It’s about as diverse as it gets when it comes to the front of the Yankees’ rotation. CC Sabathia, enjoying his fifth season as the New York Yankees’ uncontested “Ace” delivered another solid outing and lead the Yankees to another victory during a 4-3 comeback win on Wednesday.
After a less than impressive Opening Day (he’s been hit or miss since he’s been here), Sabathia’s velocity and reputation returned during his last three appearances.
Coming off of just one earned run surrendered in his past 15 innings, the massive lefty was greeted by a Paul Goldschmidt two-run blast in the first inning. Sabathia would go onto to throw seven more innings and yield just one sacrifice fly in the process.
Next is a toss-up of who you want to consider the number two starter. Andy Pettitte and Hiroki Kuroda are both at least 40 years old, significantly older than Sabathia, but indisputably are masters of their craft.
Kuroda is in his second season in Pinstripes and indicated in his first healthy start he could be on his way towards repeating a successful season in the Bronx after spending his entire Major League career in the National League.
It’s easy to look at Kuroda’s age and figure he could fall apart or get hurt, but when he’s on the field you would have to be an absolute amateur to consider him anything but a front-of-the-rotation arm.
Kuroda won 16 games and pitched to a 3.32 ERA in 219.2 innings last season. After leaving Opening Day with a finger injury trying to grab a comebacker, Kuroda seemed to still be bothered in his encore, throwing 5.1 innings and allowing an uncharacteristic four walks.
His past start seemed to be his first healthy one and it showed. The same pitcher who delivered 8.1 innings of two run ball against the Orioles in the division series, was at it again, this time tossing a complete game shutout on just five hits against his division rival. It’s not out of the realm of possibility for the durable Kuroda and the fully recovered Sabathia to throw 450 innings while posting sub 3.50 ERAs this season.
Finally, there’s Pettitte. Another lefty and the least hard-throwing of the group. Pettitte grew up a Yankee and will retire one. When he was younger, Pettitte used to be a 20 win threat via an elite cutter and a knack for the double play ball. The game’s best pickoff move also helped to shut down the opposing team’s running game.
Now Pettitte has made up for a dwindling arsenal by being one of the more intelligent pitchers in the game. After 15 innings to start the season in his first two starts, Pettitte has allowed two earned runs.
The Yankees are 7-2 when these three pitchers have began games in 2013, and 1-3 with everybody else. It’s not to say it is a guarantee over 110 years of combined age and a trio likely to break 7,000 combined innings can’t backfire. Nor should Phil Hughes and Ivan Nova be terrible. Pettitte hasn’t broken 200 innings since 2008 and has already been pushed back due to back spasms. Sabathia has spent time on the DL his past two seasons and Kuroda is indeed, in what could be his final season.
But if the Yankees’ front of the rotation can stay on the field most of the year, the missed starts can be compensated by the likes of David Phelps, Chien-Ming Wang and multiple other options in the minors as well as the potential return of Michael Pineda later in the year. There is plenty of pitching depth major league ready.
New York has the rotation to win the American League East and challenge for a pennant (though the Tigers have a superior rotation). It has helped win seven of the past eight games, allowing three runs or less in seven of 13 games, two or less in six and already collecting two shutouts in this young season.
And if Travis Hafner keeps hitting game-winning pinch-hit home runs, Vernon Wells can hold the outfield together until Curtis Granderson is ready, Lyle Overbay and Kevin Youkilis can stay effective until Mark Teixeira returns, and Francisco Cervelli and Brett Gardner can continue to play at their ceilings, the Yankees will be a leading force in a division full of flaws.
The Toronto Blue Jays have had gelling issues and are relying on Mark Buehrle, Josh Johnson and R.A. Dickey pitching in the AL East for the first time (plus a Jose Reyes injury). They need everything to fall into place as head into the summer to make up over 20 games in the standings.
The Tampa Bay Rays can’t score runs, period.
The Baltimore Orioles have had an inconsistent offense prone to power outages (like last season) and have already slipped up in one run games, something they posted a 29-9 mark for last season.
The Boston Red Sox are playing its best baseball in April as is tradition in Boston. Clay Buchholz and Jon Lester aren’t going to put up historically dominant seasons and Boston is not going to improve by 30 games this season, regardless of how some might feel or how Boston might look while mostly healthy (unless you consider a John Lackey injury a bad thing).
And all of that translates to opportunities for each team.
The Yankees have theirs in three starters with the potential to carry a team.
