KISSIMMEE, Fla. – Mike Mussina doesn’t know where you live but he is very aware you are out there. He understands all about Yankees fans who doubt he can bounce back from a 2007 season that was handicapped by injuries that spawned bad pitches. Mussina hears the whispers every player near the end of a career can’t avoid: He’s done.
So, when Mussina gave up five runs (four earned) and six hits in two-plus innings yesterday against the Astros at Osceola County Stadium in a 7-6 Yankees victory, the alarmists who spent the winter bemoaning Mussina being one of Joe Girardi’s five starters belched a collective groan.
However, according to Mussina, you can hold off the obituary.
“If this is a couple of starts down the road I would be worried about it,” Mussina said following his initial spring outing. “The first start is not time to worry.”
That would be easy to agree with if Mussina wasn’t less than a year away from 40 and coming off an 11-10 record that had a 5.15 ERA attachment. As much as numbers mean nothing for veterans in spring training, especially veterans who have the team made, they are still available to study, and Mussina’s digits were ugly.
“I felt OK but I didn’t get the ball where I wanted it,” said Mussina, who threw 31 pitches. “I can get to two strikes, but right now I don’t have an out pitch.”
That was evident in the third when Carlos Lee drove a 1-2 fastball over the left-field wall for a three-run homer.
“We wanted him to throw fastballs to build arm strength,” Girardi said. “He threw better than the numbers indicated. Arm strength is the important thing.”
Despite throwing off an indoor mound on his Pennsylvania spread during the winter and buying into Girardi’s conditioning program, Mussina admitted he isn’t ready to give a maximum effort.
“I am not in pitching shape,” Mussina said. “You don’t jump out there and have it back where it was. I wasn’t all over the place, but when I missed, I missed too good. I didn’t get the ball where I wanted with two strikes.”
Since the Yankees are going to monitor how many innings Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy work, Chien-Ming Wang, Andy Pettitte and Mussina will be counted on to provide the innings the youngsters don’t give.
“Somebody has to eat them up,” said Mussina, who worked 152 frames last year when he was slowed by hamstring, foot and hip problems. It was his lowest total since 1991, when he appeared in 12 games and threw 87 2/3 innings. “There is no pressure on me because I can only do what I can on my day. I am trying to get to the seventh inning every time. If I do that, we should be prepared after that.”
Mussina went seven or more innings five times in his 27 starts a year ago.
Asked about the innings limit that Hughes and Kennedy and Joba Chamberlain will be harnessed with, Mussina said, “Let them pitch before making judgments.”
Yesterday, Mussina pitched. The numbers weren’t pretty. The naysayers are moaning. Even if he isn’t concerned.