Comparing the 1996 and 2009 Yankee championship teams

When I first thought of the idea for this post, I thought that the 2009 Yankees would be so different be so different from the 1996 Yankees. Really, when you look at the big picture, that's not the case. Let's compare them position by position to illustrate that point.

C: Joe Girardi vs. Jorge Posada
Before you say anything, let's compare the salaries: 2.325 million dollars vs. 13.1 million dollars. Sure, Girardi was signed as a free agent, but to be a role player. Also, the players themselves couldn't be more different. Girardi hit .294 with 22 doubles, 2 homers, 45 RBI, 13 SB, and a .346 OBP in 124 games. He also played well defensively, posting a .996 Fld% at catcher, and a 25% CS%. Posada in contrast, hit .285 with 25 doubles, 22 homers, 81 RBI, 1 SB (had to point that out), and a .363 OBP in 111 games. He posted just a .990 Fld%, although he did post a 28% CS%. Girardi was a scrappy player who got on base and played well defensively. Posada was a power hitter who had trouble just stopping errant pitches (Girardi had 10 passed balls compared to Posada's 31). Going by WAR, Posada had a much better season. But, was he worth almost 11 million dollars more? Either way, both players played important roles for their teams.

1B: Tino Martinez vs. Mark Teixeira
Let's look at the salaries again. 2.3 million dollars for Tino compared to 20.625 million dollars for Teix. Tino and Teix was much more similar than you would think based on their salaries. Tino hit .292 with 28 doubles, 25 homers, 117 RBI, 82 runs, and a .364 OBP in 155 games. Teix hit that same .292 with 43 doubles, 39 homers, 122 RBI, 103 runs, and a .383 OBP in 156 games. Tino posted a .996 Fld% at 1B compared to Teixeira's .997. First base might be the one position where both teams were very similar. Teixeira was a better player, but not by that much. Obviously, Teix isn't worth over 18 million dollars more than Tino. Both teams filled a very similar role for their respective teams- a power-hitting first baseman in the middle of the lineup who also plays well defensively.

2B: Mariano Duncan vs. Robinson Cano
The salary gap here isn't that far: 845,000 dollars for Duncan compared to 6 million dollars for Cano. They certainly had very different seasons. Duncan hit .340 with 34 doubles, 8 homers, 56 RBI, and just a .352 OBP (9 walks all year) in 109 games.Cano hit .320 with 48 doubles, 25 homers, 85 RBI, 103 runs, and a .352 OBP (30 walks) in 161 games. Defensively, Cano was far superior, posting a .984 Fld% at Duncan's .973. Duncan was an incredible hitter for average that had few other skills, while Cano was an amazing hitter who hit for average and power in addition to being a Gold Glover defensively. Cano was significantly better, but Duncan filled a nice niche for the 1996 team.

3B: Wade Boggs vs. Alex Rodriguez
2.05 million dollars versus 33 million. Oh my gosh. Boggs and A-rod are as different as night and day. Boggs hit .311 with 29 doubles, 2 homers, 41 RBI, 80 runs, 1 SB, and a .389 OBP in 132 games. A-rod hit .286 with 17 doubles, 30 homers, 100 RBI, 78 runs, 14 SB, and a .402 OBP in 124 games. Boggs posted a .974 Fld% at third base compared to .967 by A-rod. Boggs is a Hall of Famer because he was an amazing pure hitter. A-rod was once a good pure hitter (215 hits in 1996 and 213 in 1998), but is now known strictly as a power hitter. Boggs was a very good role player at that point in his career, while A-rod was still a superstar when he came back from injury. They contributed very different aspects to their teams; Boggs was a top-of-the-lineup kind of player who was a table-setter for the big hitters. A-rod, obviously, is a big hitter.

SS: Derek Jeter vs. Derek Jeter
The salary comparison isn't fair- Jeter was a rookie in '96 so of course he didn't a lot of money! He made just 160 thousand dollars compared to 21.6 million in 2009. Let's compare Jeter's seasons. He certainly had two Jeterian seasons. He hit .314 with 25 doubles, 10 homers, 78 RBI, 104 runs, 183 hits, 14 SB, and a .370 OBP in 157 games on his way to the AL Rookie of the Year. Like most rookie shortstops, he did struggle defensively, posting a .969 Fld% (although his range was must better than it is now). In '09, he also had a great season, hitting .334 with 27 doubles, 18 homers, 66 RBI, 107 runs, 212 hits, 30 SB, and a .406 OBP in 153 games. He posted a .986 Fld%. Jeter was a great player both back then and in '09 (maybe not really anymore).

LF: Gerald Williams/Tim Raines vs. Johnny Damon
Looking at the salaries, Damon easily made more than Williams and Raines combined. Raines made 2.1 million dollars and Williams made '200 thousand while Damon made 13 million. Williams had a below-average season, hitting .270 with 15 doubles, 5 homers, 37 RBI, 7 SB, and just a .319 OBP while posting just a .978 Fld% in LF, which was just slightly below league average, but you would expect more from a player who played most of his career in centerfield. To make things worse, he only had 1 assist. He was traded to the Brewers in August (through waivers). Raines meanwhile, was sidelined most of the year by a hamstring tear, but came back after Williams was traded. He did well, hitting .284 with 10 doubles, 9 homers, 33 RBI, 45 runs, and a .383 OBP in 59 games. He also posted an above average .988 Fld% in LF, with 3 assists. In 2009, Damon had a great season offensively, hitting .282 with 36 doubles, 24 homers, 82 RBI, 107 runs, 12 SB, and a .365 OBP in 143 games. But, he posted an astronomically below average .978 Fld% in LF (league average was .987). This guy was playing centerfield the year before! Anyway, Damon was certainly better than Gim Waines (Williams + Raines). But again, was he worth 10 million dollars more?

CF: Bernie Williams vs. Melky Cabrera
In terms of salaries, Bernie made 3 million dollars to Melky's 1.4 million. Bernie was certainly double as good as Melky. He hit .305 with 26 doubles, 29 homers, 102 RBI, 108 runs, 17 SB, and a .391 OBP in 143 games. He did post just a .986 Fld% in centerfield, which was below average, but he had 10 outfield assists, third in the league. He had an outstanding season. Not that Melky was bad at all. He hit .274 with 28 doubles, 13 homers, 68 RBI, 10 SB, and a .336 OBP in 154 games. He posted an above-average .990 Fld% in the outfield, including a perfect 1.000 Fld% in CF, but he posted just 3 assists. In a battle of arbitration-eligible players (Bernie won in a hearing), Bernie was certainly a far superior player, although Melky filled an important role for the 2009 Yankees.

RF: Paul O'Neill vs. Nick Swisher
O'Neill and Swisher happened to make nearly the same amount of money, with O'Neill earning 5.3 million dollars and Swish earning 5.4. Both players had good seasons. O'Neill hit .302 with 35 doubles, 19 homers, 91 RBI, 89 runs, and a .411 OBP in 150 games. Swish hit .249 with 35 doubles, 29 homers, 82 RBI, 84 runs, and a .371 OBP in 150 games. O'Neill was superb defensively, posting a perfect 1.000 Fld% at RF with 7 assists, while Swish was still OK at .983 with 7 assists as well. They gave similar contributions to their teams (O'Neill was better), so they certainly deserved similar salaries.

DH: Ruben Sierra/Darryl Strawberry/Cecil Fielder vs. Hideki Matsui
The three headed monster at DH made a total of 6.5 million dollars, while Matsui made double that, 13 million dollars. Ruben Sierra was the DH for the '96 Yankees until July. But, he performed so poorly (.258 BA, .327 OBP, 11 homers in 96 games), that the Yankees traded him for Cecil Fielder at the deadline, and acquired Darryl Strawbery. (Fielder was actually in the middle of his last monster season, as he would go on to hit 39 homers and drive in 119 runs.) Decil Fieldberry hit 24 homers in a combined 116 games, hitting .261. (Darryl played a bit in the outfield and Fielder played some first base). All 3 players combined hit .260 with 35 homers and 125 RBI in 212 games. Matsui himself hit .274 with 28 homers and 90 RBI in 142 games. Advantage 2009. Might as well pay double for some stability rather than RubenDecil Sierra-Fieldberry. (Thank you BenJarvus Green-Ellis.)

Rotation:
The 1996 Yankees had a rotation of Andy Pettitte (21-8, 3.87 ERA), Kenny Rodgers (12-8, 4.68), Dwight Gooden (11-7, 5.01), Jimmy Key (12-11, 4.68), David Cone, who missed much of the year with an aneurysm (7-2, 2.88), and Ramiro Mendoza, who replaced him (4-5, 6.79). They earned a total of 11.467 million dollars. The 2009 Yankee rotation consisted of CC Sabathia (19-8, 3.37), AJ Burnett (13-9, 4.04), Andy Pettitte (14-8, 4.16), Joba Chamberlain (9-6, 4.75), and Chien-Ming Wang/Sergio Mitre/Chad Gaudin (combined 6-9, 6.63, although Gaudin went 2-0, 3.43). They made 42 million, 718 thousand, 289 dollars. That's almost 4 times as much as '96. But their ERA was better, 4.40 compared to 4.56, but not THAT much better!

Closer: John Wetteland vs. Mariano Rivera
There's no comparison. Rivera earned so much more (15 million dollars to 4 million), but he pitched much better. He posted a 1.76 ERA and 44 saves compared to Wetteland's still great 2.83 ERA and 43 saves. Rivera isn't 11 million dollars better, but he certainly was (and is at least arguably) the best closer in baseball.

I couldn't compare everybody, but these are the cores of those teams. Salaries are certainly different now from then, so the salary comparison is not really fair. Still, the 2009 Yankees had five times the payroll of '96. But, they were both built off of free agents with some amount homegrown talent mixed in. That's the Yankee formula now, and it won't change anytime soon. The Yankees, even with their great talent in the minors right now, do not have a homegrown dynasty coming. No matter how great the prospects are, only the very best will make it, and the rest of the roster will be made up of players, superstars, and some role players, acquired via free agency and trades. Many of the second-best prospects might have great careers with other teams, but it just won't work out for them with the Yankees. Even after A-rod's, Teixeira's, and CC's contracts expire, we all know there will be new big contracts handed out. If they do their moves right, we'll see another dynasty coming soon.

What if Joba did have to come up to bat?

In Monday's 3-1 loss to the Tigers, Derek Jeter grounded into a game-ending double play with Joba Chamberlain on double deck. If you weren't watching the game, Alex Rodriguez left the game with a calf injury and was replaced by Ramiro Pena. Pena was then pinch-hit for by Marcus Thames and Francisco Cervelli moved from catcher to 3rd base to replace Thames and Jorge Posada moved from DH to catcher to replace Cervelli, so the Yankees lost their DH. The Yankees had a empty bench because Lance Berkman was injured and Nick Swisher had also left the game with right forearm tightness and Austin Kearns went to RF to replace him. So, let's say that Jeter beat out the relay throw to 1st (he actually almost did because Brett Gardner took 2B Carlos Guillen out at 2nd base). Then, it would be 1st and 3rd with 2 outs, a 3-2 score, and Mark Teixeira coming to the plate. The Tigers would then obviously intentionally walk Teix to bring up Joba with the bases loaded. What would the Yankees do?

The first thought would be to pinch-hit Berkman even though he was injured, but Girardi wouldn't do that because he wouldn't want to gamble with the rest of Berman's season to win one game. So, the only possible pinch-hitters were all pitchers. If the Yankees did decide to pinch-hit, it would have probably been either CC Sabathia, AJ Burnett, or Mariano Rivera.

Joba is 0 for 5 at the plate in his MLB career with a walk and 2 sac bunts. He never had an AB in the minors.

CC is 25 for 97 (.258) in his career with 3 homers and 14 RBI. He's a decent hitter. But, he was the next day's starter.

AJ is 35 for 267 in his career (.131) with 3 homers and 9 RBI. He's not the worst hitter ever.

Mo is 0 for 3 with a walk and an RBI. You may remember his bases loaded walk against K-rod on the same night that he got his 500th save. Would the Yankees hope for the same magic? If he did walk (or get a base hit), he would stay in the game to pitch the 10th.

I would pinch-hit CC. If Valverde gave him a hittable pitch, CC could have gotten a walk-off hit. He probably would have gotten out, but you never know. If Girardi didn't want to take a chance that CC could get hurt, he would have either stuck with Joba or sent up Mo because there was no point of sending up Burnett. No matter who the Yankees sent up, the Yankees would have probably lost the game anyway, but who knows? Maybe Valverde's wildness could have continued and he walked whoever the Yankees sent up to bat, or, maybe he could have given CC, Joba, or Mo a mistake pitch and most unlikely walkoff ever could have occurred. It sure would have been a sight to see.

A decade of Yankee first round picks

We all remember the days when the Yankee farm system was a complete joke. The Yankees always drafted badly and when they did have a good prospect, they traded him for a veteran. But, the Yankee farm system has turned around the last few years, starting with Phil Hughes being drafted in 2004. Let's look at the Yankee 1st round picks since 2000 to see if the Yankees have improved, at least in terms of their first round picks.

In 2000, the Yankees drafted catcher David Parrish with the 28th pick in the draft. The Yankees also drafted him in the 10th round in 1997, but he didn't sign. Parrish had the potential to be a great defensive catcher. He threw out 30% of attempted base stealers his first 3 years in the minors. But, he made too many errors behind the plate, and never hit above .253 any of his years in the minors for the Yankees. He ended being a journeyman minor leaguer who never made the majors. Grade: F

With the 23rd pick in 2001, the Yankees selected Florida State outfielder John-Ford Griffin (no, his name is not a typo). At Short Season-A Staten Island in '01, he had a great season, hitting .311 with 17 doubles, 5 homers, 43 RBI, 10 SB, and a .413 OBP in 66 games. But, he was lost in the outfield, posting a .943 Fld%. In '02, he hit .267 with 16 doubles, 3 homers, 31 RBI, and a .344 OBP in 65 games for High-A Tampa before being promoted to Double-A Norwich. He hit .328 for Norwich with 3 doubles, 5 homers, 10 RBI, and a .400 OBP in 18 games. With his trade value at its absolute highest, the Yankees traded him to the A's as part of the blockbuster 3-team deal that sent Ted Lilly to Oakland, Carlos Pena to Detroit, Jeff Weaver to the Yankees, and Jeremy Bonderman to the Tigers. After hitting just .143 in 2 games for Double-A Midland, Oakland traded him to the Blue Jays for a player to be named (Jason Perry). He never hit .280 in any of his years in the Toronto, but he hit 13 homers in '03, 22 homers in '04, and 30 homers in '05. He made his major league debut in '05 for Toronto, hitting .308 with 1 homer and 6 RBI in 7 games. He also played in the majors for Toronto in '07, hitting .300 with 1 homer and 3 RBI in 6 games. Griffin played in the minors for the Dodgers and Cubs to finish off his career. He was pretty much a journeyman minor leaguer who had a couple of "cups of coffee" in the big leagues. But, he did have a role in the Jeff Weaver trade. Grade: D+

The Yankees had no 1st round pick in '02. In the 2nd round, they drafted RHP Brandon Weeden. He went 2-1 with a 2.86 ERA and 30 K's 7 starts, 4 relief appearances, and 34.2 IP in '02 for the Rookie ball Gulf Coast League Yankees. In '03, he went 2-2 with a 2.58 ERA and 31 K's in 9 starts and 3 relief appearances for the Rookie ball Gulf Coast League Yankees and the Short Season-A Staten Island Yankees. He was promptly traded to the Dodgers in the Kevin Brown deal. After posting ERA's of 5.39 and 5.70 at Low-A Columbus for LA, he was a Rule 5 draft pick (Triple-A portion) by the Royals and he posted a 6.03 ERA for them. Weeden went back to school, going to Oklahoma State University. He is now in position to be their starting quarterback this upcoming season, after starting QB Zac Robinson was drafted by the New England Patriots. Weeden did pretty well in the low levels of the minors for the Yankees and served a role in the Brown trade before completely falling apart. Grade: C-

There was a point when it seemed that 2003 first round pick Eric Duncan was going to be a star. Duncan, a 3rd baseman and the 27th overall pick in the '03 draft, hit .301 between the GCL and Staten Island Yanks in '03, with 17 doubles, 4 homers, 41 RBI, 6 triples, and a .364 OBP in 61 games. He then took his power up a notch in '04 between Low-A Battle Creek and High-A Tampa, hitting just .258, but with 43 doubles, 16 homers, 83 RBI, 75 runs, and a .357 OBP in 129 games. Duncan never hit that well again, and was stuck behind some guy named Alex Rodriguez at 3rd base. He was moved to 1st base in '06, but never hit well enough to be called up when Jason Giambi was injured. Duncan is hitting .285 right now as a Double-A utilityman for the Braves, but with just 4 homers. Duncan started off strong, but just completely fell apart. Grade: D

In 2004, the change started. The Yankees drafted some guy named Phil Hughes with the 23rd pick in the draft, who is 11-3 with a 3.99 ERA for the Yankees so far in '10. He struggled in '08 to the tune of a 6.62 ERA, but got back on track in '09 as a reliever and now is a pretty good starter. Grade: A

2005 first rounder (17th overall) C.J. Henry, a SS, never hit over .250 any year in the minors, although he was part of the Bobby Abreu trade. He is now a guard on the Kansas Jayhawks basketball team. At least he was part of that trade. Grade: D+

In 2006, the Yankees drafted RHP Ian Kennedy with the 21st overall pick in the draft. Kennedy never had an ERA over 2.22 any year in the minors, but he posted a 6.03 ERA for the Yankees, including an 8.17 ERA in '08. He was part of the Curtis Granderson. Kennedy was a decent pick, but he certainly didn't live up to expectations. Grade: B

In 2007, the Yankees drafted RHP Andrew Brackman with the 30th overall pick. He immediately had Tommy John surgery after he was drafted, and didn't make his minor league debut until 2009. He went 2-12 with a 5.91 ERA in '09, but he has rebounded from a terrible start in '10 (13.50 ERA after 2 starts) to post a 4.94 ERA between High-A and Double-A. He still has a shot to make an impact in the future for the Yankees. Grade: B

In 2008, the Yankees drafted high school RHP Gerrit Cole. Cole didn't sign, and went to UCLA. After going 11-4 with a 3.37 ERA in '09 for the Bruins, he could be the number 1 pick in the 2011 MLB draft. The Yanks picked a great talent, but this was a terrible pick because they couldn't sign him. Grade: F+ (the plus is for effort)

In 2009, the Yankees drafted 5-tool OF Slade Heathcott with the 29th overall pick in the draft. He is hitting .277 with 5 doubles, 1 homer, 13 RBI, 8 SB, 19 runs, and a .351 OBP in 34 games. He hasn't done very well so far, but its hard to tell how good a player is through 37 pro games. At least he's stealing bases. Grade: ?

In 2010, the Yankees drafted high school SS Cito Culver with the 30th overall pick in the draft. Culver is the heir-apparent to Derek Jeter. After signing quickly, he is hitting .237 for the Rookie ball GCL Yankees with 3 doubles, 0 homers, 6 RBI, 1 triple, 1 SB, 8 runs, and a .310 OBP in 21 games. Definitely too early to tell for him. Grade: ?

The Yankees have improved in terms of drafting their first round picks. Their top picks from 2000-2003 were complete disaster, while 3 out of their 5 1st round picks from 2004-2008 were at least decent picks, and Cole would have been a great pick if they signed him. Their 1st rounders in 2009 and 2010 both have potential.

A-rod begins to heat up

At the beginning of '10, A-rod just wasn't himself. He hit .250 in April with just 2 homers and 14 RBI. Then he seemed to turn it on in May, hitting .330 with 5 homers and 27 RBI. But then, at least partially because of his groin injury, A-rod hit just .220 with just 1 homer and 4 RBI in the 15 games he played between June 1st and June 21st. But since then, A-rod has finally shown some flashes of his former self. He has hit .417 since June 21st, with 2 homers and 7 RBI. In these 4 games, A-rod hit more homers and drove in more runs than he had all of June before this little streak.

Is A-rod back? Well, 4 games is a very short stretch of time. We'll have to see. But, from these 4 games we can see that A-rod can still do it. He can still be that player who the Yankees signed to such a huge contract. Can he do it consistently the rest of the year? That remains to be seen. Still, we can now justify having hope that A-rod will put up his career averages of 35 homers and 103 RBI per season. With 10 homers and 52 RBI in 68 games, he is currently on pace for 22 homers and 114 RBI, which would still be a pretty good year for A-rod, but, he would have hit less than 30 homers in a season for the first time since 1997. Hopefully A-rod can stay on this little hot streak and his homers will catch up to his RBI's.

Is Marlins prospect Mike Stanton ready for the majors?

In this post I will answer 2 questions: Is Marlins outfield prospect Mike Stanton ready for the majors right now? and How great of a slugger has he been so far in his minor league career?

Stanton has really gotten off to a great start in Double-A Jacksonville. He has hit .301 with 11 doubles, 18 homers, 48 RBI, 34 runs, and a .431 OBP in 47 games. Stanton has led the minors in homers most of the year. Also, he's averaging over 1 RBI per game, which is amazing. In addition, he has posted a perfect 1.000 Fld% in the outfield. He has primarily played RF, but he has also played 2 games in LF.

The question with Stanton is his contact rate. As evidenced by Stanton's just 11 doubles compared to his 18 homers, Stanton really doesn't make a lot of contact, but when he does make contact, he very often hits homers. He is 52 hits so far in '10 and he has 18 homers. So, 35% of his hits are homers. Also, Stanton has homered at a rate of once every 9.6 at-bats, a very good rate. Stanton really has the potential to be a great power hitter in the majors, but will he make enough contact to maintain a good BA?

For his minor league career, 27% of Stanton's hits have been homers and he has homered at a rate of once every 13.7 at-bats. Let's compare those numbers to the numbers of some major league sluggers. During his major league career, 29% of Ryan Howard's hits have been homers and he has homered at a rate of once every 12.6 at-bats. For Prince Fielder, 23% of his hits have been homers, and he has homered at a rate of once every 15.4 at-bats. For Alex Rodriguez (not including his juiced years of '01 to '03), 22% of his hits have been homers, and he has homered at a rate of once every 15.3 at-bats. (Unrelated note: A-rod has 434 career homers without steroids, so in my opinion, he will need to reach 500 homers without steroids to be a legitimate Hall of Famer. He currently has 590 homers including steroids, so in my opinion, homer number 656 will be the homer that makes him a Hall of Famer.) For Albert Pujols, 21% of his hits have been homers and he has homered at a rate of once every 14.1 at-bats. For Ken Griffey Jr., 23% of his hits in his career have been homers, and he has homered at a rate of once every 15.6 at-bats. Stanton seems to be most similar to Ryan Howard, but maybe a few homers worse. Howard has averaged 44 homers per full season, so maybe Stanton could average 42 homers per full season. Still, that's a lot of homers and if he's anywhere near as good as Howard, he'll be a great player.

We'll have to see what the Marlins do. Stanton has great numberts so far in Double-A, but the Marlins might want to move him up to Triple-A first. Whether he is called up within a couple of months from now this season or callled up next year, he will show great power in the majors and be a Rookie of the Year candidate. The only question with him is his contact rate.

Some notes on the Yanks' crazy 11-9 win over Boston last night

Wow, what a game. It looked like a blowout win for the Yanks, then it looked like a terrible loss for them, and then it turned into a Yankees Classic. Besides all the drama, what made this game so special?

You may have noticed the home run totals in the game. The Yanks didn't have any homers until the bottom of the 9th will Boston had 5. Boston had 3 solo homers, a 2-run homer, and a 3-run homer. Homers accounted for all of Boston's runs except for the first one, an RBI single by Beltre to make the score 6-1 Yanks. In contrast, before the 2-run homers by A-rod and Thames in the bottom of the 9th, the Yankee scoring consisted of three RBI doubles, a 2-run single, an RBI single, and a sac fly. Another funny thing- did the Yanks forget about the "wind tunnel" in right field? Both of the Yankee homers were to LF or left-center, while 3 of the 5 Boston homers were to RF or right-center.

Despite all the homers, there was some pitching in this game. The order of the way the pitchers performed for Boston was interesting. Matsuzaka fell apart, giving up 6 runs on 9 hits in 4.2 innings. Then, Wakefield came in and shut the Yanks down, going 2.1 shutout innings and giving up only 1 hit. Bard then came in and threw a shutout inning, giving up no hits. Then of course, Papelbon came in and gave up 4 runs on 3 hits in 0.2 innings, blowing the save and getting the loss. So, if A were the terrible pitchers for Boston and B were the good pitchers for Boston, it would be ABBA- a chiastic structure. Does it have any significance? Well, maybe the pitching in the middle doesn't matter if your starter and closer have a terrible game. To prove this point, let's look at the Yankee pitching. Hughes had his first bad start of the year (it had to happen sometime, and he'll be fine moving forward), going 5 innings and giving up 5 runs on 6 hits. Boone Logan gave up 1 run in 1 inning on 2 hits. Park of course, continues to do badly, as he threw 1+ innings and gave up 3 runs on 4 hits, blowing the Yankee lead. (As a side note, Park his pitched in 4 games, and has given up the Yankee lead and been in line for the loss in two of them. Of course, the Yanks came back last night, so Park didn't get a loss). Then, Marte came in and pitched his heart out, throwing 1.2 innings of no run, 1 hit ball. Then, Vazquez came in and pitched 0.1 innings of no-run, no-hit ball, getting the win. So, only the last 2 Yankee pitchers gave up no runs. If A was bad pitchers and B was good pitchers, the Yankees yesterday would be AAABB. So, basically, it's really tough to win if your bullpen does badly at the end of games. Despite the bad start for Yankee pitching, Marte and Vazquez combined to shut out the Red Sox for the last two innings of the game, and that was enough for the Yanks to come back. (If you look, the Red Sox scored 3 runs in the 8th, but those were all when Park was pitching. After Marte came in, Boston didn't score any more runs in the inning.)

Back to the hitting. Every single starter in the game for both teams got a base hit except for Hermida for Boston. Only one base was stolen in the game, and not by Brett Gardner (who had 2 hits and a walk), but by Ramiro Pena. On both teams, every starter got an RBI besides the first 2 batters in the batting order and the last 2 batters in the batting order. On both teams, the second batter in the batting order drew the most walks on the team: Pedroia with 2 walks (the only 2 walks by Yankee pitching) and Brett Gardner with 1 walk (Jeter, Teixeira, and Miranda also had 1 walk each). All the homers on both teams were from "the heart of the order" (3 to 6 in the lineup).

One more thing about Park: when the stat sheet says "C Park faced 3 hitters in the 8th inning." (without recording an out), you know there's a problem.

Hope that's enough random stats for you.

Why was Braden perfect?

How did A's pitcher Dallas Braden throw a perfect game against the Rays yesterday? Well, he gave up no runs, no hits, no walks, no errors, and he didn't hit any batters. But, why did was he perfect? Let's look at the stats.

Besides all those zeroes, Braden had some other key stats. He threw 109 pitches, 77 of them for strikes and 32 of them for balls. If you divide the strikes by the balls, it equals about 2.41. Let's put that into prespective. He had thrown 368 strikes in the starts before the perfect game and 163 balls in those starts. Divide the strikes by the balls in those starts, and it equals 2.26. So, his strikes/balls ratio was .15 better in the perfect game than in his other starts. That's a big difference.

Braden had 6 strikeouts. It doesn't look like anything special until you realize that he only had 6 strikeouts combined his last 3 starts. Braden had 21 strikeouts combined his previous 6 starts before the perfect game in 37 IP. Braden had a 5.1 K/9 going into his perfect game and then posted a 6.0 K/9 in his perfect game. That's a full strikeout more.

Braden gave up 7 ground ball outs and 14 fly ball outs during the perfect game. The 7 ground ball outs are his third-lowest of the year. His lowest were only 6 ground ball outs on April 6th against Seattle and April 22nd against the Yankees. He gave up only 1 run on April 6th and only 2 runs on April 22nd. Add in the perfect game, and Braden has been very successful when he hasn't give up many ground ball outs. In all his starts where he gave up 8 or more ground ball outs, Braden only has 1 start where he gave up 2 or less runs, April 16th against the Orioles. He has posted a 1.23 ERA in the 3 starts during which he got 7 or less groundouts, and a 5.04 ERA when he got 8 or more groundouts. In those 3 starts where Braden had 7 or less ground ball outs, of course he had quite a few flyouts, with 13 flyouts on April 6th, 14 on April 22nd, and 13 during the perfect game. But, he had 15 flyouts on May 3rd and gave up 3 runs, so whenever Braden gets a ton of flyouts, it isn't necessarily that great for him.

Dallas Braden obviously had everything working for him during the perfect game. As a pitcher, you have to be pretty lucky for opposing batters to have a .000 BA on balls in play, even in one game, but Braden was that lucky.

Screw 209, this is how we post in the 201!