CLEVELAND – If you stroll Ontario Street toward Jacobs Field, you will pass Quicken Loans Arena, home of the Cleveland Cavaliers. Speckled around the facility are flagpoles with picture pennants on top of each of the players.
So if you look up you can see a Larry Hughes or a Donyell Marshall or even a Zydrunas Ilgauskas. Which is humorous since the whole team is one man, LeBron James.
Baseball is not like that, of course. Alex Rodriguez was an offensive genius for most of the first half, and yet single-handedly could not drag the Yankees out of their funk.
James was at Jacobs Field last night to see A-Rod become the youngest player with 501 homers. But the main event for the Yankees in a 6-1 victory over the Indians revolved around two players even younger than James, 22. In the opener of this vital series, Phil Hughes and Joba Chamberlain – both just 21 – were everything they have been promoted to be. They were phenoms, who helped lead the Yanks into a tie for the wild-card lead.
“These guys can be difference-makers,” A-Rod said.
The Yankees desperately need that to be so. You cannot survive as a one-man band in baseball, and you definitely cannot survive without pitching, and now here are Hughes and Chamberlain to potentially deepen the roster and enrich the staff.
The Yankees need their young, talented arms to help extend this second-half surge all the way into October. Hughes and Chamberlain are not luxuries. They are not pretty advertisements about the growth of the Yankee system. They are not just here to smile next to the veterans.
They are, said Don Mattingly, the best prospect arms he has seen the Yanks promote in his three decades with the organization.
“This is top-end-of-the-rotation stuff,” explained Mattingly, who managed last night as Joe Torre served a one-game suspension.
Hughes and Chamberlain are now necessities, vital pieces within a staff that will diminish greatly if they cannot handle this load. Hughes and Chamberlain are fresh. Hughes and Chamberlain can author strikeouts for a team that does not deliver enough. Hughes and Chamberlain have electric stuff.
“That,” said Andy Pettitte, “was extremely, extremely impressive.”
Hughes showed the maturity to make adjustments after a poor start against the Royals. He shifted his position on the rubber and slowed his mechanics from the stretch, and the results were compelling. He allowed one run (a Josh Barfield homer) in six innings. He threw precision fastballs, especially to the inside corner, and worked enough changeups to enhance the fastball.
But it was his curve that was devastating. He had men on base in the first, fourth and sixth, and finished off each threat with a strikeout. He mesmerized the last hitter he faced, Jhonny Peralta, with a 70 mph curve on a full count with two out and a man on in the sixth. And then he handed to Chamberlain, who was even more impressive in just his second outing.
He put down all six men he faced, four by strikeouts, including the side in the eighth. Like Mariano Rivera, he has an easy arm action that makes his fastball all the more deceptive. And then hitters cheat to try to catch up to 96-99 mph heat and they look ridiculous against a slider that just bottoms out.
“I haven’t seen a good swing against his breaking ball yet,” Mattingly said.
For the Yanks, Hughes’ injury might be a blessing. They had planned on limiting his innings. But now there is not much duress on his arm, so they are just letting him go. Chamberlain, though, comes with more rules than golf, including no pitching on consecutive days.
But you can see how tempting he is going to be. The Yanks’ greatest need is in setting up Rivera. Torre just has not found anyone to trust.
Now here is Chamberlain, who oozes confidence at such a young age. Here he is ready to potentially solve the Yanks’ biggest problem.
“He gives us something we have not had consistently,” Mattingly said.
Hughes and Chamberlain are precious and precocious. They are two of the AL’s three youngest pitchers. They came to King James’ town and showed that they just might be ready to help get the Yanks into October.
