The big story in baseball today, though not a trade rumor, is that manager Joe Torre could be fired if the Red Sox complete a sweep of the Yankees this weekend.
One can question some of Torre’s behavior through the year, as with most managers. But to fire him in April is just silly and reactive. Typical theatrics. The Yankees’ 5.94 starter ERA is the second worst in the league. Torre didn’t cause this. Torre didn’t sign Kei Igawa, and he probably didn’t decide to give Chase Wright two starts instead of Phil Hughes. He didn’t cause the injury to Mike Mussina, and it’s not his fault the Yanks were left with Carl Pavano as the Opening Day starter.
The Kei Igawa contract was pretty dumb from the start, and Phil Hughes should’ve broken camp with the team. I would’ve given him a taste of the bigs last September. But as for Mussina and Wang having three starts between them instead of eight or nine, that’s just bad luck. True, the Yankees didn’t have a ton of starting pitching depth to cover it. The Angels and A’s did have that kind of depth, and it served them well so far. That, again, is on Brian Cashman.
