This happened last time these two teams met: On June 8, 2005, Alex Rodriguez watches his 400th career home run head toward the seats in Milwaukee. (Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)
The Yankees’ second-to-last Interleague set finds them facing former AL foe the Milwaukee Brewers this week at home. Since moving to the National League after the 1997 season, the Yankees have actually only faced the Brewers once in Interleague play, back in 2005 in Milwaukee. This was a surprise to me, as I’d thought the Dodgers were the only team since Interleague play kicked off in 1997 to not have visited Yankee Stadium, but it appears that this is Milwaukee’s first-ever trip since switching leagues.
Coming off a sweep of the Twins, the NL Central-leading Brew Crew boasts the second-best wOBA in the NL (.328), and the offense is led by free-agent-to-be and his second-best wOBA in the National League (.439) and Ryan Braun, not far behind at .416. Milwaukee also has (.371) and (.375) doing work, with also chipping in at .359. Thankfully the other three regulars in the Brewers lineup are pretty lousy, with (.336), (.264) and the execrable Yuniesky Betancourt (.264) bringing up the rear. Granted I don’t follow the NL anywhere near as closely as the AL, but I find it pretty incredible that the Brewer offense is as strong as it is with two everyday players combining for -0.6 fWAR, and that’s before the pitcher comes up in the number-nine spot. I suppose that’s a testament to the guys at the top of the pecking order.
For the Yankees’ troubles, they’ll also get to face two of the Brewers’ top three pitchers — old AL friends and , along with . As a unit, Brewers starters have pitched to a 3.85 ERA (8th-best in the NL) and a 3.43 FIP (4th-best), while the bullpen has been a touch worse, with a 3.74 ERA (10th best) and 3.63 FIP (6th best). The Yankees, as you know, boast one of the best relief corps in the AL — all the more impressive given that injuries have forced the team to already use 16 different pitchers out of the bullpen — with a 3.06 ERA and 3.39 FIP. Yankee starters have tossed to a 3.84 ERA (6th-best in the AL) and 4.03 FIP.
With the off-day yesterday, the Yankees were able to shuffle their rotation, enabling them to skip ‘s turn and line Freddy Garcia, and up to face Milwaukee.
In tonight’s opener, 2009 AL Cy Young Greinke (4.77/2.30/1.84) will face the ageless Freddy Garcia (3.23/4.15/4.08). After starting the year on the shelf, Greinke got knocked around a bit in May, but has rebounded to post some of the gaudiest numbers in the National League: His insane 11.93 K/9 and 1.84 xFIP would be first in the league if he had enough innings to qualify, while his BB/9 would be second only to and his FIP third. For whatever reason he’s getting killed on balls in play (.348 BABIP) and with men on base, having stranded a way-below average 58.8% of baserunners, which has led to the massive discrepancy between his ERA and FIP.
While it’s tempting to ascribe Greinke’s inflated ERA entirely to bad luck — and the high BABIP certainly makes a strong case — the almost comically low strand rate makes me wonder whether Greinke’s subconsciously pitching hitters differently with runners on. Greinke’s splits are similar with the bases empty (.252/.288/.439 triple-slash against) and with men on (.260/.282/.480), but he’s gotten lit up with runners in scoring position (.339/.373/.661). Granted, the latter is a smaller sample size, not to mention that all three of these splits are relatively small samples sizes and are almost certain to regress, but it probably bears watching to see whether Greinke does anything noticeably different with RISP. Or perhaps I’m just overthinking this and it really is just a matter of terrible, terrible luck.
Stuff-wise, Greinke’s a fastball-slider-curve guy who throws the occasional change. His wFB is actually the worst among Milwaukee’s starters, but again, that could be partially a function of the high BABIP, since pitch values are not defense-independent. His slider’s been his most successful pitch, followed by his change. Believe it or not, the Yankees actually haven’t faced Greinke since 2008, when he made three starts against them — the first was an eight-inning, no-run beauty; the second a five-inning, four-run affair; and the third a 6.2-inning. zero-earned run (two runs) outing. With Greinke boasting a 1.74 FIP/1.71 xFIP in June, along with the fact that the Yankees haven’t seen him in a couple of years, this will probably be a pretty tough assignment.
In the Wednesday night contest the Brewers will send changeup artist extraordinaire (2.95/3.16/3.34) to the hill against (4.05/4.35/3.83). Marcum’s been great since coming over from the Blue Jays last winter, and currently has the 5th-most effective changeup in the National League. The righty Marcum lulls batters to sleep with an 86.9mph fastball, 80.1mph slider, 72.4mph curveball, and puts ‘em away with that 79.1mph change. He also features a cutter, for good measure. Given the velocities Marcum works with, it doesn’t seem like he should be as successful as he is (all five of his pitches have positive run values), but clearly he has some of the most pinpoint control in the game. The Yankees only saw Marcum once last year — the game in which hit his 600th home run — and got him for five runs in six innings. Marcum’s good, but the Yankees should be able to beat him.
And in the Thursday afternoon (1:05pm) getaway game, (3.20/4.08/3.99) will go against (3.25/2.82/3.38). Wolf has had a quietly strong season for Milwaukee, limiting the walks, though he’s also an extreme flyball pitcher (36.1% GB%; 5th-lowest in the NL; though teammate Marcum actually has the 4th-lowest rate) with a bit of a home run problem. Wolf (avg. fastball 88.6mph) is essentially a lefthanded , though not as good. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen Wolf pitch, though I imagine the fact that there’s a 20mph(!) discrepancy between his fastball and 67.6mph curveball helps keep batters significantly off-balance. Doug Davis aside, the 2011 Yankees seem to have mostly gotten past the whole stifled-by-lefthanded-junkballers thing that recurred quite frequently last season, and I’d expect nothing short of a win with Sabathia on the hill.
The Brewers are a strong, well-rounded, seemingly playoff-bound team, and this set certainly won’t be a cakewalk. However, with home field advantage, a familiarity with Greinke and Marcum and a lineup that’s done it’s best work against finesse pitchers (116 tOPS+ and 130 sOPS+), the Yankees should be able to take two out of three this week.
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larry ive gone through each team and ive made my choice for the pitcher i most want the yankees to aquire combined with a realistic chance of getting him. and that guy is…. Anibal sanchez. you thoughts?
I like Sanchez — who is in the midst of a career year — a lot, and considered including him in the Rodriguez/Kuroda post, but even with the Marlins out of contention it seems unlikely to me that they’d trade a guy who is not only their second-best pitcher, but currently the 6th-most valuable starter in the NL by fWAR.
I can’t imagine he’d come cheaply, not to mention the fact that the Yankees and Marlins really don’t do business all that often, which I’d imagine is due in part to the Marlins anecdotally asking for too much for their players.
Given the dearth of available frontline starters, it seems unlikely the Yankees could acquire Sanchez without surrendering Montero, although based on a lot of the chatter around here of late, it sounds like a fair number of fans have crossed that particular threshold.
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[...] into Tuesday night’s game Larry had mentioned Zack Greinke‘s unusual ERA-FIP split of 4.70 to 2.30 in his series preview. For a split second during the game, we got a taste of why. In the first inning, after Brett [...]
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