The Yankees have signed three of the biggest free agents this offseason in C.C. Sabathia, A.J. Burnett and Mark Teixeira. CC and A.J. were supposed to fill in major holes in the rotation and Tex was supposed to fill in the hole at first. Are you satisfied? Through the first month of the season, I’m not that satisfied but I see better things ahead. CC has given up four earned runs at least four times and hasn’t had a game with double digit strike outs yet. Last year at this same point, C.C Sabathia has given up four earned runs at least four times so there’s a pattern of him starting slow. Maybe we could fast forward to June because last year he had three double digit strike out games in that month and had eight double digit strike out games for the season. This season, 22 percent of his pitches have been out and over the plate to left-handed batters and 19 percent of his pitches have been out and over the plate to right-handed batters. The number two batter in the order gives him the most problems and they’re batting .304 against him. The seventh batter has the second most success against him and is batting .294. CC Sabathia didn’t have great velocity on his fast ball for the first month but it’s now reaching in the high 90’s. I see CC dominating from here on out. I wasn’t jumping up and down when the Yankees signed A.J. Burnett. He wasn’t a difference maker when the Yankees signed him. They just signed some one who had a lot of strike outs with a high era. 19 percent of his pitches are out and over the plate to right-handed batters and 26 percent of his pitches are down and out of the zone for balls. This could be a reason for his high era this year which stands at 5.36. The amazing thing about Burnett is that the sixth batter in the lineup is dominating him with a .550 batting average and they have three home runs and nine RBI against him. Maybe he should just walk the sixth batter from here on out. I don’t know what to make of Burnett. Maybe he won’t handle the New York pressure or maybe he will be but he’s been a very unimpressive 16 million dollar pitcher thus far. Mark Teixeira is known for slow starts but this year he’s really gotten off to a slow start. He’s batting .202 but at least the home runs are there. He has seven. Mark is a switch hitter and the toughest pitch for him is the slider against right-handed pitchers. He’s only batting .172 when a right-handed pitcher throws a slider and Mark is batting left-handed. When Mark is batting lefty, he favorite pitch to hit the high fastball over the middle of the plate. The toughest pitch for him to hit when he’s batting right-handed is the slider as well and Mark is batting .216 against left-handed pitchers. Mark’s favorite pitch to hit when he’s batting right-handed is right down the middle of the plate. He’s batting .492 when he sees a pitch down the middle. Mark’s best count when he is up at bat is the 1-1 count. When it’s 1-1 on him, he’s batting .400 with three home runs and 5 RBI. On May 2nd, Mark was batting .182 and he’s now batting .202. 200 percentage points is a big jump in 11 days so I expect Mark to hit much better as the season wears on. Will the Yankees be better off with these free agents they signed for the future? Possibly but overall, I feel the Yankees overpaid for the three free agents. CC might of been a good gamble but there are a lot of players with the same stats as A.J. and Tex that I’m sure the Yankee could of found on the free agent market or even from their farm system to put up the same type of stats.
