August 21st, 2023: Cole, Prospects, Judge, Bullpen, Mailbag

Reminder: I’m on vacation this week. There won’t be a post Friday even if there’s breaking news. I had a lovely trip out of town planned, but instead I will spend the week at home because I tested positive for COVID on Sunday. Stupid virus. I’m okay though. It feels like a bad cold and is somehow better than watching the 2023 Yankees play baseball. I’m just annoyed I had to cancel my first vacation in forever. Anyway, things will be back to normal next week after my “vacation.” Here is this week’s post.

1. Weekend thoughts. The Yankees have lost eight straight games, their longest losing streak since 1995, and they’re four games under .500. It's the latest they've been under .500 since the final day of the 1992 season. Remember when we were talking about the Yankees having to play at a 99-win pace the rest of the way to reach 90 wins and get to the postseason? Now they have to play at a 94-win pace just to keep the winning season streak alive. I fear that sucker is coming to an end. Here are a few thoughts on the last few games.

Friday’s pitching decisions

I don’t understand the Yankees sometimes. They’ll randomly try an opener with Luis Severino and Randy Vásquez, and they’ll watch an opener work well for Jhony Brito (in this game and this game), yet they sent Brito out as a traditional starter Friday, and they were down 4-0 after four batters. Some numbers on Jhony:

• vs. 1-4 batters: .283/.371/.487 with 11.5 BB% and 15.9 K% (132 PA)
• vs. 5-9 batters: .250/.294/.500 with 5.5 BB% and 18.5 K% (146 PA)

The slug is a problem no matter where Brito is in the lineup, but clearly, he’s more effective against the 5-9 hitters than the 1-4. Teams stack their best hitters at the top of the lineup and an opener keeps Brito away from that part of the order once per outing. It’s a worthwhile move and it’s worked for Brito in the past, yet no opener Friday. Shrug.

Maybe the Yankees started Brito on Friday to challenge him and see how he would respond as they shift focus to 2024? If they did, he failed, though there is value in knowing a player can’t do something. Also, I don’t buy this at all. Not when the Yankees haven’t called up any young players (Oswald Peraza? Everson Pereira?) and Greg Allen was in Saturday’s starting lineup.

Falling behind 4-0 in the first inning is bad but not a death sentence. But when Boston stretched it to 7-0 in the second, yeah, that’s game over. At that point you have to look at the big picture and set yourself up for the rest of the weekend. Instead, Brito went out for the third inning, faced only two batters, then was pulled at 49 pitches. The Yankees didn’t want the kid to wear it.

Okay, fine, but why go to Ian Hamilton? Hamilton threw a career high 3.2 innings in a game the Yankees were losing by seven. Albert Abreu didn’t pitch Friday and Greg Weissert threw only 27 pitches. The Yankees didn’t squeeze more out of Brito and barely used their low leverage guys, and instead used one of their best relievers for 3.2 innings of mop up duty.

Hamilton has been exceptional this season. I mean really, really great: 1.72 ERA (2.88 FIP) with 29.1% strikeouts and 54.5% ground balls in 47 innings around the groin injury. He’s been a bright spot on a team lacking them. So of course the Yankees took him out of play for the rest of the weekend with that extended mop up outing Friday. Brainless baseball. Come on man.

(Maybe none of this matters because Abreu wound up throwing three innings and 56 pitches Saturday. The Yankees didn’t know Friday they would need him to do that Saturday though.)

The Yankees sent Vásquez down after last Wednesday’s start to get an extra reliever (Weissert) on the roster for the weekend. Brito was not sent down after Friday’s game. That suggests the upcoming rotation will shake out like this:

• Monday: off-day
• Tuesday vs. Nationals: Carlos Rodón (Weissert was sent down Sunday night)
• Wednesday vs. Nationals: Luis Severino
• Thursday vs. Nationals: Jhony Brito (with an opener? one extra day of rest)
• Friday at Rays: Gerrit Cole (one extra day of rest)
• Saturday at Rays: Clarke Schmidt (one extra day of rest)
• Sunday at Rays: Carlos Rodón (normal rest)
• Monday at Tigers: Luis Severino (normal rest)
• Tuesday at Tigers: Jhony Brito (with an opener? normal rest)

Unless there’s an injury, Vásquez is not eligible to return until next Thursday, so the Yankees need Brito (and Severino) to make two more starts between now and then. Once Vásquez can come back up, he should stay up, and he should start every fifth day. He’s one of their five best starters right now and it would help prepare him for a larger big league role in 2024.

Friday’s pitching maneuvers were unusual but ultimately none of it really mattered given what happened over the weekend. Still, it seems like the Yankees don’t do themselves many favors with their player usage. Using a reliever as effective as Hamilton for 3.2 innings in a blowout loss is not something that should happen often (or ever).

Cole’s Cy Young case

Saturday put a dent in Gerrit Cole’s Cy Young hopes but he’s still well-positioned. Six runs in four innings was his worst start of the season, yet he still leads the American League in ERA (3.03) and innings (160.1). As Leo Morgenstern recently noted, ERA is the best Cy Young predictor out there. Here’s the MLB pitching WAR leaderboard:

1. Gerrit Cole, Yankees: +4.6 WAR
2. Nathan Eovaldi, Rangers: +4.0 WAR
3. Logan Webb, Giants: +3.9 WAR
4. Sonny Gray, Twins: +3.8 WAR
5. Shohei Ohtani, Angels: +3.8 WAR

Eovaldi has a sore elbow and he hasn’t pitched since July 18th, and Shawn McFarland says he is expected to face hitters later this week. He’s still fairly early in his rehab work, meaning Gray and Ohtani are the more serious Cy Young threats. (Shane McClanahan having Tommy John surgery takes him out of the running as well.)

Anyway, that’s Baseball Reference WAR (based on runs allowed), not FanGraphs WAR (based on FIP), and the league leader in bWAR has won 10 of the last 14 Cy Youngs between the two leagues. On two other occasions the bWAR leader finished second in the voting. ERA may be the best Cy Young predictor historically, but bWAR might be the best predictor now. Cole still has a healthy lead there.

Saturday’s clunker took Cole from the clear Cy Young front runner to okay, maybe there’s some question about it now. It wasn’t the death knell for his Cy Young case though. Cole has another 6-7 starts remaining and he’s been great all season, but he used up his mulligan Saturday. He probably can’t afford another stinker to remain the Cy Young favorite.

So what now?

The Yankees are nine games out of a postseason spot and FanGraphs puts their postseason odds at 0.5%. For all intents and purposes, they’re out of the race, even though it is only Aug. 21st and they have 38 games remaining. A reasonable team would look at this situation and say “it’s not happening this year, let’s think big picture now.” The Yankees aren’t there yet.

As of last Friday, teams can call up prospects and ensure they don’t exceed the 45-day service time threshold for rookie eligibility. This has nothing to do with free agency or arbitration. It just means players called up now will retain rookie eligibility next season, so they can potentially win Rookie of the Year and net their team a Prospect Promotion Incentive draft pick (they also can’t go over 130 at-bats or 50 innings to retain rookie eligibility in 2024).

The Angels (Nolan Schanuel), Cardinals (Masyn Winn), and Reds (Noelvi Marte) have all called up top prospects since Friday. I’d like the Yankees to get in on that, though I’m not a “play kids at as many positions as possible” type. Jasson Domínguez has to go on the 40-man roster after the season, but I don’t think he should be called up directly from Double-A, you know?

There are three straightforward moves I’d like the Yankees to make right now rather than waiting until the Triple-A season ends or for rosters to expand in September. The moves:

• Call up Everson Pereira (DFA Greg Allen)
• Call up Oswald Peraza (DFA Billy McKinney)
• Call up Randy Vásquez (option Brito or, sadly, DFA Severino)

Vásquez can not come back up until next Thursday because of the 15-day rule, so that one has to wait, but Pereira and Peraza should be in pinstripes for Tuesday’s game. And they should play too. The Yankees called up Peraza last September and we were all excited, but he barely played because they were trying to hang on and win the AL East, and didn't want to break in a rookie under those circumstances. There’s no such excuse this year.

Shutting down Aaron Judge and his injured toe also has to be a consideration, though there is no indication that will happen anytime soon. Until then, this is the lineup I’d like to see (the batting order is whatever, the nine names are what’s important):

1. 1B DJ LeMahieu
2. RF Aaron Judge
3. 2B Gleyber Torres
4. DH Giancarlo Stanton
5. CF Harrison Bader
6. SS Anthony Volpe
7. LF Everson Pereira
8. 3B Oswaldo Peraza
9. C Ben Rortvedt

That lineup is almost entirely right-handed (Rortvedt is the only lefty), but that’s the roster the Yankees have built. I mean, they really should put Pereira in center and play Oswaldo Cabrera in left field, but there’s zero chance Bader sits. It’s almost like the Yankees should have traded him and their other rentals at the deadline. Alas.

Earlier this month I argued Estevan Florial was a better outfield call up option than Pereira, but I no longer feel that way. Florial has no future with the Yankees and there’s something to be said for Pereira coming up, going through growing pains, and learning what he has to improve and adjust in the offseason. Waiting until next season to call him up means those adjustments have to be made on the fly during the season, and that’s not easy.

As for Austin Wells, I’m less gung-ho about calling him up than I am Pereira and Peraza just because the catcher position is so demanding and has such a steep learning curve. If the Yankees call Wells up, great. That would be fun. I’m just saying I'd understand if they let him play out the rest of the season as the starting catcher with Triple-A Scranton. Their season doesn’t end until Sept. 24th. The RailRiders still have plenty of games to play.

“That’s a tough question,” catching coordinator Tanner Swanson told Gary Phillips when asked whether Wells is ready to catch MLB pitching. “You never really know until you get up here and experience it. But I do know this: there’s nothing in his performance that would say that he’s not. Everything he’s done at the minor league level would suggest that he has the skills. He’s got the tools. Now it’s just about timing and opportunity.”

The Yankees are crashing out of the postseason race and Saturday they started Allen because McKinney had back stiffness. That was absurd and it was my breaking point. They have to start giving young players a look. I’m not saying they should play kids at every position or something extreme like that. Pereira and Peraza (and Vásquez) are right there though. Call ‘em up.

“We’ll probably talk about it some more today, so I think anything’s on the table right now,” Aaron Boone told Pete Caldera on Sunday about potential prospect call ups.

(For real, if the Yankees don’t call up Peraza and Pereira after losing eight straight games and getting swept at home by the Red Sox, when will they? Something has to change before their next game Tuesday. The front office needs to make a change to the roster just to show us they're awake and aware things are bad. I need a proof of life roster move.)

Miscellany

Speaking of Cabrera, he has 99 plate appearances in the last 74 days, Triple-A included. He was good enough to begin the season as the starting left field and now he’s apparently so far out of the picture that the Yankees are comfortable letting him sit on the bench game after game. I still think there’s a potentially good utility guy in there. I’d like Cabrera to play regularly the rest of the season, even if it means going back to Triple-A … Rortvedt started the day game Saturday after the night game Friday. They’re really committed to him as Cole’s personal catcher, huh? Rortvedt hasn’t hit at all (2-for-35 since being called back up), but I feel like his at-bats have generally been okay. He’s not chasing (23.2%) or striking out (23.1%) excessively. I'll say it again: we know what Kyle Higashioka is. Keep playing Rortvedt and give him a chance to settle in and get comfortable. Even if he proves to be bad, that’s worth knowing … And finally, Keynan Middleton has been really good with the Yankees: 8.2 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 BB, 10 K. I wonder if the Yankees will look to bring him back after the season. Does something like two years and $6M get it done? Or is Middleton poised to cash in more in a weak free agent class? Yeah, probably. He’s been a solid pickup though. Not his fault he was weirdly the only move the Yankees made at the deadline. Middleton’s done his job.

2. Four things you may or may not know about the 2023 Yankees. It’s time for the latest installment of everyone’s (?) favorite feature. Here are the May 22nd and June 15th editions. I originally had five items queued up, but Michael Kay and the YES Network blew up my spot with all the 50 RBI talk Sunday. A few nuggets on that:

• Gleyber Torres and Anthony Volpe both reached 50 RBI on Sunday. They lead the team.
• Gleyber and Volpe are tied for 104th on this year’s RBI leaderboard. Not even top 100.
• The Yankees were the last team with a 50 RBI guy this season. Good grief.
• This was the latest into a season the Yankees went without a 50 RBI guy since 1949.

RBI are not the best way to evaluate hitters because they’re so teammate dependent, but geez. The Yankees not getting a 50 RBI guy until Aug. 20th is just sad. This team is in such disarray. Anyway, here are four things you may or may not know about the 2023 Yankees.

The Yankees have the fewest plate appearances with men on base

It isn’t close either. When I stumbled across this stat, I almost quit the blog. I closed my laptop, poured myself a drink, and played some video games because I was not ready to process it. Here are the teams with the fewest plate appearances with runners on base this season (these numbers are entering play Sunday):

30. Yankees: 1,814
29. White Sox: 1,884
28. Athletics: 1,904
27. Royals: 1,928
26. Tigers: 1,959
…
MLB average: 2,047
…
1. Rangers: 2,240

The gap between No. 30 and No. 29 is nearly the same as the gap between No. 29 and No. 26. Look at the company the Yankees are keeping there. They’re alongside the worst teams in baseball. Why? Because they have been one of the worst teams in baseball lately. The Yankees have the seventh worst record in baseball since Aaron Judge hit the Dodger Stadium wall.

(The Yankees are also last in plate appearance with runners in scoring position, because duh.)

The reasons for this are numerous. First and foremost, the Yankees don’t get on base all that often. Their team .305 OBP is fifth lowest in baseball and it was sub-.300 just about the entire first half. Don’t get runners on base and you don’t bat with ducks on the pond. Pretty obvious explanation there, though there’s more to it than that.

To their credit, the Yankees hit a lot of home runs – their 168 dingers are the seventh most in baseball – and homers clear the bases. The Braves lead baseball with 715 runs and yet they are only 20th in plate appearances with runners on. Why? Because they’ve hit 235 homers, 41 (!) more than any other team, and you hit with runners on base less often when you clear the bags with that many dingers. This stat isn’t all bad, right?

Also, the Yankees hit into a lot of double plays. Especially lately. Gleyber has banged into seven double plays in his last 10 games. The Yankees have hit into 97 double plays, seventh most in baseball, and their double play rate is second highest at 12.3%. The league average is 10.2% and that measures how often a team hits into a double play in a double play opportunity (runner on first with less than two outs, etc.). Similar to homers, double plays clear the bases, but not in a good way.

Point is, the Yankees have far and away the fewest plate appearances with runners on base this season. It’s because they have a low team OBP, that’s the No. 1 problem, and also because they take ducks off the pond with homers and double plays. It’s shocking how infrequently the Yankees hit with men on base compared to the rest of the league.

Judge is still top 10 in CPA

Those seventh and ninth inning strikeouts Sunday were unfortunate, but, overall, Aaron Judge has been incredible when healthy this year. He’s hitting .276/.407/.617 (176 wRC+) with 24 home runs in 302 plate appearances around the injuries. Judge has been so good that he still ranks top 10 among position players in championship probability added, or CPA. The leaderboard:

1. Kyle Tucker, Astros: 4.1% (i.e. he's upped his team's World Series chances 4.1%)
2. Chas McCormick, Astros: 3.2%
3. Mookie Betts, Dodgers: 3.0%
4. Corey Seager, Rangers: 3.0%
5. Freddie Freeman:, Dodgers 2.9%
6. Ronald Acuña Jr., Braves: 2.5%
7. Shohei Ohtani, Angels: 2.4% (hitter only)
8. Corbin Carroll, Diamondbacks: 2.1%
9. Yandy Díaz, Rays: 1.8%
10. Aaron Judge, Yankees: 1.7%

The Yankees have crashed out of the postseason race and Judge ranks 223rd among all players in plate appearances, yet he’s tenth in CPA. His contributions have been that impactful even if they are going for naught. I reckon a big hit in the seventh or ninth inning and a win Sunday would have had Judge closer to 2.0%. Still, he’s high up on the leaderboard.

Judge’s injury was the beginning of the end for the 2023 Yankees, though they are 6-16 since he returned, partly because opposing teams keep walking him (21 times in those 22 games) and no one makes them pay. The Yankees intentionally walked Rafael Devers on Sunday (the right move) and Justin Turner sent the next pitch into the seats. No one on the Yankees does that when Judge gets pitched around. When teams pitch to him, Judge has been amazing. They just don’t pitch to him often these days.

The bullpen workload is very spread out

The Yankees have a very good bullpen overall and they use it a lot, especially lately. Prior to Clarke Schmidt’s outing Sunday, the starter had failed to complete five innings in each of the previous five games. The Yankees do use their bullpen a lot. What they do well is spread the workload around. Some numbers on the relief crew:

• 392 relief appearances are ninth fewest in baseball.
• 2,005 bullpen batters faced are ninth most in baseball.
• 478.1 bullpen innings are eight most in baseball.
• 128 relief appearances of at least four outs are fifth most in baseball.
• No Yankee is in the top 40 in relief appearances.
• Only one Yankee (Wandy Peralta) is in the top 60 in relief appearances.

Despite ranking in the bottom third of the league in individual relief appearances, the Yankees are near the top of the league in batters faced and innings pitched by relievers. That’s because they use their guys for 4+ outs more often than all but four other teams. And yet, none of their relievers is anywhere close to the top of the league in appearances.

The Yankees take care to spread the workload among their entire bullpen. They don’t lean on one or two or three guys heavily the way Joe Torre did all those years. That can be good and bad. Good because no one is overworked, bad because sometimes a lesser reliever finds himself in a costly high leverage situation. Generally though, the Yankees are really good with their bullpen, and I consider their ability to spread the workload around a positive.

The Yankees are on pace to win 21 fewer games than 2022

And reader, that is a lot. The Yankees are on pace to go 78-84 after going 99-63 last year. Ignoring the pandemic season and strike-shortened seasons, the Yankees are on pace for the second largest year-to-year decline in win total in franchise history. Only six times in Yankees history have they won 15 fewer games than the previous season:

1. 1965: 22 fewer wins than 1964 (99-63 to 77-85)
2. 1925: 20 fewer wins than 1924 (89-63 to 69-85)
3. 1940: 18 fewer wins than 1939 (106-45 to 88-66)
4. 1999: 16 fewer wins than 1998 (114-48 to 98-64)
5. 1933: 16 fewer wins than 1932 (107-47 to 91-59)
6. 1944: 15 fewer wins than 1943 (98-56 to 83-71)

That 1965 season was the beginning of a down period for the franchise. Their record winning season streak ended at 39 years, several all-time greats began to age out (Whitey Ford, Elston Howard, Mickey Mantle, etc.), and the Yankees would not return to the postseason until 1976. It was an unthinkable postseason drought at the time.

Several of those seasons above were the result of the Yankees going from otherworldly to merely great (1933, 1940, 1999) and this season is not that. The Yankees have gone from great to bad. They are 15+ games out of first place for the first time since 1995 and are looking at their first losing season since 1992. They also have a chance to match that 1965 team and win 22 fewer games than last season. History with an exclamation point.

(I don’t know what MLB's all-time record is for year-to-year decline in win total. I have to think the 1997-98 fire sale Marlins are up there. They went 92-70 en route to winning the World Series in 1997, then traded everyone making more than $7.50 an hour and went 54-108 in 1998. That's a drop of 38 wins from one year to the next.)

3. Rapid fire thoughts. The Yankees have been relegated to Little League. They’re going to play the Tigers in the Little League Classic in Williamsport next Aug. 18th, MLB announced Sunday. A field befitting their recent play, I’d say. Anyway, I am pro-baseball in different places and I’m looking forward to next year's Little League Classic. It’ll be a nice change of pace in the middle of the dog days of August.

Mailbag Questions of the Week

Noah asks: What do you think of Gerrit Cole’s HOF chances? High peak, we’ll see about the longevity. Maybe best pitcher post Scherzer, Verlander, Kershaw era.

Cole’s career very, very, very closely mirrors Max Scherzer’s up to this point (age 32 season). It’s so close it’s kinda freaky. Here are their numbers through their age 32 seasons:

Cole debuted at 22, a year younger than Scherzer, which kinda balances out losing a chunk of 2020 to the pandemic (Cole still has another 6-7 starts remaining this season though). Both were good pitchers early in their careers who really broke out around ages 27-28. Scherzer’s WAR advantage has to do with playing in front of poor defenses in Detroit more than anything.

Scherzer had more hardware at this point. He won his third Cy Young during his age 32 season. Cole might win his first at age 32. Winning three Cy Youngs by age 32 puts you in the “yeah, he’s in” category. No Cy Youngs at age 32 puts you in the “mailbag questions about your Hall of Fame chances” category. Cole winning some hardware will help his case, for sure.

This is the sixth year of what is a Hall of Fame peak for Cole. The longevity component, we just have to wait and see, and hope he stays healthy. For what it’s worth, Cole is well short of the established Hall of Fame standard for starting pitchers according to JAWS, though the standard for starters has to change. They don’t make 35 starts and throw 265 innings a season anymore.

I’d say Cole is about 75% of the way to the Hall of Fame. Roy Halladay is the modern standard for a “short” career starter and Cole is more than 900 innings behind him. A Cy Young(s) isn’t necessary for Hall of Fame induction but it does help. I think Cole needs another year or two of ace-like performance and a graceful Mike Mussina-esque decline (Mussina was a 111 ERA+ pitcher after his age 32 season) to get into Cooperstown.

Ted asks (short version): You mentioned in a recent post that you didn't think Jake Bauers would be back next year, and that seems to be the consensus (at least among the group of people inclined to ponder such questions as "will Jake Bauers be on the Yankees' 2024 roster?"). From my point of view though, it seems like we should bring him back. The batted ball data has been there all season, he should be entering his prime, and he won’t cost much his first pass through arbitration.

As Ted noted in his much longer email, Bauers has been very bad lately, going 7-for-53 (.132) with 26 strikeouts since Anthony Rizzo’s last game. That has dragged his season line down to .208/.289/.435 (97 wRC+) and that won’t cut it for a bat only first baseman/DH/fake outfielder. Before this recent slump though, Bauers was pretty good, and his contact quality is still great:

• .234/.314/.500 (121 wRC+) overall before Rizzo went down.
• .241/.325/.526 (130 wRC+) against righties before Rizzo went down.
• 90.6 mph average exit velocity (87.9 mph from 2018-22).
• 49.6% hard-hit rate (33.5% from 2018-22).
• 20.2% barrel rate (5.5% from 2018-22).

Bauers, 28 in October, has always struck out a lot and likely always will – that 121 wRC+ before Rizzo went down came with a 31.4% strikeout rate – because his strikeout issues are tied up in swinging through pitches in the zone, not chasing pitches out of the zone. He is a flawed hitter, for sure, but squint your eyes and you can see a useful platoon bat against righties.

We have to see how the rest of the season goes – Bauers could be so bad these final 38 games that he plays himself right out of the picture – but sure, there could be a role for him next season. It depends what the Yankees do with the roster more than anything. There may be no room for a defensively limited situational lefty bat on the bench when Spring Training opens.

At the moment, I think Bauers is toward the back of the DFA line, and if he makes it through the offseason, fine. And if the Yankees have to cut him to clear room for someone else, then so be it. Bauers hits the sweet spot between just interesting enough to keep around and not impactful enough to really move the needle for his team. As we’re seeing now, if he’s not hitting for power, he’s pretty much useless.

(I want no part of Bauers next season. I’m just saying I can see a scenario in which the Yankees keep him through the offseason.)

James asks: Do the Yankees use a qualifying offer on Harrison Bader this offseason?

I keep going back and forth on this. Sometimes I think yes, of course they’ll make Bader the QO, and then an hour later I think nah, that’s not their style. The Yankees have been stingy with QOs the last few years, most notably declining to give one to Jameson Taillon last offseason, though every offseason and every free agent class is different. Things may be different now.

So, let’s do a pros and cons list. As a reminder, the QO is a one-year contract at the average of the top 125 salaries in baseball, so figure around $22M this offseason. Free agents who decline the QO net their former team draft pick compensation when they sign elsewhere. Here are the pros and cons of making Bader the QO.

Pro: The Yankees get a draft pick if Bader signs elsewhere and that’s better than losing him for nothing. Pretty straightforward.

Con: Given their luxury tax status, the Yankees would only receive a compensation pick after the fourth round (No. 135-ish overall). That’s not much of a reward, is it? Might not be enough to justify a $22M-ish roll of the dice.

Pro: If Bader accepts the QO, the Yankees get to keep him on a one-year contract. It’s a pricey one-year contract, but the Yankees can afford it, and the one-year term limits the risk that comes with his age (30 next year), injury history, and trouble with righties (i.e. most pitchers).

Con: Bader at a $22M or so salary means less money to spend on other players. According to Cot’s, the Yankees already have $175.75M on the luxury tax payroll in 2024. Add in the $17M or so for player benefits, and that’s $192.75M. For seven roster players (i.e. not including Aaron Hicks). Add in Bader at $22M and the Yankees are at $214.75M for eight players. Call it $215M.

The fourth luxury tax threshold will be $297M next year. If the Yankees spend to that threshold again, Bader accepting the QO leaves them $82M to fill out the rest of the roster, including:

• Getting a new left fielder and another starting pitcher, even just a back-end innings guy.
• Miscellaneous upgrades. A catcher who can hit? A lefty hitting third baseman to pair with DJ LeMahieu? A lefty reliever to replace Wandy Peralta? A bench guy?
• Arbitration raises. Nestor Cortes, Clay Holmes, and Gleyber Torres will come in around $25M total, then there’s Mike King, Jonathan Loáisiga, Clarke Schmidt, etc.
• Pre-arbitration players to fill out the roster. The league minimum jumps to $740,000 next year. Those guys add up. Then there’s the rest of the 40-man in the minors.

Bader pretty clearly loves being a Yankee and the Yankees seem to love him. He fills a position of need too. I could see the Yankees wanting to bring him back, just not at $22M or so, even for one year. They might decline to offer the QO and instead pursue an extension at, say, $15M a year for 3-5 years. We know they prefer lower average annual values for luxury tax purposes.

There are no rules preventing the Yankees and Bader from working out a new extension after he accepts the QO, even one that lowers his 2024 salary. José Abreu and the White Sox did this in 2019. He accepted the $17.8M QO, then they ripped it up and worked out a three-year deal worth $50M. That had an $11M salary in Year 1 and a $16.7M annual value, so it was more total money than the QO but a short-term salary reduction. The Yankees could try that with Bader.

But do the Yankees want to risk that though? Risk Bader taking the QO and saying “I’m cool with the $22M this year and testing free agent next offseason, thanks.” They could gauge his interest beforehand, but until the ink is dried, you never know. The TL;DR version of this con: Bader at $22M could screw up the team’s luxury tax payroll situation next year.

Pro: The QO could depress Bader’s market. We’ve seen plenty of players have their market hurt by the QO. Bader’s a nice player but maybe not “give up a reasonably high draft pick(s) to sign him” nice. Bader could pass on the QO, have trouble finding a contract to his liking in free agency, and then come crawling back to the Yankees. That’s kinda sorta what happened with LeMahieu three years ago. He was reportedly seeking $100M and it wasn’t out there.

That’s three pros and two cons, though pros and cons are not created equally, and I’m guessing the “Bader accepting the QO could screw up the 2024 luxury tax payroll situation” thing will be the driving force behind the decision. I keep going back and forth on this, but, right now, on Aug. 21st, I say no, Bader does not get the QO. Ask me again next week and the answer might be different.

Robin asks: I see that on MLB.com Spencer Jones is rated above Jasson. Dominguez is over two years younger, at a higher level. His batting average is .326 over the last 30 games (.877 OPS). Great that they think Jones is a top 100 prospect, but seriously?!?! Also Drew Thorpe should surely be a top 100 prospect.

I don’t agree with it but I don’t think Jones over Domínguez is outlandish, and the MLB.com folks are not the only ones with Jones ranked over Domínguez. Baseball Prospectus (sub. req’d) had Jones over Domínguez before the season. Differences of opinion are fine (they’re a good thing, really), and, ultimately, the rankings don’t matter. Jones and Domínguez are both in the system. It’s not like the Yankees have to pick one over the other. There’s room for both long-term.

As for Thorpe, he’s been great in his first two starts with Double-A Somerset. He struck out nine in eight scoreless innings in his first start with the Patriots (video), then he struck out 12 in 6.2 innings of two-run ball his second time out (video). For the season, Thorpe owns a 2.62 ERA (3.20 FIP) with 33.3% strikeouts and 7.1% walks. He had a bit of a rocky start in April, but he’s been great since.

Baseball America (subs. req’d) has seven Yankees on their midseason top 100 prospects list but Thorpe is not one of the seven. He’s No. 10 on their midseason Yankees top 30 prospects list (subs. req’d), which suggests he’s not particularly close to the top 100. I suspect Thorpe would be a consensus top 100 guy with a 95-97 mph fastball rather than 92-94 mph. Lower velocity guys always get dinged. Such is life.

Jerome asks: With the myriad of preventable shortcomings within this team and overall mismanagement from almost every aspect, do you think some of the blame has shifted away from Aaron Boone? It feels like most of the fanbase believes he's not the man for this job, which I might not argue with, but do you think we'll all be more forgiving of Boone whenever his time is up and we consider what he had to navigate?

I don’t think Boone is a particularly strong on-field manager and we’re seeing this year that he won’t elevate a team through a time of crisis, but he gets what, maybe 5% of the blame for this season? I’m not sure any manager would drag this team to the postseason (or even to a winning record). The blame gets distributed like this, I think:

• 40%: Brian Cashman and the front office (includes player development)
• 40%: Players
• 18%: Hal Steinbrenner and ownership
• 5%: Boone
• 2%: Bad luck and baseball randomness

It’s difficult to untangle what’s on the players and what’s on the front office for acquiring those players, but those two groups deserve the largest share of the blame. Cashman and the front office put the team together and the players throw pitches and take swings. Both groups have performed poorly this year, and you can go back a few years for the front office too. Maybe it’s 50% front office and 30% players? 30% for the players feels low.

Hal does support a large payroll. Not as large as it could be, but large. The problem is the very obvious lowering of standards. Winning the World Series is not the priority anymore. If you ever find yourself wondering why Cashman is still the general manager, there’s a very simple reason: he’s doing exactly what Hal wants and Hal believes he’s doing a great job. That’s it.

Someone(s) will be scapegoated after the season and the hitting coach has already been fired, so Boone is the next logical candidate. If the Yankees fire Boone and otherwise make only a few tweaks to the roster, then nothing’s going to change next year. A new manager alone won’t fix the Yankees. Boone gets some blame but I see it as only a very small part of the pie. He’s not to blame for the roster or for so many players performing below expectations.

Chris asks: It may be selective memory, but do the Yankees have a pattern of deciding certain young position players are too valuable to trade, but not good enough to play in the majors? Peraza, Frazier, post-injury Andujar come to mind. They were right, it seems, about Frazier and Andujar not being MLB players. So why didn’t they move them when they still had some value? Is this happening again with Peraza?

Estevan Florial is in this group as well. Other teams do this too, and that’s something you can miss when you’re hyper focused on the Yankees. The Dodgers don’t seem to have a plan with Michael Busch. Same with the Rays and Jonathan Aranda, or the Guardians and Tyler Freeman, or the Cubs with Matt Mervis. They fit the “too good to trade but not good enough to play” mold.

As for Oswald Peraza, I think it’s incompetence more than anything. I think the Yankees went to Spring Training expecting Peraza to win the shortstop job and Anthony Volpe to go to Triple-A, where he would begin to learn second base. Then Volpe blew everyone away in camp and the Yankees didn’t know what to do with Peraza. Things did not go according to plan and they’ve failed to adjust. It’s not the first time it’s happened with this team.

Generally speaking, I’m happy to defer to teams when it comes to a prospect’s MLB readiness. They know a lot more than us. In Peraza’s case though, he was starting postseason games last year, and he’s spent just about this entire season in Triple-A. Something is seriously wrong there. Is he ready for postseason action or not ready for the regular season? There’s a difference between adjusting and making things up on the fly, and it feels like the Yankees have done the latter a lot lately.

Anonymous asks: You mentioned Mitch Spence as a possibility but he’s not on any prospect lists. Can you give us a scouting report?

Pitching coach Matt Blake mentioned Spence as a call up candidate last week, so it wasn’t just me. The Yankees selected Spence out of South Carolina Aiken with their tenth round pick in 2019. He spent the 2020 pandemic season at home, 2021 with High-A Hudson Valley, 2022 split between Double-A Somerset and Triple-A Scranton, and so far all of 2023 with the RailRiders.

In his most recent start Spence struck out six in six scoreless innings in Worcester (video), against the third highest scoring team in the International League. He has a 4.63 ERA (5.39 FIP) in 23 starts and 126.1 innings this season, and keep in mind offense is off the charts in Triple-A this year. Here are Spence’s big picture numbers and the International League averages:

The homers are a problem, though the walk rate suggests Spence is pounding the zone with the automatic ball-strike system (ABS), and when you fill up the zone, you’re gonna give up some dingers. His ground ball rate is solid and his strikeout and barrel rates are league average-ish. Finding an average Triple-A starter in the tenth round is good work.

Stuff-wise, Spence is Clarke Schmidt lite. It’s all cutters and curveballs and sliders, plus the occasional sinker and changeup. He doesn’t have Schmidt’s ability to spin the ball (few do), but Spence throws strikes and locates well, the curve and slider have above-average whiff rates in Triple-A, and he’s been better against lefties than righties the last two years.

I’ve only seen Spence, now 25, on one prospect list: Eric Longenhagen had him as an honorable mention this spring. He’s in that weird prospect place where he’s much more likely to play in the big leagues than most players on whatever Yankees prospect list you look at, though he’s a lower upside guy and more of a depth piece. That’s okay though. You need depth pitchers.

Spence was passed over in the Rule 5 Draft last offseason because he lacks the standout pitch data teams crave – the Rule 5 Draft is the “pitchers with big spin or funky angles” draft now – but he does enough to be a viable up-and-down swingman for a contender. Let’s put it this way: teams have trotted out worse pitchers for 30+ innings this season.

Kyle asks: Should the Yankees be stretching out Ian Hamilton alongside Mike King or are they already doing that?

No and I’m pretty sure no. Friday’s extending outing (3.2 innings) had more to do with Hamilton being super efficient (only 43 pitches) than anything. Hamilton is a two-pitch guy (fastball and slambio) who throws only 45% fastballs, and the 11.6% walk rate is high. Not sure that'll work as a starter. He’s a clear reliever to me. A very good one, but a reliever, and that’s fine. You need good relievers.

King has a starter’s arsenal. He throws four pitches regularly (four-seamer, sinker, sweeper, changeup) and he throws plenty of strikes (7.8% walks). King’s injury history makes me uneasy about stretching him out to start, but I understand trying it. Hamilton has fared well in multi-inning outings, but I think he would be a lesser pitcher when asked to go 5-6 innings at a time. King has a chance to make the starting thing work.

Paul asks: When is Donaldson eligible to come off of the IL, and can he file a grievance or whatever if the Yankees don't activate him? Can they string him along long enough on a rehab assignment to run out the year, or do the minor league seasons end too early for that work? In short, is it going to get messy with him when his 60 days are up?

Josh Donaldson is not eligible to be activated until Sept. 15th. I haven’t seen or heard about him going through any workouts on the field since his show earlier this month. Players can absolutely file a grievance if they’re kept on the injured list longer than necessary, though they have to prove they were ready to be activated, and I’m not sure how you go about that.

The Yankees could easily avoid this by releasing Donaldson. You don't have to justify a release. Donaldson still gets paid and the Yankees open a 40-man roster spot. It’s exactly like keeping him on the 60-day injured list, only the player is no longer in the organization. I have a hard time believing Donaldson will ever play another game for the Yankees. Either he stays on the injured list or they release him.

Emiliano asks: Yankees never have "scandals" besides those by Pineda, Chapman and Germán which are, "mild". But now it seems that on top of the terrible performance, additional noise is building up with things like the Ben Ruta interview. Did you see it? What did you think of it?

I did not watch the interviews – there’s two of them now, so Ruta’s milking every second of his 15 minutes – but I’ve gotten the gist of what was said. Long story short, Ruta criticized the Yankees because there’s “no baseball being taught there anymore” in the minors, and he blamed it all on the boogeyman: analytics. Christian Arnold was nice enough to transcribe it:

“Here’s all you need to know,” Ruta said. “In 2020, before COVID hit spring training we played a game called ‘pitchers vs hitters,’ the only way to score a point was to walk or hit a ball 95 mph-plus. There’s no baseball being taught there anymore. No baserunning, moving runners, fundamentals, etc.”

Carlos Collazo notes that drill is common and I got news for you, no team is teaching their minor leaguers to hit ground balls to the right side to move the runner over after a leadoff double. They work to turn players into the best possible version of themselves.

Ruta, a 2016 30th round pick who last played in the system in 2019 (he was released after 2020), said “I played in the Yanks’ org before analytics (2016-17, before Dillon Lawson was hired as minor league hitting coordinator) and then after (2018-19 with Lawson). Stark difference in developments.” I mean, yes, stark difference in developments. What’s the complaint, exactly?

• Ruta from 2016-17: .243/.298/.292 (85 wRC+) with 12.8 BB% and 27.3 K% (Rk, A-, A+)
• Ruta from 2018-19: .280/.340/.418 (119 wRC+) with 8.3 BB% and 16.5 K% (A+, AA)

There is plenty to criticize about the Yankees and their player development, but “they teach their hitters to control the strike zone and hit the ball hard” is not one of them. That is standard across baseball. Every organization teaches that. Some are just better at it than others.

It’s possible I’ve missed it but I haven’t seen anyone come forward to either corroborate Ruta’s complaints or rebut them. This feels like sour grapes and piling on the Yankees at a time when it’s easy to pile on them. Again, there is plenty to criticize about this team. A player complaining about things that helped his career is a weird way to go about it.

Michael asks: What’s the best draft pick the Yankees can get? Doesn’t their pick move back 10 spots?

The Yankees can have the No. 1 pick next year! Their top pick will move back 10 spots because of their luxury tax status, though lottery picks (No. 1-6) are protected. If the Yankees get lucky and move into the top six picks through the lottery, their second highest pick will move back 10 spots instead. Their draft possibilities break down like so:

• No. 1-6: Lottery picks, Yankees can pick here
• No. 7-16: Non-lottery picks, Yankees can’t pick in this range because their first rounder will move back 10 spots
• No. 17+: They can have any pick from here on out

The Yankees currently have the 12th worst record in baseball and that would give them a 1.1% chance at the No. 1 pick in the lottery. I have no idea what their odds of moving up into the top six are, but it can happen. The Twins moved up from the No. 13 pick to the No. 5 in the lottery this year. If the Yankees get a top six pick, they can keep it. Otherwise it’s no earlier than No. 17.

(Send your requests for Friday's mailbag to RABmailbag at gmail dot com. The random Yankee series is on hiatus, but feel free to send in requests for when it returns.)