So yet again we have another instance of Girardi overusing the bullpen and having a quick hook with his starter. This is getting worse and worse with every passing night. He's always pissed off fans with his mismanagement of the bullpen, but it's really getting terrible. At least he's always pissed me off with this. Justin Montgomery was 5 innings into his start. He had thrown 65 pitches, given up one run and retired 9 straight up until that point. He's also taken CC out incredibly early the past couple starts as well. While CC can be shaky at times he's a guy that can battle through one bad inning and give you another solid couple innings after that. He took CC or Severino out a couple weeks ago to put Kahnle in for one out before going to Betances in the following inning. He buys into lefty/righty matchups way too damn much too. He even does it in the lineup too in trying so hard to split them up so that the player placement in the lineup doesn't always make sense. I understand that we have an exorbitant amount of good relievers. But these guys need to be given a shot to pitch a bit longer in games they're cruising. It's bad for their confidence, the pen is going to be burned out very quickly, and the starters aren't going to have any ability to go deeper than 5 because that's what they're used to. Frustrating. /end rant
I'm shocked we didn't not see any combination of Kahnle/Robertson/Betances/Chapman in today's 8-1 win. Every win counts. Can't take any chances Witt Chasen Shreve & friends normally. Edit: i spoke too soon without really inspecting the box scoreboard. Kahnle faced one batter in what took three relievers to close out two innings. Brilliant.
SOLID start by Jaime Garcia. Chapman walks the bases loaded and then gets bailed out by an awful base running play by Eduardo Nunez as he gets thrown out at third on a sac fly by Aaron Hicks. He did make the second out at third not the first or third but Jesus Christ. The dude was in scoring position with one out in a one run game, and ran on Hicks whom has a cannon. Not to mention Chapman hadn't been able to find the strike zone all inning and Betances was warming to come in and blow the game on his own. Awful awful baseball play. Solid win for the Yanks though. Needed that after a so-so performance in Toronto. Good momentum with Severino pitching tomorrow as we'll likely take a loss to Sale on Sunday night. Cmon boys!
In scoring position already with one out, he tagged on a flyball to left field with 4-5-6 coming up in the order. And Chapman already couldn't find the strike zone walking the bases loaded. That play was also huge for momentum. Great play, but making a critical out at third in the 9th is always a bad baseball play.