The Crushing Pressure of the Hype Machine
We’ve seen it all before. Kevin Maas. Shane Spencer. Drew Henson. All of them highly touted, all of them faltering under the pressure of enormous expectations. So where am I going with this you ask? It’s simple really. Young phenom pitcher Philip Hughes has been wowing both players and coaches down in Tampa, Florida, home of Legends Field, the Yankees Spring Training home. Let’s take a look of some of comments made by various people and you will see how highly Hughes is looked at:
” (Hughes is like) a young Rocket, the ball jumps out of his hand.”
- Jason Giambi
“He’s just special, I think he knows it, but he just wants to get better. He doesn’t seem caught up in when he’s going to get to the big leagues, or anything like that.”
-Ben Davis
“He can pitch anywhere, anytime.”
-Gene Michael
“The kid is special, he’s got great ability. We just have to wait and see what happens in his situation.’’
-Ron Guidry
So everything is going great, right? Right now it is, but with young pitchers, anything can happen. All it takes is an injury or for the Yankees to rush him up to the big club and have him struggle, thus resulting in a loss of confidence for him to lose what now seems to be a “sky is the limit” future. But this is just me trying to provide a Devil’s Advocate point of view. What makes me think the Yankees will not rush Hughes, is my faith in General Manager Brian Cashman and his comments that he refuses to rush Hughes, even though Joe Torre suggested that they give him the call last season. And even Giambi in his comments about Hughes said(although while laughing), “We could have used him last year.” But now it is this year, and it’s time to expect big things from the phenom, but only when he is ready. And once he is ready, Major League Baseball is in for a rude awakening.
February 26, 2007 at 3:17 am
It scares me a little. The heaps of praise. He’s going to have unbelievable pressure when he does finally come up. from reading the quotes and back pages, the casual fan will think Hughes is gonna dominate from game 1. what if he ‘only’ pitches 5 ip, 3 er? the Post might kill him. not to mention if he DOES stink that first game. oh lord. that’s why I hope we don’t see him before July.
his innings can be more easily mannaged in Scranton, and he can refine his game a bit more before the big lights of MLB. apparently, about 4 guys are still ahed of him on the depth chart: Rasner, Karstens, Sanchez, and maybe DeSalvo (who almost made the team out of ST last year). that’s the way it should be. god forbid we have to depend on Hughes and then he pulls a Liriano.
anyway, i believe he’ll be a league avg. starter at worst for years, and a true ace at best.