Hey how about some even later than usual graphs?? I have no excuse, I’m just lazy. And honestly this is going to be a comparatively lazy post because I’m stupidly busy once again. So apologies in advance for all laziness.
Here’s where we are up to this point (two weeks ago or so) in the season:
Click for the full-size version.
July was a good month for Yankees pitching. That wonderful difference between ERA and xFIP means that they didn’t give up as many homeruns as expected with a normalized HR/FB rate.
Let’s take a quick look at the breakdown for the month:
Click for the full-size version.
Looking at this, you can see that the rotation was 1) Very good; 2) Pretty much performed (as a whole) as their peripherals said they would. Don’t mistake this for every pitcher in the rotation being awesome,we’ll take a look at that a little further down.
The bullpen has been very good as of late, and their numbers in July reinforce this. Relievers can and do often outperform their peripherals such as HR/FB%. It’s not necessarily a skill or something you should count on as repeatable but it’s not an uncommon occurrence in the limited amount of innings relievers pitch. Take, for example, Mariano Rivera’s career HR/FB rate of 6.3%. And no, not everyone is Mariano—not even close—but do remember that he pitches quite a lot of the relief innings put in by the Yankees bullpen.
Click for the full-size version.
Last month is eerily similar to the first month of the year, no? Anyway, since it’s silly to pretend the rotation was all performing on that level let’s take a look at how each member fared:
| IP | ERA | FIP | xFIP | K/9 | BB/9 | BABIP | LOB% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A.J. Burnett | 27 | 2.00 | 3.43 | 4.76 | 6.67 | 3.00 | 0.291 | 86.70% |
| Andy Pettitte | 16 1/3 | 3.86 | 5.36 | 4.31 | 8.82 | 4.41 | 0.302 | 87.20% |
| CC Sabathia | 43 | 2.30 | 2.65 | 3.92 | 7.33 | 3.56 | 0.348 | 74.60% |
| Dustin Moseley | 6 | 1.50 | 3.26 | 4.17 | 6.00 | 3.00 | 0.236 | 85.70% |
| Javier Vazquez | 32 1/3 | 3.34 | 4.33 | 4.79 | 5.01 | 2.23 | 0.247 | 79.00% |
| Phil Hughes | 29 1/3 | 5.52 | 5.92 | 4.70 | 6.44 | 2.15 | 0.271 | 74.60% |
| Sergio Mitre | 4 1/3 | 10.38 | 7.01 | 4.96 | 2.08 | 2.08 | 0.348 | 26.30% |
To the shock of no one who watches baseball CC Sabathia was the anchor of the Yankees rotation. He was very, very good and his numbers are a very large part of why the overall rotation numbers looked so great.
Andy’s FIP is exaggerated by the 2 1/3 innings he pitched (walking 3) before getting pulled with a groin injury. We miss him and he should come back before I hang myself after watching Dustin Moseley pitch (it’s not Moseley’s fault he just is what he is, and that is not very good).
The reason Burnett and Sabathia have such big differences in their FIP/xFIP is that they gave up so few homeruns in July (big old duh, I know). To be specific, AJ gave up 1 and CC 0. Hard to believe about AJ specifically, but there you have it.
Javier Vazquez was who he is, and Phil Hughes has been working through a bought of Babypitcheritis.
To be fair, Hughes’ numbers are exaggerated by two bad starts. He also had a very good start and two ok starts. Then again, that sort of month is Babypitcheritis in a nutshell. I’m sure he’ll be fine.
Click for the full-size version.
The bullpen went from horrifying to hooray pretty quickly and stayed that way. This is thanks to David Robertson turning things around (which I knew he would because he is clearly powered by my love), Boone Logan somehow turning into a good pitcher (I don’t get it either, but I’ll take it as long as it lasts), no more Chan Ho Park (sorry things didn’t work out, buddy) and so on. Life’s been good lately. No complaints!