PBP #5: We are the (League) Champions(hip Series)

Live chat reminder

Given the baseball-less-ness of tonight, why not have a live chat? Talk ALCS, NLCS, anything October and baseball related.

7.30 PM, and we'll go as long as there's interest.

Hope to see you there!

Sterling's right, you know...

So I was talking to one of you wonderful blog readers this evening, when one of you repeated a favorite Sterling-ism: "Well, Suzyn, you just can't predict baseball!"

Although Mike Blowers might disagree, on this front, Sterling is kind of right.

I got to thinking about all the games I've seen in person this season, and then thought about how improbably some of the results have been:

• I saw Chien Ming Wang, the 2009 Chien Ming Wang, outpitch Roy Halladay on July 4th. Halladay didn't get the loss, even though the Yankees won the game, but until Wang's shoulder blew up on him, he was easily the better pitcher that day.

• I saw three walk off wins, two of which included walk offs against Joe Nathan--Nathan, who is considered one of the best closers in the league--and those two walk offs involved coming from behind in the ninth inning.

• I saw Brett Gardner hit a home run. Okay, so it was an inside-the-park home run--which, depending on your view might make it more or less unexpected.

• I saw Alex Rodriguez hit a bottom of the ninth game tying home run in the postseason (!) (tongue in cheek here, folks)
  

• I also saw AJ Burnett get shelled twice and,

• I saw the Yankees lose to the Nationals, the Orioles and the Royals--the three worst teams in all of baseball, pretty much, unless one counts Pittsburgh, but I don't even know if the Pirates qualify any more.

These were just the games I saw in person, and out of a 162 game schedule, 10 games (and 2 postseason games) is not a whole lot, and yet, I still got to bear witness to some pretty incredible things.

This isn't any sort of predictor as to what's going to happen in the ALCS, but rather, just an observation.

This is baseball, after all, where crazy things happen in a way they don't--and they can't--in almost any other sport.

ALCS game start times announced

From various sources:

ALCS games times, all eastern:

Game 1, in New York-7:57;
Game 2, in New York-7:57;
Game 3, in Anaheim-4:13;
Game 4, in Anaheim-7:57;
Game 5, in Anaheim- 7:57;*
Game 6, in New York-4:13;*
Game 7, in New York 7-8:20*

* = If necessary.

All games on FOX.

I don't really get the 4.13 start times, though I guess the idea for Game 3 is to avoid a conflict with Monday Night Football.

Still, a 1.13 PM start time for those in California can't be too appealing, especially a game six which could likely be decisive.

If a tree falls in the woods and no one's there to hear it...

Jeter hits, Hard Rock Donates

Via Hard Rock:

In celebration and recognition of Derek Jeter's 2,722 career hit to break Lou Gehrig's team record, representatives from Hard Rock International present a charitable contribution to Derek's Turn 2 Foundation in the amount of $52,722. This donation marks the beginning of a new philanthropic relationship between the Turn 2 Foundation and Hard Rock International.



(Pictured from left to right: Jim Allen, David Miller and John Pasquale of Hard Rock International; Sharlee Jeter and Derek Jeter)

Photo credit: Brad Barket/Hard Rock

Constructing the ALCS Roster

The cool thing about the postseason is that teams that advance to the next round can adjust their roster, for whatever reason--maybe someone gets hurt, maybe someone is better against one team than another.

With the ALDS over, the Yankees can now construct their ALCS roster.

This roster will largely remain the same--the differences come down to basically whether or not, against the Angels, you want an extra pinch runner or an extra arm out of the bullpen.

For the ALDS, the Yankees went for the extra bullpen arm and stuck with just Brett Gardner and Jerry Hairston as pinch runners.

Here is the way I'd construct the roster for the ALCS, bold selections are explained below:

1) Derek Jeter
2) Johnny Damon
3) Mark Teixeira
4) Alex Rodriguez
5) Hideki Matsui
6) Jorge Posada
7) Robinson Canó
8) Nick Swisher
9) Melky Cabrera

10) CC Sabathia
11) AJ Burnett
12) Andy Pettitte
13) Chad Gaudin

14) Brett Gardner
15) Jerry Hairston, Jr.
16) Freddy Guzman
17) Jose Molina
18) Francisco Cervelli
19) Eric Hinske

20) Joba Chamberlain
21) Phil Hughes
22) Mariano Rivera
23) David Robertson
24) Alfredo Aceves
25) Phil Coke


Chad Gaudin/Joba Chamberlain: I put Gaudin in fourth starter's spot because, at the moment, I have more confidence in his ability than I do in Joba's. There are a couple of points here: Joba has not started since his final start of the season, which I was, uh, fortunate enough to attend in person. He was, more or less, awful.

While Gaudin, through the course of the season, was a roll of a dice once one hit the sixth inning, the five innings he did get through were much cleaner than those Joba pitched.

It's entirely possible, come Game 4, depending on what the scenario is, that Joe Girardi asks CC Sabathia to go on three days' rest and thus the Gaudin/Joba debate becomes moot. Still, Girardi has shown a tendency to play-by-the-book and it's hard for me to imagine him, in the ALCS, asking Sabathia to go on such short rest unless the Yankees were down 3-0 in the series.

There's no question about keeping Joba on the roster, merely a question of where he would best be used. If you think Joba, and not Gaudin, should be the game four starter, please feel free to say so in the comments.


Freddy Guzman: My major move here is that I take Damaso Marte off the roster and put Freddy Guzman on it. It's not just that Marte was completley ineffective in his one appearance, but that if Johnny Damon continues to struggle as he is, Girardi might give a thought to starting Gardner--the considerable loss of potential power may, in fact, be negated by the improvement in outfield defense--and having Guzman on the bench means that doing so would not leave Girardi without a pinch runner for Posada or Matsui.

I still remain of the opinion that if you're going to have someone not named Jorge Posada catch--which I don't agree with, but can live with--that your better option is Cervelli, who is a more than adequate defender and not an automatic out in the line up.

Since there's utterly no chance of Girardi removing Molina for Cervelli, however, I will have to let the three catchers stand as is. If the Yankees are going to start Molina, they almost have to carry Cervelli--as, in game 2, if Posada pinch-hits for Molina and then someone pinch runs, you still need another catcher.


It's extraordinarily tempting to want to add another pitcher. Six doesn't seem like enough, and while I still stay far, far away from Brian Bruney, there's a part of me that doesn't have any issues with putting Mark Melancon on said roster, even if he's just along for the ride in the sense that Jeter and Rivera were in 1995.

If you keep Guzman on the roster, and you don't remove either Molina or Cervelli, the tempting thing to do would be to remove Eric Hinske--Hairston is probably better defensively in the outfield, and certainly the faster runner--but the extremely superstitious person in me balks. Hinske's got some seriously good World Series luck that you don't want to touch.


It's pretty amazing how intricate the arguments can be when choosing between just one or two players that, all told, are not expected to have an impact on the series the way that Derek Jeter or Alex Rodriguez might, but then, it's not too hard to remember how Luis Sojo and Jose Vizcaino basically won the 2000 World Series for us, and then we know the importance of every spot on the roster.

On Bullpens and Nostalgia

Although the Yankees have played just three games in the postseason thus far, a clear pattern seems to be emerging in Joe Girardi's managerial style.

Girardi, as many Yankee fans will remember, was a member of the 1996 Yankee team and had, perhaps, one of the biggest hits in the series--a triple, hit by the most unlikely guy on the team to hit it.

So perhaps it's not much of a surprise, then, that Girardi is managing the Yankees as though the year still was 1996, some 13 (!) years ago. In all three games, Girardi went to the bullpen no later than the seventh inning, and while CC Sabathia's pitch count may have warranted the move, Andy Pettitte's, at a meager 81, did not.

In 1996, the starters left after six for the shut-down duo of Mariano Rivera and John Wetteland.

In 2009, the starters are being removed for the trio of Joba Chamberlain, Phil Hughes and Mariano Rivera. At least, theoretically, this is what's supposed to be happening.

More than once, however, Chamberlain was pulled before getting the final out of the inning. The example I am thinking of here is Friday night's game, where Chamberlain was pulled for Phil Coke. At the time the move worked, Coke got the strikeout that the Yankees needed, but it hurt the team later on when Damaso Marte was the only, and not very good, lefty in the bullpen in the eleventh inning.

The idea to use a shutdown bullpen a la 1996 is one I understand in theory, but not necessary execution.

It's one thing when you have a game where the starter is clearly gassed by the seventh inning, and thus there is no dilemma, but quite another where your playoff-experienced starter is pitching extremely well and you remove him for a relatively inexperienced (postseason, here) set-up crew.

What happens, then, is that when a game goes into extra innings, Girardi is soon left with a depleted bullpen that may have been avoided.

Again, the idea to shorten the game and get to Mariano as quickly as possible has a lot of merit, both historical and theoretical, but sometimes you will have a situation such as last night, where letting the starter go one more inning or even just one more out is just as prudent as going to the bullpen.

The Twins are easily a weaker opponent than the Angels, and any questionable bullpen decision could be obscured by the Yankees' brute strength that allowed them to overcome deficits in every game. With the Angels, the Yankees are unlikely to have this luxury, so Girardi's use of the bullpen has the potential to become true tabloid fodder.


The major difference I see between the 2009 and 1996 Yankees is that in 1996 the Yankees went to Rivera so quickly not just because Rivera was that good (and he was), but also because the caliber of the starters were not what they are in 2009.

The Yankees shortened the game in 1996 because they had to in order to succeed. The 2009 Yankees are lucky enough that this is not necessarily the case.

*****

So I realize this is kinda a downer post from me, so to cheer you up, have a look at the TV and radio calls of the final 2009 ALDS out