Wednesday Morning

And still remain razor sharp.
Brooklyn, New York - April 2007

Now the Yankees are in sole possession of last place, and I'm not the least bit surprised. The more I listen to John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman on the radio the more I wonder how the game got to the point that it's in now. The point where pitch counts are the single most important stats--at least according to them. They're more important than strikes, more important that balls, more important than how many guys has the guy gotten out. They spend a lot of time theorizing and conjecturing about how many pitches Joe Torre will let Pavano, or Wang, or Pettitte go. What happened to the days when being taken out of a game was punishment? What ever happened to the days when pitchers were allowed to go so long as they don't suck? What happened to the art of throwing a great game? When Mark Beuherle thew his no-hitter last week, it took him 104 pitches. I was a little bit surprised they let him finish. I wonder if Joe would have let him. I wonder when the Players' Association will file a greivance against the White Sox for they overworking him.

I've been thinking a lot about where baseball went wrong. It's easy to say that the owners simply don't want to risk injuring their investment by over-using them, and I know art and business don't exactly mix, but I'd bet checking through the records, there's a direct correlation between higher salaries and more time spent on the disabled list. Where does that come from? Does it really make good business sense to basically pay these guys all this money to throw two thirds or a half of a season? It's clear starting pitchers, with a few exceptions, can no longer throw more than 5 or so innings. How is that an improvement?

It's easy to put the blame on the Yanks' injuries, regardless of their source, but I think that's a cop out. Am I the only one who thinks it's absurd that the Yanks have guy like Mike Myers** who can only face one batter, and Kyle Farnsworth who can't pitch more than one inning, and can't pitch on consecutive days, on their roster, yet they can't find room for Bernie Williams? Am I the only one who thinks that needing six pitchers, including two guys who only face one batter, to get through a garden variety 6-3 (for instance) win is actually creating *MORE* work for the already tired bullpen? Is baseball heading toward football-style special teams?

The cynic in me thinks that the reason pitching has gone this way is because it makes the pitching worse overall. When there's worse pitching, there are more home runs. More home runs sell.

The cynic in me also says that the reason for this is more pitching changes allow more commercial breaks and lengthens the game (insufferably). So, there's more money from advertisers.

For the longest time, I looked forward to baseball. Give me all you got. I love pitching. a nothing-nothing game is the way to go for me. I'd watch every pitch, but as time went on, that started to happen less and less. So, I started to imagine that instead of Kenny Rogers or Mike Witt, or Kevin Brown pitching, it was Ron Guidry or Dave Righetti or George Frazier. Gary Sheffield wasn't in right field, Winfield was in the games I was half imagining. I can't even do that anymore. Something needs to be done.

As far as I know the only saving grace is that Topps still doesn't pitch any pitch count-related stats on the backs of their cards. Or do they?

This team seems like it's gone a long, long way from that balmy October night in 1996. Has it really been that long?

-=-

Photo taken with a Nikkormat EL on expired Fuji Superia 200.

Labels: baseball, coffee, fuji, fuji superia, nikkormat, nikon, remote control, yankees