A FEW BRIEF WORDS ON KERRY WOOD
As I said on Twitter earlier, having acquired Kerry Wood, the Yankees now stand an excellent chance of winning the 2001 World Series. Kerry Wood has been fairly miserable the last couple of years. As a closer in 2009-2010, he converted 28 saves and blew nine, which is an unacceptable conversion rate. Last year, he had pitched at least somewhat effectively, unlike this season which has been marred by injuries. Still, if you put the two seasons together you get 81 games and 75 innings with 39 walks (too many) and 10 home runs (too many). You also get 81 strikeouts, which is nice but less than what Wood used to be capable of. Wood’s ERA for the last year and a half is 4.80, but that’s not representative; when you consider inherited runners he’s

Now that the Berkman trade is official, a couple of words on the price paid to get him:

Mark Melancon was treated strangely by the Yankees this year and in general. His resume entering the season as excellent. They signed Chan Ho Park despite possessing a kid who threw in the low-90s, a cruel curve, and ground-ball tendencies. In both the minors and the majors, he was very difficult to take out of the park; in 232 processional innings, Melancon has allowed just 15 home runs. His control was also good in the minors, at least until this season. He struggled with walks in the majors, and seemed to take that problem back to Scranton with him, so we will never know if he would have licked the problem with more patient handling.

The stranger part of Melancon’s Yankees years was the way

Robinson Cano is now hitting .407/.444/.790 with eight home runs. It’s as if he has been possessed by the ghost of Rogers Hornsby, albeit a smiling, likeable Rogers Hornsby whose time in the afterworld has taught him that should he receive a second chance it would probably be more fun if he just got on with the hitting and stopped being so mean to everyone. As we discussed in a previous entry, Cano has had hot openings before—last year in fact—before losing the thread. That said this is a whole other flavor of hot. Cano has been more disciplined, and the results have been unworldly, or afterworldly, or any other –ly you’d like to use, and if he maintains his disdain for first pitches and pitcher’s pitches and trans-fat pitches and all the other bad-for-you

The Yankees have an unusual bullpen. Due to their collection of pitchers like Chan Ho Park, Joba Chamberlain, Alfredo Aceves, and Sergio Mitre, who are not only viable starters but conditioned to be starters, Joe Girardi can, if he so chooses, dispense with the match-up-based relief tactics that have come to dominate bullpen strategy in the age of Tony LaRussa and reinvent the long-man -- a pitcher who simply throws a few relief innings instead of jogging in and out to face one or two batters. These pitchers had seemed to be ticketed for extinction, having been outcompeted by specialists, but whether by plan or by accident, the Yankees are well-positioned to ignore this frequently counterproductive strategy and just let their best relievers pitch for as long as they can.

Rather than rush

Is it yet time to call up Mark Melancon?

In fairness to Chan Ho Park, not only is it too early for me to say “I told you so” on that particular signing, but the debacle of Opening Night had multiple authors. These can be separated into two groups, “likely transient” and “likely permanent:"

Likely Transient
• CC Sabathia’s lack of location.
• Chan Ho Park’s lack of location/nervous overthrowing.

Likely Permanent
• Brett Gardner’s weak arm.
• Curtis Granderson’s vulnerability to left-handers
• Jorge Posada chasing balls to the backstop.
• Joba Chamberlain being wild and hittable.

Of the second list, Gardner’s range should compensate for his arm. Granderson will eventually be treated like a platoon player in

THE EIGHTH INNING IS JUST ANOTHER INNING UNLESS YOU’RE JOBA CHAMBERLAIN
In today’s New York Post, Joel Sherman suggests that we’ve been on the right path about Joba Chamberlain being no lock for the eighth inning:

As for Chamberlain, the road is not quite as clear. There is not quite as much trust in Chamberlain as a pitcher or a person. He is not going to just be handed the eighth inning.

In fact, the more and more I talked with Yankee people the more and more I got the vibe that Joe Girardi either will mix and match the eighth inning by using lefty Damaso Marte in spots or go with Chan Ho Park … Or maybe there fixation with Park is just one more motivational tool to get the full attention of Chamberlain.

Sounds ominous. What I wonder is this: if the Yankees had such