Yanks System: Clarkin/Walks Issue Cont'd

Listened to Ian Clarkin's latest start in Low A today.   He's only made a few starts, so adjustments are still needed.   But what he does have, already, that is nasty and will be lethal when harnessed is a 91-93 MPH fastball, an 82-83 MPH change and a 72-73 MPH curveball.  And he's already getting swings and misses with all of them.    He's also able to climb the ladder with his fastball and get guys to swing at stuff out of the zone.   This is really encouraging, what he doesn't have quite yet is superb control and has a tendency to start guys off 1-0 instead of 0-1.    He's not wickedly wild, or walking the park like some other lefties have in the minors, so it should come around for him.   Yankee fans should start getting excited about him because having a ten mph difference between each of your pitches is nasty.  All he needs to do is build innings and find strike one.  Impressive talent.

I also listened to parts of both Trenton games.  They played a double header today and both O'Brien and Sanchez homered.   But, they lost both games.  And over the combined 14 innings of the two games, they did not draw 1 single walk.  I don't care how much they like Tony Frankin or Marcus Thames, but if the plate discipline isn't with the player by AA, they have to teach it to him.  And it seems they have a pretty laissez faire attitude toward developing the grinding approach that has won so many titles -- going back to Ruth -- for the Yankees.    That's really just pathetic.

On the positive side, a healthy Bleich could still end  up helping us as either a starter, long reliever or lefty trade chip.  His health ups and downs are somewhat reminiscent of Danny Borrell's, so let's hope he has better luck going forward.  DB's injuries cost us a quality starter...

Anway, the walks are a problem throughout the system and they have to fix it.