Wednesday, September 7, 2011

That Took Forever

The Good

Hughes went 6 innings allowing 2 runs giving the Yankee offense a chance to get into it, which they did with homeruns from Posada, Cervelli and Gardner. When it comes down to it, the Yankees have been swinging the bats very well of late. Mariano locked his 39th save of the season putting him within 3 saves of tieing Trevor Hoffman's career record.

The Bad

The game started at 11:00pm and ended around 2:15am. This was problematic because those are also the hours that Curtis Granderson fights crime. Distracted by all the calls for help, Granderson went 0-3 with 3 strikeouts.

The Ugly

Posada got in the game and went 1-3 with a homerun. The truth is, the Yankees have mishandled Posada all season. They dropped him to number 9 in the lineup on a nationally televised game against the Red Sox, then they removed him from the lineup altogether on another nationally televised game against the Red Sox. Then they got mad at Jeter for not jumping on Posada. Posada isn't done. And the Yankees showed a lot more patience with Jeter at the plate than they have with Posada, and that's with Jeter batting leadoff as opposed to number 6, 7, 8 or 9 like Posada has. It almost feels like there's something personal between Posada and the Yankee brass, and that right there is ugly.

Homeruns from the Peanut Gallery and their Chaperone.

Posada, Gardner and Cervelli all hit solo homeruns accounting for an additional $6 going to the Children's Health Fund. Granderson's bat has been pretty quiet, but he tends to go through streaks, and there's no better time like to present to start a streak.

Mark Teixeira 36hr = $72
Curtis Granderson 38hr = $76
Russell Martin 17hr = $34
Alex Rodriguez 15hr = $30
Jorge Posada 12hr = $24
Robinson Cano 24hr = $48
Andruw Jones 11hr = $22
Brett Gardner 6hr = $12
Nick Swisher 22hr = $44
Derek Jeter 5hr = $10
Francisco Cervelli 3hr = $6
Eduardo Nunez 4hr = $8
Ramiro Pena 1hr = $2
Eric Chavez 1hr = $2
Jesus Montero 2hr = $4
Total = $394

PS. The Yankees are at 200 homeruns on the season. Last year they him 201 all season. Let's see how close they get to the 244 they hit in 2009. Ah, what a good year for the Children's Health Fund.

3 comments:

Rich Mahogany said...

In the team's defense, Posada has been much worse than Jeter. Posada can hit one out every now and then, but he's batting .100 against lefties, doesn't get on base and has no speed.

The team shouldn't have waited until there was extra attention on Posada to demote him, but games against the Red Sox require the best lineup possible and Posada isn't part of that lineup.

Posada seems to realize that he can bow out gracefully by serving as a mentor to Montero (who should DH against every left-hander for the rest of the season and playoffs) and he deserves credit for that.

Joey said...

Not to mention that Posada's only job as the DH is to hit. Jeter had his struggles but he wasn't much worse than most starting SS in the league. Jeter contributed in several other ways. I love Posada but he had his chances and didn't execute.

Also, I'm not convinced that Posada's good games are not a result of limited play and rest. It reminds me of Matt Stairs a few years ago- you don't want him playing everyday, but you like the bat off the bench.

Fernando Alejandro said...

Those are good points, though keeping him out of the Red Sox games to boast a better lineup proved to be pointless. If Posada was still catching, he'd probably still be in the lineup, but as a DH, there has to be a shorter leash.