Tuesday, May 17, 2016

Luis Severino, Michael Pineda & Why Spring Training Stats Don’t Matter


Heading into the 2016 regular season the New York Yankees had to feel pretty good about what they had done this winter and what they had heading into the new season. They had their ace healthy in Masahiro Tanaka with the promise of a much sharper splitter after offseason elbow surgery to remove bone spurs and they had a promising up-and-coming staff. Luis Severino many donned as the current and future ace of the staff while many believed Michael Pineda was ready to break out in a big way in 2016 after a strong spring. Nathan Eovaldi was healthy, Ivan Nova was in his second year removed from Tommy John surgery, which as we know is usually always much better than the first, and CC Sabathia was sober and level-headed with a new knee brace and look on life. The Yankees felt like, with their bullpen especially, they had a chance to compete when they headed out of spring training this year and then the regular season and real life hit the team, especially Severino and Pineda.

Looking at these two right-handers spring training stats you would think that the Yankees were on their way to having a three-headed monster in the rotation as well as in the bullpen but to date that has never come to fruition.


Severino has struggled and has been the loser in every decision he’s had this season while Pineda has struggled with his command and his location for much of the season. Pineda all of a sudden has fears and nightmares of the first inning while Severino struggled with his command and his control of his best pitch before landing on the disabled list with a triceps strain. Meanwhile Tanaka came out of the spring gates slow and has been nothing less than advertised thus far this season for New York.


So what do spring training stats mean in the grand scheme of things? Very little to nothing and I’m leaning more towards nothing than anything. 

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