May in the pitching ranks of the New York Yankees went pretty much the way of April. Most of the starters struggled – Michael Pineda was the obvious exception. The bullpen began to look tired: the inevitable result of overuse, caused by sub-standard starting.
The starting rotation has, probably, been less than the Yankees wanted it to be in April. And it has lost one very notable player through injury. However, it has been bolstered by a stellar bullpen which has done very little wrong.
Let’s look over the pros and cons in the second half of our monthly survey…
The Yankees have got off to a surprisingly good start to the season with a 14-8 record in April. This becomes doubly surprising when we consider that they got off to a 3-6 run in their first nine games. Both the bullpen and large sections of the offensive line-up have done better than we had any reason to expect and whilst there are more than a few weak links, there is good reason to think they can at least stay with the pace of a division which doesn’t have a clearly outstanding team.
Let’s survey who is doing well and not so well…
The Yankees have had a pretty good Spring Training with a 15-12 record at the point I am writing this article which ranks them 4th in the American League and 4th in the Grapefruit League.
In this article, we will survey the players who are possibles to make the opening day roster and check out what they have done in the Spring games…
Sometimes an article changes direction just as you’re writing it and this is one because the Yankees’ progress over the last month has had more twists than the average tornado.
First there was their majorly disappointing decision not to make an offer to David Robertson. If you’d asked me in September who was the most important player that the Yankees must re-capture in 2015 then there would be no doubt in my mind that it would have been Robertson.
As we move on to the second half of our survey of the Yankees’ performance in September, we find a fairly surprising picture amongst the pitchers. Whilst the team averaged giving up between 3 and 4 runs a game which is pretty competitive, more surprising was that those who had been successful prior to September struggled and some new faces were successful.
As the 2014 season draws to its conclusion and the Yankees role in that season has already ended, it merely remains for us to look at the month of September. In our next two articles, we will look back on individual performances but first let’s summarise those changes which took place after the trading deadline and the roster expansion.
twilightdawning 