Theo Is Being Kind To Cashman
From the Daily News -
Red Sox general manager Theo Epstein has followed the travails of his team’s rival and his counterpart, Brian Cashman. The guy on a big roll is feeling for the guy who’s “on a big hook,” as George Steinbrenner deftly put it.
“Cash and the Yankees are going through what we went through last August – it’s no fun,” Epstein said. “When injuries and circumstances come together and give you short-term bad results, it creates a lot of distractions. You have to feel sympathy for someone in his position.”
The injury-thing is a bit of a reach for me. Did the Yankees have injury woes in April? Yes, no question. Wang, Mussina, Pavano, etc., made the pitching staff into a mess.
But, what about May? The Yankees pitching staff had a team ERA of 4.28 in May. That’s not terrible. You can’t cry about having injuries to your pitchers when they are pitching well.
Yet, the Yankees went 13-15 in May…which is a very weak showing (given the names on their roster).
So, it must have been injuries to the hitters, right? Well, as I detailed yesterday, only Giambi, Abreu, and, to an extent, A-Rod have been batting poorly during May. Of that group, only Giambi is injured.
Can the Yankees, or anyone, claim that “injuries” is the reason why New York has stunk in May…when only Giambi is playing poorly because of an injury? Man, that’s a reach in my book.
The Yankees struggled over the past month because they played poorly. And, it could have been worse.
The Yankees went 13-15 in May…but, in May they were 5-1 against Texas. Therefore, over the past month, the Yankees went 8-14 when they were not playing the Texas Rangers (who also stink).
Injuries are an excuse. It’s a good one. It’s just one that does not apply to the Yankees poor play over the last 4-5 weeks. Theo is being kind to Cashman by floating this notion out there.
FWIW, 7 of those 15 loses were in games started by DeSalvo, Igawa, Clippard, and Rasner. They were/are all filling in for injured starters. Also, Pettitte lost three 1-run games in May. A healthy Giambi and Damon may have helped the team overcome those 1 run deficits.
That’s 10 loses that were impacted by injuries (and that doesn’t include games blown by a bullpen worn out from compensating for starting pitching injuries in April). Do the Yanks win all 10 of those games with a healthly roster? Probably not – but you can’t say that injuries do not apply to the Yanks poor play over the past 4-5 weeks.
What about the other 8 from the 15, who started them?
As far as the one-run games….first, Damon batted well in May…you can’t say that injuries hurt him. Secondly, what about Abreu, A-Rod, Cano, etc. Could they have not made the difference in those one-run games too? Did they have an injury? No – they just stunk.
~~What about the other 8 from the 15, who started them?~~
Wang, Pettitte, and Mussina.
~~Damon batted well in May…you can’t say that injuries hurt him.~~
I think we’re talking about different Damons. He had maybe 3 good games in May. He had a 3 week stretch where he did absolutely nothing. You really don’t think injuries hurt him? Why did he only start 75% of their games? Why did he only manage to get 5 at bats in the Angels series? Why did he miss 2 out of 3 games in the ChiSox series? He was injured.
Steve, I don’t think you can lay the blame on Cashman for the offense not performing.
At the beginning of the year, nobody was really worrying about the offense, so just because they are doing poorly now then it’s Cashman’s fault?
I am in now way defending the man I personally don’t think he’s done anything great or horrible at the same time but I don’t think it’s his fault that Giambi and Damon are banged up and god knows what’s wrong with Abreu. At least Cano is starting to turn it a around a little bit.
If you want to blame Cashman then to me the only legit claim you can make is that he didn’t strengthen the bench knowing that he has injury prone players like Giambi and Damon on the team. I don’t think you can blame him for their struggles though.
Just to save you the time…yes I know your post was about injuries being the reason why the team did poorly in May…but I do believe the pitching was still not 100% and Damon is definitely banged up as well as Giambi and who knows maybe Abreu is secretly hiding an injury that is making him swing like a girl. haha
Damon has not been close to the same player this year because he’s been hobbled since April. But when healthy, he is a huge catalyst for this offense.
When close to 100 percent (I’m not sure we’ve ever had the pleasure of experiencing a completely injury-free Damon in pinstripes), he sees and spoils tons of pitches, hits for power, and covers more ground than most other centerfielders. He gets a lot of press for his goofy, surfer-dude mentality; but, in reality, he’s a significantly undervalued component to this team.
Yanks had exactly one string of three straight quality starts in May (only one of the season). While the starters were better, they still weren’t great, especially in terms of length. Combined with the already overworked bullpen, any slump in the offense meant they weren’t going to win alot of games. And they didn’t.
Guys, Damon saw his OPS go up by 100 points between April and May…and he had 3.2 AB per every game the Yankees played in May. Let’s not pretend that he was a no-show for the month.
And, bottom line, even if the Yankees had guys like Rasner DeSalvo, Igawa, and Clippard starting games in May…the team had an ERA near four for the month.
That’s my point…when the players, who played, put up good stats, you can’t cry about injuries costing you games. You lost because you lost – not because your stars were hurt.
This is so annoying. Everybody was ballwashing Cashman last year after the Abreu deal. Everyone. There wasn’t one person who said, “this is a horrible mistake Cashman is making for picking up Bobby Abreu because Abreu is going into the tank next season.” Not ONE MOTHERFUCKING PERSON SAID THAT. But because Bobby is slumping this year, it’s Cashman’s fault. We shoulda kept Sheff or something. JESUS, what a bunch of dipshits.
I think there’s clearly a carry over effect from April too though, the Red Sox got most of their guys healthy again in the last 2 month and it really didn’t reflect on their record at all, as they manage to fall even further and ended up behind the blue jays.
When a massive collasps happens like the April SP injuries, it really takes more than just putting the people back in the roster healthy to get it going again.
This is why you don’t judge the performance of a GM based on the 1st two months. SteveB relpy is a archetype.
Hope he’s happy the Yanks are winning now while he’s working at the car wash.