Just when you thought the Yankees were going to give David Cone a legit shot at becoming the successor to Larry Rothschild, they go out and call an audible by hiring highly-regarded, yet publically unknown pitching expert Matt Blake of the Indians.
The 33-year-old Blake is an analytics-heavy, progressive biometrics believer that spent the previous four seasons in Cleveland as their pitching coordinator and assistant director of pitching development.
In a quick turn of events, the Indians promoted Blake to director of pitching on Tuesday — however, the allure of returning to the Yankees — where he previously worked as an area scout (from Maine to New Jersey) was too much to turn down.