Cashman, Torre Must Go, Hughes Overrated

Cashman and Torre's Failures

BAD GM, BAD MANAGER, BAD BULLPEN = NO PLAYOFFS FOR YANKS
By Andy Roth

The string of nine consecutive American League East Titles and eleven straight playoff appearances will end in the Bronx this season. There are just too many hurdles  to overcome.

The firing of the General Manager, Brian Cashman, is long overdue, and it is no coincidence that the Yankees have gone six years without a World Championship with Cashman at the helm. Despite having the highest payroll in baseball by far each year during that stretch, the Yankees have failed to win a World Series because Cashman has probably been the worst talent evaluator in the game.

The nucleus of the clubs that won three straight titles in the late 90's was built by Gene Michael and Bob Watson. Once Cashman had to replenish the talent left by his predecessors he has failed miserably.

In particular, his ability to evaluate pitching talent has been a complete disaster. Cashman's penchant for giving starting pitchers with unimpressive track records huge contracts is hard to fathom. Just take a look at a few examples.

Sterling Hitchcock.  Despite a 67-72 lifetime record and coming off major arm surgery, Cashman signed Hitchcock to a two-year, twelve million dollar contract. Hitchcock ended up having more are problems and pitched just 79 innings in his two years in the Bronx, going 2-5 with a mid-five ERA.

Jaret Wright. Cashman gave Wright a three-year, twenty-one million dollar contract coming off a career year 15-8 mark with the Braves. He completely ignored Wright's long years of arm problems and his 11-19 record from 2000-2003.  Sure enough, Wright met with more arm problems in his first season with the Yanks and pitched just 63 innings. The second season was mediocre at best, but Wright failed miserably in the pivotal Game 3 of the American League Divisional Series which culminated in his ticket out of the Bronx.

Carl Pavano. Once again Cashman ignores a long track record of failure and signs a pitcher coming off a career year to a huge contract, giving Pavano a four-year, forty million dollar deal. Prior to Pavano's 18-8 season in 2004, his career mark was 45-60.
Pavano's Yankee career so far has been a complete disaster and the outlook is dim with Pavano sidelined once again with more arm problems.

Cashman's track record in the bullpen, whether it be a free-agent signing or trade isn't any better. The long list of names that have passed through here over the years that have failed is mind boggling. Remember Antonio Osuna, Juan Acevedo, and Jay Witascik?
How about Gabe White and Felex Heredia? Both pitchers were unimpressive after coming over from the Reds, yet in the off-season Cashman re-signed them to new two-year contracts. The following season, White and Heredia were so bad that they were both dealt before years' end. More recently we have Kyle Farnsworth and Luis Vizcaino. Cashman signed Farnsworth to set-up Mariano Rivera not even knowing Farnsworth couldn't be used in back-to-back games because of his ineffectiveness.  Vizcaino, meanwhile had an excellent strikeout-to-walk ratio in each of the last three seasons, but his ERA was in the mid to high three's in each of those years.

Next up on the chopping block is Joe Torre; not because of the Yankees' bad start, but because Torre is an extremely poor game strategist and one of the most overrated managers in baseball in this area.

Last week when Derek Jeter sat out a game after getting hit by a pitch on the leg, Torre put Doug Mientkiewicz in Jeter's place in the two-hole and batted Robinson Cano eighth. How do you bat a washed up hitter with a .150 average in that spot in the lineup and why in the world would you want Mientkiewcz to get more at bats in a game than Cano?

But this wasn't the first time Mientkiewcz was part of one of  Torre's blunders. As a matter of fact he was probably involved in the worst strategerial move of the Yankee manager's career. In game five of the American League Championship Series in Boston in 2004 Torre chose to pitch to David Ortiz with runners at second and third and two outs in the 14th inning with Mientkiewcz on deck. Ortiz, one of the game's great hitters, had only homered the night before to win Game 4 and homered again in the 8th inning of Game 5 to ignite the Red Sox's rally. The choice to pitch to Ortiz rather than Mientkiewcz has to go down as one of the biggest blunders in baseball history.

These are not isolated mistakes. Torre became more vulnerable as a manager as the Yankees' began to field weaker teams following the four World Championships of the late 90's. During that run he had a push-button bullpen. It was hard to make a mistake when you had the likes of Mendoza, Nelson, Stanton, Rivera and Wetteland..

In game three of the 2003 World Series against Florida he brought in one of the worst pitchers in the game that season in Jeff Weaver in relief rather than using Mariano Rivera.  Torre explained the choice saying he wanted someone who could give him a lot of innings and didn't want to use Rivera in a non-save situation. He misread the situation on both fronts. With Weavers' track record that season it was highly unlikely that he would go any sort of distance without giving up a run and losing the game. He also didn't understand that you had to use Rivera there for two reasons. One, to prevent Florida from scoring and two, to extend the game to get into the weaker part of their bullpen.

And speaking of bullpens,  Torre, earlier in the season, actually called this the best pen he's ever had. Has amnesia set in? How could he make such a statement with the relief corp he had during the championship run.

As a matter of fact, this may be the weakest bullpen he has ever had, and one of the main reasons why the Yankees won't make the playoffs. Kyle Farnsworth has been a failure as the set-up man for Rivera. Scott Proctor seems to get worse as time goes on. Proctor consistently throws in the mid 90's but his fastball is very flat and very hittable as exemplified by his 5.12 ERA this season.  Luis Vizcaino looks like a mediocre reliever at best, while Mike Myers has been less than adequate as the clubs' lefty specialist. Brian Bruney has pitched well but if you have to rely on him to be a featured part of this bullpen then you are in trouble.

As for Mariano Rivera, I'm not convinced Mo is slipping yet, but even with a strong Rivera this Yankee bullpen is just too weak in every other area to have any kind of success.

Observations...Mike Mussina's return this week will improve the Yankee's rotation but don't look for big results from the The Moose this season. Age seems to be catching up with Mussina as he continues to break down each year. Also, his fastball now tops out in the high 80's making it awfully tough to have a high level of success...At the other end of the age spectrum is Philip Hughes. I've seen Hughes three times now; twice in spring training and his major league debut last week. What I saw was a pitcher with a low 90's fastball with very little explosiveness. I can't see Hughes being a big time talent on the major league level with that type of fastball.