Quote:
Originally posted by ThurgreedMarshall
He couldn't pitch in New York. New York = pressure. You better hope the problem was a combination of Mel Stottlemyre's inability to fix his mechanics, the stress of bringing his family over in a boat under cover of darkness and our general impatience. Because if it's baseball stress that did it (see: Kenny Rogers), he's cooked in the playoffs.
I hope he pitches well, though. I always liked him and was pissed off when we got rid of him. I felt like we gave up on him too early. (Big surprise that we did.)
TM
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You know, I've heard this a million times -- that for some reason, pitching (well, playing maybe, but really, most often it's in the context of pitching) for the Yankees turns otherwise reliable-to-good pitchers into quivering masses of turd (see, e.g., K. Rogers, J. Contreras -- though I agree they should have given him more time, K.Brown, J.Weaver, J. Vasquez), and outstanding pitchers into less-than-outstanding, albeit reliable ones (e.g., Mussina, El Duque in his later Yankee years -- there are others, just can't think of any now). I guess there's no other explanation for it, but it seems such a flimsy excuse. And it happens all the time! Can anyone offer a more convincing explanation (other than the "pressure" of pitching in Yankee Stadium) for the performance discount?