ALCS Game 5 Thoughts

Thoughts about the game while I try to stop my head from sadly shaking:

◊ Last night once again encapsulated AJ Burnett as a pitcher. Burnett came out in the bottom of the first and stunk up the joint, allowing four runs before an out was recorded.  A long flyout and double play later, AJ gets out of the inning and puts up zeros for the next five.  Burnett gave up five hits and two walks over that scoreless five innings, complimented by a wild pitch.  When Yankee fans talk about mystique and aura, they may be referring to Burnett's control.

◊ Despite that five inning stretch and 80 pitch count, the bullpen should have been humming when AJ took the mound in the bottom of the seventh.  Instead, Girardi waited for Burnett to give up a single and a walk before bringing in Marte.  I can understand letting AJ start the seventh, although I probably wouldn't have done it.  It was a minor miracle that AJ made it that far with the lead.  There was little reason for Girardi not to mix and match his bullpen to try and maintain the lead.

This is where Girardi is at his most confusing.  In a tie game, such as game three, Girardi will mix and match his bullpen until he finds a reliever that can stabilize the game.  In game two, it happened to be Hughes after Joba, Marte, and Coke all got a shot.

In game five, the bullpen wasn't prepared for a reliever, or even Burnett, to fail.  Hughes was left out there for the entirety of the inning without a good fastball, appearing to shake Posada off three times before surrendering a game tying single to Vlad on... a fastball.

The formula, or at least our understanding of the formula, was to get to the seventh inning and have the bullpen shut the door.  You can't judge the moves in this inning by what happened.  It's easy to say now that it's a good thing Joba didn't come in because he was ineffective in the eighth.  That's applying results to a probability question.

Girardi would have been better off with Joba or Hughes starting the inning with Marte or Coke and another right-hander in the pen.  If you're willing to mix and match in the midst of en extra inning tie game, there's little reason not to do it with a two run lead in the seventh.  If the pitcher that starts the inning is effective, you can sit the guys in the pen.  Otherwise, you're at least ready to mix and match and try to put out some fires.

Instead, they started the inning with two runners on quickly, both of whom scored, and Hughes was left out there with less than his best stuff to give up the lead.  Mariano could have gone more than an inning, so all you had to do was get through the seventh with the lead in tact.

And, considering David Robertson's success in high leverage situations these playoffs (and Joba's lack of success), why wasn't he anywhere near the seventh or eighth innings?  Girardi likes to call it a bullpen by committee, but those are just words.  The pitchers were supposed to fill their roles last night, whether effective or not, and it didn't work.

◊ It's pretty easy to jump on Nick Swisher at this point. The guy has looked like a lost puppy at the plate.  I will give Girardi credit for this quote after the game about Swish:

“Guys are going to struggle during the course of the season and you just don’t give up on a guy if he is struggling because the flip side of that is they are due to get hot.  We feel good about Swish.”

That's a reasonable approach.  Nobody has been calling for Teixeira's head and he went 2 for 5 with 3 RBI last night.  Swisher ain't Teixeira but he's also not batting third.  If he gets his walks like he's capable of and a few hits, he'll be fine.  The alternative is Brett Gardner who has trouble getting the ball out of the infield.

(H/T to Rob Neyer for the quote)

◊ Pinch running for ARod in the bottom of the ninth was almost as laughable as pulling Damon in the bottom of the 10th in game three and losing the DH.  Girardi was hedging a bet that Guzman's possible extra little bit of speed would be the difference if Matsui hit a ball in the gap.

Of course, Matsui didn't hit a ball into the gap.  He walked, pushing Guzman to second.  Then Cano was plunked, pushing Guzman to third.  And suddenly, with two outs, speed wasn't an issue.  If Swisher had actually walked and the game continued into extra innings (again), the Yankee lineup would have looked pretty fearsome with Jerry Hairston, Jr. batting cleanup.

Girardi's reasoning is that you do everything you can to tie the game at that point.  And I agree with that logic when applied properly.  You should also do everything you can to win a game in late innings but that hasn't had much of an effect on Girardi's illogical bullpen decisions.

The difference in speed between Guzman and ARod is probably negligible at this point.  ARod seems to be pretty healthy on his hip, to the point where the proposed followup surgery may not be necessary anymore.  He's certainly done his share of running at this stage.

Matsui had 21 doubles and 1 triple in 526 plate appearances this year.  That means there was a 4% chance of Matsui hitting a double or triple into the gap (for his career it is a 5.4 % chance.)  Matsui also has 28 home runs this year which obviously outnumber his doubles and triples.

◊ Melky Cabrera is actually heating up a bit and Robinson Cano got a rare two out hit with runners in scoring position.  It goes without saying that when the bottom of the order is hitting well, it's a lot easier to win games.

◊ There was some debate on Twitter last night after the game about CC's next start.  The forecast calls for rain on Saturday in New York, which could possibly push game six back to Sunday.  That would mean Sabathia, currently scheduled for a possible game 7, could pitch game six on full rest.

I doesn't make any sense, however.  Pettitte is capable of pitching an effective game 6 and if the Yankees win, CC would be available for game one of the World Series.  If CC were to lose game 6, Pettitte would still be needed for game 7.  Either way, one of those two guys has to step up.  I think we all can agree that if it comes down to one game to continue the season, CC Sabathia should be on the mound.

◊ Both Hughes and Joba are struggling in the postseason. With Joba, it's somewhat expected at this point.  He's looked decent at times, as has Hughes, but for the most part Joba is the same confusing pitcher he has been for most of the season.

Hughes, though, has been somewhat of a mystery.  He was averaging almost 96 MPH on his fastball last night, which is about what he was throwing in game three.  The pitch wasn't breaking, though, much less than game three and the Angels were sitting on it.  His curve remained sharp, but for some reason he and Posada didn't throw it again to Vlad despite how bad Guerrero looked on the pitch.

One has to wonder if the workload of this season has caught up to Hughes.  He isn't grossly past his previous totals but he is coming off a shortened 2008 season.  Hughes has never worked in a relief role before which usually means throwing harder over less innings than a starting pitcher.  Relief pitching is a volatile trade, evidenced by the lack of consistency most relievers experience from season to season.  It may be that the extra exertion Hughes has applied coming out of the pen has started to wear him down a bit.

Girardi might be better off keeping Hughes to one inning outings through the rest of the playoffs.  When Girardi replaced Marte with Coke in the bottom of the eighth in game three, his reasoning was that he didn't want Marte warming up twice given his injury over the summer.  In that same game, Hughes warmed up three times.  Should that be a big deal?  Probably not as his workload hasn't been that tough over the last week.

When you see his fastball flatten out like it did last night, you start to wonder, though.  Hughes faced eight batters across three innings in game three.  Since Hughes became a reliever at the beginning of June, he has averaged 4.4 batters per appearance and only once did it extend over more than two innings.  That was June 10th against the Red Sox, when Hughes was still stretched out to be a starter.

It's the playoffs and all hands are on deck.  That's fine as long as Girardi is paying attention.  He's shifted the workload for his second most valuable reliever and the results may not be the same.

◊ Finally, if you haven't stopped by our live chats during the game, come on by. It's been a lot of fun.  Last night, ESPN's Rob Neyer graciously stopped in to take a few questions from the crowd during the game.  We'll be doing it (hopefully) every game the Yankees play in the postseason and are hoping to get a few more guests.