FIRE JOE MORGAN

Nice catch by reader Steven K. -- we hope.

Yanks-Blue Jays, 4-2

Top of the first, two out, Thomas hitting. Orel talking about Mussina and said, "When I came over to the AL, you always looked who you were going to pitch against. Whenever I saw Mussina, I knew I was in for a battle."

Scanned his game logs, looks like Orel never faced Mussina. Ever.

So remember, aspiring broadcasters: you're totally allowed to just make shit up.

Any chance someone can help prove that Orel never did, in fact, face Mussina? That would be nice. Otherwise we'd ruin our record of being exactly 100% right about everything.

** EDIT: Blargh. They met once in the 1997 ALCS. Thanks to the several of you who instantly pointed this out.

Still kind of absurd to say "whenever I saw Mussina..." when it only happened once.

Labels: mike mussina, orel hershiser

New York FJM Correspondent America's Sweetheart files this report in re: the Randy Johnson trade (the whole thing, I believe, is non-verbatim, which we normally do not do, but for America's Sweetheart, we at FJM make an exception).

America's Sweetheart writes...

I just love listening to people talk about ND losing in football. So much so that I clicked on a link to the Michael Kay show to hear Mike Golic talk about it. Then I heard Kay talk about the Randy Johnson deal and the callers who phoned in to disagree with him.

Opening comments....

Randy Johnson won 17 games last year in the toughest division in baseball....

People say he didn't win in the playoffs. Neither did Mike Mussina and we signed him to a two-year extension.

He's well worth they money he has on his contract....16 million.

He won 17 games...please don't forget that.

(now a caller)

CHRIS IN WEST NYACK

Chris - You keep saying that it's important that Randy Johnson won 17 games, but equally as important is, he had a five ERA.

Kay - Why does that matter? Only thing that matters is the W.

Chris - The win is the function of the team. But the ERA is more indicative of how he pitched.

Kay - How come Mike Mussina didn't win 17 Games?

(he won 15 games)

Chris - This isn't about Mike Mussina.

(thank you, Chris)

Chris - How many pitchers in the AL would win 17 games if they pitched behind the Yankees. With that run support?

(At this point there is a very long beat. Kay must be taking into account that of qualified ERA leaders, Johnson was 34th out of 39. Perhaps he will go with 20 or 25 as an answer?)

Kay - But...but...It doesn't matt...I again I tell you I understand what you're saying that it's a function of a team but I also say it's a function to a...You're a Yankee fan right? They scored eight runs he gave up six...they won, so what....he's a veteran pitcher that knows how to pitch to the score so his ERA is going to be higher. It doesn't matter. All that matter is if he wins and loses.

Chris - Any pitcher who gives up six runs a game under your scenario would win 17 games.

Kay - Pitchers pitch to the runs they are given. Good pitchers do that.

Chris - That's not true. Pitchers are going out there to give up the fewest runs possible.

Kay - No. If the Yankees score 8 runs in five innings he's not going for the shutout!

(A luxury pitchers on bad teams don't really have, but that's their fault)

Chris - What about the year Jason Marquis won 15 games and had a 6.21 ERA. Are you impressed with that?

Kay - No, not in the national league.

(but why not?)

Chris - What if he did it in the American League?

(nice one, Chris)

Kay - Yeah. I would [be impressed].

(Chris, please don't let him off the hook!)

Chris - So you would take someone like that over Kevin Millwood in '04 who went 9-13 in and won the ERA title with Cleveland.

(I love you Chris from West Nyack)

Kay - I'm gonna tell you why, and you are bringing up good points so I am not going to say that you are 100% wrong here. I believe by watching baseball my whole life and being involved with it for 25 years is that there is nothing harder to do in sports than to win a game by a pitcher.

(Nothing harder, save for the fact that in every major league game that has ever been played it has happened exactly one time)

Kay - That's why the era of the 300 win pitcher is going.

(hmmmm)

Kay - It's not easy to win games. And there is an art to it. So if the art is to win 17 games and have a 5.00 ERA I don't care.

(don't forget the league leading 7.51 run support. That's like forgetting the paint brush)

Kay - All these Sabermatricians get locked up with all of these stats and I don't. You know what stat I care about?

(wins?)

Kay - Did he win the game?

(that's the question you care about. the stat you care about is wins.)

Kay - Would you rather have a guy really lose a good game. "Wow, he pitched well -- we only lost 2-1!" I always said this about those pitchers, "Oh, the Yankees only scored one, then you have to give up zero." In twenty years you're going to look back on Mike Mussina in game 2 against the Tigers...had a 3-1 lead and we lost 4-3....That's not that bad...yeah it is bad! He gave up runs he shouldn't have given up!

(note: don't start a sentence "would you rather..." if you are only going to bring up one choice. it ruins the game)

(also, am I allowed to remember the next game when Randy Johnson gave up five runs? Note: The Yankees had not scored eight runs in the first inning. They hadn't scored at all. Perhaps Johnson was confused because he was used to 7.51 runs a game)

Kay - I don't care that his ERA was 5. It was good enough to win 17 games. Mike Mussina didn't win 17 games.

(he won 15. and his ERA was 1.5 lower.)

(Kay at this point rambles on to Chris about how the AL is hard. Not so hard that 33 players can't have higher ERAs than 5.00 hard, but hard nonetheless. I think he's hung up on Chris because Chris stops talking. Kay does end with this....)

Kay - You are wrong in that sense....dead wrong.

(Chris = best dude ever. not close.)

Labels: era, michael kay, mike mussina, randy johnson, wins

Let the knee-jerk overreaction to a four-game series (Really, we're talking about two bad losses. Two.) continue. Murray Chass knows why the Yankees haven't won a championship in six years: Mike Mussina.

Nothing against Mike Mussina, but he is the symbol of the Yankees’ failure to win the World Series the last six years. If George Steinbrenner is seeking a scapegoat, make it Mussina.

First off, the article begins "Nothing against Mike Mussina," but the very next sentence basically says, "Hey, fuck you, Mike Mussina." And pretty much the whole thing is one big Mussina-bash. But nothing against you, Mike.

Let's get to the numbers. Reader Pandrew has done some of the legwork for us.

This is what Mike Mussina has done since 2001:

W/L - 92-53
ERA - 3.80 (#1 among Yankees' starters since 2001, minimum 400 IP)
WHIP - 1.179 (#1)
K/BB - 4.11 (#1)
IP/GS - 6.42
K/9 - 7.77 (#3 behind Clemens (8.80) and Johnson ( 8.01))

Thanks, Pandrew. In Murray Chass' world, these concrete, objective results don't matter at all.

I think Murray Chass lives in a Jules Verne-style whimsically constructed aboveground submarine.

Mussina joined the Yankees as a free agent six years ago. The only other players who have been with the team that long have a bunch of World Series rings: Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Bernie Williams, Jorge Posada.

This is a true fact. Those other four players were around a little longer, so they got those rings. What's your point?

Mussina is the ringleader of the anti-World Series champions: Jason Giambi, Hideki Matsui, Gary Sheffield, Alex Rodriguez, Jaret Wright, Carl Pavano, Randy Johnson, Johnny Damon, Kyle Farnsworth.

From everything I've seen and read about the Yankees, Mussina is not a ringleader in any discernible way. He's just a guy who shows up every so often and pitches and gives you an above-average ERA. Also, Gary Sheffield, Carl Pavano, Randy Johnson and Johnny Damon have World Series rings.

And you suddenly think Hideki Matsui is some sort of cancerous loser? Harsh, dude. He seems to be trying to me.

Mussina, like some players on that list, is a pitcher, and the lack of strong pitching has undermined the Yankees’ chances of winning the World Series.

In spite of Mike Mussina's general positive contributions, yes.

Mussina pitched his division series game against the Tigers just well enough to lose.

I hate -- hate hate hate -- that meaningless cliche. We've gone over this before. This is a dumb, equally meaningless thought experiment, but bear with me. Mussina allowed four runs through seven innings. Not great, but let's assume for one second that Mussina decided, hey, I don't really care about pitching excellence today. I'm going to mail it in and just hope my team scores enough to win. I, Mike Mussina, am going to pitch just well enough to win. Mike pulls up the Yahoo! MLB team stats page and clicks to sort the teams by runs scored. Well, what do you know? My boys the Yankees are first! Bully for them. They scored 930 runs this year. Mike goes to Google and enters 930/162 into the search field, and he finds out that the Yankees averaged 5.74074074 runs per game this year. So Mike figures, I go seven innings, give up four runs, let Farnsy cough up another one in the eighth, and we still win by 0.74074074 runs! I'm a hero!

What he does not do: give up six runs, which would, on an average Yankee day, be just good enough to lose. (Hypothetical Mike Mussina doesn't care who the opposing pitcher is. Hypothetical Mike Mussina isn't much of a sabermetrician.)

A genuinely top-notch pitcher finds a way to win. Mussina finds a way to lose.

Really? Is that why he's 239-134 in his career with a 3.63 ERA?

The outcome of the game last week left him with a 7-8 postseason record, indicating he is not the pitcher to come up big when something big is needed.

I forgot. The playoffs are the only true Measure of a Man. Real Men come up big. They Find a Way to Win. I hate when people Capitalize Things to Emphasize Them.

(In the 21 postseason games before this year, Mike Mussina posted a 3.30 ERA, a third of a run better than his regular season mark.)

Chien-Ming Wang, playing his first full season in the major leagues, was the Yankees’ only reliable starter this season, and he came through again in the playoff opener.

Define "reliable." In the Murray-Chass Oxford-Webster Collegiate dictionary, reliable is defined as Asian.

(Mike Mussina had a better ERA, WHIP, K/BB, K/9, and Whiteness Ratio than Chien-Ming Wang this year. He spoke marginally better English.)

That left Wright as the pitcher to put his finger in the dike.

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA! Finger in the dike.

Labels: mike mussina, murray chass, yankees