Putting together a truly complete pitching staff is a hard thing to do for any major league team, even the Yankees. Hell, getting five men together to form a rotation is hard enough. Luckily, the Yankees seem to have more than five guys who could be in a rotation. In fact, the Yankees’ fifth best and sixth best starters might be the third or fourth best starters on other teams.

Of course, I’m talking about Joba Chamberlain and Phil Hughes. The one who doesn’t fill the fifth starter role will likely be in the bullpen (even if I don’t want it to happen, but I’m assuming my “wish” won’t come true). It’s safe to assume that the non-starter will be the last brick in the “Bridge to Mowhere”, and be the designated-eighth-inning-set-up-whatever man.

That leaves five more roles to be filled in the bullpen (assuming a 12 man pitching staff and a 13 man “lineup”). Who will fill what roles? Let’s discuss, shall we?

Long Men/Spot Starters:
There are legitimately three guys who could fill this role, and if you wanna get frisky, four (Jophil Chamberhughes could do long relief to get more innings. Wouldn’t that be a mind blower?). The three are Alfredo Aceves, Sergio Mitre, and Chad Gaudin. Something tells me that the Yankees won’t keep all three of these guys around. Aceves’ spot is basically guaranteed. So, that leaves Gaudin and Mitre. The latter has pitched relatively well in Spring Training but it’s unlikely he can succeed in the bullpen. Maybe Mitre is better than he showed in 2009, but I have a feeling that his time with the Yankees is running thin. Chad Gaudin’s ability to occasionally miss bats may play better in relief. Of course, this means Sergio Mitre would be exposed. He’s out of options and, despite my doubts, he’d likely be claimed on waivers. Perhaps, though, the Yankees could work out a trade with some team (probably an NL one).

Now we’ve got 9 pitching spots filled (five starters, Chamberhughes, Ace, Gaudin) so that leaves three more, and the choices are obvious.

The lefty will be Damaso Marte. He appears to be fully healthy and ready to contribute as the great lefty reliever the Yankees thought they were getting in 2008. I’m not saying he’s going to be as lights out as he as in the ALCS and WS, but he’ll be a lot closer to the 130 ERA+ guy he’s been for his career than he will be to the mediocre pitcher he’s been in his time with the Yankees.

Chan Ho Park is another guy who could pitch multiple innings/spot starts out of the bullpen, but could also do well in a one-inning reliever role. The latter role is likely what he’s going to do, though he and Chad Gaudin could flip places and no one would really notice.

Lastly, we come to my favorite Yankee reliever (non-Mo division): David Robertson. I absolutely love this kid. Maybe I’m way too high on him, but I think this dude is certainly the real deal. His two pitch combo is absolutely perfect for a short reliever and it doesn’t hurt that his curveball is just devastating. While everyone thinks that either Chamberlain or Hughes should be “groomed” as the “heir” to Mariano, I think it’s Robertson who should be getting that treatment. I’ll re-state it: I’m really high on this guy and we obviously need to see him keep it up for a full season, but I think this is one guy in whom we can believe.

So, that’s it, 12 men to lead the Yankees on the mound. Here they are, listed by (my projected) role:
SP1: CC Sabathia
SP2: A.J. Burnett
SP3: Andy Pettitte
SP4: Javier Vazquez
SP5: Jophil Chamberhughes

LRP: Alfredo Aceves
LRP: Chad Gaudin

MRP: Chan Ho Park
MRP: David Robertson

LOOGY: Damaso Marte

SU: Jophil Chamberhughes

CL: Mariano Rivera

“If everyone pitches great, we might run them all out again”

That’s what Yankee manager Joe Girardi said in his pregame interview when asked if the 5th starter competition would get wrapped up next week. As Chris reported yesterday they intend to wrap things up soon, but things could get extended with some big performances among the participants.

But it begs a question, one that I thought would be fun to kick around. I think we know that all things being equal, this is a 2 horse race between Joba and Hughes. Let’s assume that both of them pitch lights out in their next outing, and then again in the next run-off outing. So what were effectively doing is taking performance out of the equation, and going with who you believe is the best choice for #5 starter. I’m going to hold off on weighing in, because I don’t want to steer the debate in any particular direction. I’ll do a follow-up piece tomorrow with my choice and the reasons behind it.

So tell me, if both Joba and Hughes are pitching great, who’s your #5 starter?

Not sure if this was mentioned at some point earlier this week, but, according to Tyler Kepner of the New York Times, Yankees skipper, Joe Girardi, “has said he would like to decide on a fifth starter by next Thursday or Friday,” meaning that it is imperative for each of the five competing starters vying for the team’s final rotation spot to make the best of their remaining opportunities (possibly one more game a piece). Basically, this is it. It’s crunch time down in Florida.

Now for a quick tangent…

When you think about it strictly from a statistical perspective, spring training “battles” – assuming there are absolutely no preconceived notions going into them – are extremely asinine. In essence, Girardi, an example here, is making a pivotal pitching decision, one with real consequences, based on a few abbreviated and meaningless outings. Now, I do not view the Yankees’ fifth starter battle as a true spring competition, as Phil Hughes and Joba Chamberlain have always seemed to have inside tracks, but it is still worth noting the inanity of the longstanding spring competition. The only utility I see provided by this practice is that it forces a complacent player to think he is fighting for his spot.

In this case, Joba Chamberlain is that particular player.

Photo by the AP

After Phil Hughes turned in an impressive effort against the Astros last night, Joe Girardi had the following to say:

“He threw the ball extremely well tonight,” Girardi said. “Attacked the strike zone. Had a good curveball. Threw some good changeups tonight. He let his fielders do the work, too. He looked good tonight. It seems like his fastball command gets better and better each outing, and that’s important.”

Being that spring training results are largely irrelevant (Hughes pitched 4 innings against scrubs from the worst lineup in the sport), it is important to see that Girardi felt Hughes was throwing well. This has rightfully lead many to proclaim Hughes as the obvious frontrunner for the 5th starter job. However, it has also lead to some posts that have imparted an air of finality to Joba Chamberlain’s career as a starter. Most notable is the following article by Joel Sherman, that I will run through in order to dispel some of the myths included therein.

Joba Chamberlain is scheduled to pitch four innings today. This is possibly the last time we will ever see him stretched out this long. He is still considered a candidate for the fifth starter’s spot and Joe Girardi is saying he will get at least one more chance after today to work in extended fashion.

But, at this point he would have to change an awful lot of minds – and quickly – that he is best suited for that job. Or else there will be no next long outing or the next long outing will merely be a formality. Today is his starting Waterloo.

I find it hard to believe that the Yankees will give up on three years of development based on 10 spring training innings. Joba had an ERA of 3.58 entering August last season, an admirable number for a pitcher in his first full year as a starter. At that point, he began to approach his career innings high and his performance suffered mightily. Basically, we are talking about two bad months as being the impetus for the Yankees sacrificing an immense amount of value for the future. I highly doubt that Brian Cashman would be that shortsighted, and I firmly believe that the loser of this competition will get another chance at the rotation. Expect both Joba and Hughes to be in the rotation in 2011. (On that note, see Fack Youk for an explanation of why sending Joba to AAA rather than the bullpen might make sense).

As I reported on Feb. 3 in this column , many Yankee officials were heading into spring already believing that Phil Hughes was going to be the fifth starter and that Chamberlain was going to be Mariano Rivera’s set-up man. That was based on how Chamberlain’s best fastball returned in the postseason as a starter and so did his confident strut – both elements mostly missing when Joba worked as a starter last year.

This is a myth. Joba’s fastball improved out of the bullpen because that is what happens to most pitchers, but his “best fastball” did not return at all. He was throwing 95-96, which is actually the velocity that he was averaging as a starter in 2008. In fact, that “best” fastball has been mostly absent from Joba’s repertoire since his shoulder injury in late 2008. Regarding the silliness of Joba’s “confident strut,” I did not see it when he nearly cost the Yankees Game 3 against the Angels (triple, sac fly, double in a tie game) and Game 4 against the Phillies (Feliz homer to tie game). He allowed 10 baserunners in 6.1 innings in the postseason. I’m not saying that he cannot be an effective reliever going forward, but the 2009 postseason is certainly not evidence that supports such a conclusion.

The Yanks truly wanted to believe his repertoire screamed front-of-the-rotation starter and they did an awful lot of work – most of it controversial based on the Joba Rules – to try to shoehorn him into that role. But actions speak louder than words. And Joba’s actions – no matter what he says – are those of someone who wants to relieve and, more important, is mentally built to relieve.

I like Joel Sherman, but this is the typical revisionist history that is only spewed by people who never heard of Chamberlain until he toed the rubber in New York. Joba was a starter in college, a starter in the minors, and became a mega-prospect based on his work in the minor league rotation. The Yankees did no shoehorning, and it was not a matter of the Yankees “truly wanting to believe” that he was a fit as a starter. On the contrary, there was not a scout in all of baseball that would have pegged Chamberlain for the bullpen before the Yankees put him there in August of 2007. He was seen as a power arm with four above average pitches, and projected as an ace. If Joba had never been put in the bullpen for that stretch run, we would be discussing whether he should be in the rotation or in Scranton, because the bullpen would not be an option.

He gets, perhaps, a final chance to change minds today. But if it is more of what we have seen so far in spring, a combination of lack of endurance and refinement, then Joba might not get another shot in five days to work extended innings. Instead, he might be heading to his old new job out of the pen; this time permanently.

I certainly hope not. If Joba Chamberlain never sees the rotation again, the Yankees will have made a massive mistake.

We have been bandying about the various options that the Yankees have at 5th starter for a while now, and I thought it might be interesting to add some numbers to the discussion. I asked people on Twitter to provide projections for each player in each role, assuming that they spent the entire season in that role. Fangraphs currently does something similar with projections, and noted sabermatrician Tom Tango is a major believer in crowdsourcing. Small sample size and sampling issues definitely apply, but I think the averaged projected performances are quite reasonable. Thank you to everyone who participated. These were the results:

As Starters (bottom row is the average)

As Relievers (bottom row is the average)

As you can see, this leaves us with the following permutations, assuming all three make the club:

So, what does this all mean? It suggests that Yankees fans believe that all three permutations will be fairly effective, and that there is really not much of a difference between the options. In fact, if you add a slightly above replacement level pitcher (say, Sergio Mitre) to option #3 to make up the innings that it lacks relative to option #1, #1 and #3 are practically identical. Even option #2, which lags a bit behind even before the replacement level innings are added, still only shows a difference of 5-6 runs over an entire season, which is equivalent to about half a win. Based on these numbers, it would make sense for the Yankees to have either Joba or Hughes in the rotation for developmental reasons. Since the computed difference to the club in 2010 would be marginal at best, the Yankees can consider developmental concerns when choosing a 5th starter.

Brian Burkhart chimed in yesterday with a fantastic post about the difficulties that a team like the Yankees faces when trying to develop young pitching:

Now, let me first state that this is a great problem to have. But the reality is, because the Yankees are expected to compete for the World Series every single year, it is difficult for them to give young starters the experience they need. In a perfect world, at least for Joba and Hughes, both pitchers would be allowed to make however many starts they needed to reach their innings cap. The Yankees can’t just run both pitchers out there though; they tried that in 2008 with Ian Kennedy and Hughes, to disastrous results. So instead, in comes Javier Vazquez……

The big market teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, and Mets have been accused in the past of using other teams like a farm system, but sometimes when it comes to starters, this is simply the most effective method. Look at how hard it is to juggle the development of 2 young starters.

Brian is right on the money here, as developing pitchers in a winning environment is difficult in terms of both perception and execution. Fans and media expect clubs like the Yankees and Red Sox to do what is best for the club at the present moment, and frequently suggest moves that might improve the team in the short -term but are not in the long-term best interests of the club. Teams shut down pitchers due to workload concerns all the time, but it gains negative attention when the club doing it is in the midst of a pennant race. Even though that sort of perception should not have an impact on decision-making, it is difficult for a club to act as if they were in a vacuum when every member of the media and many of their paying customers disagree with a move.

In terms of execution, even if the club ignores external pressures to send a young starter down or put him in the bullpen, the vagaries of a long season and the typical struggles of a young starter often force the organization’s hand. The team needs to find a balance between short-term and long-term goals, and it is often difficult to gauge what kind of impact a move made for “the now” will have down the line. When the club is in the midst of a pennant race and a young pitcher is struggling in the rotation, the priorities of the team may be altered and decisions that would not be made in Kansas City are undertaken to satisfy the needs of the current roster, often at the expense of the pitcher’s development. These factors combine to make for a inhospitable environment for young pitchers.

From Bill Madden:

Indeed, the fact that Francona is boasting about a five-strong rotation of Josh Beckett, John Lackey, Jon Lester, Daisuke Matsuzaka and Clay Buchholz, with 43-year-old Tim Wakefield, a first-half All-Star last year before he sustained back problems that required surgery, in reserve, should come as unsettling news to Yankee legions watching Joe Girardi conduct endless tryouts for the fifth spot in his rotation.

This is pure silliness from Madden. If all of the Red Sox starters were healthy, they too would be having a competition to figure out the 4th and 5th spots, with Dice-K, Buchholz, and Wakefield vying for the two spots. As it is, the Red Sox are fairly thin in terms of bottom of the rotation starters, with Matsuzaka already hurt and Junichi Tazawa currently the 6th starter. Now, being thin at 7th starter is a problem that most teams would love to have, but the idea the Red Sox have an advantage because their rotation is currently settled is ridiculous.

By contrast, the Yankees have a handful of guys fighting for the 5th spot, but that is in no way indicative of a lack of talent. Joba Chamberlain, Phil Hughes, and Alfredo Aceves would all be solid options in almost every rotation in baseball, and the losers of the rotation battle will give the Yankees enviable starting pitching depth should one of the top 5 get hurt. Both teams have solid depth and are among the best rotations in baseball, and the idea that competition for one spot makes the Yankees weaker is typical myopic thinking from Bill Madden.

Yankee Pitching Coach Dave Eiland weighed yesterday in on the competition for #5 starter’s role. George King of the NY Post has the story:

TAMPA — Nine games and two rainouts into the exhibition season, none of the five pitchers competing for the fifth spot in the Yankees’ rotation has copped a lead.

That means the headliners — Phil Hughes and Joba Chamberlain — are tied with long shots Sergio Mitre, Chad Gaudin and Alfredo Aceves.

“As of right now, if we had to pick one we couldn’t really pick one,” pitching coach Dave Eiland said yesterday after a game against the Nationals in Viera, Fla., was rained out. “The sample is not big enough.”

I’ve said all along the sample will never be big enough. You’re talking about facing AA and AAA hitters for the first few weeks, and many of the MLB vets are either working on things or still getting into shape. That leaves 2 starts at the end of March for them to ‘make a decision’ on, since they said they want thing thing wrapped up a week before the end of Spring Training.  I’ll say it again, I think this entire ‘battle for #5′ is absurd. They know who these pitchers are, and a few weeks of Spring Training shouldn’t change that evaluation, even at the margins.

He adds:

Though Girardi and Eiland said the competition won’t be decided by numbers, Chamberlain clearly needs a solid outing — if only for his confidence — after posting a 27.00 ERA so far this spring.

Yet, Eiland is looking behind the statistics, focusing on what the club is asking pitchers to develop.

“If a pitcher is working on something and it hurts him, we have to understand that,” Eiland said.

(snip)

“It’s not just numbers, it’s the quality of each pitch, pitching ahead in the count, first pitch strikes and stuff,” Eiland said. “Are the outs hit hard? You can give up lasers that get caught and not give up any runs.”

That last sentence can’t be overemphasized, the whole reason why folks have developed stats like BABIP and FIP is to try to isolate the element of luck from a hitter or pitcher’s results. And I’m not saying you can’t get valuable info from the small sample of a few starts, advance scouting is all about that. But to draw a determination of who someone is as a pitcher, and what their role on a team should be based on 2 exhibition starts in March is utterly absurd.

I’ve mantained all along that this is simply a storyline for sportswriters and folks like us to kick around, since Spring Training gets pretty dull in a hurry. But don’t buy what they’re selling you folks, it just doesn’t add up. The Yanks are smart enough to know this.

Here are a few quick items on the evening regarding Phil Hughes and Joba Chamberlain:

• Sam Borden has an interesting piece out on the way the Yankees’ starters work with each other in order to craft and refine their own repertoires. A notable item from the article is that former Yankee, Mike Mussina, advised Phil Hughes to adopt a “spike grip” for his curveball back in ‘06. Hughes tried the grip and has used it ever since.
• According to an unnamed (of course) Yankee executive that spoke with ESPN 1050, on Wednesday, while facing Detroit, the first 2 innings Joba Chamberlain threw prior to giving up 6 earned runs were very good. In fact, the executive claimed that “he thought Chamberlain’s first two innings were the best he has looked in two years.”
• Speaking of Joba, Joe Pawlikowski of River Ave Blues penned a piece on the right-hander’s reduced velocity, noting that he should employ his breaking pitches with greater regularity this season – and in the future – to counteract the loss. I think Joba’s curveball, in particular, is a very good pitch that he needs to use more often.

In 2009, the whiff rate on Joba’s curve was 14.9%, the second highest rate in his four-pitch repertoire, just behind the slider. It was put in play 10.9% of the time, which was actually the lowest rate of the four pitches in his arsenal.

Photo by Reuters Pictures

In all the excitement and joy of the 2009 championship season, there was one area of the club that simply was not very much fun. Joba Chamberlain’s starts over the last two months of the season were excruciating to watch, as the Yankees limited his innings to protect him arm. After all that, it would be quite frustrating to hear that the Yankees still overused him and that he is at risk for an injury. However, according to fantasy site Razzball’s well researched list of 20 pitchers at risk, Joba is in fact in danger of injury or weakened performance.

The criteria for getting on the list include having the previous season being your first full one as a starter, adding upwards of 700 pitches over the prior season, and extensive use of the slider, and Joba meets all three standards. Now, this system is by no means perfect, and the author of the study is still tinkering with the criteria. That said, I do think that the results can teach us something about the Yankees approach to young arms.

Whether it is Razzball’s system or the Verducci effect, Joba exceeded the totals that most freely available systems would have allowed him in 2009. As I have said a number of times in the past, it seems that the Yankees are a bit more liberal with their pitchers than people like Verducci would be. They tend to allow a jump of 40-45 innings over the previous career high, and do not seem to have an overall pitch limit. This is likely based on the results from a proprietary calculation on pitcher injuries and risk. This is an area where research has been largely incomplete, so it is hard to say whether the Yankees are being prudent enough. Hopefully, the results on Joba will help confirm the club’s process as reasonable and adequate.

Photo: Kathy Willens