Now that we’ve seen the entire rotation at least once (Wang twice now), here are some observations:
Chien-Ming Wang – Looked very solid twice now, against teams with differing levels of offense. If he continues to be able to use his slider and changeup the way he did in his first two starts he’ll do well and hopefully make John Heyman eat his stupid words.
Mike Mussina – I hope it was just the weather because his fastball was topping out at 86MPH, and that is not going to cut it over the course of the season if he can’t spot it perfectly. Still, he did not look horrible.
Phil Hughes – Didn’t really go to his change, but his other pitches looked good. He’s brought back the slider and used it well. His fastball was a few ticks below his norm but hopefully that will change as the season goes on. He’s young, so I’m not concerned that he isn’t throwing 93-93MPH out the gate as a starter. If he continues to mix up the pitches he should have a successful season.
Ian Kennedy – Kennedy doesn’t have really good stuff and so he relies on his command, and his first started showed what can happen to him when that’s off especially since he is a rookie and isn’t going to get any generous calls from the umpires. He can and will pitch better than he did, and hopefully be a solid 3 or 4 in the rotation.
Andy Pettitte – His command was off a bit, he wasn’t able to use his repertoire of pitches as effectively as usual and then he ran out of gas. The horrible defense behind him did hurt him a bit but the homerun Gomes hit was a hung pitch. He’ll be better in subsequent starts unless he is hurt.
Bullpen Notes
LaTroy Hawkins had an okay first outing (1.1IP 2H, 1ER) and a bad second outing (.2IP, 6H, 6ER, 1HR) that wasn’t helped by Kyle Farnsworth coming in and letting all the inherited runners score. It’s too early to freak out but I am somewhat concerned.
Mariano Rivera was throwing around 90MPH in his first two outings, today he was back to his normal 93-94MPH. He is having no trouble locating pitches, hopefully this keeps up and everyone is happy.
