!
Yesterday, it happened, it finally happened! For the first time this year in seven games, by hitting Judge in the 2 slot, he came up in the 9th inning with two outs, nobody on as the tying run, a situation that wouldn't have happened if he'd batted #3, at least if you assume everything else stayed the same. Unfortunately, the intelligent Orioles gave Judge the unintentional intentional walk. The kind of thing that you rarely see the Yanks do with their closers ("hey, our closer is good enough to get anyone out! ..." Bang, zoom, game tied).
All of the things that we had talked about happened in this game.
In the first inning, DJ walked. Judge struck out. Rizzo singled. Of course I realize that Judge did not have his best game with the bat, and reversing Judge and Rizzo probably would've made no difference in the outcome. But the fact remains that, by hitting Judge #2, you gave up any chance of him hitting with two men on base in the 1st inning. (Plus, if DJ's on base percentage is .330, you're going to have Judge hitting in the 1st inning with nobody on base 67 percent of the games.)
In the 9th inning, the Oriole closer came out mowing everyone down with 100mph heat and wipeout stuff. With two outs, he (very smartly) pitches gingerly to Judge and gives him a free pass. Whereupon Judge becomes a quasi-leadoff man and swipes second base (cringe) and then takes third base on a wild pitch. But Rizzo popped out to end the game. You get the feeling that their only chance to tie the game was if there was another wild pitch.
So, if you think about it, Boone made the 1st inning less dangerous for the Orioles starting pitcher, by hitting Judge in the 2 slot. And I remind you that, as a road game, the score was 0-0 at that point. And then circumstances basically took the bat out of Judge's hands for the 9th inning, when they were trailing by a run. Even if the Orioles closer had pitched to him, though, that was a tall order, to have to hit a home run to tie the game. What are the chances of that? Yeah, it can happen, but it's kind of like a 1 in 100 shot. Not the kind of odds you want to play.
When I play chess, I'm the kind of guy who likes to go back and consider what would have happened if I'd made this move instead of that move. When I play poker, (I play only for fun, never for money), I like to look at the remaining pile after the hand is over, to see what would have happened if I'd asked for one more card or if I'd gone for this combination instead of that.
So, fans are always going to be armchair managers and go back and look at the what ifs. It's part of the fun of the game to think about what might happened if Boone had done this instead of that, or that instead of this, or the other thing instead of this or that.
"I respect someone being on a hot streak, but you know, hot streaks are so tiring. That's why I brought in IKF."
He didn't say it, but he's an idiot and it wouldn't surprise me.
The question will be who gets a hit first, Falafel or Hicks. Right now, they are a combined 0-19.
I'm not betting on Hicks.
Hoss, you would've lost your bet. Hicks finally got a hit. Game tying RBI to boot. Unfortunately for us, that means he's going to be here for the rest of the season.
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