Could Joba Chamberlain’s impending AAA stint simply be a tune-up for a Bronx appearance? The Daily News today has a notebook piece on some future plans for the Yanks’ young pitching stud. Brian Cashman and Joe Torre both seem to think that Chamberlain could make an impact in the Yanks’ beleaguered pen sooner rather than later. Yankee concerns over Joba’s health and trade deadline moves by the Yanks will probably be the deciding factors here.
Hughes or Joba?
This is a couple of days old, so you may have seen it already. My bad for missing it.
Anywho, John Sickels asks a pretty interesting question over at his blog:
True or False:
Joba Chamberlain will win more major league games in his career than Phil Hughes. Discuss.
I recommend checking out the discussion in the comments, there’s some good stuff there.
As for me, I say FALSE because, well, Hughes is the better pitcher. His control is better, his command is better, his secondary stuff is better, he’s been healthier (Phil’s had some pretty fluky injuries), and I like his delivery better. Hughes has a chance to have one of those “15+ wins a year for 15 straight years” kind of runs. That said, Joba’s got a chance to do some serious damage, like 250+ K in a year.
Long story short, I think Hughes has a longer career with more wins, while Joba has a greater peak with more “holy crap” moments. Â
Joba at the Futures Game
Thank goodness for Generation YouTube…
Futures Game today
The 9th annual Futures Game takes place today at 4pm EST. Joba Chamberlain last pitched on Tuesday, so you can go ahead and bet your 401k on him throwing an inning today. As you may remember, Phil Hughes got lit up his inning of work last year, coughing up 3 runs to the World Team and was almost decapitated by Jose Tabata.
The game will be on ESPN, so find a comfy chair and watch the best prospects in the game strut their stuff.
The Chamberlain/Kennedy show
The Star-Ledger had a good piece on our two favorite young hurlers in the Yankee organization yesterday. That article comes highly recommended. Hat tip to, um, well, Mike.
In your dreams Kenny Williams
From The Post:
The White Sox have had a scout looking at Yankees’ Double-A pitchers Ian Kennedy and Joba Chamberlain. Chicago general manager Kenny Williams has vowed to make changes, and if he wants to deal Mark Buehrle or Jermaine Dye, expect the Yankees to be interested. Williams talks regularly with Brian Cashman. Dye has been out since Friday with a quad injury.
Brian Cashman should give full authority to his secretary to tell Williams “Get bent” if he calls with a Buehrle-for-IPK/Joba proposal. Don’t get me wrong, Buerhle’s a very nice, very consistent pitcher (save the second half of last year), but young controllable starters do not get dealt for pitchers with impending free agency. Can’t blame Kenny for tryin’ though.
And for those of you that still worry that Cash may jump at such a deal, do not fret: players can not be traded until the 1 year anniversary of when they signed, which is something in mid-to-late August for Kennedy and mid-September for Joba. All that “they can be PTBNL” garbage is just that; garbage. A guy can’t be the PTBN for a deal that is retroactive to their 1-yr anniversary. Williams will get a better offer for Buehrle before those dates. Rest easy.
Watch Joba Chamberlain pitch on TV!!!
In about 2 and a half weeks. (sorry for the tease)Â
Joba was named to the USA squad for the 2007 Futures Game, which takes place Sunday July 8th at 2pm, and will be telecast on ESPN (or ESPN2, one of those damn channels). Both Phil Hughes and Jose Tabata made the game last year (you can watch watch Tabata almost talk off Hughes’ head here), but this year the Yanks only have one representative. You can check out the World Team roster here.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.