I'm Back From Vegas!

Wow....I sure did pick a bad set of days to be away from Fire Jay Mariotti. A thank-you to Pearlman for raising our readership to what seems like eleventy billion compared to what it was before. My flight landed recently, and it's 3:15 A.M., so yeah, dead tired. But after taking a cool 2 G's from the complete lack of poker common sense found in Las Vegas tourists, I think the gambler inside me is appeased, and I'm ready to blog it up again.

That having been said, lets take a look at what Wallace Matthews was up to while I was away.

Yankees' Chamberlain right man for job

Yankees' Chamberlain: 5 IP. I have a similar theory along the same lines.

Kevin Mench between Apr 21, 2006 and Apr 28, 2006: 7 games played, 7 HR (one in each). Conclusion: Kevin Mench is the best baseball player who ever lived.

The buzz spread through Yankee Stadium as soon as the bullpen door swung open, the way it does in a plaza de toros when it is time for the matador to meet the bull.

They were excited by a pitcher they had never seen, not in the flesh, yet it seemed as if they believed that maybe they had seen his like before, in a different time under a different name.

Just a guess....but couldn't they have been cheering him because he had been pitching very well so far, and not because they had this mystical sense of him being the new Jeff Nelson?

They weren't cheering the man so much as they were cheering the concept, one that had carried the Yankees to four world championships in five years but of late has seemed as outdated and unattainable as 300 wins. They were cheering the concept of the seven-inning game.

Okay now you're pushing it. I think that most Yankees FANS are more sensible than you. They're giving a hometown ovation for a pitcher who has performed very well, not assuming they have a lights-out setup man after 3 games.

That was what those other Yankees teams were built on, the crushing reality that while they had 27 outs to complete their job, their opponents had only 21. Or, on some nights, 18.

First it was Mariano Rivera pitching two innings and handing off to John Wetteland. Then it was lefthander Mike Stanton and righthander Jeff Nelson clearing the path to Rivera.

This is such a bullshit exaggeration, with all due respect to Riviera being an awesome closer. The middle relief is NOT EVEN CLOSE to what those Yankees teams were built on.

2000 New York Yankees:

Jeff Nelson: 2.45 ERA, 1.27 WHIP (pretty decent, ERA probably lowered by Riviera stranding inherited runners)
Mike Stanton: 4.10 ERA, 1.35 WHIP (this is lights-out???)

1999 New York Yankees:

Mike Stanton: 4.33 ERA, 1.43 WHIP
Jeff Nelson: 4.15 ERA, 1.62 WHIP

1998 New York Yankees:

Mike Stanton: 5.47 ERA, 1.22 WHIP
Jeff Nelson: 3.79 ERA, 1.64 WHIP

I guess teams should have just fucking gave up against the Yankees once the 7th inning rolled around and they didn't have the lead, because those guys were just plain UNSTOPPABLE (Riviera was pretty damn good for Wetteland, though).

Now it was the kid's turn, a 21-year-old who grew up on an Indian reservation in Nebraska, raised by a divorced father confined to a wheelchair by polio, a kid whose weight sometimes rose higher than his ERA.

Weight rose higher than his ERA? Does that make any fucking sense at all, Wallace? Please, help me out here.

Now Joba Chamberlain - with a name pronounced like the name of a computer-generated sci-fi villain in a movie made two years before he was born

A Star Wars reference! Matthews is a closet nerd! This can't be a sports column. This is a blog.

was being asked to nurse more than a one-run lead over the Baltimore Orioles. He was being asked to nurse a pennant race, a race the Yankees had fought their way back into during the past month but could just as easily fall out of during the next.

No. He was being asked to nurse a one-run lead over the Baltimore Orioles. That's the kind of thing middle relievers do. The Yankees were playing amazing baseball before stumbling upon Joba the Hutt. Granted, he can help a great deal, as the Yankees' bullpen hasn't been good, but you're WAY overstating his importance.

This was what they have been waiting for around here, not another one-dimensional slugger or overpaid starter who goes five innings and calls it a week. Those Yankees teams of 10 years ago, the ones who brought baseball fans back to the Bronx and continue to do so to this day, were strong because they were strong in the middle. Middle relief, that is.

Yeah, get rid of fucking A-Rod, he isn't helping anything. He's a one-dimensional slugger. Mister One-Dimensional and his weak-sauce 12.3 WARP3 should high-tail it out of New York. And I just proved up above that the Yankees' championship teams were not that strong in the middle, save for 1996. Those teams were awesome because they outscored their opponents by a ton and Riviera is one of the best closers ever, NOT becuase middle relievers had WHIPs in the 1.20-1.70 range.

Those teams didn't need A-Rod or Giambi or Sheffield to win. They needed Nelson and Stanton and David Weathers and, of course, Rivera.

I really, REALLY don't want to look up the WARPs of these players to disprove that. You all can do it yourself to see just how stupid Wallace is. What I do want to call your attention to is the fact that Wallace Matthews JUST SUGGESTED THAT THE YANKEES NEEDED DAVID WEATHERS TO WIN.

First of all, David Weathers pitched exactly 17 1/3 innings for a Yankees' championship team (in 1996). He had a 9.35 ERA and a 2.14 WHIP. And David Weathers was a part of the reason they were winning games? Really? DAVID WEATHERS?!?!?!?!?!

Brian Cashman has made his share of mistakes in the past couple of seasons, but holding tight to Chamberlain - and Cabrera, for that matter - do not qualify. After all, had he given in to temptation as in years past, that bullpen door could have swung open last night and Eric Gagne could have waddled out.

Gagne was incredible for the Rangers this year. Despite his recent Red Sox struggles, I would definitely take him over some guy who's thrown 5 major league innings.

Instead, it was Joba Chamberlain, who brings more with him than a wicked fastball and a nasty slider.

He brings, too, the promise of a return to the formula that made Joe Torre's Yankees great: Nine innings for them. Seven innings for you.

That's the brilliant secret. THAT'S THE FORMULA FOR JOE TORRE WINNING THOSE CHAMPIONSHIPS. "Nine innings for them. Seven innings for you." Not only is that one of the dumbest sayings in the world, it completely ignores the fact that the Yankees consistently scored a lot of runs every year (10th, 5th, 3rd, and 10th in MLB in runs scored during championship seasons) and had David Cone turning in great season after great season, supported by some solid performances by El Duque, Pettite, David Wells, and Roger Clemens.

Hell no Wallace, I'm wrong. It was all Jeff Nelson and fucking Mike Stanton. The Yankees should trade the Red Sox A-Rod for Okajima straight up, immediately. The Red Sox are suckers and will bite. They have no idea that A-Rod isn't what championships are built on.

Honestly, lose your job already.