Saturday, April 20, 2013

Game 18 Lineup: Yankees @ Blue Jays

Brett Gardner CF
Ben Francisco DH
Robinson Cano 2B
Kevin Youkilis 1B
Vernon Wells LF
Francisco Cervelli C
Ichiro Suzuki RF
Eduardo Nunez SS
Jayson Nix 3B

RHP Hiroki Kuroda

3 comments:

  1. He haunts Buehrle as well. I loathe that Ben Francisco is in this lineup.

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  2. Bad lineup choice by Girardi putting Francisco in the 2-hole. Francisco is the weak link on this team and you bat him 2nd between Gardner and Cano? I know he did it to split up his lefties but why Francisco? Does he think that Gibbons will hesitate to bring in a LH reliever to face Gardner and Cano because he'll also have to face Francisco?

    It almost killed us when Francisco struck out looking with 2nd and 3rd and no outs. How do you look at 6 straight pitches without swinging in a situation like that?

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  3. You have every reason to loathe it. Girardi is hypnotized by numbers in his binder so he's looking at Francisco's 3 for 9 career mark vs Buehrle with 3 singles but he hasn't faced him since 2008-2009 and Francisco has sucked every season since then.

    Meanwhile you have a guy like Hafner who has been the team's best hitter ALL year with a 1,207 OPS. We know Hafner struggles vs LHP but Buehrle isn't the type of lefty that is tough on lefty hitters and Pronk has faced Buehrle twice as much as anyone on the team from playing in the same division for years. Hafner has a solid .801 OPS vs Buehrle with 3 HRs and even more importantly he's 6 for 16 with a 1,161 OPS vs him since 2010.

    If you want to throw out the #s, Hafner is your hottest hitter while Francisco looks like a deer in the headlights at the plate with his big bug eyes.

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Sorry for the Capatcha... Blame the Russians :)