Quantrill wasn’t as good as people thought, and Proctor, once he found his niche, was actually a decent reliever.

I don’t think Torre’s (mis)management of the pen had much to do with anything.

Also, can we not forget that Joe Torre singlehandedly killed at least two of these guys that I can think of (Proctor and Quantrill)? IMHO, Proctor could have stayed as an effective bullpen arm if it wasn’t for Torre. I generally don’t attribute too much to the manager, but I truely think that if we had the Girardi version of Joe and not the Torre version, our bullpen would have been more effective and individual players would have put in better performances (because of both Torre’s mis- and over-use of RPs.) Thoughts?

The fact that there have been so many arms that have passed through the bullpen from 2004-07 (which pretty much applies to just about every team in the majors), speaks to the point that RP’s are a dime a dozen and are easy to find…

From a Yankees’ POV

(20 appearances minimum)
2004
Rivera, Quantrill*, Gordon, Heredia*, Prinz*, Sturtze*, Proctor*, White*

2005
Rivera, Gordon, Sturtze*, Felix Rodriguez*, Proctor*, Quantrill*, Groom*, Embree*, Stanton*

2006
Rivera, Proctor, Farnsworth, Villone*, Myers, Beam*

2007
Rivera, Luis Vizcaino, Farnsworth*, Bruney*, Myers, Proctor, Villone, Henn*, Edwar*

2008
Rivera, Veras, Edwar, Farnsworth, Hawkins*, Joba, Giese, Ohlendorf*, Bruney, Robertson*, Marte*

* = ERA+ less than 100 (Lg Avg)

It appears the same applies here; a decent amount of turnover in the pen; I limited it to 20 games to keep the exercise simple.

As for “the GM’s inability to find these RP that were so easy to find” it appears that more often than not, the pitchers that were effective stuck around for a year or two (Bruney, Gordon, Fanrsworth, etc), the ones that weren’t (Felixes Rodriguez & Heredia, Gabe White, Hawkins, etc.) didn’t.

Raf – If RP are a dime a dozen and so easy to find, etc., then why was the Yankees pen, as a unit, so bad from 2004 through 2007? Was it related the GM’s inability to find these RP that were so easy to find?

Well, like I said, Bruney is just 26 and he’s already broken down twice. That’s not a good sign, IMHO.
How can you just ignore that?
———-
My point is that if Bruney breaks down or is ineffective, you just get another RP. There are plenty of those to go around.

Seanez pitched for 9 different organizations over 17 years, Lee Arthur pitched for 8 different organizations over the course of 18 years.

Relievers are the flotsam & jetsam of a major league roster.

Some of you guys are missing the point.
Can any – or all – players get hurt?

Sure. Heck, I could get hurt – so could you.
Anyone is a risk to get hurt.

But, some guys are risker than others.
IIRC, Rudy Seanez (sic?) was a pitcher who always got hurt.
And, IIRC, Lee Smith never seemed to get hurt.

The trick is determining who your pitcher is – more like Seanez or Smith?
Well, like I said, Bruney is just 26 and he’s already broken down twice. That’s not a good sign, IMHO.
How can you just ignore that?

Well…I guess that you can – if you want to stick your head in the sand and hum a tune in your head so that you only see and hear want you want…as opposed to what’s really going down around you…

mariano rivera had major elbow surgery in 1992 and has gone on to have one of the most brilliant careers ever. jose reyes experienced a number of injuries early in his career and then just shook them.

mark prior experienced injuries and hasn’t stopped since.

the list on both sides goes on and on. injuries are totally unpredictable. count on? maybe not. have confidence coming in that bruney can do the job and do it with health? probably yes.

I think what you ideally need is a group of high-end guys who can handle the eighth inning. If you have enough, you can survive the inevitable variance in setup men performance. The Yankees have some as noted above, but how many of them have any history of success at this level doing that job? Which is why, IMHO, they should be keeping Marte.

RP’s are a dime a dozen.
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Not ALWAYS true, but given our plethora of them this is certainly the case for the Yanks. Albaladejo (SP?), Coke, Bruney, Robertson, Melancon, Veras, Edwar, and others in triple A.

So, for Steve, I don’t think you ever really need to ‘count on’ somebody to do anything except be a closer. Other relievers can be easily replaced by someone of near-equal value. So, I simply think we ride Bruney as long as we can. Hopefully it lasts the whole year, but if not we know the bullpen can handle itself. This isn’t like ‘counting on’ someone to play 1st base, or CF, where the equal replacement simply isn’t there. The bullpen (where the worst pitchers on a team generally pitch) can be reloaded from within without much worry, it seems.