There Is Still Hope for CC Sabathia This Season

The first inning of Thursday’s Toronto Blue Jays/New York Yankees game started off with CC Sabathia striking out Jose Reyes, inducing a ground-out from Russell Martin, and then striking out Jose Bautista. It looked like vintage Sabathia, but that glimmer of hope faded in the second inning when Edwin Encarnación singled to start off the inning, then Josh Donaldson, then Danny Valencia, then Kevin Pillar, and in the blink of an eye, the Yankees were down 4-0.

The problem isn’t that Sabathia can’t pitch anymore, he can, the problem he faces, is the impending epic meltdown that happens ever so often. After the second inning collapse in Thursday night’s game, Sabathia didn’t allow another (earned) run, and struck out five over the next three frames.

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What made Sabathia the Cy Young award winning pitcher that he once was, was the makeup, command, and velocity of his pitches. During his prime, he had a nasty four-seam fastball, a very rarely used curve, a change-up, and a devastating slider.  He had three plus pitches, and could put them at any spot he wanted, his command was remarkable.

So what has made him decline so rapidly over the last few years? Age, probably. Although, he can still be very dominant, which makes the meltdowns more puzzling. The main problem he’s faced is the velocity he’s lost over the last two-three years on his fastball The fastball is the pitch he uses the most, so when that started to go, so did it’s effectiveness.

During his prime, he relied heavily on the four-seamer. He was throwing it around 60% of the time, that was his bread-and-butter pitch, which was fine because it was topping out at 98mph, and batters couldn’t really catch up to it. He’d set them up with a heater, and then strike them out with devastating change-ups and sliders. He was an artist, not only that, he was a model of consistency.

Three of those post-meltdown strikeouts in Thursday’s game came in the top of the fourth inning, when Sabathia struck out the side. However, the problem now, is whether or not he can stay on the mound without melting down. He’s shown that he can still display dominant command on his pitches, so right now, it’s about the mental game.

There is still a glimmer of hope though, he has more dominant innings than bad innings, but the bad innings really outweigh the good innings. There’s definitely no living up to that insane contract he signed in 2009, but if he can get back to the same CC Sabathia of even 2012, the Yankees, and Yankees fans alike, will be satisfied.

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