Yankees Interested in Gerardo Concepcion

Enrique Rojas of ESPN Deportes reports that Cuban defector Gerardo Concepcion has officially declared for free agency and the Yankees are one of the five teams expressing the most interest in the 18-year-old left handed pitcher.

Rojas also says  Concepcion will put on a training session Thursday at the Yankees facility in the Dominican Republic.

The 64,000 dollar question is who is Gerardo Concepcion?

There is not much out there about him so I am guessing we will find out a lot more come Thursday, but what we do know as of now is he is being described as a finesse lefty. His fastball is reportedly at 89-91 mph, which if true is actually pretty good considering his age and his 6'1", 175 lbs frame, that leaves some room for projection.

According to this article Concepcion described his best tool as control and goes on to say that he has a good curve and efficient slider. His stats as seen below don't necessarily back this claim 100%.

Stats:

Age	W	L	ERA	G	GS	IP	H	R	ER	HR	BB	SO	H/9	BB/9	SO/9
18	10	3	3.36	21	16	101.2	103	42	38	6	43	53	9.1	3.8	4.7

For someone who is supposed to have great command and a great curveball he walks a fair amount of batters and doesn't really strike out anyone. Granted he is extremely young so he does get the benefit of the doubt, but I would hope the Yankees don't commit too much if they choose to go after him. He definitely has potential winning the Rookie of the Year award in Cuba, however, I am not getting ready to jump all aboard the Concepcion bandwagon just yet.

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Bounce Back Candidate: A.J. Burnett

Earlier in the podcast Matt and I briefly talked about who was going to ultimately win the Yankees No. 5 starter job. We both pretty much agreed that A.J. Burnett would win by default, but a deeper look shows that Burnett is actually poised for a nice bounce back year.

I mentioned that Burnett’s 17% HR/FB rate last year looked extremely fluky and was way off his career average. A deeper look shows that was the highest home run rate in Major League Baseball since 2007 when who else, but A.J. Burnett posted a 17.7% HR/FB. Burnett followed that year up by going 18-10 with a 4.07 ERA over 221.1 innings. The year was fueled by a much, much better 9.6% HR/9.

(Photo by Al Bello/Getty Images)

A big difference since that 2008 season, however, is the fact his fastball has dipped 1.6 mph and the decreased velocity has seemed to really have an affect Burnett. He tried to adjust by throwing his fastball an astonishing 10% less than average and rely more on his changeup.  He attempted to become a three-pitch guy for the first time and it failed. If he gets back to throwing primarily fastball and curveballs he could return to being a decent pitcher.

The reason I actually see him having the bounce back is because his peripherals where no different last year than normal. His 8.18 K/P and 3.92 BB/9 were a little worse than his average, but not by much. The hits allowed were also no different; the only major change was the home runs. A inch here or an inch there and things could look very different.

I am not trying to say Burnett will be a miracle and carry the Yankees, but there is every chance he performs like a No. 3 starter in the No. 5 slot. That is something that cannot be taken lightly. His FIP last year was 4.77 and his xFIP was even better at 3.86. Assuming he is healthy I don’t see why he can’t win 10+ games and throw a 190+ innings with an ERA in the low-to-mid 4’s.

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Mets Addition By Subtraction

ESPN released its schedule for Sunday Night Baseball and Mets fans should find themselves blessed that the Mets do not take the Sunday stage once.

Usually getting worse only has its negatives, but this scenario seems like a huge addition by subtraction. The fans get more Gary, Keith and Ron and don ot have to listen to the horrid ESPN crew. Granted Jon Miller and Joe Morgan are no longer there, but I'm not sure I trust the new crew anymore than them.

Unfortunately for Yankees fans they have three of these games: April 15th against the Angels, April 22nd against the Red Sox, and July 8th against the Red Sox.

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Gotham Power Rankings: January 8-14

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Gotham Power Rankings: December 19-25

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