Kuzul

Take away the pinstripes, the statues, the lore.

Get rid of the 27 rings, the 40 American League Championships, the Hall of Famers.

Strip it all away, and the New York Yankees still run their team better than any other ball club in baseball does. In fact, they run theirs better than any other team in the Western Hemisphere.

What Manchester United is to soccer, what the Green Bay Packers are to football, what the Lakers are to basketball pale in comparison to what the Yankees are to baseball.

They are Apple in a league full of IBMs. They are Goldman Sachs in a league full of Lehman Brothers. They are Walmart in a league full of K-Marts.

With their most recent baseball-related moves, the New York Yankees showed that they are rich in every sense of the word, able to control the balance of power in baseball with a simple phone call. Love them or hate them, you have to respect the power of the Evil Empire.

As the only free-market American sport, baseball lends itself to a lack of parity. Since the free agency era began, baseball has shifted more from a sport full of hometown heroes to a relentless business, a perfect example of survival of the fittest.

And that’s exactly what the Yankees have been—the fittest. They signed Catfish Hunter. They traded for and signed Alex Rodriguez. They signed CC Sabathia, Mark Teixeira and A.J. Burnett in one offseason. They’ve traded their farm system for big-time talent, a practice other teams wouldn’t dream of.

Maybe they don’t get the best return on investment, but the Yankees have always been profitable.

When a shipbuilder from Cleveland named George Steinbrenner took over the team, he instilled a businesslike demeanor throughout the organization. It was all about the bottom line—the wins, the championships and the profits.

There is no more powerful brand in sports than the mighty “NY” embroidered on jerseys, hats and t-shirts. No team’s logo has more selling power. Not even close. When you throw in a television station and baseball’s largest market, the Yankee dynasty refers more to business than baseball.

Everything about the Yankees’ dominance was exhibited in the span of one evening. Last night, the Yankees, in two transactions, went from being doubted to win their own division to being the American League favorites.

First, they traded Jesus Montero, their top prospect, future superstar and best bargaining chip, to Seattle for Michael Pineda, a pitcher with just over 170 innings of major league experience. Why? Because they could. Why? Because the Yankees can afford to take risks like that.

Next, they bought their insurance policy. They signed Hiroki Kuroda, a proven commodity and workhorse pitcher, to a one-year deal. No other team in baseball showed much intent to pay $10 million for Kuroda. For the Yankees, he is an investment with almost zero risk. If he produces, $10 million might have been cheap. If he doesn’t produce, well, $10 million is pocket change to the New York Yankees.

Think about that for a second. The Yankees traded their best offensive prospect for what amounts to their second- or third-best pitcher. Then, they bought an insurance policy on that pitcher, who also happens to be a pretty good pitcher himself. It’s baseball’s equivalent to buying a Mercedes, then an Audi as a backup car. You can still drive the Audi, but if your Mercedes breaks down, you’ll be happy using it as your first car.

The only reason the Yankees are able to do this is because of their bottom line. It’s because their merchandise sales dwarf everyone else’s. It’s because their television revenues are astronomical. It’s because they are absolutely unaffected by the luxury tax and revenue sharing.

Perhaps this is baseball’s biggest flaw, or perhaps it is the Yankees’ biggest strength. The Yankees control the business of baseball. They set the bar. The Rays can exploit undervalued players all they want, and the Rangers can make perfect trades all they desire, but at the end of the day, the Yankees are the ones who can do literally whatever they want.

Ask any businessperson on the planet—the ability to be completely financially flexible is the ultimate dream. At an organizational level, the Yankees have achieved that dream for many years now.

What they did Friday night is simply another lesson taught by the masters of the business of baseball. The New York Yankees are the business kings of sports.

Now it is time to see if they want to sign themselves a Prince.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

When you think of elite pitchers, James Shields is not one of the first people who comes to mind. It is easy to pass over a pitcher in a discussion just because he hasn’t had past success.

After a strong start to the season, many people were skeptical whether Shields could sustain his success. His 2010 campaign was disastrous, and bad luck aside, Shields was one of baseball’s most ineffective pitchers that year.

But this season, James Shields has been great. Scratch that–incredible. Unbelievable. Dominant. In the course of one offseason, he has transformed himself from mediocre workhorse to a legitimate front-of-the-rotation starter.

So what is behind Shields’ success? Let’s take a look.

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It’s the morning of April 11th, and all is not right in the AL East. The Rays and the Red Sox were set to do battle that evening at Fenway Park, and two supposed contenders had already lost a combined 15 games. The 2-7 Red Sox had just won two of three from the Yankees. The Rays dropped two of three to the White Sox and sat in last place at 1-8.

Then, the Rays woke up. That Monday night, the Rays erupted for 16 runs and demolished Daisuke Matsuzaka and the Red Sox 16-5. The Rays have gone 12-3 since, and in the process turned 2011 from a rebuilding year into yet another year of AL East contention. As the Yankees have played their typical baseball and sit in first place, the Red Sox have somewhat hit a stride, yet sit in fourth place with an 11-13 record.

But right now, everything the Red Sox did to improve this offseason is starting to look inadequate. It’s only late April, but everyone in Beantown knows that this is not the Sox team that was supposed to be on the field this year. And a thousand miles away in St. Petersburg, the Rays have gone from a team that lost everything in the offseason to a legitimate threat to make the playoffs.

They’ve done it in a variety of ways. They’ve replaced Manny Ramirez at designated hitter with Johnny Damon, who has flourished and provided a collection of big hits. To fill the void in left field, the Rays called on an undersized Stanford graduate named Sam Fuld to take over. You probably know his story by now.

The pitching has been stellar—and that is a severe understatement. James Shields, the supposedly washed-up and home run-prone starter, has thrown two straight complete games and has seemed to regain confidence and control of his pitches. David Price, who had a rough start to the year, has found his form and been dominant the last three times out. Behind them, it’s been a steady stream of strong starts from Wade Davis, Jeremy Hellickson, and, as of last night, Jeff Niemann.

On Thursday, Ben Zobrist had 10 RBIs. That is not a misprint. In a day-night doubleheader, Zorilla, as he is known, had eight in the first game and added two more in the second. His April 28th RBI total exceeds the 2011 totals of Hanley Ramirez and Justin Morneau. For the road trip, Zobrist hit four home runs and brought in 18 RBIs.

And for every hot player like Zobrist, there’s the missing bat of John Jaso and Reid Brignac. There’s the missing power stroke from Matt Joyce (who, to be fair, is hitting .310). This offense has not yet hit its stride.

The scariest part? There’s a certain third baseman whose name rhymes with Schmevan Schmongoria who is due to return from a month-long DL stint on Tuesday. Insert him into the middle of the lineup and, all of the sudden, the Rays look pretty dangerous swinging the bats. Who would have thought anyone would be saying that for a team who had 20 runs through nine games?

The supposed weakness of the team—the bullpen—has been good. They haven’t been working a lot lately (thank the starters for that), but only one reliever has an ERA over 4.00, and they’ve all done exactly what has been asked of them—keep the game close or keep the lead. And just like the offense, they will be getting a huge boost with the return of J.P. Howell in a few weeks.

A lot has gone right for this team since their 1-8 start. Sam Fuld might be an all-star; Carl Crawford won’t. Ben Zobrist looks like he’s earning his $18 million contract. Johnny Damon is proving to be yet another genius investment by Andrew Friedman. And, with no offense to the Yankees, Red Sox, Angels, or Athletics, the Rays do have the best top-to-bottom rotation in the American League this year.

As we move into May, lots could change. The Red Sox could catch fire. James Shields could revert back to his inflated ERA form. The bullpen could experience a complete collapse. But right now, very few, if any, teams want to play the Rays. After a dominant sweep of the Twins in Minneapolis, the Rays sit at 14-11, lurking just a game and a half behind the Yankees.

If the Yankees and the rest of the AL East aren’t scared yet, they need to be. This Rays team is very good, very scary, and they won’t be going away any time soon.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

Over the course of four full seasons, Tampa Bay Rays pitcher James Shields has gone from a top-flight starter to a homer-prone liability. Since entering the league in the middle of the 2006 season, Shields has exhibited an elite changeup and a good curveball and slider to complement a serviceable fastball. But “Big Game James,” as he is known to the Rays faithful, has been on an alarming downward spiral, culminating in a 2010 season in which he allowed 34 home runs and ended up with a dismal 5.18 ERA.

So what happened?

Let’s start at the peak. In 2008, Shields was the No. 2 starter on the Rays AL championship team, serving as the tail end of a great one-two punch with Scott Kazmir. Shields went 14-8 with a 3.56 ERA in a stellar season that included two shutouts. After a shaky debut season in 2006, Shields had pitched well in ’07. 2008 was simply the combination of Shields’ potential reaching a peak and a chance to play on a team with great defense and run support.

That season, Shields had a nice mix of pitches—a fastball (44.9 percent of his pitches), a cutter (19.2 percent), the changeup (26.3 percent) and a curveball (9.6 percent). All of his pitches had positive values except for his fastball, which was just less than zero at a minus-1.5. This is not a bad number by any means. It simply shows that Shields’ fastball cost the Rays about 1.5 runs over the course of the season.

And, though hitters did make contact with his pitches, Shields was able to keep himself out of trouble. He induced ground balls 46.3 percent of the time, still a career high. His line-drive rate, often an indicator of how well hitters make contact, was a career low. And his BABIP (batting average on balls in play) was a very good .287.

His control was very impressive in 2008, especially when it came to painting the edge of the strike zone. In this heat chart, courtesy of Fangraphs, you can see that a high volume (the red, pink, and white) of fastballs were thrown down the middle and on the outer part of the strike zone. We can safely assume that most of the fastballs down the middle were either first-pitch fastballs or 3-0 pitches, so the fact that a high volume of pitches still hit the corners is very impressive. Compare this to his 2010 chart, where you see high volumes of fastballs clustered in or around the middle of the strike zone.

When examining the changeup, a similar trend appears. Since we examined his fastball success against righties, let’s look at changeups against lefties. In 2008, the chart is incredible. Shields threw his great changeup in exactly the spots you’d like to see—down and away from the left-handed hitter. A select few pitches missed up and towards the middle of the strike zone.

Now look at 2010. He still did a decent job of locating his changeup, but many more pitches missed in the middle of the zone and up.

The bottom line is this—in 2008, Shields was a control pitcher, combining excellent command with great movement on his pitches. In 2010, for whatever reason, he was missing spots and missing them badly. The result? Ten more home runs allowed, an ERA 1.5 runs higher and a decrease in WAR from 4.1 to 2.2.

But we’re not done yet. When examining the PitchFX data for Shields, there was a very interesting development between 2008 and 2010. Remember that 44.9 percent fastball rate in 2008? Those were all four-seam fastballs. But in 2010, PitchFX recorded only 28.4 percent four-seamers. This is because a new pitch came into Shields’ arsenal—the two-seam fastball, thrown 18.7 percent of the time.

Here is the chart of this pitch against lefties. You will notice that a large volume of two-seam fastballs were thrown basically right down the pipe.

It is very hard to grasp the effects of this new pitch, but the most convincing argument against Shields’ two-seamer I could find was his pitch value. As mentioned before, in 2008 Shields had a fastball value of 1.5 runs against the Rays. In 2010, this value plummeted to 24.7 runs, an astronomical figure. In 2009, a year in which he threw 8.2 percent two-seamers, his fastball value was a horrible 13.1 runs against. And it wasn’t just his fastball that killed him in 2010. His cutter registered a value of 9.2 runs against.

In short, this is what it seems like—Shields’ four-seam fastball is fine. But his moving fastballs (cutter and two-seamer) kill him. They either don’t move enough or cannot be located well enough for them to be effective pitches. Mariano Rivera’s cutter is deadly because not only does it break a ridiculous amount, but it can be located wherever Mo wants it to be. Shields’ cutter and two-seamer seem to be the polar opposite.

If Shields is to return to form in 2011, he must reverse this trend of throwing more two-seam fastballs. And if he has to throw them, he must improve their effectiveness, whether it be through better movement or location.

Shields is not a strikeout pitcher. He learned that the hard way in 2010. The highest K/9 ratio of his career coincided with his worst season. He is a control pitcher that relies on deception and location, much like a Pedro Martinez or Greg Maddux.

Parents always tell their kids to not be someone they’re not. As much as James Shields may want to be David Price, he will always be James Shields. He will always have a killer changeup, a good fastball and a good curveball. He will never be able to blow pitches past hitters without sacrificing command.

If James Shields can figure that out, his 2011 campaign will be much like 2008. And if that happens, the Rays season in 2011 may turn out much like that magical year.

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com

This year’s American League East is going to be a very hotly contested division. With all five teams easily capable of putting together .500 or above seasons, the order of finish could be dictated by just a few games.

For the Tampa Bay Rays, the new look of the franchise gives them a new set of advantages and disadvantages over their division rivals. While the other teams within the division spent big bucks this offseason, the Rays were able to cut their payroll from over $70 million to approximately $42 million without sacrificing a tremendous amount of production.

While this is a great feat in terms of business, the results on the field will determine how smart the Rays really are. Here are some of the big matchup advantages and disadvantages the Rays have going into the 2011 season.

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The Tampa Bay Rays enter the 2011 season with lower expectations than the last few years, and for good reason. This past offseason saw the Rays lose some of their most valuable players.

While the losses of players like Carl Crawford, Rafael Soriano, Matt Garza and Carlos Pena will hurt, all is not lost for this team.

Here are eleven bold predictions, both good and bad, for the Tampa Bay Rays this season.

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Today, the common baseball fan wakes up from his winter hibernation. Eleven teams will start their workouts today in preparation for the 2011 season.

This is sure to be a season filled with great teams, great players, great games, and great moments. But there are still lots of questions to be answered during the season.

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