Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Something to keep your eye on

I know that every Yankee fan out there has a basic idea of what they Yankees off-season plans are going to be whether or not they are successful in their run at the post season this year. On the top of the list will be recruiting a starting pitcher and at the top candidate is of course CC Sabathia.

Now a lot has been going on with the Yankees so you may have only heard the good/bad news that Sabathia is destroying the NL by putting up an 8-0 record with an ERA of 1.60. You would like him to pitch well but every victory he records with the Brew Crew means that his price keeps going up.

But the real bad news that comes with every Sabathia start is his pitch count. Last night's 9-3 victory over the Astros is the best example yet of what is happening to Sabathia. Even with a six-run lead Bob Melvin felt it necessary to allow Sabathia to pick up his fifth complete game in nine starts with Brewers. This one required a ridiculous 130 pitches for CC to finish.

It was the third time that CC has topped 120 pitches in a game with the Brewers and the fifth time he has surpassed 110. Now I don't blame the Brewers for squeezing every pitch they can out of CC since the gave up a ton of talent to get him knowing that he was walking at the end of the season. But I hope CC understands that the more the Brewers abuse him in meaningless situations, like last night's blow out win, the harder it will be for him to convince people to give him seven years and 150 million.

Sabathia's pitches per game is now a full nine pitches over his career average and five more than his career high of 107 which was set last year. I'm sure Brian Cashman will take all of this into account as well this off season during negotiations. It will be a big risk for any team to give him a huge deal especially if the Brewers do end up going deep into the post season and CC goes over 250 innings again.

And any Yankee fan that tells you that you should ignore these facts because the Yanks need a no-brainer left-handed ace at the top of the rotation to start next season, well, they may be right. But perhaps they should look at who might be starting for the Yanks on Saturday for a little history lesson on free agent pitcher signings.

3 comments:

Joe said...

I think CC will continue to feast on the weaker NL line-ups. Why would he ever return to the American League especially the AL East. Dealing with the Rays, Sox, Jays, and O's for 80 games a year, no thanks.

Dan said...

Even if he throws 300 innings, no one will care. Some team will still come to his doorstep with a dump truck full of money. It may wear out his arm or it may not. Every pitcher is different. Look at all the seasons Randy Johnson threw 260-270 innings with the D'Backs. He didn't suffer for it. He just put up another 250+ innings and an ERA under 3.00 the next year. The only way you'll know if he's thrown too much is to wait and see. It will be a calculated risk for whoever signs CC. I have always believed that you should not over pay for pitching. Getting the third or fourth best guy out there is just fine.

Peter said...

Joe he might come back to prove himself after getting embarrassed by the sox in the post season last year. I don't know what kind of personality he has but I have to imagine that most big leaguers prefer to play against the best to prove how good they are rather than just coast along to earn a pay check.

I think players like Beckett and Jeter wouldn't want to play anywhere else because they play in the best division against the best teams.