Quick Pitch: Week 2 (4/7 - 4/13)

5 - 5 record - after a 1-4 start to the season which seemed to confirm the fears of many Yankee fans and prognastications of some Yankee detractors, New York bounced back to win 4 games this week.  The first came against vaunted Yankee slayer Justin Verlander.  The bombers got on base 9 times in 7.1 IP against the Tigers ace, including a bomb from Jayson Nix that sparked a 3-run second inning and put the Yanks ahead for good.  CC rediscovered his good stuff allowing only 7 baserunners and 0 ER in 7 IP.  Shutting out a good Detroit team on the road was a great pick-me-up for the team and it's fan base.

Silver linings - I tweeted after the aforementioned victory that being 2-4 after a series in Detroit with this lineup and inconsistent pitching is not the worst thing in the world.  Since then we've won two games at Cleveland against a team that is re-tooled and seems to be a possible threat to Detroit in the AL Central, (depending on how you feel about Terry Francona and the job he can do with those new weapons in Choo, Swisher, Bourn, etc).

Rain, Rain Go Away - the two rain outs in Cleveland on Wednesday and Thursday served as a good reminder why I don't schedule my baseball trips in April.  Those games will be made up during an entirely different series but would I have been able to make it to Cleveland for a second time in a year?  Probably not.  The wife and I are going to see them take on San Diego in early August...it never rains in SoCal, right?

The Future is Bright - I'm still not convinced that a line-up featuring Vernon Wells, Travis Hafner, and Lyle Overbay playing everyday is a recipe for success but we all know this won't last long.  When Jeter, Granderson, and Teixeira return, each of whom appear to be set to return next month, this team will actually be fairly deep.  Wells will probably enter into a platoon situation with either Hafner at DH or Ichiro in the OF.  Overbay may be released or at most will be bannished to the end of the bench.  But no matter the structure, these three have shown they can be significant contributors.

Pronk Go Yard - Travis Hafner, who just a few years ago was in the discussion for best designated hitter in the league, would probably still be in Cleveland if it were not for the injuries that have kept him out of the lime light and the Indians every-day lineup the past three seasons.  So in a somewhat poetic moment, the man known as Pronk hit a three-run bomb in his first at-bat as a visitor to Progressive Field.  This just seconds after receiving a warm ovation from the Indian faithful.  I always admired Hafner from afar as he exhibited ability to hit for both power and average.  I'm so glad he's on this team and hope he can stay healthy long enough to hit a few (dozen) more dingers.

Michael Pineda Takes Another Step Toward the Bronx - The would be number two (or at least that's what we were sold when he was traded for) took another big step towards returning to action on Wednesday when he threw batting pratice to live hitters for the first time since shoulder surgery that ended his 2012 season.  This guy has become the invisible man ever since last Spring and if he makes it to a big league mound this summer you'll hear a collective "Oh yeah!...I remember that guy!" from the Yankee fanbase.  Who knows if he'll return to his 2011 all-star form.  It's foolish to expect that, but if it happens Yankee fans should rejoice.

Robbie at Short, Clapper at Second - Every year you see guys playing out of position due to circumstance.  Last year Chris Davis pitched 2 scoreless innings for the Orioles and actually got the win.  Jorge Posada once played 2B in 2011 against Oakland.  So yeah, it happens.  And on Saturday against Baltimore, it was Robinson Cano's and Francisco Cervelli's turns when the short handed Yankees needed some late inning shifting after starting SS Jayson Nix got pinch-hit for by Brennan Boesch.  As much as I love Robbie and think he could be an outstanding SS with that arm of his, let's hope the Captain returns soon and we don't have to see that again.

Favorite Play of the Week - So I'll preface this by saying I didn't get to see it live, but rather so the highlight this morning on MLB Network.  But if I saw last night's triple play as it happened I probably would have done a backflip!  Not only did it get us out of a real jam (what triple play doesn't get someone out of a jam?) it was great to see the excitement on everyone's face in the dugout afterwards.  Youk was especially exhuberant.  It was the icing on the cake, (too bad we didn't win).

The Week to Come - the Yankees have one more game against Baltimore before taking on the league's grittiest team, Arizona, before heading up north for three against the Blue Jays.

Quick Pitch: Week 1 (4/1 - 4/6)

You know what's hard about blogging?  Coming up with long thought provoking articles every week.  I point to the fact I went through the whole month of March without writing a single word.  Blogging ain't easy, folks.  Kinda makes you appreciate the guys who write every day about the same general topic.  Maybe that's why they get paid and I don't :)

Sure, I have thoughts about what's going on.  Plenty!  I just can't write 1,000 words about it.  But I can bullet point with the best of them!  So that's what I'm going to do every week in between articles about the draft, the farm system, and so-on.  And I figured I should finally write about the Yankees in my Yankee fan blog.  So here we go...

1 - 4 start - Well, this wasn't the ideal start.  Surprising?  A little, but not a lot.  It goes without saying the line-up is depleted, (Jeter, Granderson, Teixeira...Rodriguez) so you would have thought going in that the team would struggle to score.  But the pitching was supposed to be their saving grace and it's been anything but.  They're giving up 6.6 runs per game, 7.75 in the four losses.  I'd like to see the offense score more than 3.4 runs per game.  It needs to get closer to 4.5 if they want to achieve their goals...and maybe even more if the pitching doesn't improve.

The injuries that were almost harmful - did anybody else squirm in their seats when Kuroda got pulled Wednesday?  Anybody else see a third pitcher in our shoulda been starting rotation, (I'm speaking of Phil Hughes and even the long-injured Michael Pineda), going on the DL?  Luckily, he'll make his next start, but only going 1.1 innings put New York in a bind it could not escape; another 1.1 innings from Cody Eppley sealed their fate.  And while Eduardo Nunez will never be mistaken for a game-changing, line-up anchor at short stop, he's theoretically the best short-stop we have right now.  So when Nun-E took a fastball off the bicep in Friday's game I thought "Here we go again."  But the injury does not appear serious upon review and Eduardo should be in the line-up again soon.

Reliable Andy - I tweeted Thursday during New York's lone win (so far) this season that I'm never more confident about our chances then when Andy Pettitte is on the mound.  He just gets it done.  He'll show up on the mound with a razor focus and not let anything prevent him from giving his all.  There was NO WAY he was going to let Boston sweep us at home to start the season.  Derek Jeter will always be my favorite Yankee, but Andy Pettitte will hold a special place in my fan's heart for his reliable warrior mentality.

Forever Mo - I can't mention Thursday's win without tipping my cap to the Sandman...sorry, let me try that again.  I can't mention the win without bowing at the feet of the Sandman.  Even while giving up a run and allowing the tying run to come to the plate, I never doubted he will get it done.  I'm going to go on record with a prediction: Rivera's last season will be his finest.

A Doofus says what? - After Mo and Andy's dandy (sorry, had to) performance, Greg Amsinger starts the MLB Tonight broadcast saying "The Yankees finally win..."  Game three Greg, it was game three...

The New Yankees - Lyle Overbay.  Travis Hafner.  Vernon Wells.  Kevin Youkilis.  The masses would have cried out "Evil Empire!  Evil Empire!!" if the Yankees had acquired these 4 players four years ago, (Ok, at least Hafner, Youkilis, and Wells).  But this year their acquisitions were greeted with snickers and second guessing.  I myself oscilated back and forth between supporting and scoffing the Wells trade.  But this week they all stepped up and had their moments and I think proved they can still contribute something.  Wells has homered twice and has 4 hits (how long did it take him to get 4 hits last year?  Until June?).  Youk has nuke'd (thanks John Sterling).  Pronk has 5 hits (with a homer) and Lyle has 4.  Whatever you say this week, you CANNOT say these four did not do what they could to contribute.

Cano's in an "Empire State of Mind" - my twitter feed has become my primary source of news now.  It's true.  Am I the only one?  Doubt it.  When I read Wednesday morning that Robinson Cano had fired Scott Boras, I did a (figurative) backflip!  I've long held that Boras would undermine New York's attempts to negotiate a new contract and would be detrimental to Robbie re-signing with New York, (again, I know I'm not alone there.)  But Robbie dumped Boras for notorious Yankee fan Jay-Z?!?!  I'm suddenly feeling a lot better about the Yankees re-signing Cano, which I tweeted this week they must do.  It's imperative.  It is EMPIRE-tive.  In an era where free agency pools have dried up because teams have been locking up their best players pre- free agency, the Yankees have to abandon their policy of letting their players go into free agency.  With Cano in they Jay-Z camp, I feel a lot better about our chances.

2013 MLB Draft: Compilaton Board #1

We're just 61 days from the MLB Draft, which is kind of like my Super Bowl. Last year, I sat in my wife and mine's bedroom with my laptop and watched the draft contently. I had various websites like Baseball America and MLB.com pulled up to see who they had ranked where. I also had a spreadsheet up entering who all got drafted by which team. Then I came up with an idea...

I decided to compile a spreadsheet starting last June that had almost all of the rankings and mock drafts that I could find. To date I have 52 entries! These are weighted by who wrote them and when, (the more recently they're written the more weight they get naturally). So far I've compiled over 140 names. I could have a lot more but I cut some of the longer rankings off at 80 for reasons too lengthy to explain).

Because the system ends up with ties, I serve as a tie breaker. I've also added a few names to the bottom of the list that I keep hearing about, thinking they'll show up on a mock at some point. It's been a real labor of love! Because I don't rank all the players personally, other tiebreakers include # of appearances and peak rank. Without further delay, here's the list as of today:

 

Rnk	Name	Pos	School	Wgt Rnk	Ben	Peak	Count
1	Mark Appel	SP	Stanford	1	1	1	50
2	Austin Meadows	OF	H.S.	3	3	1	53
3	Sean Manaea	SP	Ind St	3	5	1	50
4	Clint Frazier	OF	H.S.	5	4	1	50
5	Kris Bryant	3B	San Diego	6	6	2	52
6	Ryne Stanek	SP	Arkansas	9	10	1	53
7	Jonathan Gray	SP	Oklahoma	11	2	2	18
8	Kohl Stewart	SP	H.S.	12	7	5	49
9	Jonathan Denney	C	H.S.	12	8	4	39
10	Trey Ball	P/OF	H.S.	15	9	7	52
11	Colin Moran	3B	UNC	15	11	5	53
12	Chris Anderson	SP	Jack'ville	15	12	8	14
13	JP Crawford	SS	H.S.	15	15	7	37
14	Austin Wilson	OF	Stanford	17	27	2	49
15	Ian Clarkin	SP	H.S.	18	17	10	42
16	Braden Shipley	SP	Nevada	19	13	8	11
17	Dominic Smith	1B	H.S.	19	16	4	38
18	Reese McGuire	C	H.S.	21	14	3	49
19	Jonathan Crawford	SP	Florida	21	19	4	49
20	Marco Gonzales	SP	Gonzaga	23	21	8	43
21	Ryan Eades	SP	LSU	23	22	9	41
22	Ryan Boldt	OF	H.S.	25	24	10	43
23	DJ Peterson	3B	New Mex	27	30	13	24
24	Phillip Ervin	OF	Samford	29	29	10	34
25	Oscar Mercado	SS	H.S.	29	32	3	50
26	Aaron Judge	OF	Fresno St	30	46	9	45
27	Bobby Wahl	SP	Ole Miss	32	20	4	49
28	Billy McKinney	OF	H.S.	33	48	22	7
29	Hunter Harvey	SP	H.S.	36	23	21	5
30	Matt Krook	SP	H.S.	37	25	17	8
31	Nick Ciuffo	C	H.S.	37	26	20	17
32	Tom Windle	SP	Minn.	37	45	26	19
33	Andrew Mitchell	SP	TCU	38	18	16	16
34	Rob Kaminsky	SP	H.S.	40	31	10	41
35	Trevor Williams	SP	Arz St.	41	37	6	32
36	Jason Hursh	SP	Okl St.	41	47	22	8
37	Kevin Ziomek	SP	Vandy	42	28	7	23
38	Michael Lorenzen	OF	CS Fuler.	42	53	15	27
39	Stephen Gonsalves	SP	H.S.	43	39	3	45
40	Andy McGuire	SS	H.S.	44	34	15	32
41	Eric Jagielo	3B/OF	N Dame	44	38	24	10
42	Connor Jones	SP	H.S.	45	33	23	7
43	Dustin Driver	SP	H.S.	47	35	18	26
44	Andrew Thurman	SP	UC Irvine	48	36	24	6
45	Scott Frazier	SP	Pepper.	48	54	18	13
46	Aaron Blair	OF	Fresno St	48	65	39	7
47	Cavan Biggio	3B/2B	H.S.	49	43	21	22
48	Garrett Williams	SP	H.S.	49	81	30	10
49	Dillon Overton	SP	Oklahoma	50	61	22	7
50	Tim Anderson	SS	East C CC	50	76	36	3
51	Hunter Renfroe	C/OF	Miss St.	51	44	26	7
52	Chris Kohler	SP	H.S.	51	50	31	2
53	Matt McPhearson	OF	H.S.	51	52	19	13
54	Jordan Sheffield	SP	H.S.	52	49	10	29
55	Hunter Green	SP	H.S.	52	51	33	3
56	Rowdy Tellez	1B	H.S.	52	57	19	13
57	Brett Morales	SP	H.S.	52	66	11	28
58	Ryan McMahon	3B	H.S.	52	74	27	7
59	Chris Okey	C	H.S.	53	42	17	25
60	Cord Sandberg	OF	H.S.	53	59	29	11
61	Tony Rizzotti	RP	Tulane	53	63	38	2
62	JaCoby Jones	2B/OF	LSU	53	85	16	19
63	Colby Suggs	RP	Arkansas	53	86	29	9
64	Justin Williams	OF	H.S.	54	40	6	41
65	Carlos Salazar	SP	H.S.	54	41	15	11
66	Jeremy Martinez	C	H.S.	54	58	1	33
67	Travis DeMerritte	3B	H.S.	54	60	24	16
68	Wil Crowe	SP	H.S.	54	69	41	2
69	Alex Gonzalez	SP	Oral Rob	54	75	44	3
70	Josh Hart	OF	H.S.	54	89	29	9
71	Chad Pinder	SS	Va. Tech	55	64	41	2
72	Dylan Covey	SP	San Diego	55	105	12	16
73	Alex Balog	SP	San Fran.	55		40	2
74	Clinton Hollon	SP	H.S.	56	67	2	36
75	Ivan Wilson	OF	H.S.	56	70	47	2
76	Dustin Peterson	3B	H.S.	56	71	44	1
77	Kyle Serrano	SP	H.S.	56	72	47	1
78	Chris Oakley	SP	H.S.	56	73	24	16
79	Adam Plutko	SP	UCLA	56	77	6	16
80	Hunter Dozier	3B	SF Austin	56	80	43	3
81	Corey Knebel	RP	Texas	56		24	7
82	Brian Ragira	1B	Stanford	56		30	7
83	Jonah Wesely	SP	H.S.	57	55	12	18
84	AJ Puk	SP	H.S.	57	68	24	17
85	Tucker Neuhaus	SS	H.S.	57	90	51	1
86	Devin Williams	SP	H.S.	57	92	51	2
87	Colin Bray	OF	Faulkner	57	98	51	1
88	Drew Ward	1B	H.S.	58	56	6	10
89	Trey Masek	SP	Tex Tech	58	79	30	6
90	Keegan Thompson	SP	H.S.	58	82	11	14
91	Jan Hernandez	SS	H.S.	58	94	8	13
92	AJ Vanegas	RP	Stanford	58	103	13	16
93	Karsten Whitson	SP	Florida	58		2	34
94	Austin Kubitza	SP	Rice	59	62	9	16
95	William Abreu	OF	H.S.	59	83	5	16
96	Chris Rivera	SS	H.S.	59	84	1	17
97	Kent Emanuel	SP	UNC	59	87	21	9
98	Casey Shane	SP	H.S.	59	91	23	7
99	Brian Navarreto	C	H.S.	59	93	19	7
100	Zach Collins	1B/C	H.S.	59	99	14	17
101	Trey Williams	3B	JUCO	59		20	10
102	John Simms	RP	Rice	59		39	4
103	Derick Beauprez	SP	H.S.	59		38	3
104	Jacob Brentz	SP	H.S.	59		49	3
105	Ben Lively	SP	UCF	59		39	2
106	Teddy Stankiewicz	SP	JUCO	60	78	68	1
107	Daniel Palka	OF/SP	Ga Tech	60	88	19	4
108	Christian Arroyo	SS	H.S.	60	95	0	0
109	Nick Longhi	1B/OF	H.S.	60	96	44	5
110	John Sternagel	3B	H.S.	60	97	38	2
111	Tyler Danish	3B	H.S.	60	100	22	4
112	John Kilichowski	SP	H.S.	60	101	30	3
113	Joseph Martarano	3B	H.S.	60	102	14	5
114	Dominic Ficociello	2B	Arkansas	60	104	16	13
115	Conrad Gregor	1B	Vandy	60		24	5
116	Josh Dezse	RP/1B	Ohio St	60		11	4
117	Jared King	OF	Kansas St	60		32	3
118	Kevin Davis	SP	H.S.	60		35	3
119	Dominic Taccolini	SP	H.S.	60		50	3
120	Sheldon Neuse	SS	H.S.	60		16	2
121	Trevor Clifton	SP	H.S.	60		21	2
122	Zach Farmer	SP	H.S.	60		21	2
123	Matt Vogel	SP	H.S.	60		26	2
124	Dan Slania	RP	N Dame	60		27	2
125	Thomas Hatch	SP	H.S.	60		28	2
126	Konner Wade	SP	Arizona	60		34	2
127	Mark Payton	OF	Texas	60		36	2
128	Barrett Astin	SP	Arkansas	60		41	2
129	Adam Frazier	SS	Miss St.	60		50	2
130	Robert Tyler	SP	H.S.	60		55	2
131	Tony Kemp	OF	Vandy	60		11	1
132	Tim Richards	SS	H.S.	60		28	1
133	Edwin Diaz	SS	H.S.	60		32	1
134	Tyler O'Neill	C	H.S.	60		32	1
135	Ben Wetzler	SP	Ore St.	60		47	1
136	Kevin Franklin	3B/OF	H.S.	60		50	1
137	Dane McFarland	OF	H.S.	60		65	1
138	Stuart Turner	C	Ole Miss	60		71	1
139	David Denson	1B	H.S.	60		79	1
140	Connor Heady	SS	H.S.	60		0	0
141	Dom Nunez	SS	H.S.	60		0	0
142	Ryan Olson	SP	H.S.	60		0	0
143	Phil Bickford	SP	H.S.	60		0	0
144	Corey Ray	OF	H.S.	60		0	0

I hope to have 200+ names by the draft. As lists get expanded to Top 100 and beyond I think I'll make it. For those curious, the writers used and their websites are listed below. If anybody knows other lists to include, please let me know, (info@thebronxempire.com). I'll post the final compilation just prior to the day of the event.

Big League Futures - Matt Grabusky, Kevin Gallo, Kevin Rosa, Mack Ade

Baseball America - Jim Callis, Connor Glassey

The Baseball Draft Report

Bleacher Report - Prospect Pipeline - Mike Rosenbaum

ESPN Insider - Keith Law (subscription required)

Minor League Radar

Sports City

Through the Fence Baseball - Dan Kirby

Rant Sports - Derick Hingle

MLB.com - Jonathan Mayo

Minor League Ball - Matt Garrioch

Minor League Rundown

MLB Draft Insider - Chris Crawford

MLB Draft Countdown - Zachary Ball

Cubs Den - John Arguelo