Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
July 22, 2007
A Game and a Half

Last week I noted that the Yankees need to gain one game a week to catch the Red Sox for the division. They did a little better than that as New York won 6 of 8 and the Red Sox won 4 of 7. New York gains 1 1/2 games, leaving them 7 1/2 games out with ten weeks to go.

Both team just completed taking three games out of four after losing the opening game. Tampa Bay defeated New York 14-4 on Friday night, but the Yankees took today's game 21-4, outscoring the Devil Rays 45-12 over the last three games. Alex Rodriguez homered again today, scoring twice and driving in three. He's one RBI away from his tenth straight 100 RBI season, and two home runs shy of 500.

Shelly Duncan homered twice, giving him three in four games. He's an old rookie, with unimpressive minor league number for a first baseman/DH. But he's making the most of his chance, although I suspect he'll go the way of Kevn Maas.

The Red Sox lost 4-2 on Thursday, but they turned on the offense as well, outscoring the White Sox 29-10 over the last three games of that series. Manny picked up two hits and three walks today, driving in four. He's hitting again, collecting four home runs and thirteen RBI in eleven games since the All-Star break.


Posted by David Pinto at 05:12 PM | Division Races | TrackBack (0)
Comments

The Yankees and Devil Rays combined for 75 runs in the series. I believe the all-time record before this weekend was 70 (Yankees at Colorado, 2002).

Is that right?

Posted by: maynard at July 23, 2007 01:39 AM

Duncan was a career .251/.334/.468 hitter in the minors through 2006, but he hit .295/.380/.577 in AAA this year, at age 27, a time when most hitters, or at least major league hitters, peak, so that's not totally unexpected. His isolated power is up (25 HR and 18 doubles in 336 at-bats) but the main difference is the increase in his walk rate. He was taking a free pass about once every ten at-bats in AA Trenton in 2005 and 2006, while this year he's walked about once every 7.5 at-bats. No walks yet with the Yanks, and I doubt that this is much more than a timely fluke, but he could have a decent couple of years of "usefulness" as a Russ Branyan/Wily Mo PEna type of player, though admittedly, those guys were both better than Duncan at a much younger age.

Posted by: Travis M. Nelson at July 23, 2007 09:41 AM

Duncan also slugged close to .500 at AA in 2005 and 2006. He's not going to Cooperstown but could be useful in a limited role. It's not like the Yankees have a lot at DH right now, anyway. The club's .820 OPS from their DH's only ranks sixth in the league, so why not take a look at Duncan?

Posted by: Casey Abell at July 23, 2007 10:20 AM

The other thing about Shelly which I heard late last night during the ESPN game is that Shelly and Chris spent the last couple of winters at Mark McGwire's getting personalized batting instructions. McGwire certainly had a great eye for the strike zone and a terrific home run swing. It seems to be paying off.

Posted by: David Pinto at July 23, 2007 10:31 AM

While I was looking at the DH numbers, it struck me how many teams are absolutely stinking at the position. Several clubs have DH's who are hitting like shortstops - bad-hitting shortstops. The Devil Ray DH's are putting together an appropriately satanic .666 OPS, and six clubs are below .730.

This seems like an inefficiency waiting to be corrected. If you've got somebody like Duncan - limited but with a little pop - kicking around your minor league system, why not plug him into the DH slot? A lot of clubs have little to lose.

Posted by: Casey Abell at July 23, 2007 10:37 AM

The Yankees should be winning these games. KC? Tampa? Come on, wake me up if they can take 6 / 8 in a month when they are in meat of their schedule.

Posted by: Beau at July 24, 2007 10:07 AM
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