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July 22, 2007

My Boy, Sherman On Iggy & Joba

From Joel Sherman -

A thought to make Yankees fans nauseous: Their player who is currently signed furthest into the future is Kei Igawa through 2011. .. The Yankees have used the oldest player in the AL this season (Roger Clemens, 44) and the youngest (Phil Hughes, 21).

Multiple executives said they have been led to believe the Yanks' near-future plan is to put Hughes into the rotation, use Jeff Karstens as a long man and call up Joba Chamberlain, who is dominating in Double-A, to work in relief. An NL executive who saw Chamberlain said, "He is legit. His stuff is impressive and he has presence on the mound. There's no doubt he's good."

Kei Igawa. 2011. Great, just great.

We keep hearing about Joba Chamberlain joining the pen. Man, Torre is going to kill him. It will either be the Edwar-trick, where Joe uses him once every 12 days, or, it will be the Sturtze-trick, where Joe uses him until his arm falls off. Either way, I feel sorry for the kid, if he is, indeed, coming up to work in the billpen.

Posted by Steve Lombardi at July 22, 2007 08:36 AM

Comments

god, please dont bring Joba up as anything less than a starter. his arm is too valuable to have Joe messing with it.

but i still think he should remain in the minors this year (until sept. of course). his change needs work, and he should at least spend time in AAA to refine everything.

Posted by: Travis G. [TypeKey Profile Page] at July 22, 2007 06:23 PM

I didn't know Peter Gammons was the new GM for the Yankees. It was Gammons who first floated the idea that Joba be used out of the pen...partly because he thinks there's some parallel to Papelbon and partly because he'd love to see the Yankees destroy one of their legion of young arms that will help the team dominate the AL East for the next decade. Papelbon never demonstrated the ability to pitch effectively past the 5th inning. Moving him to the pen at the age of 25 was a last ditch effort to save his prospect status and to solve the Red Sox's closer problem. Joba's situation isn't remotely similar: he's been clocked in the high 90s in the 7th inning of his starts. If other ML executives think that's our plan, I hope Cashman's just getting the price down on the relievers he's actually attempting to acquire.

Posted by: JohnnyC [TypeKey Profile Page] at July 23, 2007 11:41 AM