After attending Sunday’s game left me barely alive, but full of rage at Joe Torre’s once again not so good decision making, I decided to shun baseball yesterday. Which was good, because strange decisions that resulted in awful things were once again made.
Roger Clemens is apparently hurt, and has been so since his start against the Red Sox. So the question on my mind is why did the Yankees let Clemens pitch?. (Another question of course is: Why did the Yankees sign him in the first place?)
The real answer is that the Yankees management makes consistently bad decisions about pitching. On Sunday, following a start where he went for 7 innings and threw 119 pitches he looked a little tired come the end of the sixth inning. He got himself out of trouble, and the Yankees were trailing 2-1. Behind, but still reachable. Torre then made the bizarre and Grady Little-esque decision to bring him in for the 7th when he had already thrown 110+ pitches. I don’t care if Pettitte said he could pitch fine, it was clear from the 6th inning that he needed rest and the 7th inning was a disaster that proved this. Especially when Pettitte was not taken out as soon as he looked shaky, even though there were relievers warming up in the bullpen since the 6th. Great.
Not that I have any faith the Yankees could have come back to win it the way they have been playing lately. It is like April and May all over again. Most of the the team looks lazy in the field, and even worse at the plate. It’s obvious that Derek Jeter is hurting, yet Torre consistently gives Rodriguez the rest in blowout games before him. Again, I don’t care if Jeter says he’s okay he’s obviously not and it’s the manager’s job to tell him that he’s far too important to the team to risk getting a knockout injury.
To add to this, the ball that hit Andy Phillip’s wrist broke it. The only way this can end in anything but tears is if Giambi is the everyday first baseman, but I expect to see everyone’s favorite not a first baseman Wilson Betemit appear there more often. Andy Phillips is not a fantastic player by any means, but he is stable. Okay at the plate and good in the field. Scrappy players are generally overrated but the loss of Phillips is going to have a big impact on the team (who I doubt will be the Wild Card now).
