Just days after claiming catcher Jorge Posada, the injury bug has claimed yet another Yankee victim: third baseman Alex Rodriguez. So…you’ve lost two of your biggest offensive forces for at least 15 days and your young starting pitchers are still struggling…what’s a club to do?
Well, Morgan Ensberg and Alberto Gonzalez will definitely be seeing more playing time now that A-Rod is locked down. AG can also fill in when needed for Cano and Jeter (he’s still up while Betemit is on the DL with those eyeball ulcers). So do the Yankees need to bring up another position player? No, not really. They could, of course, but I think the more dire need right now is pitching.
Phil Hughes only went 3.2 innings in his start yesterday, forcing the Yankees to bring in Ross Ohlendorf yet again to play the role of innings eater. The lack of innings that the Yankees have been getting out of Kennedy and Hughes has definitely cost the Yankees, eating into their bullpen time and again. That is why they need a true long man…a guy that they can call on for at least 3 or 4 innings to save the bullpen and to give Ollie a break. How many times do I need to say this: call up Rasner. He has been murdering AAA hitters time and again. Yes, the Yankees would need to make some room on the 40-man roster, but this is getting ridiculous. There are some expendable pitchers on the roster (are Sean Henn or Billy Traber going to be contributing much anytime soon?) that could be DFA’d…or you could transfer Bruney to the 60-day DL, since he will be out at least 2-3 months.
Well, I don’t know what’s going to happen. What would you do if you were in charge? Oh, and the Yanks have 9 players on the DL. This just isn’t going their way, is it?
