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I don't think the Hughes comments are fair in the least. (Yes, I'm commenting on Hughes again.)

It's not fair to say Hughes' upside is a 3 any more than it's fair to say Joba will be an ace, Kennedy a 5, and Clippard not even a major-leaguer. You can't say what a 21/22 year old kid is going to become. You can't judge Hughes based on this one season. And even if you do judge him based on this season, saying it's a "disappointment" is more than a little disengenuous or ignorant. Phil -- apparently his nickname is Peej, just like P.J. Harvey (the first and only P.J. Harvey reference on this site, no doubt) -- is striking out a man per inning, which I find impressive. I think the most important thing he brought with him to the majors is his ability to strike men out.

Phil has plus-stuff. Who knows, as far as rotation placement, where he'll end up. But no one has that crystal ball, and anyone who thinks what they see today is all he has -- that he can't improve -- is a fool. The YES crew showed the stats of the great pitchers when they were Phil's age and he was in the same range as them. And in some cases better (again, the strikeout numbers are key).

Also, why would an AL executive have anything positive to say about a Yankee prospect?

The whole 1-starter, 2-starter thing is blurred now. I think you have an ace (Santana, Peavy, whoever) and everyone else. I don't think much separates a 2 from a 3 or a 3 from a 4 nowadays. I think the only truly definded slots are 1 and 5.

I take it this is the same AL executive who probably never even heard of Joba Chamberlain before August of this year. Or the same AL executive who swore to God that Robinson Cano would never amount to anything and questioned his range at second base. And, perhaps, it's the same executive who opined loudly that the Mariners' Jeremy Reed was the second coming of Willie Mays. Look, why trust the opinion of an anonymous "AL executive" when, for all we know, he could be in the Baltimore Orioles front office. And, well, you get the point. Considering that most organizations in the majors routinely fail to break .500 year-to-year, why do baseball writers even listen to these anonymous execs?

By the way, Steve, hang in there. I appreciate your take on Yankees' matters, whether I'm in agreement or not. The fact you're not a knee-jerk fanboy makes your blog good, stimulating reading.

Keith Law of ESPN had a long notebook posting about Phil Hughes' performance last night. You need Insider access to read it but the gist of it was that Hughes didn't look good to Law last night. I am curious if anyone else read it and what they're take on it was.

http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?name=law_keith

First of all let me say I am NOT a Phil Hughes fanboy. The point on Hughes might end up being accidentally correct. However, it is definitely unfair because the AL exec based his opinion on his intution, given the lack of history on Hughes. Now unless that AL exec on record was Billy Beane, I highly doubt his "feelings" are any better than mine or yours. Let things play out for a few seasons, then we will decide whether Hughes is a colossal bust or not.

JohnnyC - thanks

~~~Keith Law of ESPN had a long notebook posting about Phil Hughes' performance last night. You need Insider access to read it but the gist of it was that Hughes didn't look good to Law last night. I am curious if anyone else read it and what they're take on it was.~~~

I don't have insider. But, the only thing I could guess that would be a concern about last night was the three "free" outs that Hughes got when the umps blew two calls on Ichiro and when Duncan nailed Ibanez at 2nd. Three outs equals one inning. Take away those 3 outs, the one inning, and then last night was the same old story for Phil: 5 IP and near 100 pitches. Is that what Law mentioned?

baileywalk -- I read this entry and then read the comments and you wrote exactly what I was going to write. I think that there's nothing more phony than know-it-all anonymous executives (or some of the writers at Baseball Prospectus) labeling a kid as a 1,2,3,4, or 5 starter. Take Wang, for instance, no one saw him as being as good as he has been.

I read Law's entry. The most important thing that he said is that Hughes is not pitching his game. He thinks that his velocity is down because he's still having trouble with the leg (he also cites Hughes' soft landing as confirmation of a lingering injury). This makes any judgment of Hughes based on his performance this year all the more misguided.

I could guess that would be a concern about last night was the three "free" outs that Hughes got when the umps blew two calls on Ichiro and when Duncan nailed Ibanez at 2nd. Three outs equals one inning. Take away those 3 outs, the one inning, and then last night was the same old story for Phil: 5 IP and near 100 pitches.
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I think that's a grand leap of an assumption there. You can't say definitively that Hughes would have gone 5/100 if the umps get those calls right (the play at second got called because Molina threw him out by a mile; the play at first was just a really bad call). And I don't really understand faulting a pitcher for the nice plays made behind him. Defensive plays and breaks are a part of pitching performances. When Mark Buehrle threw his no-hitter, Dye took a home run away from someone. Doesn't mean the no-hitter shouldn't count. Sometimes you get saved with nice plays and killed with bloops.

Yes, bailey, but, as you know, Yankees get graded differently. They're not supposed to benefit from great defensive plays, bad umpiring, bloop hits, seeing eye bleeders past the pitcher's mound, or lucky squirrels. That's only for the bloody sock types of the world who play far beyond the environs of The Bronx. As it was, so shall it ever be. Keith Law just puts a nicer ribbon on his commentary.

~Take away those 3 outs, the one inning, and then last night was the same old story for Phil: 5 IP and near 100 pitches.~

Your attempt to prove your point isn't logical unless you've used the same method in all of Hughes' starts and also taken into account any offsets in things such as fielding and mental errors by teammates. I'm not recommending that at all but if you look for adjustments in only one direction what value is that?

Why are you trying to back into your "5IP / 100P" when that wasn't his performance? It's like saying every day's temperature this week has been 90 and even though today was 109 if we pretend it was 90 instead that would make the average temperature 90 for the week.

Would you accept that type of argument in a matter you didn't agree on? I don't think you would.

I don't think the off season is as dire as Stark paints it. I don't see any way the Yankees let Rivera or Posada walk. Odds are they'll extend A-Rod. Clemens really has no place left to go without it being awkward if he wants to pitch next year. Giambi has one year left whether we like it or not, and its not worth losing his bat and paying half his salary to go away. The only guy I could see them paying to leave is Mussina, and that's if he proves over the next month that he really has hit the wall. Torre is the one guy whose future really hangs on this postseason.