Phil Hughes made his return to Arlington, the site of a traumatic event in his young career. As a hotshot 20 year-old and top pitching prospect, Hughes was at the top of his game, tossing 6 1/3 no-hit innings and keeping the Rangers on the ropes. This all changed with one pitch, a curveball to Mark Teixeira, where Hughes went for a little too much, and injured his hamstring.
2 years later Hughes, now 22, has experienced both success and frustration. Filling in for Chien Ming-Wang, Hughes has been up-and-down, though he had posted quality starts in his last 2 outings. Returning to the site of his injury, you would have to imagine that Hughes was looking to dispel the bad memories from his last appearence in Texas. And with Wang back in the majors, Hughes’ time in the rotation might be numbered, so the pressure was on him to pitch well.
And pitch well he did. With the Yankees exploding for 11 runs against Ranger pitching, highlighted by a 5 for 5 day by Alex Rodriguez, Hughes allowed just 3 hits and a walk in 8 innings of work, while striking out 6. He was very efficient against the free-swinging Rangers, throwing just 101 pitches, and this allowed him to make it through 8 innings. His fastball was consistently in the 92-93 range, his control was good, and his curveball was sharp. He was able to obtain swinging strikes on both curveballs and fastballs, though I didn’t see many changeups. I liked that he was fired up and wanted to finish the game.
It was another encouraging win for the Yankees, with a powerful offense bolstering an excellent outing from the rotation. Hughes, by shutting out a hot Texas team for 8 innings, probably earned himself another start.
In other news, Dave Robertson has been promoted from Scranton to replace Brian Bruney, who was placed on the disabled list with continued pain in his elbow. Though the last MRI looked good, the Yankees don’t want Bruney pitching through elbow pain. I hope Robertson gets a chance to show what he can do with regular work, because I think he can become a reliable reliever in the Yankee ‘pen.
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“Hughes, by shutting out a hot Texas team for 8 innings, probably earned himself another start.”
If you saw the latest “Joe Girardi Show” on YES, he made it clear that they’re going to take things very slow with Wang, and that Hughes is in the rotation for the foreseeable future.
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I don’t think Phranchise is going to be going back to AAA unless it’s a rehab start. Not when he can get swings and misses with his fastball vs good MLB hitters. (Along with a solid curve and cutter.)
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Steve S. Reply:
May 26th, 2009 at 6:14 am
That cutter moves a lot, Gameday was even calling it a slider. That’s the difference for him, it keeps lefties honest.
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The curve was awesome today. He mixed his pitches much better. His willingness to throw the curve behind in the count was the huge difference along with awesome command of his fastball.
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I don’t think he throws the change-up anymore, I haven’t seen one in the last two starts. Almost all pitchers that throw the cutter, don’t have a change-up…most of them go with a splitter/curve.
Even Mo can’t get a change-up to work for him, before he developed the cutter he had a very good change-up along with a FB.
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