Today in The Journal News
Posted by: Peter Abraham - Posted in Misc on Jun 07, 2008 
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Jason Giambi didn’t think he swung. But the umpire did as the Yankees lost another frustrating game. Darrell Rasner deserved better.
Gerrit Cole is a Yankees fan. But he’s not going to sign easily. This notebook also has updates on Chris Britton, Dan Giese and Chien-Ming Wang.
Wow, Pete. You’ve been typing up a storm. Been busy, but not too busy to read your updates. Thanks for keeping the denizens informed!
I object to being classified as a “denizen”. I’m innocent.
Why build off a heroic last at bat-walkoff-pinch hit home run when you can watch a pitcher throw another quality start with no run support ?
This should encourage the lowly K.C. Royals that just came off getting swept in a 4-game series.
Are the Yankees truly able to put together a streak of winning something like 14 of 16 games ? They give no indication of being able to do so.
Pete,
Your notebook lists 20 pitchers drafted (it was 20 RHP + 6 LHP = 26 FYI)
Below is the breakdown…
51 players
15 HS / 36 College
Position Breakdown (w/ HS/Col splits)
RHP = 20 (5/15)
LHP = 6 (3/3)
C = 4 (2/2)
1B = 3 (all college)
2B/SS = 8 (3/5)
3B = 1 (college)
OF = 9 (2/7)
Positionally seems like even breakdown, 1B are all college with hope of them reaching the majors sooner (given our dearth of prospects) Lots of balance…. should be interesting if we can sign 30+.
What a shame that Rasner pitches the way he does and the Yanks can’t get it done.
Andy P will get 11 runs in support today and Rasner will be sitting there scratching his head
How does the ambidextrous pitcher get listed? He had been drafted last year but didn’t sign, any idea if he will sign this time around?
Rasner pitched well, you can’t ask for much more from him. This loss was on the offense. What a shock I tell ya.
Venditte got listed as a RHP – since that’s his dominant side.
http://www.baseballamerica.com.....26983.html
for some perspective here’s the all time list of baseball america prospects
as far as the yankees drafting garrit cole, yankee fans can look forward to four years from now wondering if he’ll ever live up to the hype just as we are today with phil hughes.
i don’t know about you, but in my own personal life, i don’t worry about much four years from now. why should i worry about the yankees four years from now? that’s not to say any of us or the yankees shouldn’t pay attention at all to four years from now, but how much focus it should get in relation to the present ?
we’re in a world where four year plans ( education,home mortgages, etc are of course important, but we’re also in a world where companies like apple reinvent themselves in less than four years and often in less than two years. is there anyone looking forward to the 2012 iphone?
but we’re supposed to look forward to the 2012 garrit coles?
draft a college pitcher who’s two years away and will be closer to 24 when he makes his debut( like buchholz or joba) and i’ll get a little more excited.
for me to get excited the yankees need to give me something to look forward to that’s closer to my “look forward to” attention span.
in the meantime, the word on the street is the new apple iphone will be out this week.
now, that’s something to get excited about.
poor rasner should be 5 in 1 or 6 in 0.
Lack of run production / timely hitting when needed will make any quality start or good bullpen effort of no consequence.
“draft a college pitcher who’s two years away and will be closer to 24 when he makes his debut( like buchholz or joba) and i’ll get a little more excited.”
There’s little to no chance of landing a college version of Cole as late as the Yankees pick – specifically for the reason you give (they’re closer to the majors).
A lot can go wrong in development in the minors – injury, ‘not getting it’, etc.
But, the Yankees selected the best player available when they had their first pick. I like that.
I actually like following prospects, trying to pick who can help the club in the near and eventual future.
Melancon very well may be up in the bullpen -this- year. Some posters here have been talking about him for as long as I can remember. I like that.
Last night was a horrible waste of a gutsy and good pitching performance by Rasner. 10 hits and 1 run is despicable. I am a fan of ARod, so, don’t anyone take this the wrong way – I appreciate that he got 2 hits last night, BUT – he’s supposed to be the one CLEARING table, not setting it! However, if someone had cleared him, it wouldn’t be a problem.
We’ll never know if Jason had a hit in him after that apparently uncharacteristically shoddy call by the umpire, but I don’t understand why the hitter can’t ask the umpire to check with the 3rd or 1st base umpire in that situation, since apparently a catcher is allowed to ask for help if the strike call is not made on a check swing and the catcher thinks it was a swing. And another impression – it seems clear to me that the catcher tagging Jason is what precipitated the strike call – an umpire is never going to admit that what a catcher does influences his calls, but it sure seems to. That was not the first time I’ve seen an umpire make a call that seemed to be a reaction of what a catcher does – including “selling” those pitches that aren’t quite strikes.
Well, another day, another game. Let’s hope the bats come alive today with men on base. 10 hits should have been enough to plate some runs last night, and 10 hits means the bats are working. They’re simply not working together!
I think it was great that they drafted the best player available and he happens to be a hs player… right now there are too many pitchers in the 20-22 age group and this will help diversify the portfolio… It’s like football recruiting – you want to have your classes balanced – not top or backloaded. To cite an example – look at the Florida Gators – win ’06 title, but dropped off in ’07 because 75% of their players (90% of starters) were Freshman/Sophomores.
I watched the Giambi swing on the encore last night since I was at the game and of course we all thought he didn’t go. The only word that describes that call is DISGRACEFUL. That was not even CLOSE to being a swing. Let the players play the game, don’t take it into your own hands. He didn’t even appeal to the third base umpire on it.
What is it with umpires this year? Is it just that we’re noticing it more with the replay technology improving? These guys have the impunity of the umpires’ union and with no accountability, it’s tough to see it improving any time soon.
” A lot can go wrong in development in the minors- injury ,’not getting it’ , etc.”
…but it is a very good way to deflect doing a bad job in the present.
yankee gm- “we may suck now, but in four years by sucking really badly now, we’ll be really good.
p.s. make sure to send that weekly pay check .”
Yeah, Matt, I was about to say the same thing. Umpires are just horrible this year. They seem to make a mistake all the time. It also seems like all the mistakes are just when the Yankees play. I can’t say they are completely against the yankees because of the Delgado call but whoever umps for the Yankees just cant do it right.
Randy l, I was at the Apple store yesterday they said that the new iphone is coming out “soon, real soon”. I said you mean in a couple of weeks? the guy winked and said “you could be right”:-)
The ump call last night was horrible, but I was more upset by the offense. How is it possible that they could drop that game at home against the worst team and the 6+ERA Davies is beyond me especially after that dramatic win just the day before. Baseball is as much of a mental game as it is physical, games like last night’s send a message to the rest of the league that the Yankees are no longer to be feared.
Girardi’s post-game sounds the same after every game. I’m so sick of hearing “we gotta do better, we gotta start winning, I hate to lose” after every loss. Does he have a plan at all or is he just sitting around waiting for the players to get hot? Because the guys have gotten hot already after the initial slump, they just can’t stay productive to string together series wins. I hope he has a plan.
If you keep doing the same thing over and over and don’t understand why you keep getting the same result, that’s one definition of insanity. At some point, if you keep running the same team out there and expect different results… you get the idea.
I agree with Doreen: 10 hits and one run is just appalling but that’s who this team is right now. Shame on them.
If I had to pick one thing the Yankees need to do to make an immediate impact on their offense, it would be to cut down – way down – on the GIDPs. Now, how do you do that? I have no idea!
But seems to me that that’s what is really killing them this season. I’d almost prefer the strikeouts and pop-ups – at least they’re one out at a time.
Can Girardi do anything to make this happen? I guess he could call for more hit-and-run type plays. I have a difficult time faulting Girardi for the offense, though. He can’t hit for these guys, and if they’re ocntinuing to do their work and show a good attitude, which is the impression I get from his post-games, then he has every reason to expect a more positive outcome. He’s switched line-ups around not only to no avail, but to the dismay of many fans here (i.e., why can’t he leave the lineup alone???).
But something clearly is not happening once the games get started. All I can say is, because of the talent level, it can reasonably be expected that this team is going to bust out offensively. But will it be in time? And will it be before they totally decimate the pitching staff?????