@ MJ:

I’ve had it with Joba as a starting pitcher as well. He refuses to attack the zone and the perfect example of that is the 3-2 slider way out of the zone that he threw to Scutaro that resulted in a walk to open up the 1st. What really infuriated me was his post game interview where he claimed that his mechanics were the best they have been all year and that the Jays just have a good line up and there is nothing that can be done about that. What a load of crap.

All I remember about Keisler is that he was bitten by a rattlesnake once

Keisler did look OK that day. But, that look didn’t last too long…

I was at that game on Sept 10, 2000, with a group of statisticians from Harvard and BU. It was Randy Keisler’s first start. I don’t remember much about the game, except that it was unusually hot for September in Boston (we were sitting in the OF with no shade). I have no memory of Doc Gooden coming in for the 4-inning save, but I do remember thinking that Keisler looked like he had pretty ordinary stuff, and I was mystified that he was able to keep the Sox at 1 run through 5 IP.

Corey wrote:

@ MJ:
i feel ya, but im not even 100% sure puttin him in the pen fixes his problems..

I’m not ready to banish him to the bullpen yet. But I agree that maybe that wouldn’t even fix him.

To Kevin Long (Robbie Cano) and Dave Eiland (Joba Chamberlain) I say this: earn your effin’ money, you worthless twits. These guys are sucking hardcore and they’re not even talking about changing their approach or trying something different. What are we waiting for, exactly? Aren’t coaches paid to coach? Is it that hard to tell Robbie not to swing at the first shitty pitch he sees? Is it that hard to tell Joba to throw his goddamn fastball and to attack hitters?

@ MJ:
i feel ya, but im not even 100% sure puttin him in the pen fixes his problems..

I’ve seen 4 of Joba’s 9 home starts and his line is 10.1 IP, 9 H, 7 BB, 6 ER, 16 K (6.09 ERA / 1.55 WHIP). In short, I want my money back. I’m utterly sick of watching him pitch.

He gets one more full season of this crap in the rotation and then he’s gotta go back in the bullpen. Right now, his stuff is irrelevant. He’s simply got no command and doesn’t absolutely, positively belong in the rotation.

I don’t want to nitpick what was a nice win in that they slugged their way to victory, but there is no reason that Pena should have been sent down fro Ransom. I have nothing against Ransom personally, but Pena is the best backup infielder we have had in years.

As far as Joba, he is still developing and hopefully he can learn from this experience. Even with losing a few MPH, which does concern me, he still has good stuff and needs to focus on getting ahead and stop nibbling.

aceves really has been this team’s unsung hero. difficult to quantify how important he has been to this club.

i have little to prove any causation, but have to give the yankees at least a little bit of the blame for what is going on with joba. maybe the shoulder injury was going to happen no matter what and that’s why we are where we are. but maybe all the yanking him around had something to do with it. it certainly can’t be completely helpful. and now they are in the same situation with hughes. i just don’t understand.

tough to argue with 48-33 playing in this division though. really tough. the fact that they’ve gone on two majorly extended winning streaks (one of which isn’t yet past tense) is really a testament to the capability of this pitching staff. i just hope they next week’s perfectly timed (for us) days off to really figure out what they are going to do with the 5th spot the rest of the season. it should not be a stop-gap line of thinking either, as who knows when wang is coming back, if at all. with the way joba is going, you have to think about protection for him as well. i guess a more succinct way of putting it is that in my opinion they need to make a decision with the thinking in mind that they are going to need a starter for the rest of the season, not just one month. if that doesn’t end up being the case, it’s a bonus.

I remember reading this when it first came out. Shed a tear back then.