Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Not going well

It's the end of 4 now and Phil Hughes has been bad. 79 pitches is almost 20 per inning. He has been wasting a ton of pitches and has had questionable control throughout. It's tempting to think of him as an ace already with all the hype, but he's a young rookie with virtually no experience above AA. He'll contribute, and occasionally dominate, but starts like this are sure to rear their ugly heads from time to time.

One thing that I always question is why managers sit their best players against opposing aces. I know that Bedard is a tough lefty, so you think about giving a day off to some of the weary left handed hitters, but the Yankees' lefties are All Stars for a reason. They can hit lefties too. I don't ever think it's a good formula to start Betemit, Phillips, Duncan, and Molina on the same day. It's not fair to Phil Hughes and this late in the season with as much as there is at stake.....questionable.

Come on fellas....come back!

1 comment:

RollingWave said...

I think in general this start wasn't as bad as it felt, the O's comming in are actually hitting extremely well as a team with the exception of the back end blackholes in LF and C . and it was very very fun seeing Edwar Rameriez pitch again, he was down right awsome. the Shelley HR was also very cool. if Hughes hadn't messed up that play at first or Shelley hadn't misread tht ball in RF the Yankees could have won this game. (though Shelley's throw to end the 5th was hilariously awsome to say the least. )

I think Hughes still aint trusting his stuff enough, he nimbles a bit too often, though he does have the control to do it better than most people. and apart from that, people must not forget that he was dragged around all season long and had injury, it took even vets like Moose and Wang awhile to get back into a true groove. why except Hughes to do it sooner?

As for the lineup, I think Betemit was a mistake, even Michael Kay realize he utterly suck from the right side, Shelley / Phillips at least made some sense, but the only reason to start Betemit seem to be giving Cano some rest, and they probably could have picked days against weaker righties to do that .

I agree