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Saturday, June 15, 2019

"We Have The Pitching We Need."

I watched Aaron Boone's face when he said this.

He had just been informed that Dallas Kutchel had signed with Atlanta.  Boone had not been aware of this unbelievable development, and it looked as though he was trying not to choke on a rattlesnake sandwich.

He kept a "poker face," of course, not wanting to in any way, form or manner to disparage what was obviously the stupidest decision the Yankees have made since the Jay Buhner deal.  Hal Steinbrenner didn't want to go as high as $15 million, for one year, to solidify legitimate pennant and world series ambitions.

Why?  Because he doesn't have such ambitions. 

He simply promises them he will make the Yankees champions again, but has no intention of taking any action to back up that promise. His technique is to lie to the fan base, earnestly and often,    because he believes them to be stupid and gullible.

 " Money talks and those without it, listen," is Hal's mantra.

It is like someone else promising to bring back all the coal mining jobs, and then sending in three fresh faced teenagers in Brooks Brother's suits to teach 55 year old miners, with 6th grade educations, to become Google coders. 

Boone regathered his composure and went on the offensive:

" We have young guys like Chance Adams, and Luis Cessa.  Soon Betances will be back in the bullpen, stretching it out further" ( so starters only have to go 4 innings ). 

Lets be candid, folks.  There are only two choices remaining for the Yankee administration:

1. Play out the string and see if Boone is right.  Judge and Giancarlo are coming back. Maybe we'll average 10-12 runs per game.

2.  Compound the error of " I'm not cheap Hal Steinbrenner" ( who never wanted this job and doesn't even like baseball), and unload the future.  The panic button here is that Brian has only a terrible track record when it comes to reclaiming once effective pitchers.

In short, this season is over.  And the next 10 may be full of useless old guys whom no one wants to watch.



15 comments:

13bit said...

We don't need pitching. We need another over-the-hill RH power hitter. Someone like, oh, I don't know, maybe Edwin Encarnacion...

13bit said...

We are OVERstocked with quality starting pitching. That's all I know. WAY too many of them.

Anonymous said...

Encarnacion--I suppose this means Clint Frazier is gone. Very stupid, very depressing.

Anonymous said...

What I mean is, Clint Frazier will be gone at some point--if not in this trade, in a future trade. What they need is a pitcher, not another right-handed-batting one-trick pony who is pushing forty. Can anyone make the slightest sense of this?

Anonymous said...

If this is the prelude to a trade of Frazier, I've had it with this fucking team.

Anonymous said...

Either Frazier is going, or Stanton or Judge is not recuperating as planned and is not expected back anytime soon. If not the latter, then Frazier is gone.

Leinstery said...

If Nestor Cortes can go 5 innings and only give up 2 runs, shouldn't that earn him CC's spot in the rotation?

Rufus T. Firefly said...

Hopefully the death star has a plan to trade Stanton for a pitcher.

But not likely.

Anonymous said...

Stanton has a no-trade clause. Not likely that he would accept a trade to the Giants, if Bumgarner is the target.

HoraceClarke66 said...

Ridiculous. And while the guy they traded is only 19, "Juan Then" is a great baseball name.

HoraceClarke66 said...

Nice effort by Cortes tonight. But why oh why is Surrenderer still on this team???

Joe Formerlyof Brooklyn said...


I don't know why you acquire a 36-year-old power hitter, but maybe more trades ARE coming, so we'll see. Trade Voit? Or Urshela? Or maybe one of the injured OF giraffes really is NOT doing that well.

However, I ran across a write-up of young players Cashmoney has traded in the recent past. Reminded me of two guys I had thought were "the future" for the NYYs -- Billy McKinney and Dustin Fowler.

McKinney - age 24, hits LH. in 140 ABs in 2019, slash line is 221/272/636. Sent to minors 5/24/19.

Fowler -- age 24. Has spent all of 2019 in minors, where he's hitting .262 with 9 HR and 42 RBI. 62K in 62 games. Also hits LH.

I'm not sure there's a conclusion to draw here, but it appears as if neither of these guys would be helping the current team if one or both had been kept.

Alphonso said...

Just a note;

The Yankees won't sit down CC until he gets that 250th win. They will die trying. He gets his ticket punched to the Hall with that win, and he will wear a Yankee cap. That's what this has become. Another Hall of Famer.

The focus of the season.

HoraceClarke66 said...

You're right, Joe FOB. Coops has been lucky—or good!—in that most of the people he has traded even in his worst deals of late have done nothing, and probably will do nothing.

But if only a couple of them turn it around and have good careers, those deals will be much worse.

Jorge Mateo, for instance, who the Yanks tried to convert to an outfielder, is now batting .325/.355/.559/.914, with 37 extra-base hits (in just 64 games) and 15 stolen bases, as a Triple-A shortstop for the A's system.

Now maybe this is just a small sample in a hard-hitting league. But if Mateo, who is still just 24, becomes a .325-hitting SS in the show, then the Sonny Gray deal starts to look a whole helluva lot worse.

Same if Fowler manages to recuperate and shine, same if any of the young pitchers Coops has sprinkled around the majors like so many M & Ms end up making it.

And the bigger question it all raises is this: why HAVE so many guys who were shining on all levels of the Yankees' system 1-2 years ago flamed out?

Was something used to make them look better—something such as PEDs? Or were the managers and instructors who were making them so good simply discarded or passed over?

It would be nice to know.

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