Will the Yankees catch Jose Molina in A.J. Burnetts starts?
They should, and this time, Jorge Posada should act more like the team guy he has always been. When Molina started in Game 2 of the LDS, Posada whined about it. He had a point; he had started 79 of the past 80 postseason games. No catcher in history had even come close to his starts behind the plate in the postseason. But this point is even stronger: Burnett pitches better with Molina back there in part because Molina is a much better defensive catcher than Posada (one major league manager said Posada has trouble handling pitches above his mask). Entering the postseason, Burnett’s ERA with Posada catching was 4.96, which was the highest of any of the 10 catchers who had started at least 10 of Burnett’s career starts, and was significantly higher than Molina’s 3.28 with Burnett. So manager Joe Girardi chose the comfort of his pitcher over the feelings of his catcher. It has been done before. In 2000, Braves manager Bobby Cox started Greg Maddux’s personal catcher, left-handed hitting Pa
