Kuzul

With five weeks of the 2015 MLB season complete, we’ve gotten a pretty good look at the post-Derek Jeter New York Yankees. And sappiness be damned, they just don’t quite look the same without him.

There’s one way, however, that this has been a very, very good thing.

With Jeter safely retired—and evidently disconnected altogether—Yankees skipper Joe Girardi has an option that eluded him in The Captain’s final season in 2014: The option to place center fielder Jacoby Ellsbury and left fielder Brett Gardner in the top two spots in the lineup.

So, that’s what he’s been doing. And so far, it’s working like a charm.

After floundering in 2014, the Yankees’ offensive attack has gone retro in 2015. The Yankees came into the week scoring 4.85 runs per game, a massive improvement over last year’s 3.91 runs per outing.

This is a key reason why they’re out to a somewhat surprising 21-12 start that has them in first place in the AL East. And if you’re looking for reasons for why it’s happening, it’s all too appropriate that Ellsbury and Gardner might be Nos. 1 and 2 on the list.

Offensively, the two left-handed batters have been downright terrific in 2015. Courtesy of FanGraphs, here’s where their numbers stood coming into play Monday:

*Important note: All stats past this point are current through play on Sunday, May 10.

In a year in which the average OPS is only .710, Ellsbury and Gardner’s OPS’s highlight them as the clearly above-average hitters that they’ve been. So does wRC+.

For the layman, that’s “Weighted Runs Created Plus,” which measures a player’s total offensive value on a scale where 100 represents average. Ellsbury and Gardner have thus been safely above-average hitters and are certainly outperforming their own standards. Gardner’s 137 wRC+ puts him on pace to beat his 112 wRC+ from 2010. Ellsbury‘s 134 wRC+ puts him on pace to beat his 150 wRC+ from 2011.

And as you’d expect from a pair of speed demons like Ellsbury and Gardner, they’re also tearing it up on the basepaths. As the YES Network noted on Twitter:

Add it all up, and FanGraphs‘ “Offense” metric says Ellsbury has been worth 6.7 runs above average and Gardner has been worth 6.3 runs above average.

That doesn’t quite make them baseball’s top offensive duo, mind you, as that’s less than half of the 28.3 runs above average that slugging Los Angeles Dodgers teammates Adrian Gonzalez and Joc Pederson have combined for. 

But if you go looking for a better one-two punch at the top of a lineup, you’re not going to find one.

Each of Ellsbury‘s 142 plate appearances have been out of the leadoff spot, so his .341 average, .415 on-base percentage and .812 OPS are entirely leadoff numbers.

As for Gardner, 107 of his 115 total plate appearances have come in the No. 2 spot. In those 107 plate appearances, he’s hit .308 with a .394 OBP and an .834 OPS.

So, let’s ask a question: How many other teammates have logged as many as 100 plate appearances in the top two spots in the lineup and, from those spots, have hit at least .300 with at least a .390 OBP and at least an .800 OPS?

Here are your answers:

• Have hit at least .300: Zero.
• Have OBP‘d at least .390: Zero.
• Have OPS’d at least .800: Zero.

As they say, there you have it. In 2015, Ellsbury and Gardner have been a one-two punch unlike any other.

Given that the top two spots in the lineup come up more than any other two spots, this is quite the advantage for the Yankees. And while other teams could hypothetically seek to replicate it by putting their two best hitters atop the lineup, that wouldn’t necessarily mean creating a carbon copy of the Ellsbury-Gardner duo.

For one, it’s not easy to find two guys who can match their speed. But more importantly, it’s not easy to find two guys who have the goods to put said speed to good use.

As Gardner put it to Bryan Hoch of MLB.com: “We take a lot of pride in getting on base, and that’s our job at the top of the lineup. We feel like we’re two leadoff hitters, and we can get on base for those guys in the middle of the lineup and give them RBI opportunities.”

By getting on base as frequently they have, Ellsbury and Gardner have certainly been producing like “two leadoff hitters.” But they’ve also been acting the part, as they’ve been tough outs in more ways than one.

There are two primary guidelines for hitters who desire to be tough outs: Don’t strike out and take your walks. And in this day and age, you can add a third: Don’t give the defense an excuse to shift. 

Ellsbury and Gardner have been doing all three of these things, as we can see here that they’re striking out less, walking more often and going the other way more often than the average hitter:

The value of their walks is self-explanatory. Same goes for balls in play, especially given that both are hitting over .360 on balls in play. And though logic says those averages will come down eventually, they’ll come down slowly if Ellsbury and Gardner maintain their opposite-field dominance. On balls to left field, Ellsbury is hitting .429 and Gardner is hitting .379.

Between what they’ve done in the box and what they’ve done on the basepaths, Ellsbury and Gardner have been about as valuable to the Yankees offense as you’d expect. They’ve scored 47 of the team’s 149 runs. For perspective, the Yankees’ primary one-two hitters in 2014 scored 134 of the team’s 633 runs. We’re talking an increase of roughly 21 percent to roughly 32 percent.

And yes, given that Ellsbury and Gardner were there to fill the top two slots in the Yankees lineup last year, you can’t help but wonder what might have been.

Though Gardner and Ellsbury both saw their share of action in the leadoff spot in 2014, the two appeared in the No. 2 hole only 37 times. The bulk of the No. 2 plate appearances (619 to be exact) instead went to Jeter.

That didn’t go well. In hitting just .256 with a .617 OPS, Jeter qualified as the seventh-worst hitter in MLB. Largely as a result of that, the Yankees’ No. 2 spot—which is arguably the most important spot in the lineup—finished ranked No. 21 in wRC+.

Hindsight isn’t needed to see that this was a problem. People in the media (such as Andrew Marchand of ESPN New York) started questioning Jeter’s spot in the lineup in early May. As time went on, it became fair to wonder, as Howard Megdal put it at SB Nation, if “one player’s historic contribution to the team and/or ego was seemingly being put ahead of team goals.”

For his part, Girardi tried to defend Jeter’s ongoing role in the No. 2 spot. But every time he did, he effectively confirmed that Jeter’s past was taking priority over his present. In June, his rationalization for continuing to bat Jeter second was that he was “a guy who’s [always] responded.” In September, Girardi defended Jeter on the basis that he had always “been clutch” when the pressure was highest.

Apart from some short-lived hot streaks here and there, Jeter never made good on Girardi‘s confidence. And though it certainly wasn’t the reason, having such an easy out in the No. 2 hole was certainly a reason why the Yankees scored fewer than four runs per game for the first time since 1990.

Maybe things would have been different if Ellsbury and Gardner had been the one-two punch from the get-go. Both ended up being solidly above-average offensive producers, so maybe the Yankees would have avoided scoring fewer than four runs per game. And had they avoided that fate, they might have won more than 84 games and had a shot at giving Jeter a proper send-off in October.

Maybe, indeed. But with the way things are going now, that serene sound you’re hearing is the water underneath the bridge. 

The way they’re hitting this year, it certainly doesn’t look like the Yankees missed their final chance at getting the most out of Ellsbury and Gardner’s respective primes by denying them the opportunity to be a one-two punch in 2014.

Better yet, the 2015 Yankees look more deserving of such an awesome one-two punch than the 2014 Yankees. Unlike last year’s Yankees, this year’s Yankees have healthy and effective versions of Alex Rodriguez and Mark Teixeira. They also have Michael Pineda to play the ace role vacated by Masahiro Tanaka and an elite bullpen capable of protecting any lead.

Having Ellsbury and Gardner atop the lineup would have made the 2014 Yankees better. But this year, having them atop the lineup is making the Yankees legitimately dangerous.

Note: Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com unless otherwise noted/linked.

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New York Yankees pitcher Michael Pineda struck out 16 batters in Sunday’s 6-2 win over the Baltimore Orioles, setting a franchise record for the most strikeouts without any walks in a single game, per ESPN Stats & Info.

The 26-year-old improved to 5-0 on the season, allowing one run on six hits over seven innings, with a second-inning home run off the bat of Orioles shortstop J.J. Hardy responsible for that lone run.

Pineda threw 81 of his 111 pitches for strikes, getting 21 called strikes, 22 swinging strikes, 27 foul balls and 11 balls in play.

He struck out every member of Baltimore’s starting lineup besides Hardy, notching either two or three punchouts in each inning he pitched.

A one point, Pineda struck out six consecutive batters, starting with the final out of the fourth inning and ending with the second out of the sixth.

He tied David Cone and David Wells for the second-highest single-game strikeout total in franchise history, falling short of only Ron Guidry’s 18 strikeouts from a June 17, 1978 contest against the California Angels, per MLB Stat of the Day.

After pitching just 76.1 combined innings over the previous three seasons (all in 2014), Pineda looks like an early challenger for Cy Young honors in the American League, boasting a 5-0 record, 2.72 ERA, 1.01 WHIP and 54-to-3 strikeout-to-walk ratio through seven outings (46.1 innings).

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Alex Rodriguez stands alone in fourth place on the all-time home run list after hitting his 661st bomb against the Baltimore Orioles at Yankees Stadium on Thursday, passing Willie Mays.

The majority of the focus, and controversy, surrounding A-Rod has been about the long ball and performance-enhancing drug use. Lost in the shuffle is the fact that the Yankees slugger can surpass a handful of other lofty milestones this season as well.

Stephen Nelson and Scott Miller break down A-Rod’s assault on the record books in this video, presented by Jim Beam.

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It’s official now. Alex Rodriguez owns 660 career home runs, tying him with Willie Mays for fourth on the all-time list. From here, he has only Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron and Barry Bonds to catch.

Don’t feel much like celebrating? Well, you’re certainly not alone. A man hitting 660 home runs should be a big deal that has us all saying grand things about the greatness of said man’s legacy. But due to the context in which A-Rod’s legacy has been written, to do that in this situation would be a total farce.

Rodriguez is tied with Mays in home runs, yes. But now that their two legacies are side by side, there’s no ignoring how one of these things is not like the other.

We’ll get to that. But first, let’s get on with the acknowledgement.

If you missed it, A-Rod’s 660th home run was his sixth of 2015, and it came off Junichi Tazawa in the eighth inning of the New York Yankees‘ contest against the rival Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park on Friday night. It was a pinch-hit laser beam over the Green Monster, and it looked a little something like this:

If you listen really carefully to that video, you can hear some cheers. Those are coming mainly from the Yankees dugout and from the few pinstripe-clad fans peppered around the stands. Thanks to those two parties, A-Rod’s 660th home run is not a totally joyless event. 

But for everyone else? Well, the boos tell the story.

We know the Yankees’ powers-that-be aren’t happy. Bill Madden and Teri Thompson of the New York Daily News recently highlighted how the Yankees want nothing to do with A-Rod’s 660th home run, as they have no interest in paying him the $6 million milestone bonus they once agreed to.

According to a source, via Madden and Thompson, their reasoning was simple: “They say the records are tainted, and therefore they’re not milestones that can be marketed.”

Take the word “marketed” and switch in the word “celebrated,” and you get an accurate picture of not just how all the Red Sox fans packed into Fenway Park felt about A-Rod’s 660th, but how the vast majority of baseball fans feel about it. 

And by no means is that an unfair stance to take.

We first learned in 2009 that A-Rod had used performance-enhancing drugs between 2001 and 2003. He did things that almost everyone else was also doing at the time, but fans were outraged anyway. But when A-Rod was linked to PEDs again in the Biogenesis scandal of 2013, their outrage was justified. With baseball’s PED protocols well entrenched, A-Rod appeared to break the rules this time. 

There’s no looking past these events, much less forgiving them. Not even a former manager of A-Rod’s could keep himself from using the magic word, as Joe Torre told Fox Sports:

So, a tainted record indeed. And worse, it belongs to a tainted personality. 

Bryan Curtis of Grantland can tell you all about how difficult it’s been to put labels on A-Rod, but one thing he hasn’t been in a long time is likable. He first turned heel when he left the Seattle Mariners in 2000 for the Texas Rangers and their many riches. And ever since, he’s spent an inordinate amount of time mired in on-the-field and off-the-field controversies.

In fairness to A-Rod, here’s one thing that can be said in his defense: it still is—and indeed has been—fun to simply watch him play ball. His 660 home runs may be tainted, but they’re still 660 home runs. They’re also attached to a .942 career OPS and 322 career stolen bases. A clueless fan could say, “Man, that guy must have been fun to watch,” and you couldn’t disagree.

But with legacies, it’s not about just how much fun it was to watch a guy. It’s also about how much fun it was to root for him. That’s the real tragedy of A-Rod’s various misadventures. It’s because of them that his 660th home run feels more like a footnote than an accomplishment, and it’s because of them that his legacy is half of what it might have been.

That point really doesn’t require a comparison for further elaboration. But right now, it just so happens that we have A-Rod’s legacy in one hand and Mays’ in the other.

Between Rodriguez and Mays, there’s not much of an argument to be had about who was the superior player. We can use FanGraphs to put their key statistics side-by-side and come up with this:

The one thing A-Rod has done better than Mays in his career is run the bases, but Mays was no slouch in that department. And as maybe the greatest defensive center fielder ever, Mays more than made up for Rodriguez’s small baserunning advantage with his huge fielding advantage.

Offensively, batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage peg A-Rod and Mays as roughly equal hitters. When you use either OPS+ or wRC+ to adjust for parks and eras, however, Mays comes out ahead by comfortable margins.

And this is without getting into the notion that A-Rod shouldn’t even be tied with Mays on the all-time home run list right now.

Though Mays did need more games to get to 660 home runs than Rodriguez did, he might have hit a lot more under different circumstances. Mays lost home runs to his military service in 1952 and 1953, and he may have lost more to the Polo Grounds’ epic dimensions and Candlestick Park’s hostile weather patterns.

Had things happened differently, it’s entirely possible we’re having a completely different conversation right now. Maybe one about A-Rod having a long way to go before catching Ruth before he can even think about turning his attention to Mays.

But of course, there’s so much more to Mays’ legacy than his numbers. 

Maybe more so than any other player, Mays is defined by tales—and, thanks to “The Catch” in the 1954 World Series, at least one video—of how he played. Along the way, he carved out a reputation as the ideal ballplayer. He’s still the model five-tool player, and his unceasing enthusiasm for the game might as well be his sixth tool.

As James S. Hirsch put it in Willie Mays: The Life, The Legend, Mays was “always better than the box score.” The innate charisma of the “Say Hey Kid” has also long since become legendary, so what Hirsch says here rings true:

His legacy, ultimately, will never be about his numbers, his records, or how he helped his team to win. It will be about the pure joy he brought to fans and the loving memories that have been passed to future generations so they might know the magic and beauty of the game.

Sound like the exact opposite of anyone you know?

There is but one sour spot on Mays’ legacy: As much as everyone wants to believe he was clean all along, that may not be entirely true.

Mays played during the days when amphetamines were the drug of choice among major leaguers, and Mays himself was once famously linked to a liquid amphetamine called “red juice” in the 1980s. And though he denied any wrongdoing, he didn’t deny occasionally seeking chemical help.

Said Mays, according to Hirsch: “I would go to the doctor and say to the doctor, ‘Hey, I need something to keep me going. Could you give me some sort of vitamin?’ I don’t know what they put in there, and I never asked a question about anything.”

Whatever it was that Mays took, chances are it’s something that’s now banned by Major League Baseball. To an extent, he and A-Rod are peas in a pod when it comes to performance-enhancing drugs.

But only to an extent.

You can write off A-Rod’s early juicing and Mays’ vitamin habit with the same excuse: They were looking for the same edge as everyone else. A-Rod’s more recent juicing, however, is the deal-breaker. He didn’t really break the rules the first time he used PEDs, but he did the second time around. That’s worthy of scorn, now and forever.

Officially, A-Rod and Mays belong in the same sentence. That may not be the case for long with Rodriguez only one home run away from having fourth place on the all-time list to himself, but it’s the case for now.

Unofficially, however, is a different story. And though hundreds of words can be (and just were) dedicated to the matter, it’s really quite simple in the end.

A-Rod’s legacy is that of a star most everyone can’t wait to forget. Mays’ legacy is that of a star nobody wants to forget. 

Note: Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference unless otherwise noted/linked.

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First place in the American League East will be on the line this weekend at Fenway Park in Boston as the division-leading New York Yankees (13-9) visit the Red Sox (12-10) in the opener of a three-game series on Friday.

Despite losing five of their past eight games to fall out of first place in the AL East, Boston remains one of the favorites to win the AL Pennant at 11-2 odds on the MLB betting futures. New York has improved slightly to 10-1 from 18-1 on April 15.

The Yankees have won 10 of their last 13 games to put themselves into position to contend for the division crown this year after taking two of three from the Tampa Bay Rays, who are tied with the Red Sox for second place.

New York saw its three-game winning streak come to an end Wednesday following a 3-2 home loss to the Rays, with the under cashing for totals bettors on the baseball betting lines for the third straight time in the series.

Boston has been involved in a lot of high-scoring games recently but saw its over streak end at five after a 4-1 victory against the Toronto Blue Jays on Wednesday. There had been an average of a little more than 15 combined runs scored in each of the previous five Red Sox games.

Recent history between the two fierce division rivals also suggests a high-scoring game and series, with the past five meetings all going over the total along with nine of the previous 11 games between the teams, according to the OddsShark MLB Database.

Boston starting pitcher Justin Masterson (2-0, 5.16 ERA) has seen the over cash in three of his four starts this season as well. The Red Sox lost for the first time in Masterson’s four starts this year in his last outing, as he allowed three runs and seven hits in seven innings of an eventual 5-4 loss to the Baltimore Orioles April 25 for a no-decision.

The Yankees will send CC Sabathia (0-4, 5.96) to the mound still looking for his first victory of the season. Sabathia got hit hard last time out on Saturday against the New York Mets, surrendering a season-high seven runs and nine hits, including three home runs, in five innings with no walks and two strikeouts.

Sabathia has seen the under cash in two road starts, while the over has gone 2-0 in his two at home. Sabathia’s previous trip to Fenway last season saw the total go way over the closing total of 8.5 runs, however, in a 14-5 road victory last April 24.

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Now the New York Yankees can fear the worst.

A heavy part of their 2015 success is contingent on the health, and therefore effectiveness, of Masahiro Tanaka. The narrative rightfully flowed as something like this: Whichever way their Japanese ace goes, so too shall the Bombers.

The Yankees are now in full-blown “hope that isn’t the case” mode after Tanaka had to be shuffled to his dark place, the 15-day disabled list. And those 15 days will not be his maximum time spent there.

Tanaka’s MRI showed a small forearm strain so he will be placed on the 15-day DL.

— Jack Curry (@JackCurryYES) April 29, 2015

Tanaka showed up to Yankee Stadium on Tuesday afternoon complaining of pain in his right wrist, general manager Brian Cashman told reporters. The team sent the right-hander for an MRI after that, and it revealed tendinitis as well as a mild forearm strain.

Tanaka will miss at least a month. And that is leaning conservatively for the team’s $175 million foreign investment, Cashman noted via Tyler Kepner of The New York Times:

Cashman said “conservatively” it would be a month before Tanaka returns to Yankees.

— Tyler Kepner (@TylerKepner) April 29, 2015

“I’m going to try to get back as soon as I can,” Tanaka said through an interpreter, per Peter Botte of the New York Daily News. “Personally, I don’t think it has anything to do with my elbow.”

That his right elbow is even brought into the conversation is the scary part for all involved parties.

Tanaka missed two-and-a-half months last season because of a slight tear in his ulnar collateral ligament, which, as even casual fans are now poignantly aware of, is the precursor to Tommy John surgery and an absence of a full calendar year or more. Three separate specialists told the Yankees last year that Tanaka could avoid Tommy John surgery with rest and rehab, and he came back to make two starts in September.

The MRI did not show any changes to the already existing UCL damage, but any forearm injury in this day of “routine” Tommy John surgeries can pump fear into a pitcher and his employer. So much so that Cashman could not help but acknowledge that elephant sitting in front of Tanaka’s locker, per Botte:

Cashman said no change in Tanaka’s elbow, but when asked if this might be a Tommy John precursor, said “Could be.”

— Peter Botte (@PeterBotte) April 29, 2015

“We want to make sure this does not lead to more horrific problems,” Cashman told reporters, meaning that particular surgery.

A month is already a significant chunk of the season for Tanaka to miss. Anything longer, and the Yankees will be forced to join the likes of the Los Angeles Dodgers, St. Louis Cardinals and Boston Red Sox as suitors for a front-line starting pitcher, assuming they were not already involved in that trade market.

Tanaka made four starts this season, his last one on April 23. He went 6.1 innings and allowed one run. Over his last two outings, he has allowed just that one run in 13.1 innings. He complained of no discomfort after either start and was scheduled to pitch Wednesday vs. Tampa Bay.

Without him, the Yankees have to rely heavily on Michael Pineda to be the pitcher they have seen only blurs of since trading for him in 2012. Pineda has to be a No. 1 capable of matching arsenals with any ace in the league, which Tanaka has been when healthy. So far this season, though, Pineda has resembled that only once, in his most recent start Friday when he pitched 7.2 innings and allowed just one run against the Mets.

Last season, in 18 starts before his elbow became a problem, Tanaka was 12-4 with a 2.51 ERA. He was easily the team’s best pitcher, and based on his 3.3 Baseball-Reference WAR, he was on his way to being the team’s best player, period.

If Pineda turns out to not be the suitable answer in Tanaka’s extended absence, the temptation for the Yankees to part with pieces of their up-and-coming farm system might be too sweet to resist as Cole Hamels, Johnny Cueto, Jeff Samardzija and Scott Kazmir could all be dangled in front of them in the coming months. Doing so could set the organization back years in player development.

If they do not, it could mean a third consecutive season without postseason play for the Yankees as the roster gets older, injury concerns become more realistic and frustration billows from the owner’s box and fanbase.

This is what Tanaka means to the Yankees. Partly because of an expensive, old and potentially declining club and partly because he has been so damn effective when his seemingly fragile right arm allows him to occupy the mound, Tanaka is the first domino in the Yankees’ 2015 season.

If he stands tall, they could be the team to beat in the American League East this summer. If he does not, the fallout can become undeniably enormous and detrimental to the team’s immediate and long-term future.

For now, the Yankees wait for Tanaka’s arm to respond, as scared as can be.

All quotes, unless otherwise specified, have been acquired first-hand by Anthony Witrado. Follow Anthony on Twitter @awitrado and talk baseball here.

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We all knew the script. In his return from a season-long suspension, Alex Rodriguez was supposed to be over-the-hill dead weight in the middle of the New York Yankees‘ lineup in 2015.

Evidently, he must have lost his copy. All of a sudden, A-Rod is clobbering the ball all over the place and, in doing so, carrying an otherwise sluggish Yankees offense on his shoulders.

What happened Friday night at Tropicana Field is a microcosm of the whole affair. The soon-to-be 40-year-old Rodriguez led the Yankees to a 5-4 victory over the Tampa Bay Rays by collecting four RBI on two home runs—Nos. 657 and 658 for his career, putting him just two behind Willie Mays on the all-time list—and a go-ahead RBI single in the eighth inning.

We’ll get back to that RBI hit in good time. But since you probably came here for the dingers first and foremost, let’s check out the dingers.

The first was an absolute moonshot that ESPN Stats & Info measured at 477 feet, the longest in the majors so far this season. Here it is in moving pictures:

And here’s the second, which was a laser down the left field line:

Thanks largely to these two dingers, A-Rod drove in as many runs as the Rays themselves. Per Erik Boland of Newsday, that prompted Yankees skipper Joe Girardi to state the obvious:

It’s not a stretch to say A-Rod has carried the Yankees offense. He’s hitting .344 with a 1.214 OPS, which stands out in an offense that’s hitting just .222 with a .712 OPS as a whole. According to FanGraphs, Rodriguez has a laughably large margin in park-adjusted offense over all other Yankees regulars.

Of course, A-Rod can’t possibly keep this up. I know that. You know that. We all know that.

There’s the reality that he’s darn near 40, for one. Another reality is that he hasn’t been productive for a full season since 2007. Then there’s how it’s beyond unlikely that he’s going to continue producing at a high level as long as he’s striking out more than 30 percent of the time. The BABIP gods are favoring him with a .438 average on balls in play, but that will disintegrate eventually.

However, just because we must acknowledge A-Rod’s eventual slowdown doesn’t mean we can’t also give him his due credit. There is, after all, a lot more than just luck driving his early hot hitting.

At the least, you’ve probably noticed that A-Rod hasn’t been getting by on squibbers and Texas Leaguers in the early goings. Seemingly every ball he’s put in play has been hit hard.

Your eyes haven’t deceived you. According to FanGraphs, A-Rod came into Friday night’s game with a career-high 25 percent line-drive rate. That there’s good for collecting base hits. Elsewhere, he also came in boasting a 50 percent fly-ball rate with an infield fly-ball rate of 0 percent. That there’s good for power.

Going back to the eye test, it sure seems like a lot of this hard contact is coming from Rodriguez’s ability to punish mistakes.

For example, you saw him hit a high fastball that was supposed to be low for his first home run on Friday night. The same thing happened when he hit his first home run of the season. When he hit his RBI single, he got a low slider that just didn’t do much. And so on.

But this is not to suggest that pitchers only need to stop making mistakes and wait for the luck dragons to abandon A-Rod to slow him down. Not making mistakes is a good place to start, but he has also quietly shown that the general approach pitchers are using against him isn’t going to work.

One thing this approach involves is more fastballs. FanGraphs put A-Rod’s fastball percentage at 60.4 coming into Friday’s action, which is higher than the league average of 58.5 and several ticks higher than what he was getting between 2011 and 2013.

This isn’t working. Brooks Baseball had A-Rod hitting .353 with both of his homers against heaters at the start of play on Friday, and then he hit two more home runs on heaters.

As if it wasn’t self-evident enough, here’s ESPN.com’s Buster Olney to note that A-Rod has erased a pretty big question mark with his domination of fastballs:

But the approach to A-Rod hasn’t just involved a steadier diet of hard stuff. It’s also involved a steadier diet of inside stuff.

Owen Watson of FanGraphs noticed as much before Friday’s game, noting that Rodriguez had so far seen 8.4 percent more pitches on the inner third of the zone than the average hitter. That’s an indication that pitchers don’t think his aging bat is quick enough to hit anything close to him.

Well, about that…here’s a plot of his batting averages, courtesy of Brooks Baseball:

Once again, this was before Friday night’s game. Not included here is the laser that A-Rod hit for his second homer of the night, which came on a two-seamer that drifted over the inner third of the zone.

Fortunately for opposing pitchers, Rodriguez certainly isn’t unbeatable.

You can see that he’s been dicey beyond the area where he’s being pitched the most. And while he’s crushing fastballs, he came into Friday’s game hitting .100 against breaking stuff and .250 against off-speed stuff, with just one extra-base hit against both. Also, here’s a chart that shows he’s done a lot of swinging and missing at the slow stuff.

As such, the message actually appears to be quite simple: stop being so predictable. Pitch A-Rod not like some helpless geezer but like a perfectly capable major league hitter.

Because that’s what he is, folks. Against all odds, that’s what he is. 

And that’s OK. If we’re being honest, this new script is a lot more fun than the old one.

Note: Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference unless otherwise noted/linked.

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The New York Yankees are always one of the most divisive teams in Major League Baseball. It’s also true, though, that the 2015 season brings about one of their most divisive on-field products in recent memory.

As is true of any professional sports team, there’s always a divide between what fans of that team feel their chances for success are and what fans of other teams feel. However, with the 2015 Yankees, it feels as though the predictions for this team range anywhere from a sub-.500 record to 90-plus wins.

With such a wide gap between the predictions set forth by detractors and supporters, it stands to reason that a lot of moving parts are at work here. Because of that, there are numerous storylines to watch early on in the Yankees’ campaign.

Over the course of this piece, we’ll look at five such storylines, all of which could have a major impact (good or bad) on the Yankees’ season.

So, let’s get to it!

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Jimmy Fallon is a Yankees fan.

Sure, he grew up rooting for the New York Mets, because his dad worked for IBM and received tickets for games. He also made a rom-com about loving the Boston Red Sox and, outside the context of the film, likened the team’s victory over the Yankees in the 2004 American League Championship Series to “the U.S. hockey team beating the Russians in 1980.”

But Fallon is a Yankees fan, as noted by his hat and presence behind home plate at Yankee Stadium on Thursday night. That beloved Yankees cap of his came into play as the Tonight Show host took in his team’s 6-3 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays from the power seat section.

Reacting to a foul tip in the bottom of the seventh, Fallon jerked his head backward and lost his cap. He then rose from his seat and took a bow.

Fallon also stood up and chugged a beer after a similar foul-tip scare later in the game.

I’m starting to think Fallon may be chipped, guys—that his body is no longer under his control, and Lorne Michaels is perpetually pushing buttons marked “LoLz” and “Hijinks (Viral)” on a remote control.

Or Fallon’s just having a lot of fun sitting really close to the game, and sports allegiances don’t matter in the grand scheme of things. Either/or.

Dan is on Twitter. He’s just jealous of the seats.

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If the New York Yankees want to return to the postseason in 2015, they’re going to need Masahiro Tanaka to be the ace he was in 2014. That’s pretty much non-negotiable.

Through one game, here’s how that’s going: not so good.

Tanaka drew the Yankees’ Opening Day assignment against the Toronto Blue Jays on Monday afternoon at Yankee Stadium and looked very little like the guy who posted a 2.77 ERA and 6.71 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 2014. In four innings, he allowed five runs (four earned) on two walks and five hits, one of which left the yard.

That got the Yankees off on the wrong foot in what went into the books as a 6-1 loss, and Katie Sharp of River Ave. Blues notes that it was the shortest Opening Day start by a Yankees hurler in 30 years:

If there’s a silver lining, it’s that the 26-year-old Japan native’s right elbow didn’t self-destruct. After missing a good chunk of 2014 with a partially torn ulnar collateral ligament that wasn’t repaired with Tommy John surgery, that was at least a secondary concern at the start of the day.

If there’s another silver lining, it’s that six of the 12 outs Tanaka got came via strikeout. As MLB GIFs can show, that had a lot to do with how his splitter and slider were generally in fine form:

But that’s where the silver linings end for the Yankees. Though Tanaka‘s 2015 debut wasn’t a total disaster, it’s definitely a performance that belongs in the file marked “DISCOURAGING.”

Let’s get the obvious out of the way: No, Tanaka‘s wasn’t good.

According to FanGraphs, Tanaka‘s average fastball in 2014 was 91.2 miles per hour, and it could get into the mid-90s when he needed it. It soon became clear on Monday that he wouldn’t be showing that kind of velocity against the Blue Jays. Instead, he sat in the 88-90-mph range.

Now, Tanaka did warn us this was coming. As reported by Andy Martino of the New York Daily News, he told reporters that it was “not the wisest” to anticipate good velocity from him in 2015.

“I think, yes, because of the fact I’m throwing more two-seamers, that could make the velocity go down a bit,” he explained. “As far as my pitching style and my mechanics, I’m trying to relax a little bit more when I’m throwing, so that might have to do with it a little bit.”

To this extent, it’s not surprising that Tanaka‘s velocity was down on Monday. Two-seamers do indeed move slower than four-seamers, and the PITCHf/x data at Brooks Baseball confirms that his two-seamer was his primary fastball.

But in this case, “primary fastball” really only works in a relative sense.

Of the 82 pitches Tanaka threw, shockingly only 26 were fastballs. That’s a fastball 31.7 percent of the time, which is quite a tumble from last year’s rate of 40.6 percent.

In the long term, this makes it even harder to have faith in Tanaka‘s elbow holding up.

Splitters and sliders don’t have the best reputation when it comes to elbow preservation. If he continues to throw more of them, his elbow might go from being in danger to being altogether doomed.

But that’s not the only concern here. Tanaka has indicated that he doesn’t have confidence in his fastball without his usual velocity, and that led to an approach with a perilously small margin for error.

The fastballs Tanaka did throw Monday adhered closely to the borders of the strike zone, and his splitter and slider usage was focused on getting swings and misses outside of the zone. Through it all, he looked like he had no interest whatsoever in testing himself within the strike zone.

This worked fine when he was getting ahead of hitters in the first two innings, but not so much when he started working from behind in his third and fourth innings of work.

He effectively permitted Blue Jays hitters to spit on his secondaries and sit fastball, and that led to a series of comfortable-looking at-bats.

In times like those, a pitcher is eventually going to have to challenge hitters in the zone with his fastball. And as Edwin Encarnacion made clear, that’s where Tanaka‘s diminished velocity could really hurt him:

In all, here’s how Tanaka‘s debut can be summed up: After looking like a rare pitcher with both command and power stuff in 2014, he spent Monday looking more like a Daisuke Matsuzaka-esque nibbler.

That’s not a good transition, and Arizona Diamondbacks announcer Steve Berthiaume may speak for everyone in noting that it doesn’t bode well:

Of course, this is where we can acknowledge that it’s only Opening Day. The Yankees have 161 games still ahead of them. That’s a lot of time for Tanaka to get squared away, even if he never gets his old stuff back.

For an encouraging illustration, consider Pedro Martinez in 2002. At the time, he was coming off an injury-marred 2001 season, and it was clear as he was giving up eight runs in three innings on Opening Day that he didn’t have his usual array of power stuff. But though that remained the case for the rest of the year, Martinez still finished with a 1.97 ERA in his final 29 starts.

That’s proof that a power pitcher can learn to live without lesser stuff. Maybe Tanaka can too.

He’ll have to stay healthy, though, and his splitter- and slider-heavy approach may make that more difficult. Even if he does stay healthy, the nibbling approach he showed off against Toronto won’t get it done.

In the event that Tanaka can’t pull a Martinez—which wouldn’t be surprising, given that he’s not Pedro Martinez—the Yankees are going to be in trouble.

Regardless of whether you ask Baseball Prospectus or FanGraphs, the Yankees entered 2015 as a team projected to only finish around .500. And that was with a common assumption that Tanaka would once again be the team’s best pitcher.

Such projections aren’t exactly gospel, mind you. But in this case, they do reflect just how volatile the Yankees’ roster is and how much the team really needs Tanaka to live up to his ace billing this year.

Based on our first look, that could be difficult for him. And if it is, the Yankees will be in trouble.

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com unless otherwise noted/linked.

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