The New York Yankees Achilles Hamstring - Pampering Then Pushing Philip Hughes

MAJOR BLOGS - www.majorblogs.net - Last night, Yankees prospect Philip Hughes (MLN FAB50 Baseball 2006 No. 45) was headed to the pitching promised land: A no-hitter in one of his first handful of starts as a major league pitcher. A phenomenal phenom dream-come-true. Until pop-goes-the-hamstring, it all came crashing down.

Hammy injuries are pretty uncommon for a pitcher of Hughes age and conditioning. To Yankees fans, it was another sign of the season apocalypse. To the legions of Yankee haters elsewhere in the American League, it was a sign from God, or perhaps indication that George Steinbrenner's contract with Satan may be coming due.

To me, it is another sign of the screwed-up Yankees farm system misusing and abusing its great prospects.

Last year we ranked Hughes 45th, to lots of flames, boos and cat-calling from the Yankee nation reading the MLN FAB50 Baseball 2006. Yankee fan knows that we don't include many of their players, because the FAB50 is a movement and talent ranking. While there are lots of Yankee prospects with great talent, movement is a different thing.

In the case of Mr. Hughes, who was pampered and moved through the farm like a prime piece of Kobe beef, the "plan," as it was laid out last year, was to keep Hughes at the Triple-A until at least mid-2007. This was largely why he went mid-40s.

On sheer talent he was far better than a lot of players on the FAB50, but, according to our sources, he wasn't considered ready for the big leagues. That usually signals some concerns about emotional readiness to handle the big leagues, or the pressures of being a phenom in the most intense sports media market in the world.

Fast forward to 2007. The Yankees pitching staff is wracked with injuries, and Pavano, last of the able, is having hang-nail issues. The New York sports media enters into its usual blood-thirsty war dance, taking the tantrum temperature of the Tyrant of Tampa and issuing the effigies of Joe Torre for public burning. As is always the case with the fickle fourth-estate of New York sports, they only remember the farm system when they run out of healthy players to flog.

Humberto Sanchez (MLN FAB50 Baseball 2006 No. 5), the recent acquisition from Detroit, was more ready in terms of both physical and emotional equipment to step into the foxhole of salvation pitcher, but his nagging forearm injuries sidelined him pre-season.

With not much else to speak of on the Yankees' farm in the true phenom department, particularly anyone that was even close to ready for a big-league shot, Hughes was the next logical choice to feed to the New York Media, and perhaps become the good omen that might turn around the Bronx Bombers' dismal start to the 2007 season.

It might have worked, too. Hughes was looking like he was both physically and emotionally up to the call up. His performance last night was the kind of magic that the Yankees know they will see out of their budding super-star. He was pitching a no-hitter into the seventh inning when he popped a hammy, which will sideline him for several days to a few weeks.

The Yankees crushed the Rangers 10-1, but with Hughes gone Mike Myers released a hit, and the Rangers Ian Kinsler (MLN FAB50 Baseball 2005 No. 4) launched an RBI-double that scored the lone Rangers run.

The injury is minimal from a physical standpoint. The psychology of it though is huge. The hype-induced Yankee fans, who live on a steady diet of hyperbole from YES and the Yankee broadcast booth, as well as the screamingly sensational fishwrap of Manhattan, have been told that the 20-year-old Hughes is the golden child, the Second Coming, the Natural. Hughes knows what is expected of him. He has big shoulders, but he is also 20 years old.

Some guys his age eat stress and don't let it show. The Mets Jose Reyes was tossed into the core of the Big Apple sports market at 19 and survived. It can be done.

Yet those reports that we had last year on Hughes nag at me. Even rolling into this Spring, the desire was to give him more time to gain some confidence at the Triple-A level. There was a reason for that move that makes more sense than tossing him to the wolves in the New York City media, and to the overblown expectations of Yankee fan too early.

The hope is that he will roll into his next start and into the supportive arms of a loving Yankee nation. Given their level of frustration with a lousy season, though, will they take it out on the great white hope?

Baseball Magic 8 Ball says: It is almost certain.

Ask Melky Cabrera about the grief that he took with a few rookie performances. Yankees who under perform get trashed, from A-Rod to a rookie, even a talented one like Hughes. If the leg is causing him problems, and he has a couple of rocky starts, Yankee fan will quickly forget the 7-inning no-no and go Duracell on his dome at the first sign of inconsistency.

Of course, if they send him down to repair and rebuild, the media and the fans will also give him a bad time on call-up. How many times have we heard the New York media bemoan a "failed" talent who was either hurt, or had just spent so much time stuck down on the farm that they take a few games to start performing at big league levels.

It is not a phenomenon limited to Yankee Stadium. Other power expectation clubs do it too. The Atlanta Braves gave Andy Marte a few innings, then packed him off to Boston. Last summer he put on a homer spectacular in June and moved up to the big leagues with the Cleveland Indians, who picked him up from the Red Sox pre-season.

The Los Angeles Dodgers retarded Chan Ho Park's career by a few years by rushing him. They wanted to satisfy the growing Korean ex-patriot community in Los Angeles by serving up one of their own. He sold a lot of tickets, but he frayed around the edges and had to go down to the minors for a while to get his confidence back. Even when he returned to the Dodgers, he didn't develop into a formidable pitcher until he matured at the major league club for more than a year. Had he stayed on his development path, he would have had a much bigger career launch.

Park's abortive launch occurred in an easier time when you had months to develop at the big league level. In the Yankees fishbowl, Hughes will not be so lucky.

Plucking Hughes into the starting rotation before his time, rather than buying a couple of cheaper veteran arms that might fill in for the ailing starting roster was a mistake on GM Cashman's part. Hughes may be one of the best Yankee prospects in a generation. He should have stayed on the game plan.

Torre may not get fired for the Yanks atrocious April, but he should have done more to protect his young arm. The modern system doesn't allow for distance pitching. Most pitchers are not trained to go 7 to 9 innings anymore. If you're a middle distance runner, you can run a marathon. If you have had no conditioning to acclimate your body to it, you won't do well.

Hughes was babied on the farm. Limited pitch counts. Complete games? Few. Who on the Yankees pitching staff, and more importantly, Joe Torre, thought he could handle that?

Hughes was thrown on to the hot surfaces of the Yankee media and got a bit burned. Hopefully it's just a bump on the career path, and not a detour. If he goes down, the Yankees front office takes the rap on this.