The Futility Infielder

Shows you what I know. Al Leiter was not party to a double-digit shellacking at the hands of the Red Sox in his Yankee debut. Salvaged off the junk heap, the 39-year-old lefty with the 6.64 ERA reached back and found a part of himself that had gone missing -- namely, the part that knew how to throw first-pitch strikes -- and befuddled the Sox for 6.1 innings, striking out eight and allowing only one run. Behind a pair of two-run homers off of Yankee nemesis Tim Wakefield by Jorge Posada and Gary Sheffield and a solo shot by Alex Rodriguez, the Yanks survived a wild ninth inning to win 5-3, take the series in Boston 3-1, and close to within a half-game of the Sox in the AL East. They won again on Monday night, beating the Texas Rangers in a wild, ugly affair 11-10, while the Sox lost to the othewise hapless Devil Rays, thus moving into first place in the AL East for the first time this season. In the words of the late Mel Allen, "How 'bout that?"

Leiter's effort seemed torn from the pages of a storybook. Drafted by the Yankees 21 years ago and making his first appearance in a Yankee uniform in 16 years, the Grizzled Southpaw Had Come Full Circle, perhaps merely to end his career with a modicum of pinstriped dignity. With the Yanks desperate for able-bodied starters, he seemed worth the gamble even against the patient Sox, especially in a situation in which they had nothing to lose after guaranteeing themselves a split in the series.

Leiter had struggled with his command as a Marlin, walking more batters than he struck out and throwing first-pitch strikes only 49.1 percent of the time, the worst in the majors. On this night, he was much more precise, consistently getting ahead of the hitters with his cut fastball, then forcing them to chase pitches out of the zone. Through four innings, he had thrown first-pitch strikes to 12 out of 16 hitters, whiffing Johnny Damon (twice), David Ortiz, Doug Mirabelli (twice), Mark Bellhorn, and Kevin Millar before the Sox knew what had hit them.

It helped, of course, that that the big Yankee bats came to life early to give Leiter some breathing room. In the second inning, Hideki Matsui slapped a double off the Green Monster, and then Posada, who's struggled mightily of late, drilled a home run into the rightfield corner for a 2-0 lead. In the third, Robinson Cano poked a one-out double down the righfield line and then Sheffield, who had already homered once and doubled four times in the series, launched one over the Monster to extend the lead to 4-0. How do you like them apples?

The Sox finally broke through against Leiter in the bottom of the third. Edgar Renteria -- a former teammate of Leiter's on the 1997 World Champion Marlins and just about the only hitter who seemed to have a gameplan at the plate -- drew a two-out walk and then Ortiz doubled him home before Manny Ramirez popped out to end the threat. But even when he couldn't get strike one, Leiter was successful. All three hitters took ball one to start the fifth; Bill Mueller popped out on the next pitch, and Bellhorn grounded out on the third pitch of the at-bat. Only Damon went deep into the count, and Leiter was out of the inning in 11 pitches. He worked harder in the sixth, going to three-ball counts on Ortiz, Ramirez (who singled), and Millar but escaping intact.

Leiter began the seventh having thrown an even 100 pitches, and after inducing Trot Nixon to fly out, he was done for the night, a hero in his return just for preserving the Yankee bullpen in the face of uncertainty. Tanyon Sturtze and Tom Gordon took the game into the ninth with the Yanks leading 5-1. Gordon came in having not allowed a hit in his previous 9.1 innings dating back to June 28 (the Mike Stanton farewell), completing a hidden no-hitter the day before (he walked four in that span). He got the final two outs of the eighth, then yielded a homer to Ramirez to start the ninth to cut the lead to 5-2 and rouse Mariano Rivera in the bullpen. After walking Millar, Gordon yielded to Mo, who had a rockier outing than usual. On a potential double-play grounder, Cano threw the ball into leftfield, and then Jason Varitek poked an RBI single to bring the tying run to the plate in the form of Mueller, who singled to load the bases with nobody out. Gulp.

Fortunately, the next batter was Alex Cora, recently acquired from the Indians and hitting exactly .200. Rivera fell behind 2-0 before Cora slapped a tough grounder to Rodriguez at third. A-Rod made a perfect peg home for the forceout, and Posada threw a bullet to first to complete a beautifully-executed 5-2-3 double play. Damon, who had salvaged his 29-game hitting streak with a double off of Sturtze in the eighth, tapped Mo's first pitch to Cano, who fielded it cleanly, and that was the end of that. The Yanks had stolen a series they had little business winning. When you're hot -- this was their 10th victory in 12 games -- you're hot and when you're not -- the Sox lost for the 11th time in 17 games -- you're not. Amusingly enough, ESPN's headline after the game turned my previous column title on its ear. "Leiter fluid: Yankees' new starter subdues Red Sox."

• • •

I missed most of Monday night's game against the Rangers. Plugging away on this week's Prospectus Hit List, I surrendered the TV to Andra, then couldn't get my MLB GameDay Audio to work, so I settled for updates via ESPN's GameCast. It looked to be a nerve-wracking ballgame. Fresh off the DL, Kevin Brown gave up three runs in the first, but the Yanks dropped a six-pack on Texas starter Rich Rodriguez, with a three-run jack by Posada the big blow. By the fourth inning, four more homers had been hit and the score was 9-6.

The Rangers came back with four runs in the sixth, thanks to a two-out rally that included a dropped fly ball by Bernie Williams; apparently the wind had something to do with it, but it looked ugly on the replays nonetheless. With the score 10-9 Texas in the top of the eighth and the Hit List put to bed, I finally tuned in -- just in time to catch another Yankee rally, in fact.

Cano led off the inning with a single off of Doug Brocail. The rookie second baseman's performance has been beyond the wildest dreams of even the Yankee management, to say nothing of the analytical crowd who dismissed him over the winter (myself included). His plate discipline is lacking -- seven unintentional walks in 258 plate appearances is downright Soriano-esque -- but his surprising power (26 extra-base hits) has more than made up for it. In fact, he's far beyond Alfonso Soriano (who had four hits on the night) at this stage. Compare their rookie campaigns:

         AGE   PA   AVG   OBP   SLG   ISO   UIBB   K   K/UIBB  P/PA
Cano     22   258  .302  .324  .465  .163  .027  .124   4.57   2.91
Soriano  25   614  .268  .304  .432  .164  .047  .203   4.31   3.84

ISO is Isolated Power, simply slugging percentage minus batting average, a good indicator of a player's power potential. UIBB is unintentional walks per plate appearance, K is strikeouts per plate appearance, K/UIBB is the ratio between the two, and P/PA is the number of pitches per plate appearance. Cano has matched Sori's power potential while hitting for a much higher average, and while he's walking only about half as often, he's also striking out considerably less. Based on that last column, it's fair to say he's a different kind of hitter than Sori, one who does his business early in the count rather than waiting the pitcher out. That 2.91 pitches would be the lowest in the majors if he had enough plate appearances to qualify, and not by a little. Here are the bottom 10 (Bobby Abreu leads the majors with 4.50):

PLAYER             TEAM  TPA   P/PA
Cristian Guzman    WAS   290   3.03
Vladimir Guerrero  LAA   315   3.23
Garret Anderson    LAA   368   3.25
Jimmy Rollins      PHI   406   3.28
Shea Hillenbrand   TOR   383   3.32
Orlando Cabrera    LAA   289   3.33
Carl Crawford      TB    424   3.33
Pedro Feliz        SF    358   3.34
Jose Guillen       WAS   382   3.35

That's a motley assortment. Guzman is perhaps the worst hitter in the majors right now, the only one who gives Tony Womack -- the man Cano replaced at second base -- a run for his money. Hitting just .185/.224/.269, he's actually got a lower VORP than Womack, the lowest in the majors (-16.4; Womack is third-worst at -9.3). But Guerrero is an excellent hitter (.317/.371/.551), and while you wouldn't take the rest of them to the bank as exemplars of plate discipline, Anderson, Rollins and Hillenbrand made the All-Star Game, and neither Guillen nor Crawford would have been out of place on their respective squads. With enough power, it's possible to succeed as an early-count hitter (for an excellent piece on early-count hitting, the predictive value of strikeouts and how they relate to a hitter's development, see this Nate Silver article at Basebal Prospectus).

Getting back to Cano and Soriano (who's currently averaging 3.60 P/PA, FYI), the key difference is the first column. Recall that Sori's true age wasn't publicly known at the time; the trade to the Rangers for Alex Rodriguez added two years. Developmentally speaking, that's a huge difference, one which may herald a higher ceiling for the young Yankee. But enough of that digression; the Yanks still had a ballgame to win.

A Sheffield grounder forced Cano, but then Rodriguez walked to put two men on. Matsui flied out to bring up red-hot Ruben Sierra, who in his previous nine games had gone 13-for-27 with three doubles, a homer and eight RBI, and who was already 1-for-4 with a double on the night. With both baserunners in motion on a 3-2 pitch, Sierra blooped one into the left-centerfield gap for two runs and the lead, another huge hit for the big Rube. Alas, he pulled a hamstring rounding first base and is likely headed for the DL.

Sturtze, who had come on with two outs in the messy sixth inning, worked through the eighth before handing the ball over to Rivera. At this point the YES video feed cut out, so I was reduced to listening to Michael Kay's call. Mo struck out the dangerous Mark Teixera on three pitches, got Hank Blalock to ground out back to him, and then got Sori to ground to A-Rod to end the game and put the Yankees in first place.

As if that weren't happy enough news, the Yanks even got some encouraging words on Chien-Ming Wang after his visit to a place where no pitcher wants to go:

Wang... was examined Monday in Alabama by Dr. James Andrews. The diagnosis was inflammation and a strain in his right shoulder.

Yankees team physician Dr. Stuart Hershon said Wang will go through an exercise program for two weeks, followed by a throwing program. Hershon said surgery may be necessary if the right-hander doesn't respond to the therapy.

"That's great news right now for him and us, the fact they're going to do rest and exercise. We'll all keep our fingers crossed that it will be effective," manager Joe Torre said. "I think it's a little early to be optimistic, but I think that's a good first step."

The Daily News added:

Although the statement didn't specify, sources said that Wang has a partial tear of his rotator cuff, but it is considered slight. Several other pitchers currently active, including Mets ace Pedro Martinez and Mariners closer Eddie Guardado, are pitching with partial tears and did not require surgery.

If Wang can return this year, that's a huge break for the Yankees, one that might be "the difference between baseball and golf come October," to use Will Carroll's words. All in all, another excellent day for the Yanks.

• • •

The other day, I made note of the fact that the Yankees hired former Expo, Red Sox and Phillies pitching coach Joe Kerrigan to be an advance scout. As Newsday reported:

"This has nothing to do with uniform issues," he said. "Obviously, he's quite capable, but the purpose of my engaging him was to be an in-house advance scout."

Kerrigan told the Philadelphia Daily News this week: "I'd like to be back on the field as a bench coach or pitching coach, or as an advance scout, breaking down teams. I love doing that. This opportunity with the Yankees is very exciting, so we'll see."

Cashman took responsibility for the hire, saying it's something he's thought about for "about a month." He said he has no plans to send Kerrigan on the road to scout.

"He's a baseball guy I've respected from afar, and now we get a chance to know him upfront," Cashman said.

Reader Adam B. asked me for some insight into this, and since my response is buried much further down the page, I'll repeat it here. The Kerrigan move is intriguing as a low-risk get-to-know-you opportunity that automatically puts him in the running (along with current bullpen coach Neil Allen) to replace Mel Stottlemyre next year. Additionally, he might wind up replacing Billy Connors (who will be 64 in November and is hardly the picture of health) as the Yanks' man in Tampa, though that scenario is less likely.

The interesting thing is that he's Cashman's hire, a man the Yankee GM can turn to for fresh input as the trade deadline approaches and give himself more leverage within the organization's complicated hierarchy, at the very least mitigating the sway which Connors holds over Steinbrenner. As evidenced by the fact that it took them this long to reach first place this season thanks to some questionable offseason additions to the rotation, the team has struggled to identify pitchers than can help them. In tapping Kerrigan, they've hopefully found somebody who can correct that shortcoming as well as those of Stottlemyre, who's not known for his ability to tinker with mechanics. All in all, a very good move.