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1.
New York Yankees starting pitchers need to stop walking so many batters
by Matt Gelb/The Star-Ledger
Sunday June 14, 2009, 9:48 PM
NEW YORK -- Handed a four-run lead in the third inning of Sunday's game
against the Mets, Yankees starter A.J. Burnett promptly loaded the bases
with two walks and a single.
Just hours earlier, manager Joe Girardi had chastised his starting rotation
for its inability to pitch aggressively and deep into games -- exactly the
line Burnett teetered on, again.
"We need to pound the zone," Girardi said then. "You can't walk people.
The way this ballpark is played a lot of nights, you better not walk people."
But this time, unlike the last week, a Yankee starter escaped early trouble.
Burnett struck out Alex Cora and Fernando Martinez and Carlos Beltran lined
out to Derek Jeter. Inning over, and a vital step in fixing Burnett's recent
woes.
"I thought about that when I came in," Burnett said after the 15-0 victory.
"It was big. There was no thinking. There was no panic."
Burnett's start was an encouraging sign following an ugly turn through the
Yankees rotation. Besides CC Sabathia's seven-inning, four-run effort in a
loss at Boston, no other Yankee starter made it into the sixth inning. The
Yankees lost four of the five games -- and would have lost all five had it
not been for Luis Castillo dropping a fly ball on Friday night.
And it's the walks that have Girardi most concerned.
This season, Yankees starters have walked 161 batters, the most of any
starting staff in the American League. And they've hit 29 batters, eight
more than the next team, Boston.
"Walks are a big problem and it's become a big problem for us this year,"
Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said. "It's not like we had a staff
that was a real control staff top to bottom. But we're better than this.
It's a concern."
Sabathia is walking 2.8 batters per nine innings, which equals his career
rate. But every other Yankees starter is walking batters at a pace higher
than their career figures. Burnett, even after his seven innings of shutout
ball, is walking 4.6 batters per nine innings, up from 3.8 over his career.
With home runs flying out of new Yankee Stadium at such a high rate, Cashman
wondered if that has prompted his starters to nibble away at the strike zone.
"They might be trying to be too fine because of that," Cashman said. "But
you've got to get past that."
Girardi rejected that notion, citing previous instances of his pitchers
attacking hitters at the new park.
"We've seen them do it before," Girardi said. "We're in a little rut right
now. We need to find a way to get out and someone needs to show us the way."
Cashman was quick to point out the Yankees' staff does not have the best of
control pitchers. Burnett and Joba Chamberlain have walked close to four
batters per nine innings their entire careers.
It has to be a concern for Girardi because, as the manager says, the team's
momentum is dependent on the next day's starter. After miraculously winning
on Castillo's error Friday night, the missed opportunity on Saturday for a
quality start to string a streak together was not lost on Andy Pettitte.
"When starting pitching is going good and we're going deep, we're going to
win games," said Pettitte, who allowed 12 hits in a 6-2 defeat. "We're going
to make it look pretty easy because we're going to score some runs. But when
you go out there and you give up five runs in five innings and get down, it's
hard to win."
Cashman said he doesn't feel the need to acquire another pitcher. If a
healthy Brian Bruney returns to the bullpen this week as expected, that
solidifies the staff as a whole, Cashman said.
The priority for now is to straighten the control issues the current staff
faces -- and everyone is responsible, Girardi said. The Yankees want more
accountability from the starters and Burnett's showing Sunday may have been
the one Girardi and Cashman were waiting for.
"It's something we've got to be better at, period," Cashman said. "The only
way to do that is trust your stuff and challenge everybody a little bit more
than you're doing."
http://www.nj.com/yankees/index.ssf/2009/06/new_york_yankees_starting_pitc.html
2.
Homers lead to walks for Yankee pitchers
By Josh Thomson ‧ jthomson@lohud.com ‧ June 16, 2009
NEW YORK - The cozy confines at the new Yankee Stadium have been a boon for
hitters. Unfortunately for the Yankees, opposing hitters benefit too, and
with every fly ball-turned homer the pitching staff continues to shy away
from throwing strikes.
That's the explanation given Sunday by pitching coach Dave Eiland, who,
despite imploring pitchers to pitch to contact, has seen the staff's psyche
damaged. The result: The gun-shy Yankees are tied with the Indians for last
in the AL in walks per nine innings pitched.
"It's easier said than done," Eiland said. "When you're on the mound and
every time the ball goes up in the air you're holding your breath, you try
to make a perfect pitch instead of just trusting your stuff and not worrying
about what's going to happen if you don't."
In 565 2/3 innings, Yankees pitchers have issued 250 walks, good for 4.0 per
nine. Last year the staff averaged just 3.05 walks per nine.
The offseason addition of A.J. Burnett, who is tied for the AL lead in walks
with 41, and the inconsistency of Joba Chamberlain during his first full
season in the rotation would cause a natural spike in that rate. General
manager Brian Cashman said the Yankees have constructed a strikeout staff
but hardly used that as an excuse.
"It's a problem. There's no doubt," Cashman said Sunday. "You don't want
to put hitters into hitters counts, first and foremost, and you don't want
free passes going around. We have a strikeout staff that should trust their
stuff more than they do."
Eiland has told his pitchers to forget about always throwing the perfect
pitch. Of course, he's not the one who has allowed an AL-worst 85 home runs,
including a whopping 51 at home.
Not surprisingly, the club's walk rate is slightly higher at home.
"You have to be mentally stronger than that, that's all it is," Eiland said.
"Just pitch to contact. If you pitch to contact, you're going to execute
pitches and get guys out. If you're falling behind in counts, you're making
a good hitter a great hitter. And a great hitter? You can't get him out
because you're putting yourself in a hole."
The Yankees' pitching woes came to head last week when only one of their
five starters (CC Sabathia) lasted beyond the fifth inning. Yankee starters
threw just 21 1/3 innings during that trip through the rotation and walked
16.
Burnett bucked the disturbing trend when he threw seven shutout innings
Sunday against the Mets, although he still walked four.
"The last few days we've put three or four days together where we haven't
thrown a lot of strikes and our pitchers are at 100 pitchers after five
innings," manager Joe Girardi said. "It's not good baseball."
The underperforming staff has brought Eiland under fire. If his spot on
the dugout steps isn't hot, it's warming.
He believes better days are ahead, and cautioned fans who were outraged in
April to remember how the Yankees turned their sluggish early season around.
"What do we have, 100 games left? It's going to work out," Eiland said.
"Just like I told people back in April when they were thinking about
canceling the season, hey relax. We won nine games, we were in first place
and everybody shut up about it. So it's going to work itself out."
"It falls on all of us," Girardi said. "I'm not here to point fingers.
My job is to get the best out of them. Dave's job is to get the best out
of the pitchers. The pitchers' job is to get the best out of themselves,
so it falls on all of us."
http://tinyurl.com/mm97ac
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