ARLINGTON, Texas — Phil Hughes entered this season hoping to be the Yankees’ fifth starter. He takes the mound tonight with the team’s season on his shoulders.
The 24-year-old right-hander faces the biggest start of his life in Game 6 of the ALCS against the Rangers. If he pitches great, he’ll add another line to his resume. If he tanks, he’ll have all winter to think about it.
“I didn’t want my season to end on that last start,” Hughes said of his Game 2 performance in which he gave up seven runs on 10 hits. “And so I look at this as a great opportunity to go out there, and obviously we have a lot of work to do. It’s not like we are in the driver’s seat here. We are still in this series and we have to win [tonight], and that’s the bottom line.”
The Rangers hit Hughes hard here on Saturday. This came after Hughes was brilliant in his ALDS start against the Twins. Both of those starts came on extra rest. Tonight, he takes the ball on his regular day to start.
“I’ve pitched on long rest a lot of times this year,” Hughes said. “Some have been good. Some have been bad. It’s just about what kind of work you do on the side to make sure it’s quality, and just go out there and just execute. With the more work I have on the side in between, it helps, and now that I’m on more of a regular routine, it can only help. So hopefully that’s the case.”
Yankees manager Joe Girardi believes Hughes being in his regular routine will benefit him.
“I expect him to have much better command of all of his stuff [tonight], because it is his — basically, his fifth day, where I think it was his seventh day before,” Girardi said. “The last time he had extra rest, we were able to throw him an inning of relief, but we weren’t able to do that. So I’m looking forward to his start tomorrow and better command.”
Hughes is getting close to throwing 200 inning this season. He’s at 187 1/3 innings entering tonight — that’s more than 40 over his previous career high, set in the minors in 2006. The Yankees carefully watched his innings total this year to make sure he did not overtax his arm.
When the playoffs arrived, the restrictions were off. But they have to be worried about fatigue becoming a factor for their young starter.
“I certainly haven’t noticed any wear or fatigue or anything like that,” Hughes said. “Coming into the season, I wasn’t sure how my body was going to react to throwing that many innings. To be perfectly honest with you, I feel great and when you come out and you have the adrenaline of a big playoff game like these are, any little aches and pains or whatever you have go away.”