September 1st, 2022: Collapse, Judge, Taillon, Loaisiga, Holmes, LeMahieu, Pitcher Signings, Mailbag

Remember when the Yankees could play .500 ball and still coast to 100 wins? Now they need to win 21 of their final 31 games to get to 100 wins, and seeing how they’ve won only 21 of their last 52 games, I'll go ahead and say it’s not happening. Not sure I’ve ever loved and hated a team so much in a single season. Here are Friday morning’s thoughts Thursday afternoon since it’s an off-day.

1. The collapse continues. There was a time, not more than three months ago, when we could compare the 2022 Yankees to the 1998 Yankees, and it wasn’t completely insane. Now the 2022 Yankees invoke the 1991 Yankees, one of the worst teams in franchise history. The Yankees went 10-18 (.357) in August. It was their worst month since Sept. 1991, when they went 9-19 in (.321) en route to 91 losses.

“I don’t feel like we’re as far off as the struggles we’ve had winning games this month,” Aaron Boone told Chris Kirschner (subs. req’d) following Wednesday’s loss. How many times did we hear the manager say that from 2020-21? Countless.

The Yankees are far off though. They’re getting worse as the season progresses, not better, and the division lead, which stood at 15.5 games on July 8th and 12 games on Aug. 1st, is down to six. The Rays control their destiny now. They have six games left with the Yankees, including three this weekend. Win those six games, match the Yankees in non-head-to-head games, and Tampa wins the AL East. This line could be much, much lower come Monday.

The chances that all happens remain small but the fact it is even a possibility is stunning. The Yankees just went out to the West Coast, played two teams that are a combined 59-101 since June 1st, and dropped four of seven. They got shut down by guys named Adam Oller and Adrian Martinez. They got taken deep and flexed on by Mike Ford (twice).

Unless Aaron Judge hits a homer and/or the opposing defense screws up, the Yankees struggle to create offense. DJ LeMahieu, Anthony Rizzo, and Gleyber Torres have all gone in the tank the last few weeks, though LeMahieu (toe) and Rizzo (back) at least have the injury excuse. The Yankees are getting Nady’d with Andrew Benintendi:

• 2019-21: 100 wRC+
• 2022 with Royals: 126 wRC+
• 2022 with Yankees: 101 wRC+

The Yankees bought into the outlier performance and got the guy Benintendi has always been. It would be difficult for a championship contender to have a worse trade deadline. Other than a few spurts, Benintendi hasn’t moved the needle, Frankie Montas has made one good start out of five with the Yankees, Scott Effross is hurt, and Harrison Bader is outfield Ben Rortvedt. The Yankees say they traded for him, but he’s a ghost. At least Lou Trivino has been solid.

Don’t even get me started on the offseason. I’m at my limit with Isiah Kiner-Falefa, the worst Yankees regular since … Alvaro Espinoza? Yeah, I think so, at least among players who were Plan A at their position. He made another costly error Wednesday and the bat is unplayable. Remember when he hit the home run and I wrote “(with) any luck Kiner-Falefa will relax a bit now that he no longer has to look at the ‘0 HR’ on the scoreboard each time he steps to the plate, and go on a hot streak?” He is 8-for-43 (.186) since then.

The series of bad moves dates back to last offseason. The unquestioned success stories are Jose Trevino and a few relievers (Clay Holmes, Lucas Luetge, Wandy Peralta), and I guess Matt Carpenter. That’s it. All the missteps have meaningfully subtracted from the championship odds, and because of them, we’re talking about a collapse and a shrinking division lead instead of gearing up for a deep postseason run.

I’m not sure how anyone, even the most passionate Brian Cashman supporters, can still have confidence in the front office. The mistakes, whether the move made sense at the time or not, are piling up and there is no escape hatch with so many of those mistakes. Unless the owner, who is a sentient annuity table more than a human with competitive drive, eats a ton of money, how are the Yankees unloading Josh Donaldson and Aaron Hicks?

The Yankees have lost 17 one-run games since June 19th. So many times they were one hit or one bounce away from a win, yet they keep finding a way to lose. Oswald Peraza and Anthony Volpe are simultaneously too good to trade and not good enough to call up despite doing what they need to do at the upper levels of the minors. One call up could help turn those one-run losses into wins! And still the Yankees do not act. It’s infuriating.

That said, every so often I catch myself wondering why I even bother to get excited about Peraza and Volpe. The Yankees have done a terrible job finishing off the development of their young position player prospects in recent years (Judge excluded), and what are two prospects going to fix? Do you remember what the Yankees had after 2017? A reminder:

• The AL MVP runner-up, the third place finisher in the Cy Young voting, and an All-Star catcher. The oldest was 25 and all three had five more years of control.
• One of the best farm systems in baseball and one of the best prospects in baseball, not to mention a mountain of depth. The system had everything.
• As close to a clean slate financially as the Yankees can ever have. Jacoby Ellsbury and Masahiro Tanaka were the only big money contracts on the books.

Five years ago the Yankees had that and they turned it into this. Did you know the Yankees have the oldest collection of position players in baseball? We can thank bad decision-making and bad development for that. Peraza and Volpe are coming and that’s great. They’re also unlikely to be as good as the young core the Yankees had five years ago, and the organization is in worse shape overall. The chances Volpe winds up in a “Robbie Cano on the 2013 Yankees” situation are alarmingly high.

Last year Boone said the “league closed the gap on us” and it sounds even more delusional now than it did then. The game’s elite teams – Astros, Braves, Dodgers – closed the gap and passed the Yankees years ago, and the Mets did it this year. The Yankees are collapsing because they simply aren’t good enough at too many things, and they exhibit nothing close to championship-caliber resolve. We keep waiting for them to flip the switch and history tells us they will keep us waiting. Need I remind you of the last two seasons?

• 2020: Had to win two of three against the Marlins in the final series to lock in the No. 5 seed. Couldn’t do it (lost two of three) and needed the Orioles to beat the Blue Jays on the final day to avoid being the No. 8 seed.
• 2021: Had to win two of three against the Rays in the final series to secure home field advantage in the Wild Card Game. Couldn’t do it (lost two of three) and needed a miracle walk-off in Game 162 to avoid a Game 163 tiebreaker.

The Yankees were the first team to 70 wins this season. The Dodgers have gotten their 70th, 80th, and 90th wins since then, and the Yankees are still looking for their 80th win. The lead for baseball’s best record peaked at seven games on June 18th. The Yankees were 49-16 through 65 games at the time. They’ve gone 30-36 in 66 games since. They’ve been mediocre (at best) longer than they were dominant, so this is not a blip. This is the majority of the season.

And you know what makes it worse? The Yankees are doing this while Judge is having a season that is at worst MVP caliber and at best historically great. I don’t have much confidence in this group turning things around because I’ve been waiting for them to turn it around for like three years now, and wasting this Judge season on this team is the stuff of nightmares. Surrounding him with Rangers rejects in his final year of team control is unforgivable. It really is.

The largest blown division lead in baseball history is 13 games by the 1951 Dodgers. The Yankees famously erased a 14-game deficit in 1978, though they were in fourth place at the time. The Red Sox never led the division by more than 10 games that season. The Yankees are in danger of shattering that “record” held by the 1951 Dodgers. That’s the level of collapse we’re talking about here. The Yankees haven’t collapsed all the way yet, but they’re showing potential.

Is the talent there for the Yankees to get on track, win something like 20 of their final 31 games to close out the regular season, and then make a deep run to a championship? Sure. My confidence level in it happening is very low. I feel like I’m watching the same old movie again and the ending has already been spoiled. The long 162-game season has a way of exposing teams for what they really are, and with each passing day the real 2022 Yankees reveal themselves a little more.

2. Weekday thoughts. Following the outlier 13-run game last Thursday, the Yankees scored 18 runs in six games against the Athletics and Angels. Seven of the 18 came on Aaron Judge home runs, and four scored on errors (as in the run scored on the play the error was made, not that the Yankees made the other team pay for the error a few batters later). The Yankees have hit .225/.305/.378 (97 wRC+) in the second half. If that looks familiar, it’s because it is almost exactly Josh Donaldson’s season batting line: .222/.308/.382 (99 wRC+). September is either going to be very good or very, very bad. A few thoughts on the last few games.

51 homers before September

I don’t know what more to say about Judge. He hit three homers on the West Coast trip and has 21 homers in his last 42 games. If Judge’s last 42 games were a player, they would rank 35th in home runs this season, tied with Francisco Lindor and Julio Rodriguez, among others. Judge got to 51 homers – the highest total in the American League since he hit 52 as a rookie – before September. The home run race isn’t much of a race at all:

1. Aaron Judge: 51
2. Kyle Schwarber: 36
3. Paul Goldschmidt: 33
4. Austin Riley: 32
5. Mookie Betts: 32

The last player to lead baseball by as many as 15 home runs was Jimmie Foxx in 1932. He hit 58 homers that year and Babe Ruth was the runner-up with 41. Judge also stole his 15th base Wednesday night. This is the ninth 50/15 season in history and Judge has a chance at the first 60/20 (or even just 60/15) season in history. The man is hardly one-dimensional.

In addition to homers Judge also baseball in runs scored (104), runs driven in (113), walks (78), total bases (312), SLG (.664), OPS (1.062), OPS+ (199), wRC+ (196), win probability added (+5.69), bWAR (+7.8), and fWAR (+8.3). He’s hitting .363/.504/.780 (240 wRC+) with runners in scoring position and has started more games in center field (61) than right (43). I don’t know what more this guy could do for his team.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Jameson Taillon told Bryan Hoch earlier this week. “It just feels like any time he’s out there, he’s got a chance to do something special. It doesn’t matter what scouting report you have or whether you execute your pitch or not. He’s just so good that you can make a good pitch and he can still hit it out of the park. It’s special.”

Judge needs 11 home runs in the Yankees’ final 31 games to set a new American League record with 62 homers. Roger Maris of course holds the current record and I love the symmetry: Maris hit 61 homers 61 years ago in 1961, and did it while wearing No. 9. Judge wears No. 99, and last month he passed Maris on the franchise’s all-time home run leaderboard. Neat.

Hitting 11 homers in 31 games to set a new AL record seems extremely doable – Judge hit 12 homers in 14 games at one point in July, remember – though it is a lot of homers. It’s a 57-homer pace in a full-162 game season and Judge has to continue on that pace for another month, all while teams increasingly pitch around him. He’s walked 29 times in his last 29 games.

There will be plenty of time to talk about MVP races and contract extensions and all that later. For now, I’m just marveling at the singular greatness and what is the best season by a Yankee since at least Alex Rodriguez in 2007, and possibly since Mickey Mantle in 1961. Even if Judge doesn’t break Maris’ record, the fact he’s in position to make a run at it is incredible. Just an all-time great season by a player with unreal natural gifts at the height of his powers.

Taillon’s near injury

The Yankees traded four viable MLB rotation options at the deadline (Jordan Montgomery, JP Sears, Ken Waldichuk, Hayden Wesneski) and the baseball gods said nope, we don’t like your arrogance, so we’re going to smite you. The Yankees have put six pitchers on the injured list since the trade deadline, then Taillon took a liner to the right wrist area Tuesday.

"It's not bad. It's gotten a lot better,” Taillon told Marly Rivera after the game. “I was a little worried there. At first, I had some pretty quick swelling in there. I was in some pain and then got x-rays, found out those were negative, and then we've just been treating it and I'm already seeing some improvement. We're going to treat it again (Wednesday). And then I'll try to play catch on the off day in Tampa, and just see where we're at.”

The 91.3 mph liner was a direct hit and Taillon had a welt on his arm before he even got off the field. It’s good the x-rays were negative, but until Taillon picks up a ball and throws, we won’t really know how he’s feeling. With the way things are going, watch this turn into a “x-rays were negative but he’s still sore, and oh look, a CT scan found a hairline fracture” thing. Yuck.

Anyway, Thursday’s off-day means the Yankees can push Taillon’s next start back to Tuesday, which is conveniently the same day Nestor Cortes can be activated off the injured list. I’m not sure the Yankees will activate Cortes that soon – he’ll throw a simulated game at the minor league complex this weekend – but I suppose it’s an option if Taillon doesn’t respond well to treatment.

The rotation depth chart is awfully thin now (I assume Ryan Weber is next in line) and that’s the risk the Yankees assumed at the deadline. Someone takes a liner to the arm and goes down, and you have less depth available. We’ll see how things go the next few days. Right now, it sounds like Taillon and the Yankees avoided disaster, though they’re still flirting with it.

"He kinda felt like it feels better than he expected," Aaron Boone told Max Goodman on Wednesday, adding the swelling has not yet completely subsided. "So we'll see how the next couple of days go here and hopefully he'll be in position to make his next start. But we'll know more in the next day and a half."

(That was some job by the bullpen after Taillon exited. Six relievers combined for seven innings of two-run ball, including Greg Weissert going six up and six down for the second straight outing after his disastrous MLB debut. The kid’s bounced back and fit in quite nicely.)

Loaisiga returns to form

I hereby declare Jonathan Loaisiga capital-B Back. All the way to 2021 form. I might be going out on a limb, but I’ll take that risk. Loaisiga has allowed two earned runs in his last 15 appearances and, more important than the numbers, he’s pounding the zone with his 98-101 mph sinker. He wasn’t locating at all earlier this season, so this is very encouraging:

Due to injuries and underperformance, the Yankees are lacking in all phases of the game right now, and they need people (other than Judge) to just step up and make plays. Loaisiga is doing that in the bullpen. He got some huge outs on the West Coast and again looks not just reliable, but dominant. Someone who can attack the other team’s 2-3-4 hitters in a one-run game.

Getting 2021 Loaisiga back as the calendar flips to September is the epitome of better late than never, but seriously, better late than never. The bullpen is a little short right now because of injuries and there has been a hole in high leverage spots in the seventh and eighth innings since Mike King went down. Loaisiga getting back on track is an enormously positive development.

Miscellany

Clay Holmes returned in Anaheim and looked pretty good. It was only two innings and 18 total pitches, so not the biggest sample, but Holmes looked in control and in the zone with his sinker. Before going on the injured list, he was all over the place, and unpredictable from pitch-to-pitch. Hopefully those two innings against the Angels are a sign Holmes is back to All-Star form. The Yankees badly need bullpen reliability and Holmes (and Loaisiga) getting right would go a long way toward (re)building that reliability … DJ LeMahieu must be feeling awful at the plate to squeeze bunt (!) a run in Monday night knowing full well it would take the bat out of Judge’s hands. LeMahieu is in a 3-for-29 (.103) skid and he hasn’t had an extra-base hit since the St. Louis series. If he’s performing that poorly and feels so bad at the plate that he’s resorted to bunting ahead of Judge, then I don’t see how the Yankees can keep him in the leadoff spot. Drop LeMahieu down for a bit and let Andrew Benintendi and Judge hit 1-2 … And finally, against my better judgment I’m going to give Boone the benefit of the doubt and assume Anthony Rizzo was not available to hit Wednesday night, only play the field. Rizzo was not in the starting lineup because his back is acting up again, Aaron Hicks and Isiah Kiner-Falefa hit in the eighth inning of a one-run game, then Rizzo replaced LeMahieu at first base in the ninth after LeMahieu was removed for a pinch-runner. I know there was a lefty on the mound, but I would take still take my chances with Rizzo over Hicks and Kiner-Falefa. If the Yankees didn’t want Rizzo swinging a bat, okay, fine. It stinks but whatever. If he was available to hit and Boone didn’t use him because of the left-on-left thing, oy vey.

3. Yankees add more pitching. The deadline to add players and have them be eligible for the postseason was 11:59pm ET on Wednesday, and the Yankees brought in several extra arms in the hours leading up to the deadline. Anthony Banda and Chasen Shreve joined the organization last weekend. Four more pitchers were added earlier this week.

Let’s round up the pitchers the Yankees signed this week. These are all minor league deals and, to be clear, these players were not signed specifically with the postseason roster in mind. Injuries and corresponding call ups have really thinned Triple-A Scranton’s pitching staff. The RailRiders needed a few warm bodies and the Yankees provided them. Let’s dig in (players listed alphabetically).

RHP Jacob Barnes

A few years ago Barnes, 32, looked like a potential late-inning dude for the Brewers, then it all fell apart when the rocket ball arrived, and he’s now with his eighth organization in the last three years. Earlier this season Barnes allowed 14 runs in 20.2 innings with the Tigers. He’s always been a Triple-A beast: 1.92 ERA (3.06 FIP) with 27.2% strikeouts in parts of five seasons.

These days Barnes works with a mid-90s fastball and an upper-80s cutter. He throws the rare show-me mid-80s slider, which is an interesting pitch mix. Barnes is a candidate to replace Greg Weissert as Scranton’s closer. Banda is in the big league bullpen now and we’ve seen guys like Manny Banuelos, Luke Bard, Shane Greene, and David McKay pass through the Bronx this year, so I definitely wouldn’t close the door on Barnes making a big league cameo at some point.

RHP Tyler Duffey

Of the four pitchers the Yankees signed earlier this week, Duffey is most likely to see big league action in September, and I say that only because he has the most service time and most recently held a high-ish profile role. The former Twin was a high leverage guy last year and earlier this year, though Minnesota cut him after a rough 4.1-inning stretch last month (seven runs).

Duffey, now 31, was excellent from 2019-20, throwing 81.2 innings with a 2.31 ERA (2.91 FIP) and strong strikeout (34.2%) and walk (6.1%) rates. His game slipped a bit last year (3.18 ERA and 3.49 FIP) and then cratered this year (4.91 ERA and 4.81 FIP). Not coincidentally, Duffey’s velocity has trended down the last few seasons:

In 2020, Duffey had a 33.7% strikeout rate and a 3.7% barrel rate. Those numbers were 24.0% and 5.5% in 2021, respectively, and 21.1% and 8.5% in 2022, again respectively. Factor in the velocity decline and you have an arrow down player. Duffey allowed one unearned run in five innings with the Rangers’ Triple-A affiliate last month before opting out of his contract.

The Yankees were drawn to Duffey because he still gets more swings and misses than average on his high spin curveball, giving him something of a carrying tool. As long as Banda's in the bullpen, it’s not hard to see Duffey working his way into the mix and spamming hitters with curveballs at some point. For now, he’s headed to Scranton. A big league call up is not out of the question, particularly should there be another injury (or a setback).

RHP Chi Chi Gonzalez

The Yankees traded Jordan Montgomery and three Triple-A starters (JP Sears, Ken Waldichuk, Hayden Wesneski) at the deadline, then injuries struck and Clarke Schmidt joined the big league team. That has put Scranton in a real tough spot rotation-wise. Their current rotation depth chart looks something like this (players listed in no particular order):

• Fringe prospect and Double-A call up Sean Boyle
• Fringe prospect and personal fave Matt Krook
• Fringe prospect and Double-A call up Mitch Spence
• Journeyman Ryan Weber
• Actual prospect Jhony Brito (out with a minor injury)
• Reclamation project Danny Salazar (on COVID list)

Deivi Garcia was sent to Scranton earlier this week but will work out of the bullpen the rest of the season. He’s not a rotation candidate. So yeah, the RailRiders needed a starter and Gonzalez, 30, is a classic innings-eating Quad-A guy. He spent a little time with the Brewers and Twins earlier this year (14 runs in 18.1 innings) and has a 4.19 ERA in 58 Triple-A innings.

The Yankees are into sinkers and Gonzalez pairs a low-90s sinker with sliders and changeups, though not to great effect. Since 2015, 488 pitchers have thrown at least 200 big league innings. Gonzalez ranks 479th in ERA (5.72), 476th in FIP (5.40), 481st in strikeout rate (13.5%), 475th in swinging strike rate (7.1%), and 278th in ground ball rate (42.4%). That qualifies as a yikes.

As a “go eat innings so we don’t overwork the actual prospects” pitcher in Triple-A, Gonzalez is perfect. The problem is he’s uncomfortably high on the rotation depth chart. Jameson Taillon got hit by the line drive Tuesday and I started doing the math in my head like, “okay, Weber or I guess bullpen games are probably next in line to make starts, then it might be Gonzalez?” Eek.

Nestor Cortes (simulated game) and Luis Severino (rehab start) are taking the next steps in their rehab this weekend and, with any luck, it’ll go well and both will be back in a week or so, and we can stop worrying about Gonzalez and Weber and whoever else. Until then, the Yankees are flying mighty close to the sun rotation-wise. One more injury could be a real problem.

RHP Wilking Rodriguez

If nothing else, Rodriguez has an interesting backstory. He came up through the Rays system, moved on to the Royals as a minor league free agent, then caught on with the Yankees in 2015. Rodriguez was a non-roster invitee to Spring Training that year and made seven appearances with Triple-A Scranton, then he tested positive for a banned substance and got hit with an 80-game suspension.

Now 32, Rodriguez has not pitched in affiliated ball since his 2015 stint with the RailRiders. In fact, he didn’t do much pitching at all from 2016-20, only making a few winter ball appearances back home in Venezuela each year. Rodriguez showed up in the Mexican League last year and had a 2.01 ERA with 77 strikeouts in 44.2 innings with Tecolotes de los Dos Laredos this year, so the Yankees signed him, and he’s back with Scranton.

Back in the day Rodriguez was a mid-90s fastball guy with an upper-70s curveball. What does he look like now? I have absolutely no idea. Whatever he’s featuring, the Yankees think it’s good enough to get outs in Triple-A right now. Rodriguez got into two games with the 2014 Royals and boy, I don’t even want to think about what has to go wrong to see him in the Bronx in September.

4. Rapid fire thoughts. The 2023 Spring Training schedule is out. The Yankees begin Grapefruit League play on the road against the Phillies on Sunday, Feb. 23rd. Pitchers and catchers typically report 10 days prior to the first exhibition game, so figure on or around Wednesday, Feb 13th. Next year will be the first normal Grapefruit League schedule since 2019, meaning the Yankees will travel across Florida and play all the other Grapefruit League teams. The pandemic cut Spring Training short in 2020 and forced teams to play in little 4-5 team pods to cut down on travel and exposure in 2021, then the lockout truncated camp in 2022. Next year is a World Baseball Classic year and Pool D will be played in Miami. Depending how many Yankees play in the WBC, there could be more non-roster players in camp to cover innings and at-bats and all that. Also, there are a few exhibition games on the schedule between WBC teams and MLB teams next spring, but the Yankees aren’t involved. Bummer. Those would’ve been a nice way to break up the monotony of camp. Anyway, next year’s Spring Training schedule is out … MLB is going to Mexico City. Last week MLB announced the MLB World Tour: Korea Series and earlier this week the league announced the MLB World Tour: Mexico City Series. It will be MLB’s first ever regular season trip to Mexico City. Alas and alack, the Yankees are not going. MLB is sending the Giants and Padres next April. I’m still holding out hope for those Paris games in 2025. The Yankees want in and I want to see them there … And finally, congrats to former Yankee Masahiro Tanaka. He reached nine years of service time in Japan earlier this week and now qualifies for international free agency. Tanaka is in the second year of his two-year contract with the Rakuten Golden Eagles and, if he wants to come back to MLB next year, he won’t have to be posted. He can just sign as a free agent. Tanaka, 34 in November, has a 2.93 ERA in 135.1 innings this year. The Yankees reportedly let him walk because they felt his stuff was declining, and if they felt that way in 2021, it’s hard for me to think they’ll bring him back next year, with another two years of wear and tear on his arm. We’ll see. If only I had a dollar for everyone who said Tanaka should just have Tommy John surgery to get it out of the way. It’s been nine years since his elbow injury and he’s still chugging along and not needing Tommy John surgery.

Mailbag Questions of the Week

BB asks: Is there any chance the Yankees non-tender Gleyber Torres after the year? The year after? I'm not certain how much of a raise he'll get, but believe he's a Super 2 and he hasn't been hitting well in a long time.

I can’t see it this offseason. Gleyber was an All-Star candidate two months ago and involved in Pablo Lopez trade talks a month ago. You don’t go from being almost traded for a guy like Lopez to being non-tendered in four months. Torres will be arbitration-eligible for the third time as a Super Two this offseason. He’s making $6.25M this year, so figure something like $9M next year. That’s not onerous.

Gleyber’s game has collapsed the last few weeks and all the bad habits he showed the last two years (getting too big with his swing, occasionally giving away at-bats, being careless in the field, etc.) are returning. Earlier this season we were talking about his improved contact quality and returning power, and that’s now gone. It’s back to pre-2022 levels (full-size image):

The Yankees have had way too many young position players come up and have success, then stall out (Torres, Miguel Andujar, Clint Frazier, Gary Sanchez etc.). I keep saying it because it’s true. If it happens once or twice, you can chalk it up to baseball being baseball. When it happens over and over with this many players, there’s a problem organizationally.

Gleyber needs a fresh start somewhere else (hopefully not Miami because their hitter development has been atrocious lately) and I think the Yankees will give it to him this winter. Even with a $9M or so price tag, he has trade value. Just not what it was 2-3 years ago. A non-tender – letting Torres walk for absolutely nothing – is very unlikely to me.

Sandeep asks: So we’re being set up for the Cano situation again with Judge, right? He’s too old for Cashman to give him a 10 year deal but someone will give it to him. My vote is Baltimore. They have no long term payroll commitments, the lowest payroll in the league, a proven history of spending, a stated purpose of spending in the off-season and the need to make a splash to prove they are for real while also weakening their strongest division rival. 10/400 for Judge and the Orioles are still a bottom 10 payroll. Cashman will offer 250/7 or something like that and then say something about how he couldn’t justify the price for the length etc etc. Whatever he said with Cano. I think I just threw up in my mouth a little thinking about it. But it’s totally gonna happen, right? Talk me down.

I can’t see the Orioles doing it. GM Mike Elias is a hardcore ~*efficiency*~ guy and, now that the Angelos kids are running the show rather than Peter*, they’ve really clamped down on payroll. If the O’s do spend money, I think they’re much more likely to sign Carlos Correa, who a) is three years younger than Aaron Judge, and b) Elias drafted when he was the Astros scouting director.

* There’s a pattern emerging with all these second generation owners. Daddy bought the team because he’s competitive and wants to win, and pumped money into the roster. Then the kids take over and treat the team like a piggy bank. It’s happening with the Angeloses in Baltimore, the Lerners in Washington, and Chris Ilitch in Detroit. And, you know, maybe with Hal Steinbrenner in the Bronx too.

I’ve been having trouble coming up with possible destinations for Judge that aren’t based on “well, this team has spent huge money in the past and might do it again," like the Angels and Dodgers. Maybe the Giants? The Mets have to take care of Jacob deGrom, though I guess we can’t rule them out. Maybe the Cubs? Supposedly they’re ready to spend, but I'll believe it when I see it.

Free agency is unpredictable and it only takes one crazy/desperate GM/owner to come in with a huge offer and really gum up the works. That’s exactly what happened with Robinson Cano. The Mariners were desperate and it was reflected in their offer. I think Judge is coming back. I also think it could be a drawn out free agency that doesn’t resolve until January. Judge has shown he is willing to bet on himself. He’s going to shop around rather than jump right into a new deal.

Adam asks: Not what would you do, but what would the Yankees do if Judge at the end of the season says “I’m only staying if you fire Boone.”

I’m certain the Yankees would fire Aaron Boone in that case. Boone might get the axe even if Aaron Judge doesn’t demand it (which he would never do, this is just a hypothetical). It is a heck of a lot easier to replace the unremarkable manager than it is the homegrown superstar. Yeah, Judge will cost way more than Boone, but he’ll also a) do more to help the team win, and b) generate way more revenue. The Yankees really love Boone but they’d throw him overboard in a heartbeat if that’s what it takes to keep Judge.

Matthew asks: Reading your mailbag question about whether Rizzo is back next year, it got me thinking about rule changes limiting the shift. Even if they limit it to 2 infielders on each side of the bag and make them have their feet on the dirt, that has to be worth some extra hits for Rizzo, right? How impacted would Rizzo be by these rule changes, and would that factor into the Yankees' calculation in giving him an extension?

Eliminating the shift is on the table for next season and MLB can do it unilaterally. They just have to give the MLBPA at least 45 days notice (it used to be a year’s notice). The great unknown is the timing. Does this get announced early in the offseason so teams can plan accordingly, or does MLB wait until not long before Spring Training to make it official? Rule changes are usually announced after New Years, at least publicly.

Eliminating the shift, meaning a rule that prevents teams from loading up one side of the infield, would certainly help Rizzo. His 47.7% pull rate is third highest among lefty batters this season behind Daulton Varsho (55.5%) and Max Muncy (49.6%), and he’s seen the shift in 83.8% of his plate appearances. That’s one of the highest rates in baseball. Here’s Rizzo:

• 2021-22 no shift: .304 AVG and .304 BABIP
• 2021-22 with shift: .243 AVG and .241 BABIP

Few batters are hurt by the shift as much as Rizzo, so yeah, eliminate the shift and he’s a much more desirable player for the Yankees. Ideally MLB announces the rule change right after the World Series so the Yankees can make an informed decision rather than bring Rizzo back under the assumption shifts are going away, only for MLB to say nope in February.

Also, Yankee Stadium is where Rizzo wants to be. The ballpark is perfect for him as a lefty pull hitter and the numbers this year reflect it: .235/.363/.525 (152 wRC+) at home and .212/.311/.456 (118 wRC+) on the road. Maybe the money is so good that leaving the Bronx makes sense, but boy, at this point in Rizzo’s career, is there a better park for him? That plus a potential ban on shifts will factor into the opt out and free agency equations this offseason.

A different Matthew asks: The fact that Oswaldo Cabrera, the backup SS in AAA, looks so much better at SS than IKF got me thinking about service time manipulation. The Yankees rarely have access to elite talent in the draft, but adding a compensation pick could give them the bonus pool flexibility to go after a high upside high schooler with big bonus demands. Do you think the Yankees have been holding Peraza down hoping he can come up next year and get the ROY votes needed for a compensation pick? If so, do you think they'll call him up soon as he would be pretty unlikely to reach 130 at bats? Seems the DBacks and Orioles might be doing the same with Corbin Carroll and Gunnar Henderson. Is this the next wave of service time manipulation or are these guys actually getting called up earlier?

MLB and the MLBPA agreed to several measures to curb service time manipulation as part of the new Collective Bargaining Agreement, and the early returns are promising. The first and second place finishers in the Rookie of the Year voting get a full year of service time, so Adley Rutschman figures to get a full year despite not debuting until May 21st. Michael Harris II debuted May 28th and is likely to win NL Rookie of the Year, and Braves GM Alex Anthopoulos indicated the full year of service time factored into the decision to sign him to a long-term extension last month.

In addition to that, teams are now eligible to receive an extra draft pick when prospects meet a certain criteria. It’s not as simple as “Rookie of the Year votes equals an extra pick.” Here’s Evan Drellich (subs. req’d) with an explainer (the international draft stuff no longer applies):

Teams who promote players in time to receive a full year of service, which is 172 days — so, Opening Day, or very shortly thereafter — have a chance at additional picks in the amateur draft. (If an international draft is agreed to, teams can potentially receive international picks, as well). Players with 60 days of service or less, who have rookie eligibility and are included in two or more of the preseason top-100 prospect lists put out by Baseball America, MLB.com or ESPN, are eligible. If, in the time before they hit salary arbitration, those players go on to win Rookie of the Year, finish top three in MVP voting or top three in Cy Young voting, their team gets an amateur draft pick following the end of the first round. A player can only create one new amateur draft pick for his team over time. But if an international draft arrives, a team can get as many as three total picks: two international and one amateur, with a max of one such pick per year.

The Mariners are likely to get a draft pick (these things are called Prospect Promotion Incentive picks, or PPI) for Julio Rodriguez this year because he was on the Opening Day roster and is favored to win AL Rookie of the Year. The Orioles will not get a PPI pick for Rutschman (ditto the Braves for Harris) at any point, even if he wins the next two MVPs, because he was not on the MLB roster all season as a rookie.

Carrol and Henderson, arguably the top two prospects in baseball, were called up earlier this week. That means they won’t accrue the 45 days of service time necessary to exhaust their rookie eligibility*, so they will go into next season as rookies and thus eligible for PPI picks. You don’t have to try hard to believe that, without these new rules, Carroll and Henderson would be stuck in the minors until next May sometime while their service time is manipulated.

* There’s also a 130 at-bat and 50-inning rookie limit, though those are easy to avoid.

To answer Matthew’s question, I don’t think we can rule out the Yankees keeping Oswald Peraza (and Anthony Volpe) down in an effort to secure a PPI pick in the future, but I don’t think it’s likely either. They can call him up now and still retain PPI eligibility (like Carroll and Henderson), and the criteria is pretty narrow, no? The player has to win Rookie of the Year, not just get votes, or finish top three in the MVP (or Cy Young) voting within his first three seasons. Doable, sure, but so very unlikely. These PPI picks are long shots.

The new service time manipulation rules seem to have contributed to Carroll and Henderson getting called up late this year rather than early next year, and also Harris getting a long-term deal (or a richer long-term deal than he would have otherwise because he is closer to free agency and has more leverage). If the Yankees are doing this with Peraza (and Volpe), I suggest they stop and focus on winning games right now rather than hoping all the stars align to get one (1) extra draft pick at some undetermined point in the future.

Seamus asks: I know Oswaldo Cabrera is very new to the outfield, but he looks comfortable in right field. Do you think the Yankees would ever try him in center and move Judge back to right to help keep him fresh? I’m sure they are hoping Stanton will be able to play right and then Judge can DH, but I was just thinking of ways to help ease his load as the season winds down.

Cabrera did not play much right field in the minors (only four games) but he did play it. He’s never played center field and I can’t remember the last time the Yankees asked a young player to learn a new position on the fly at the MLB level. I guess it was Rob Refsnyder and first base in 2016? “Here, go learn that position” is not really a thing they do in the big leagues.

That attempted sliding catch Tuesday (video) was the first time I thought Cabrera misplayed a ball and looked like an infielder playing the outfield. He’s taken to right field very well and I think he would pick up center fairly quickly. I would be okay with it. Tell him to shag fly balls and work out there for a few days, then try it. I don’t think the Yankees will do it though.

Earlier this week Aaron Boone said Harrison Bader is about 10 days away from starting a rehab assignment. So figure that’s all of next week ramping up, the following week playing minor league rehab games, and then in the big league lineup the week after that. That’s the week of Sept. 19th. I don’t think the Yankees want to continue playing Judge in center until then, but I think they will. Cabrera in center might be (should be) more of a 2023 thing. I think he could handle it though.

Zack asks: Are there any statistics for differential between pitch velo vs exit velo? I just saw Judge hit a laser off Walker and the broadcast just said the pitch velo was 95 and the exit velo was 116, so 11mph faster out than in. If you hit a 100mph fastball with an exit velo of 100, seems less relevant than hitting a 75mph curve with an exit velo of 100 right?

People smarter than me have done the research and found pitch velocity contributes only a little to exit velocity (roughly 15%). It’s mostly bat speed that generates exit velocity, so the old “the pitcher supplies the power” adage isn’t really true. Exit velocity is largely a product of how hard the hitter strikes the ball, not how fast the ball is going when it runs into the bat.

Zack made me curious and I looked into the largest gaps between pitch velocity and exit velocity this season (the data set is too big and this is too time consuming to research the entire Statcast era). Position player pitchers really screw us up here. The biggest gap is 71.8 mph! Jorge Alfaro hit a 110.6 mph liner off a 38.8 mph lob from Frank Schwindel (video).

Here are the five largest gaps in pitch velocity and exit velocity against actual pitchers this season:

1. Jake Burger homer vs. Rich Hill: +43.0 mph (67.0 mph to 110.0 mph) (video)
2. Ryan Mountcastle double vs. Alec Mills: +40.7 mph (66.4 mph to 107.1 mph) (video)
3. Adolis Garcia homer vs. Paolo Espino: +40.6 mph (69.3 mph to 109.9 mph) (video)
4. Giancarlo Stanton line out vs. Matt Wisler: +39.7 mph (79.1 mph to 118.8 mph) (video)
5. Ryan Mountcastle double vs. Zack Greinke: +39.7 mph (64.9 mph to 104.6 mph) (video)

Stanton also ranks sixth (+39.6 mph), ninth (+38.8 mph), tenth (+38.4 mph), and 14th (+37.1 mph) on that list. The non-Stanton leader among Yankees is (who else?) Aaron Judge with a +35.9 mph differential (video). The leader among non-Stanton and non-Judge Yankees is Joey Gallo at +35.2 mph (video), but I think that’s a data error. It was a high fly ball at 101.1 mph off the bat and it doesn’t look like 101.1 mph to me. Sometimes high pop ups can travel out of the Statcast radar range and we get bad data. Seems like that might’ve happened here.

(Here’s my spreadsheet. I only included 100 mph exit velocities because otherwise the file would be massive. 100 mph batted balls more than cover us.)

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