SHAKE IT OFF
Pineda rebounds from early HR in stellar outing
The bottom for Michael Pineda, the Yankees hope, came May 28.
That’s when the right-hander was smacked around for six earned runs on nine hits against light-hitting Tampa Bay.
It left him 2-6 with a 6.92 ERA and had many calling for his demotion to the minors.
At the time, manager Joe Girardi said sending Pineda to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre wasn’t a consideration, instead relying on the belief the flashes he has shown throughout his career meant he could rebound.
It helped that with Luis Severino still trying to right himself, there was no appealing alternative to replace Pineda.
He has made five starts since that ugly outing, mostly solid and none better than Saturday, when he limited Minnesota to one run on two hits over six innings in a 2-1 victory.
He also bounced back from his one lackluster game in June, when the Twins scored four runs off Pineda in 5 ¹/3 innings in his previous start.
In The Bronx on Saturday, Pineda had no such difficulty.
Brian Dozier turned on a 3-1 fastball and drilled it into the left-field seats to give the Twins a 1-0 lead to start the second, but Pineda settled down and allowed just a pair of baserunners the rest of the way.
Then he gave the ball to the deadly trio of Dellin Betances, Andrew Miller and Aroldis Chapman, who took care of the rest.
Pineda struck out eight and walked just one, leaving Girardi feeling good about the inconsistent pitcher.
“I think he’s looked pretty good in his last five or six starts,” Girardi said.
Indeed, Pienda is 1-1 with a 3.00 ERA in those games, as the Yankees look for starting depth beyond Masahiro Tanaka and CC Sabathia.
Against the Twins, Pineda relied more on his changeup, in addition to a sharp slider.
“The key for him is when he puts that slider in the dirt, he gets a lot of punchouts,” catcher Brian McCann said. “When he’s getting on top of it, the hitter becomes passive. … Everything plays off that. And he got his changeup going.”
Just as important was his ability to shake off Dozier’s early blast.
“The mistakes he has made have really cost him,” Girardi said of Pineda’s penchant for falling apart when things go wrong. “It’s a good sign when you don’t let that bother you.”