New York Nine

Aliteration, you know you love it. Chien-Ming Wang, at least for me has always been sort of a guy hard to figure out. When he came up you noticed right away how awesome that sinker of his is, how it made guys just look ridiclous, forcing grounder after grounder, but most people were not convinced. Indeed, as most self-respecting sabermatricians (guys who study baseball stats) will tell you, pitchers need to be able to strike out at least at a league average of 5 or so per nine innings to hope to be effective over a long period of time. Sure a guy can get away with it for awhile, but it eventually catches up to you. But despite this commonly held view, Wang just kept doing his thing, getting ground balls, eating up innings and most importantly, winning. Indeed, even after missing most of last year from 2005-2008 he ranked 15th overall in wins in the majors and 20th in ERA with a 3.78ERA, becoming a bulwark of the rotation for the yankees. As time went on and he became more effective he emerged as the "Ace" but the role never seemed to fit, at times looking very bad when matched up against the Josh Becketts and CC Sabbathia's of the AL, most notably absolutely imploding in the 2006 ALDS in his two starts against the Indians. But now its 2009, and instead of having to face CC Sabbathia they're teammates, moving Wang into the more comfortable number 2 starter, and what a 2 he is? For sure, how many teams have number 2 starts who are two 19 game winners? And yet somehow its not gone all to plan, the new guys have stepped up, but Wang flounders alone, posting some staggeringly bad numbers in three starts only lasting three innings and an obscene 34.50 ERA, what happened? What went wrong?


I wish I could say I know what's going on or see what's the problem with Wang, but he's been too painful to watch. Instead of forcing guys to hit what some guys call 'a bowling ball' sinker, he's become a mess, tossing belt high sinkers that aren't sinking and guys are absolutely crushing him at historic levels. Of the 18 pitchers since 1954, to give up seven or more earned runs in three consecutive starts, Chien-Ming Wang’s totals are by far the worst of the lot and no one knows why. Dave Eiland the Yankees pitching coach seems to think that his mechanics are ot of wack but Wang doesn't think so. Girardi wonders if Wang is hurt, but again Wang insists that he feels fine. I for one think that it has something to do with his foot that he injured last year on the basepaths, possibly he is still unsure about pushing off on his foot so he's not getting the good sink on his pitches, but whatever the reason I am worried. Perhaps this is the law of averages finally compensating for Wang's lack of other pitches or something mental, but whatever the reason its causing a great deal of problems for the yankees. Wang is out of options to be sent to the minors so he can't go back down and work on stuff like say Brett Myers did last year or Cliff Lee the year before and he's not really "injured" although I guess they could just make something up. Something must be done about Chien-Ming Wang because trotting him out there every five days is clearly not a good idea.


All of this said, it could be a whole lot worse for the Yankees right now. Consider the fact that they've been absolutely embarassed four times this season already and yet they're still one game over .500 and in second place and that's with one of their starters absolutely shitting the bed everytime he's in there, giving them less than two innings per start and absolutely killing a bullpen without a long man. Add in the fact their best player is out, well second place isn't too shabby.