Sunday, April 8, 2012

Series Wrap - @ Rays 3/6 - 3/8

Well it wasn't a good start to the season. Game 1 ended with a 7-6 Yankee loss after CC Sabathia's poor start (6IP, 8H, 5ER, 3BB, 7K, 2HR), and a blown save by Mariano Rivera (.1IP, 3H, 2ER, 2BB, 1K). Curtis Granderson failed to reach base after going 0-5 with two strikeouts. Yankee fans did get a bit of a surprise when Raul Ibanez hit a 3-run home run, while Robinson Cano and Alex Rodriguez had two hits apiece.

Game 2 didn't go any better. Hiroki Kuroda gave the team another poor start (5.2IP, 8H, 4ER, 4BB, 2K, 1HR), followed by a poor relief effort by Clay Rapada (.2IP, 2H, 2ER, 2BB, 0K). Mark Teixeira failed to give the offense anything, going 0-4 with a strikeout, leaving 4 men on base. Granderson bounced back from a hitless Game 1, hitting a single and a triple, while Derek Jeter added on two singles. Nick Swisher hit a 3-run HR in the 9th, but the comeback fell short as the team lost 8-6.

Phil Hughes didn't pitch poorly in the third and final game of the series, putting up a line of 4.2IP, 5H, 2ER, 2BB, 5K. But the offense could only muster 3 hits (all doubles), leaving 11 men on base, thanks to a very well-pitched game by Jeremy Hellickson (8.2IP, 0ER, 3H, 4BB, 4K). All of which led to a 3-0 loss, leaving the Yankees winless so far in 2012.


Jake Taylor Award*
Alex Rodriguez - 3/10, 2 Runs, 4 Walks, 2 Doubles

Gentry Award*
Mark Teixeira - 0/9, 1 Run, 3 Walks, 4 Strikeouts, 8 Left On Base

Rick Vaughn Award*
Cory Wade - 2.2IP, 1 Hit, 0 Earned Runs, 5 Strikeouts, 0 Walks

Kelner Award*
Hiroki Kuroda - 5.2IP, 8 Hits, 4 Earned Runs, 4 Walks, 2 Strikeouts


Next Series
@ Baltimore Orioles 4/9-4/11
Click here to talk about the series at the Daily Sports Pages Yankees forum.

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*The awards are named after one of the best baseball movies of all time... Major League.

Jake Taylor Award - Awarded to the most valuable position player in the series. Named after the hard-nose veteran catcher that, despite making the league minimum, was the heart and soul of the 1989 American League East winning Cleveland Indians.

Gentry Award - Awarded to the least valuable position player in the series. Named after the very first man cut from the 1989 Cleveland Indians, #47 Gentry. A man so insignificant he wasn't even given a first name.

Rick Vaughn - Awarded to the best pitcher in the series. This one is, of course, named after the "Wild Thing". The man that made Clu Haywood look silly in the division deciding game.

Kelner Award - Awarded to the worst pitcher in the series. Named after the Opening Day starter for the '89 Indians. Not a good game for Mr. Kelner, as Indians' announcer Harry Doyle famously quipped "thank God" after Kelner left the game. And yet another bad player without a first name.

Meet A Prospect : David Robertson Edition

As we continue our special edition Meet A Prospect posts I decided to choose David Robertson as our next player to look back on. I was skeptical to do so because, unlike everyone else that I chose, David does not have nearly the MLB experience and sample size as the others to prove or disprove the scouting report. David Robertson is a guy that came out of no where though as far as Yankees prospects go, is a great guy with his High Socks for Hope foundation, and most importantly follows us @GreedyStripes on twitter so I decided to include him anyway... Enjoy.



David Robertson, better known as Houdini to most Yankees fans and teammates, was born in Birmingham Alabama on April 9th 1985 so Happy Birthday to you a little early from The Greedy Pinstripes!!! David started  at short stop and pitcher in High School at Central Tuscaloosa High Shcool where he started his first three years at school.  There he helped his team win back to back area titles as well as back to back 6A State Playoff appearances. In his Senior year his high school was split into three smaller schools and David was sent to Paul W. Bryant High School where he led his Stampede team to an Area title and a 5A State Playoff appearance. That is one hell of a high school career if you ask me.

David then attended the University of Alabama for college and as a freshmen in 2005 he led the South Eastern Conference (SEC) with a .183 Batting average against (BAA) with a team high 32 games played, 3 of them being as a starting pitcher.  That season he was named Freshman All SEC team and Freshmen All American by Baseball America.  His success did not stop there as he led the Crimson Tide to a 25th SEC title in his sophmore season appearing in 29 games and led all of the SEC with 10 saves. David Robertson was 21 years old after that season so that made him eligible for the MLB First Year Player draft after his sophmore season and not after his junior season like most college players. The Yankees ended up drafting him in the 17th round of that draft in 2006. That season he also played in the Cape Cod league in summer ball and ended up winning the Cape Cod League MVP. The Yankees signed him in August of 2006 .

In college Robertson threw very hard while easily and comfortable sitting in the 94-95 mph range. He now obviously sits in the low 90's with what is described as a "natural" cutter. Robertson, surprisingly not that you can tell by his stats, actually struggled with his control while in college. Control is something that he has definitively not struggled with in his major league career. In college, and it is still true today, he had a fastball that he could not throw straight to save his life thus making it a "natural" cutter to go along with a plus curve ball and a plus slider.

David Robertson, albeit in a short sample size, has had a very good start to his career. Being called up in 2008 from Scranton (twice) he did not take advantage of the experience, being sent down the first time after compiling a 6.31 ERA. In 2009 he was called up again from AAA after a Xavier Nady injury shut him down but was sent down the very next day to make room for Juan Miranda. Finally in May of 2009 Robertson was called up, and stayed up, after a Brian Bruney injury. The 2009 playoffs is where he received his name of "Houdini" as he came into two separate situation with multiple runners on, once in each of the ALDS and ALCS, and did not allow a single run to score.

David Robertson was named an American League all star in 2011, replacing David Price, and finished that season with an astounding 100 strike outs as the Yankees set up man.He also received one vote, probably from his mother, in the AL CY Young and AL MVP award voting in 2011.  David Robertson, in my opinion, is the heir apparent to Yankees closer Mariano Rivera. All the best to him and his family and especially to his foundation the High Socks for Hope, which I recommend everyone checking out. Basically he set it up to help members of his home town in Alabama recover from the tornado strikes in 2011 and even donated $100 for every strike out that he got in 2011.

That is it. Our special edition posts of Meet A Prospect is over. I hope you enjoyed, I hope you shared the posts, and most of all I hope you learned something. Thank you everyone for reading.

Happy Easter Yankees Fans

Your treat for this Easter will be the Yankees finishing their opening series against the Rays down at Tropicana Field at 1:05 pm ET on the YES network. Phil Hughes will "need" to be our "savior" and "rise above" all the shifts and that good stuff to stop the bleeding for these Yankees fans who are already thinking that the sky is falling. Here are the lineups for the Yanks today.

Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Mark Teixeira 1B
Nick Swisher DH
Raul Ibanez RF
Brett Gardner LF
Chris Stewart C