Aroldis Chapman Says Joe Maddon Overused Him in Cubs’ Title Run
If Manager Joe Girardi’s ironclad, by-the-book protocol leaves some Yankees fans gnashing their teeth from time to time, it feels like a security blanket to Aroldis Chapman.
Chapman, who recently signed a five-year, $86 million contract to return to the Yankees — where he spent the first half of last season as their closer before being dealt to the Chicago Cubs for prospects — made it clear on Friday that despite winning a World Series in Chicago he never quite took to the unpredictable ways of Cubs Manager Joe Maddon in the postseason.
“Personally I don’t agree with the way he used me,” said Chapman, speaking through an interpreter in a conference call with reporters the day after his signing became official. “But he is the manager and he had the strategy, you know?”
Chapman said what bothered him most was being kept in Game 6 of the World Series to pitch the start of the ninth inning with the Cubs holding a 9-2 lead — after he had thrown 42 pitches two nights earlier for an eight-out save in Game 5. In Game 7 the following night, Chapman’s fastball velocity dipped precipitously, and he allowed a tying home run to the Indians’ Rajai Davis before the Cubs won in 10 innings.
“The important game was going to be Game 7,” Chapman said of the Game 6 decision. “We had that game almost won. And the next day I came in and I was tired.”
Maddon said before Game 7 that he should not have allowed Chapman, who had entered Game 6 in the seventh inning with the Cubs up, 7-2, to remain in the game in the ninth. Chapman finally departed after walking the leadoff batter.
But it might not have been just Game 6 that bothered Chapman. Maddon also frequently asked Chapman to pitch earlier in games and to enter in the middle of innings, something Chapman prefers not to do.
Chapman — who gave up three leads in the regular season for the Yankees and Cubs — ended up blowing three saves in the postseason. In addition to the Game 7 failure in the World Series, he gave up a tying two-run triple to San Francisco’s Conor Gillaspie in Game 3 of a National League division series and allowed a tying two-run single to the Dodgers’ Adrian Gonzalez in the National League Championship Series opener.
In that game, Chapman entered in the top of the eighth with the bases loaded and no one out. He struck out Corey Seager and Yasiel Puig but could not get past Gonzalez.
Chapman told Maddon shortly after he arrived in Chicago, where he quickly blew an eighth-inning save, that he preferred to pitch only the ninth. But he also told Maddon he would pitch whenever the manager wanted. They largely stuck to that plan — until the postseason.
“I never told him my opinion about the way he was using me because the way I feel is that, as baseball players, we’re warriors,” Chapman said, referring to the postseason. “Our job is to do what we need to do on the field. But if they send me out there to pitch, I’m going to go out there and pitch. If I’m healthy, I’m going to go out there and pitch. If I’m tired, I’m going to put that aside and just get through it.”
In many ways, Chapman echoed comments made by his new teammate Adam Warren, who was traded to the Cubs last winter and then returned to the Yankees in the July trade for Chapman. Whereas Girardi typically has well-defined roles for his relievers, Maddon reacts more to the particular situation his team faces in a game.
“Not really knowing when you’re coming in — that was the hardest thing, the unpredictability,” Warren said in July after he was back in the Bronx.
Chapman said that Miami, where he makes his home, made a strong offer to sign him to a long-term deal this off-season but that he was concerned that Jeffrey Loria, the Marlins’ owner, had a history of conducting fire sales.
“Sometimes they change their team a lot, and I wanted to have a stable team of young players where I could feel at home,” said Chapman, 28, who added that the opt-out option in his new contract — he can walk away after three years — came at the suggestion of his agent.
Chapman also said he appreciated how the Yankees treated him when they acquired him last December while he was the subject of a domestic violence investigation. (Eventually, Major League Baseball suspended him for 30 games at the start of the 2016 season.) He said he was still undergoing counseling, as mandated by baseball’s domestic violence policy, and understood that some fans in New York were not necessarily happy that the team had re-signed him.
“Nobody’s perfect,” Chapman said. “We make mistakes, but the important thing is we learn from them and move forward.”
Published at Sat, 17 Dec 2016 01:31:58 +0000
The post Aroldis Chapman Says Joe Maddon Overused Him in Cubs’ Title Run appeared first on Sports Insider.
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