With Jorge Posada, do the Yankees have a brewing catcher controversy?

I was on Albany's Sound Off With Sinkoff radio show yesterday, and one of the things I told host Brian Sinkoff that I'm worried about regarding the Yankees these days is Jorge Posada's apparent inability to throw out baserunners anymore.

Remember, not only did the Red Sox steal four bases off him in the ninth inning in the last Yankees-Red Sox series at the Stadium, but they also had two double steals off him in the season finale, including the Sox's first steal of home since Jacoby Ellsbury did it against Posada and the Yankees last year.

Anyhow, New York Post columnist Joel Sherman had some interesting stats about Posada today:

The Red Sox failed to make the playoffs, but they do get this concession prize: Their going-away gift for the 2010 campaign was showing the rest of the postseason field how to bedevil their most hated rival:

Run on Jorge Posada and then run some more.

Boston went 18-for-18 stealing bases against Posada this year and 44 out of 61 against every other opponent. The Red Sox all but handed their scouting report to playoff teams late in the year, going 16-for-16 against Posada over five games from Aug. 9 until the final game of the season. In that span, Boston had games of four, five and six steals. Only one other time in the last two years had the Red Sox successfully stolen even four bases against any other team.


Were you watching Minnesota? Did you see how the Red Sox grew more brazen and Posada’s throws even more scattered and unappealing?

An aside -- this is why I find Joel Sherman such a frustrating columnist. He'll do all sorts of whiny, overwrought analysis, then he'll do a great fact-based, original column like this to make you think. These stats are really illuminating, as is the fact that Posada had 72 bases stolen against him this year in 83 games, and only caught 15% of baserunners. That caught-stealing rate is the worst of his career.


Anyhow, it gets worse. Here are some quotes Sherman got yesterday (emphasis added):

But pitching coach Dave Eiland said the flaw was not Posada’s alone, insisting the staff “had a lack of concentration (on the running game) down the stretch. We haven’t paid attention the way we should.” 

Posada went further in assessing blame, saying, “They ran on the pitching. There was not an opportunity to get any of those guys.”

I don't know what's worse -- Eiland blaming this problem on the pitchers not having their head in the game, or Posada throwing his batterymates under the bus like he did, and failing to take any responsibility. Good grief.

Unless Posada was pretending to not throw the Sox out, to make it look like his arm was shot (remember Brian Cashman saying that the Yanks were holding back their big plays), this is really bad news for the Yankees. And Francisco Cervelli hasn't been any great shakes behind the dish this year, either -- he has 13 errors and has only thrown out 14% of baserunners.

It's possible that it is indeed partly the pitchers' fault, which makes one wonder why they don't have their head in the game. But for Posada to refuse to take one bit of blame is a bit much. When the Sox double-steal on you twice in one game, you just might have a little something to do with it.


What do you think? Tell us about it!

Won't you come back, Dave Eiland? A.J. Burnett needs you!

If Friday night's Yankees-Dodgers game was one of the more exciting ones of the year, Saturday's game was one of the most painful to watch. It wasn't just that A.J. Burnett looked like Dontrelle Willis did against the Yankees last week. (Actually, Burnett was much worse, come to think of it!) It was that the game dragged on, and on, and on. The first inning took forever. Three hours had passed before the fifth inning was over.

I didn't stay up for the whole game - I went to bed when the score was 9-4 Dodgers, and felt like I had watched fifteen innings or something, because what I did see dragged on so long.

A.J. Burnett seems to desperately need pitching coach Dave Eiland back - he's been in a downward spiral ever since Eiland left the team due to some undisclosed personal issue. Please come back soon, Dave! Yankee fans are flipping out over watching A.J. pitch!


And so much for skipping Phil Hughes, eh?

It figures that the Yankees lost, though - it was a FOX game, and the Yankees' record in those games always seems to be bad. And having to hear Joe Buck and Tim McCarver in the booth added to my misery. All the effusive, unwarranted praise for Joe Torre was just nauseating. The two of them acted as if "The Yankee Years" book never existed, and that nobody in the world, except for maybe Alex Rodriguez, had anything but positive stuff to say about Teflon Torre.

They went on and on about how Joe increased attendance, and somehow was involved with the YES Network become a success, and stuff that sounded like it came straight from Torre's mouth. Buck even suggested that Torre would make a great MLB Commissioner. Yeah, because somebody who tells private tales about incredible people like Johnny Damon, all the while preaching the sanctity of the clubhouse, is just the guy I want running the game. Good grief.

Billy Crystal and his dopey Switzerland hat were also nauseating. Guess he didn't read "The Yankee Years" either - his "good friend" Torre threw him under the bus in that book, griping about Crystal getting a World Series ring from the Yankees in 2000.

Then there was the train wreck that was Tommy Lasorda and Reggie Jackson in the booth. Actually, Reggie was fine. It was Lasorda who seemed to have had a bellyful of bile and bitterness, showing incredible hostility towards Reggie. He kept on threatening to deck him, and said Reggie would never be able to hit his curve ball. Huh? I guess I missed when Lasorda was a Hall of Fame pitcher. Lasorda also said Jackson was "about as funny as a bloody nose," but it was the Dodgers' old manager, not Mr. October, who made a fool of himself in the booth.


Banter like that needs to be good-natured, or it just comes off like you're stuck in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" or something. FOX owes fans an apology for that nonsense.

What do you think? Tell us about it!