Cashman: We Have Mitre, No Need For Anything Else
Via Brian Costello -
With 12 days to go before the trade deadline, Yankees GM Brian Cashman is sticking to his plan, even with Andy Pettitte on the shelf for 4-5 weeks with a groin strain.
That plan involves trying to bolster the Yankees’ bench and possibly their bullpen — but it does not include the pursuit of a starting pitcher.
“I’m not looking for starting pitching,” Cashman said. “I don’t feel compelled. This is why we have Sergio Mitre.”
Mitre started for Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes Barre last night, allowing three runs on four his in 42⁄3 innings with four strikeouts and two walks. He will come off the disabled list (strained left oblique) in time to start Saturday’s game against the Royals in Pettitte’s place.
“Mitre would be in most people’s rotations,” Cashman said.
Translation: I can’t get Sidney Ponson to return my phone calls.
Correct translation: Mitre is no worse than many other 5th starters, and deserves a shot at it. Only Yankee fans seem to think their rotation should always have five aces, even if their are injuries.
Not totally following your train of thought Steve. What should the Yankees have done two weeks ago? Predicted that Andy Pettitte and AJ Burnett would get injured in back-to-back starts and quickly traded for Cliff Lee, Ted Lilly and Kevin Millwood, then stuck Millwood in AAA to wait for a call in case things went awry in the Bronx?
Mitre’s career may be average but he’s certainly the best internal option available right now and there’s no sense trying to trade from a position of weakness when Mitre can buy the Yanks time. Am I mistaken in saying that the Yankees won 100+ games and the World Series last year after getting a combined 24 starts from Wang/Mitre/Gaudin? If we could survive that, why can’t we survive Mitre filling in for Andy for 2-3 starts before we re-evaluate the situation?
Don’t know why they couldn’t or wouldn’t get a handful of starts out of guys like Mitre, Mosely, Gaudin or some guy from AAA until Pettitte returns.
When Andy returns is the key question – because Hughes’ innings limitations will start to kick in around that time. So Mitre will be auditioning for the 5th man job while Andy’s hurt and then later when Hughes rests. If Mitre can convince everyone before the deadline, then no, they don’t need anyone.
And they have him for another year!
@ Raf:
LOL, yep. But this time they let Gaudin go and may let Moseley go as well. As a result, the “crime” of having a replacement-level pitcher like Mitre is mitigated merely by not having redundancies like Gaudin/Moseley also hanging around and clogging up space on the 25- and 40-man rosters.