Sunday, September 11, 2005

Ca-no Can't Field

After Friday's Red Sox disaster, the Junkees returned the favor yesterday. The usually reliable Shemp booted a ball, Lawton screwed up again, and Cano did his best Chuck Knoblauch imitation.

Cano's hitting prowess has long since died down, though he quietly had a good week this week (7 for 13). In today's Post, Joel Sherman points out that Cano has the lowest pitches seen per plate appearance in the league (a mere 3.03), which explains his awful OBP (.313). No wonder the guy was awful at the #2 hole. This guy makes Jose reyes look like a patient hitter. At least Snorre eventually saw the light and bumped the guy to the 9 hole, but waiting so long to do so might have cost his team a few wins.

And Cano is looking like a disaster in the field. He has two errors in the series so far, and a costly error in the 9th recently cost the Yankees a game. And something similar happened in August, though I can't remember exactly which game. Cano's fielding % is the second-worst among AL 2B, right ahead of Soriano. Add Cano to the Yankees' list of awful fielding 2B, joining the likes of Sax, Sori, and of course, Knoblauch. As the Despiser pointed out, it seems like the last decent-fielding Yankee 2B was Willie Randolph. Or, back when Felix Hernandez was 3 years old.

So the days of Cano being the next Derek Jeter seem as far gone as the days when Tino was crushing the ball every night. Yankee fans are too busy going crazy over Aaron Small to talk about this guy anymore. The truth is, Cano is probably the next Mariano Duncan. Maybe.

-- Best thing about yesterday's win: Schilling finally returning to form. And not a moment too soon. If Curt can keep this up.....

-- And did anyone notice Andy Pettitte notching his 15th win yesterday?

-- Go Indians!!!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Cano had a throwing errors in the bottom of the ninth against the Devil Rays back in August (or maybe July). He was trying to field a routine ground ball to throw out Aubrey Huff and instead threw it past Tino Martinez. It ended up costing the Yankees the game.

I don't get what the big deal is about Cano. He has no plate discipline with bad strike zone judgment and can't field. He sucks. I honestly thought that they'd start sitting him in favor of Bellhorn (who at least can get on base), but I guess not. Torre's stupidity is everyone else's gain.

Anonymous said...

not sure what mouse is talking about with bellhorn who has 1 hit as a yankee and an OBP of .286 (which is a point above cano's BA).

cano is a rookie on a high profile team hitting .285. sure he makes a few too many errors. but to say he sucks is quite an exaggeration

Anonymous said...

Bellhorn's season OBP is about .320. Cano's is about .313. See the difference? While Bellhorn isn't hitting, he's still working counts, drawing walks, and getting on base. Cano's ability to get on base is more or less determined by his batting average; if he can't get a hit, he's not going to get on base. Considering he takes only about 3 pitches per at-bat, that's not a good thing.

Fielding...eh. Rookies make mistakes to be sure. But right now, Torre has a veteran 2B on the bench who, while not spectacular, is at least competant in the field. Considering the other options, Torre is stupid for continuing to play Cano.