Waiting for Phillip Hughes

Last Saturday we travelled down to Bradenton, Florida to watch the Yankees take on the Pittsburgh Pirates at the Pirates’ spring training facility. It was really freaking hot, and our seats turned out to be on bleachers (without seatbacks) down the first base line, though we promptly moved down to field-level seats (with seatbacks), though even these seats were still directly in the sun, and so we fried for three hours. The Yankees’ starting pitcher was Phillip Hughes, who began the game by letting up a towering homerun to right field. And then another one. But then he settled in, more or less, finishing three innings without giving up any more runs.

While I am no pitching coach, Phillip Hughes still does not look ready yet. This is not such disappointing news as it might be – for the short-term, anyway – in light of the acquisitions of C.C. Sabathia and A.J. Burnett, and the re-signing of A.E. Pettitte. The 2009 Yankees already have a formidable starting 5, regardless of whether Phillip Hughes finally has his breakout year or not.

That having been said, it’s a good time for me to introduce to our loyal blog reader(s) my philosophy of Baseball (and therefore, of Life) – specifically, how to build a winning baseball club/dynasty.

Simply stated, I don’t believe in the C.C. Sabathias of the world; I believe in the Phillip Hugheses. Which is to say, I don’t believe in acquiring big name pitchers for inflated contracts who may have already pitched their best days with another team. I believe in young, unknown arms.

In fact, there’s no substitute, in my view, for a good homegrown, young ball club – pitchers and non-pitchers alike. Sure, you want to anchor a team with some veterans who will lead the young guys by example – including a crafty veteran pitcher or two who will keep the team competitive while the younger guys are coming into their own. But the older guys, as well as the guys who are in their prime, should make up less than 50% of your team, or you’ll have problems like the Yankees, and teams like them, have had over the last ten years (as they did in the 1980s).

I support this view in two ways. First, I notice that, almost every year, the hot team in baseball is not the team with all the hired guns, but rather the team with players that none of us have heard of yet. This is because Baseball is not about how many big guns you have on your team, but is really about how well the players play together as a team. Consequently, chemistry is everything. Some recent examples include: the 2005 Chicago White Sox, 2006 Detroit Tigers, 2003 Florida Marlins, 2008 Tampa Bay Rays, etc. Indeed, last year’s championship Philadelphia Phillies consisted of stars – Cole Hamels, Ryan Howard, Chase Utley, Jimmy Rollins – all of whom were homegrown players who started and developed together as a team.

I remember another team that did this: the 1996-1999 New York Yankees. While the 1998 Yankees, for instance, consisted of a great balance of battle-hardened veterans and key trades (Pail O’Neill, Chuck Knoblauch, Scott Brosius, David Cone), the nucleus of that great dynasty was the awesome young, previously-unknown, homegrown talent (Derek Jeter, Andy Pettitte, Mariano Rivera, Jorge Posada, and Bernie Williams). The problem came when the aforementioned veterans got old and retired. But instead of waiting a few years to build another dynasty around the Jeter-Rivera nucleus, the Yankees’ ownership instead opted for quick-fixes by buying every hired gun that came available in an expensive effort to plug holes in a ship that nevertheless continued to sink.

Which brings me to my second point: that hired guns generally do more harm to team chemistry than good. And the problem only gets worse the more you do it. Instead of a team, what you get is a collection of individuals, and a ball club with a median age above 30. E.g., NY Yankees 2001-2008. In fact, the only team of hired guns to win a World Series that I can think of is the 1993 Toronto Blue Jays (who, admittedly, did kick a lot of ass). But generally speaking, great teams begin in the farm system.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m very happy that C.C. Sabathia is pitching for us, and not on the Red Sox staff. But how he performs, at least to me, is not nearly as important as how the Phillip Hugheses and Joba Chamberlains of the team do this year. Because that is where the next great Yankee dynasty will come from.

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