Chad Jennings of the Scranton Times-Tribune has a quick Q & A on various pitchers with Nardi Contreras, Yankee organizational pitching guru, on his blog today. Everything sounds good, but unfortunately, no mention of how Alan Horne is coming along.
Eric Hacker
Left yesterday's game because of a blister.
Jeff Karstens
Throwing batting practice, facing live hitters. "Might get in a game next week," Contreras said.
Humberto Sanchez
Throwing bullpen sessions, but Contreras said he's not at 45 pitches yet. Forty five is an important number because if the Yankees are going to use Sanchez as a starter, they want him throwing at least 45 pitches before they let him pitch to hitters. If he's a reliever, he can start at 35 pitches. It has been my understanding that Sanchez will work as a reliever, at least that's what I was told this spring, but Contreras made it sound as though that's not set in stone. He obviously didn't go into specifics -- to be expected because the Yankees rarely go into specifics with this kind of thing -- but it sounds like Sanchez could be -- could be -- fairly close to pitching in games.
On Zach McAllister
Simply mentioning McAllister's name led Contreras to make this noise: "Wheeeew." He went on to say this: "I saw him pitch two days ago. Very, very good."
On Chris Garcia
Let's just run one big quote here: "He'll pitch tomorrow, 55 pitches. Innings, it doesn't matter. He won't go more than four because he's only gone two, so we'll only bring him up by two. Even if he has pitches left, he'll throw those in the bullpen."
On Mark Melancon
Actually, this is about more than Melancon. This is Nardi's reaction when I said that Melancon seems to be pitching well: "Melancon is throwing hard, Coxy is in Double-A. Things are good. Things are good with the Yankees. Just got to get Ian back up and get Hughes healthy."
On Chase Wright and Dan McCutchen
I asked if it was possible that one of those two could be with the Triple-A team some time soon. Contreras didn't answer. He instead smiled and said he's going to Trenton tomorrow. Don't know exactly what that means. Might mean something, might mean nothing. Guess we'll find out in the next few days.
On Sean Henn
Nothing really to tell you about Henn. I didn't ask Contreras about him but I asked Brian Cashman when the team might know something and Cashman said only that the team would know something soon. I realize that tells you absolutely nothing you don't already know, but it's all I've got.
http://emedia.thetimes-tribune.com/Blogs/SWBYankees/tabid/552/Default.aspx
