It’s CC’s time of the year
Posted by: Peter Abraham - Posted in Podcast on Aug 19, 2009 
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CC Sabathia has his doubters earlier this season when he was 7-5 with an ERA of 3.85 after 17 starts.
The big man is 7-2 since and has dropped his ERA down to 3.58. He, Josh Beckett and Adam Wainwright are tied for the most wins in the majors and Sabathia has given the Yankees 178.2 innings. Just like he promised in the spring, Sabathia improved as the season went on.
Remember that Chicago game on Aug. 2? With the Yankees having dropped the first three games of that series, CC allowed four runs in the third inning. Here is what he has done since:
27.2 innings, 13 hits, 4 earned runs, 5 walks, 29 strikeouts. He came back to win that game and has won every start since. It was like he said, “That’s enough, it ends here.”
Take away the intentional walk and Sabathia threw 62 of his 90 pitches for strikes tonight. Once the Yankees got the lead he went to his sinker and change and got a series of groundball outs.
“He has that ability to change gears and keep you from getting back in the game,” Nick Swisher said. “Once CC gets a lead, he’s not going to start walking people and give you a chance. He bears down.”
You wanted an ace? You have one.
Here’s CC talking about his night:
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Oh, and he picked up 150 tickets for his family and friends. Half of Vallejo was here tonight based on the noise in the crowd.
CC-Beckett on Sunday night at Fenway. That’s going to be fun.
There aren’t many pitchers I’d rather have than CC. Great pitcher, great man.
I second that.
i third that
repost: Fell asleep to a 2-2 tie woke up to a Yankee win…outstanding!! Thanks CC!
I fourth that
Brett: I’m back!
Where’s the afterparty?
Not in Larkspur.
>CC-Beckett on Sunday night at Fenway. That’s going to be fun.
Only because you don’t have to sit through ESPN commentary.
It’s not going to be fun for the Sox or their fans unfortunately
Hard to believe as good as he has been recently that is ERA hasn’t gone down accordingly.
Mind you, I’m not really complaining. But 3.85 to 3.58? Not a huge difference.
Yeah, the crowd was great tonight. I was in the right field bleachers and definitely half the people there were Yanks fans. It was great to hear Yankees cheers drown out Oakland’s.
“Hard to believe as good as he has been recently that is ERA hasn’t gone down accordingly.
Mind you, I’m not really complaining. But 3.85 to 3.58? Not a huge difference.”
You do understand it’s late in the season and with the amount of innings he has pitched so far this season, it’s a larger difference than you realize.
Great game CC! Can’t think of anyone else I’d want to go up after 2 losses.
Great game by CC. These W. Coast games are killing me though. Can’t wait for the weekend.
dennis leary is co-host with Mike Greenberg today,
kind of annyoying after a while
I agree RIBlue, the W coast games are killer. I usually record the end of the game, and then wake up during the night wondering what happened.
Vinny- I kinda like Leary being on there, maybe its just cause I haven’t been watchin for too long but I like that he isn’t afraid to really crack jokes and speak freely. His red sox fanhood obviously counts as a big strike against him, though.
CC and Beckett going for #15 should be fun to watch.
Cardinals to sign Smoltz as 5th starte,will only cost the Cards about 100k.How desperate is La Russa?
14-7??? I’ll take it.
“His red sox fanhood obviously counts as a big strike against him, though”
sevencostanza:
that’s probably it : )
Almost as desperate as Smoltz it would appear!
To better illustrate what CC has done, when he gave up his fourth run in that Chicago game there was one out in the third inning and his ERA was 4.01.
Since then he has allowed 4 ER in 28 1/3 innings (1.27 ERA) to lower his season ERA to 3.58. So since his low point he’s actually lowered his ERA by almost half a run (0.43).
CC’s been fantastic lately – and efficient, too. Last time it was 105 pitches, now 94 over 8. Good job by Joe getting him out of there to save his arm…..Robertson put a scare into me, but he did a good job getting out of it.
CC and AJ give us a ton of innings……..CC has always been a horse, but AJ – is this a surprise? In any case, having these two at the top of the rotation is pretty nice….
CC is back in the discussion for Cy Young. There’s still 6 1/2 weeks left in the season, anything can happen. He wins games, pitches a ton of innings and pretty much keeps his team in every game. His ERA is going down.
Grienke, Felix, Halladay, Verlander, Beckett and CC are all in the hunt and what happens the next month and a half will determine the winner. CC has a track record of pitching well in August/September and has started his roll. I wouldn’t count him out just yet.
Jeter went 3-5 again and hit a hot shot in his last at bat that Ellis made an error on – he’s just scalding hot. Wow, he’s up to .330 alreadly, lol. What a year – but I called this at the beginning of the season. Nonetheless, Jeter won’t be taking any MVP votes from Tex. Jeter will never get any votes – not after what happened in 2006 (I think that was the year). He’s not a power guy and that will always cost him.
I was just thinking that I’m glad they have no incentive clauses in baseball for stats like wins. AJ has 10 wins this year – on the face of it, that’s not that great. He’s pitched much than that, though. At most this year, he’s going to end up with 14 or 15 – he’s got an awful lot of no-decisions, it seems. This is also another reason why you can’t just judge someone’s season by win totals. Some guys pitch lousy and get tremendous run support and some guys pitch well and don’t.
By that token, Greinke should get serious consideration for the Cy Young as his ERA is well below any other contenders (didn’t realize that until it was pointed out to be mlast night). However, I don’t think he has enough wins…..
Phil Hughes needs to get in a game tonight, even if it’s just for a couple of batters and the Yankees are behind. He’s barely pitched on this road trip and they have a day off tomorrow. He’ll be rusty otherwise going into Fenway…..not exactly ideal
Joba is the only starter out of synch, the 5th starter notwithstanding.
A.J. had no run support on Monday night. Andy has been solid.
Andy’s record also doesn’t show how good he has pitched lately.
“Phil Hughes needs to get in a game tonight, even if it’s just for a couple of batters and the Yankees are behind. He’s barely pitched on this road trip and they have a day off tomorrow. He’ll be rusty otherwise going into Fenway…..not exactly ideal”
Rivera, Hughes, Coke and Aceves need some work and based on who’s pitching today, I suspect they’ll get some action today.:)
Well Aceves will get some action, but Hughes and Mo won’t come in until they are leading (and we’ll see about that with Gaudin pitching, lol)……..Phil is not getting enough innings this year, he’s just not…….
Early Cy Young candidates:
Halliday
Sabathia
Beckett
Hernandez
Verlander
Greinke
Mo
I personally feel this might be the year Mariano wins the CY award.
Betsy, IIRC winter ball is in Phil’s future if he didn’t get enough big league innings this year. No he may not be getting enough innings, but his confidence is back. That’s the biggest thing he could’ve gotten out of this season. Now, he just needs to work on that change and get ready to (hopepfully) start for us next year. In the offseason of course.
Has a reliever/closer ever won a Cy???
Eckersley ,Fingers come to mind
as well as:
Sparky Lyle
Willie Hernandez
Bruce Sutter
Steve bedrosian
mark Davis
Eric Gagne
Rivera has finished in the top five in voting for the CY award on 5 different occasions
As well as the top 15 in MVP voting five times and three other years he got MVP votes.
“Well Aceves will get some action, but Hughes and Mo won’t come in until they are leading (and we’ll see about that with Gaudin pitching, lol)……..Phil is not getting enough innings this year, he’s just not…….”
I disagree, I think Hughes, Bruney, Coke and Hughes might get used today despite the score because two of them haven’t been used since last Friday and other two since Saturday with an offday tomorrow. You want them sharp for the Boston series on Friday.
I think Halladay, Beckett and Hernandez are all ahead of CC right now in terms of Cy Young. For him to win it, he’s got pretty much win out and have those other 3 have some bad outings in there.
It would be great though to have our guys winning both the MVP and Cy Young, especially in their first seasons here.
I love how well Sabathia, Burnett, and Pettitte have been pitching lately, but I hope they save some bullets for October!
Much like Jeter in ’06, I think last year was the year for Mo to win the Cy Young. He had a ridiculous 1.41 ERA, 0.67 WHIP, and 77/6 K/BB ratio.
If it wasn’t for Lee having a historically great 22-3 season on a last place team, or Krod breaking the all-time saves record, Mo might have gotten more recognition.
It was interesting that Hughes did warm up. When it was decided to make a pitcher change Mo was told to warm up and Hughes sat down. If they are trying to save Mo for Boston how come they didn’t just go with Hughes.