December 21, 2005
a better yankee bullpen?
Johnny Damone got me a little excited about the Yankees today, so I did a little catch-up work on the team to try and get a sense of how improved they really are going to be.
The main weakness of the New York Yankees last season was the ridiculously bad bullpen. They consistently made blowout games tight and blew chances for the offense to mount late comebacks. I wasn't nearly as concerned about centerfield going into this offseason as I was about Mariano's help in the pen.
Apparently, Cashman felt the same way, as he's made a few additions while dropping the dead weight. Since the end of the 2005 season, he's signed Kyle Farnsworth, Ron Villone, Mike Myers, and is about to close a deal on Octavio Dotel. I decided to run a stat check on these guys and compare them to last year's bullpen. The results are very encouraging:
I took all the regular relievers (minus Rivera) from last year's team and figured out their combined ERA for the Yanks. This group is comprised of Tom Gordon, Colter Bean, Tanyon Sturtze, Buddy Groom, Felix Rodriguez, Steve Karsay, Scott Proctor, Wayne Franklin, Paul Quantrill, Mike Stanton, Alan Embree, Alex Graman, Ramiro Mendoza, and Jorge Depaula. I left sometime relievers Aaron Small and Al Leiter off the list, considering they started games significantly more often than they relieved.
Last year's bullpen combined for 351.1 innings pitched. Their combined ERA: 5.05
That number is way too high for a bunch of guys that only have to pitch an inning or two every other day. Most of them have been let go, making room for the new guys I previously mentioned. I took the numbers from Proctor and Sturtze (who will be staying) and added the stats from the newbies: Farnsworth, Myers, Villone, and Dotel. Leiter will probably be in the bullpen at the start of the season too, but I still left his numbers out because I had trouble finding anything that separated his relief stats from starting stats.
Those six pitchers currently scheduled to set up Rivera from the bullpen combined for 309.1 innings pitched last year. Their combined ERA? 3.96
Of course, that number will increase - considering that Yankee Stadium has been known to cause more than its share of pitching jitters - but at this point anything around 4.00 looks pretty good to me. At the least they'll be able to spare Rivera's arm a little more, as he shouldn't have to mop up someone else's mess as much as he did in '05. Cashman has made good moves so far - hopefully everything will work out as expected.
The main weakness of the New York Yankees last season was the ridiculously bad bullpen. They consistently made blowout games tight and blew chances for the offense to mount late comebacks. I wasn't nearly as concerned about centerfield going into this offseason as I was about Mariano's help in the pen.
Apparently, Cashman felt the same way, as he's made a few additions while dropping the dead weight. Since the end of the 2005 season, he's signed Kyle Farnsworth, Ron Villone, Mike Myers, and is about to close a deal on Octavio Dotel. I decided to run a stat check on these guys and compare them to last year's bullpen. The results are very encouraging:
I took all the regular relievers (minus Rivera) from last year's team and figured out their combined ERA for the Yanks. This group is comprised of Tom Gordon, Colter Bean, Tanyon Sturtze, Buddy Groom, Felix Rodriguez, Steve Karsay, Scott Proctor, Wayne Franklin, Paul Quantrill, Mike Stanton, Alan Embree, Alex Graman, Ramiro Mendoza, and Jorge Depaula. I left sometime relievers Aaron Small and Al Leiter off the list, considering they started games significantly more often than they relieved.
Last year's bullpen combined for 351.1 innings pitched. Their combined ERA: 5.05
That number is way too high for a bunch of guys that only have to pitch an inning or two every other day. Most of them have been let go, making room for the new guys I previously mentioned. I took the numbers from Proctor and Sturtze (who will be staying) and added the stats from the newbies: Farnsworth, Myers, Villone, and Dotel. Leiter will probably be in the bullpen at the start of the season too, but I still left his numbers out because I had trouble finding anything that separated his relief stats from starting stats.
Those six pitchers currently scheduled to set up Rivera from the bullpen combined for 309.1 innings pitched last year. Their combined ERA? 3.96
Of course, that number will increase - considering that Yankee Stadium has been known to cause more than its share of pitching jitters - but at this point anything around 4.00 looks pretty good to me. At the least they'll be able to spare Rivera's arm a little more, as he shouldn't have to mop up someone else's mess as much as he did in '05. Cashman has made good moves so far - hopefully everything will work out as expected.
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dotel is bad bad bad news. he will break your heart and then leave and come back and break it again just to make sure it's broken.
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# posted by 
: 12:03 PM
: 12:03 PM << Home
