Yankee Player Development: Pitching Side

I said earlier in the week that I would start taking a look at the Yankee Development side.   So let's start with pitching, though it is clear through the hiring or Gil Patterson and the reassigning of Nardi Contreras that they're already trying to address it.

The fact is the Yanks haven't developed a long term, consistent starter since Andy Pettitte.   Yes, Wang had a few good years, ended by injury, but he like Phil Hughes and Ivan Nova arrived in the bigs without an out pitch.   And that seemed a very low priority for Yankee prospects under Nardi Contreras.  To wit: if a kid showed up with a plus slider like Phil Hughes or Brett Marshall, he'd take it away from from them and make him learn a curve.   Similarly, he'd take away splitters and discouraged them throughout the system,    Marshall ended up needing TJS and hasn't had a whiff of his draftable stuff since.   Phil Hughes's problems run a little deeper than pitching coaches, but he's not the pitcher he should be, nor is Joba Chamberlain, nor is Dellin Betances.    In  fact it can be said, without reservation that none of the super high upside pitching prospects the Yanks have drafted or signed as IFA's in the past 10 years has amounted to 1 plus MLB starter.

That's pathetic, and the Yanks have drafted and signed a lot of amateur pitchers in that time.   Strangely, over the past couple of years, top prospects like Betances, Banuelos and Bryan Mitchell have all came down with fastball control issues.   And that hadn't been an issue for Betances or especially Banuelos in the past.

It seemed like the method under Nardi tried to use a cookie cutter approach toward what they could throw and how they could throw it.  The curve/slider thing was supported by some health studies, but look what happened to Marshall.   And somehow throwing the same stuff became more important than getting people out.   The test for every major league pitcher is:  can they retire major league hitter?  That's it.   That's the only test an organization is training them up for.    And 0 for everyone since Pettitte is ridiculous.

Having said that, they did develop some collegiate relievers. And those were mostly players like David Robertson who were fast tracked.  Phil Coke also had a few moments of clarity before being paired with Ian Kennedy and the incomplete Austin Jackson, and shipped off for Grandy.  And there are more encouraging relievers in the pipeline which is a function of the value of where Yankee picks have fallen.

Now they've brought back Gil Patterson.   Gil was the `70s version of super high upside pitching prospect that kept failing under Nardi.   Gil was great when he was healthy, but that was really for just a few days in his career.  He had both rotatator cuff and TJS among others.   So he's either figured a few things out or he should stay away from round throwable objects.   Kidding aside, he's had success with kids in Oakland and at a few other stops as well as in the Yankee system in the past.

It's my hope that he does not have a cookie cutter approach to pitching prospects and has successful strategies for coaching up a number of differing styles.  

We're going to find out some stuff real soon.  As Yankee minors fans are aware, at any given time over the past few years, the Yanks have had almost as many prospects in extended spring training in Tampa as they've had around the minor leagues.    Well, short seasons are starting and drafted pitchers are showing up.   Let's see how they are handled and how the kids who come out of EST are doing after longer exposure to the Patterson method.

Of course, it's also about the pitching coaches throughout the system and there have been some changes there.   There's been some movement there over the past season or so, but it might take this season for Gil to weed out those that don't fit now, Carlos Chantres, I'm looking at you:)     So we'll see what happens.   If Nardi was still on the job, I could speak more conclusively about the development problem, but I'm hoping they're already starting to solve it with Patterson.

We'll talk about hitting and the lack of plate discipline among the prospects in the next few days.