The Yankees Will Have to Go Without Marte and Aceves in 2010

Two important members of the 2009 World Series Championship team will not be back for the 2010 team. From the New York Daily News' Peter Botte:

Hughes will have his next start skipped due to innings limits (LoHud)

Phil Hughes will be skipped one start in the Yankees rotation to limit his innings, Joe Girardi said before Wednesday's series finale against Baltimore. Dustin Moseley will start Sunday in Texas, and Hughes will return to the rotation next Wednesday in Tampa.

Also, Girardi said Alfredo Aceves (back) will not return this season, and Damaso Marte (shoulder) will "probably not" be back in 2010.

The first bit of news is not surprising. Hughes is currently on pace for about 181 regular season innings which would probably be too many for him if he was also asked to start in the playoffs. Although Hughes almost certainly slots in as a start in the playoffs, it probably wouldn't hurt to give his arm some rest. Since they first skipped a start for Hughes in late June after Hughes was 10-1, Hughes is 6-6 in 13 starts (73 innings) since with a 5.55 ERA, 15 HR allowed and an .833 OPS against. Although the track record for skipping Hughes' starts hasn't been great, the results he's put up since June haven't been consistently stellar either so this makes a ton of sense.

The Aceves and Marte news is not great for the Yankees, though they seemed to be resigned to move on without them before this news came down today. Marte has not been a great regular season pitcher for the Yankees but his pitching in the playoffs last year was a big reason they won the World Series (5.2 innings of no-hit ball in the ALCS and World Series). Amazingly, Marte pitched in 30 games for the Yankees in 2010 (the last being on July 7th) which is tied with CC Sabathia for the 4th most on the team behind Joba Chamberlain (60 games), Mariano Rivera (52), David Robertson (52), and Boone Logan (39). The last guy on that list, Logan, is the reason the Yankees can probably be OK with Marte being out. Logan has stepped up in a big way to solidify the lefty specialist role in the bullpen (lefties hitting .194 vs. Logan with one XBH in 70 PAs).

Alfredo Aceves has been one of the more underrated players on the Yankees the past few seasons. As a swing man (long man, short relief, set-up, spot-start and even occasional closer), he's been extremely valuable, pitching 126 innings in his Yankees career and going 14-1 with a 3.21 ERA and a WHIP of 1.063. No Yankee pitcher with at least 125 innings pitched has even close to as high a winning percentage as Aceves' .933 (next closest is 4 with .800; CC Sabathia is 6th with a .731 mark). This year Aceves had been limited to only 12 innings of work and although it looked like he was rehabbing to come back, he has now been shut down for good, it seems. Guys like Sergio Mitre, Chad Gaudin and Dustin Moseley (and possibly Ivan Nova) will try to fill Aceves' void down the stretch and in the post-season.

Just a few more bumps in the road as the Yankees look to defend their World Series crown and the Quest for 28.