December 7th, 2021: Coaches, Tanaka, Suzuki, Verlander, Peraza, Nittoli, Roster Check-In

Lockout, Day 6: I don’t miss reflexively checking my phone every few minutes to see whether there’s breaking news. I guess that means the lockout isn’t a total loss. I do miss having some baseball news though. Radio silence is pretty boring. Anyway, let’s get to today’s thoughts.

1. New coaches. The lockout has halted roster moves but teams can still build their coaching staff because they don’t involve the 40-man roster. According to Lindsey Adler (subs. req’d), the Yankees have promoted minor league staffers Dillon Lawson and Desi Druschel to the big league staff. Lawson takes over as hitting coach and Druschel as assistant pitching coach.

“I feel like we are down the tracks with our Major League coaching staff. We’re dotting I’s and crossing T’s,” Brian Cashman told Ken Davidoff last week. “That’s something that will be revealed here if it’s permissible at some point.”

A few weeks back I wrote I expected the Yankees to hire the hitting coach version of Matt Blake (i.e. a new school analytics guy) and that’s exactly what they did, though Lawson was promoted from within rather than hired from outside. Here’s what I wrote in October:

In the most basic terms, the organization’s hitting philosophy is “hit strikes hard.” I think anyone who’s ever watched like 12 seconds of baseball can agree that’s smart. A one size fits all approach never works because players have different skill sets (Aaron Judge vs. Tyler Wade, for example), but hitting at its core is “hit strikes hard.” That’s what you want.

That’s the philosophy and how the Yankees go about developing those skills is another matter, and frankly, based on the year the farm system just had, the player development staff is nailing it. So many position player prospects had breakout years! Anthony Volpe, Oswald Peraza, Hoy Jun Park, Oswaldo Cabrera, etc. At the MLB level? Not so much. Lots of guys took steps back.

A few years ago the Yankees overhauled the player development staff and put Dillon Lawson in charge of hitting development. Similar to pitching coach Matt Blake, Lawson understands the numbers and how to use them, and the results speak for themselves in the minors. In Lawson’s first “normal” minor league season, hitters throughout the system exploded.

Whatever Lawson and his staff did in the minors worked pretty darn well and obviously the Yankees believe it can translate to the MLB level. Teaching minor leaguers who are trying to find their way in this game is much different than working with veteran big leaguers who are set in their ways, but Blake made the transition successfully. Hopefully Lawson can too.

Cashman said the Yankees are looking to hire three hitting coaches and right now it’s just Lawson. He’s a rookie too. This will be his first big league job. Will the Yankees hire a veteran coach to support him? Not necessarily. Experience is nice but you want smart people, first and foremost. Experienced coaches seem to be something fans want more than teams. The Giants have done well with a (large) staff of young coaches with limited experience.

Druschel, like Lawson, joined the Yankees as part of their player development overhaul a few years ago and his fancy title was Manager of Pitch Development. Druschel and Director of Pitching Sam Briend oversaw a system in which non-elite prospects like Janson Junk, Glenn Otto, Randy Vasquez, Hayden Wesneski, and Ken Waldichuk took significant steps forward, in some cases going from non-prospect to trade chip.

Blake remains the pitching coach and Druschel is the assistant. Cashman said they intend to employ three pitching coaches, though that includes bullpen coach Mike Harkey, so they’re done on the pitching side. They have their three pitching coaches. Here, just to lay it all out, is what the coaching staff looks like at the moment:

• Manager: Aaron Boone
• Bench coach: Carlos Mendoza
• First base coach: TBA
• Third base coach: Luis Rojas
• Hitting coaches: Dillon Lawson, TBA, TBA
• Pitching coaches: Matt Blake and Desi Druschel
• Bullpen coach: Mike Harkey
• Catching coach: Tanner Swanson

The Yankees recently lost bullpen catcher and coaching assistant Radley Haddad to the Pirates (his new title with Pittsburgh is Game Planning and Strategy Coach). I assume incumbent bullpen catcher Aaron Barnett will take on Haddad’s other responsibilities, and the Yankees will bring in someone else to fill Barnett’s second bullpen catcher spot.

It was only a matter of time until Lawson and Druschel moved upward, either with the Yankees or another team. Too much progress was made in the minors the last few years for them to stay put. The hope is they can work that magic with the big league team and gosh, the Yankees need it. Too many core players have gone backwards. It might be too late to salvage Gleyber Torres, but you don’t want that happening to Anthony Volpe, you know?

Briend will continue to run minor league pitcher development. I’m not sure who will take the hitter development reins from Lawson, but I’m sure the Yankees have a succession plan in place. The big league team is the top priority, always and forever, but you want that pipeline of prospects (and trade chips) to keep flowing. Lawson and Druschel were just two cogs in the machine. The player development staff is enormous and there are lots of capable people in the system.

So, the coaching staff is nearly complete. A first base coach and two more hitting coaches are still to come. Maybe the Yankees will hire a quality control coach (a few other teams have one of those) or something like that as well? We’ll see. If you thought the Yankees would move away from analytics this offseason, even a tiny little bit, you were sorely mistaken. That was never going to happen. With Lawson and Druschel, they’re only going even more all-in on data.

(Lawson worked with the Astros and Southeast Missouri State before joining the Yankees. Druschel was at the University of Iowa. Back in 2017, R.J. Anderson wrote about both of them and how they used numbers to take their programs to the next level, so check that out.)

2. Latest hot stove news. Hot stove news will be in short supply during the lockout. We might get a nugget here and there, though I expect it to be pretty quiet. Here’s the last bit of news we got right before the lockout and in the first few hours after the lockout.

Tanaka staying in Japan

Masahiro Tanaka will not return to the Yankees next season. Over the weekend the Rakuten Golden Eagles announced Tanaka did not use the MLB opt out clause in his contract, so he will stay with the team in 2022. Tanaka signed a two-year, $17.2M contract last offseason and is the highest paid player in Japan. He’s the highest paid player in league history, in fact.

Tanaka, now 33, was ninth in the league in innings (155.2) and sixth in ERA (3.01) this year. He had a league average strikeout rate (20.2%), a much better than average walk rate (4.5%), and a slightly worse than average home run rate (0.98 HR/9), so he’s still the same guy. Tanaka also helped Japan win a gold medal during the summer Olympics in Tokyo. That’s pretty cool.

Surely the lockout played a role in Tanaka’s decision to stay with Rakuten. He can’t sign or even negotiate an MLB contract until the lockout is over and who wants to deal with this nonsense? Stay in Japan, be close to family, make a bunch of money, watch new teammate Chris Gittens hit massive dingers. Do that in 2022, then maybe look into an MLB return next winter.

I can’t find it now but I remember reading a report that the Yankees let Tanaka leave last winter because they are worried about the decline of his stuff, and if that’s true, then they were never going to bring him back for 2022, when he’s another year older and has more innings on his arm. Reuniting with Tanaka was fan wishcasting more than something rooted in reality.

(Tomoyuki Sugano, who was posted last offseason but didn’t sign with an MLB team, is also staying in Japan. He didn’t exercise his opt out clause either. Sugano, 32, had a 3.16 ERA in 119.2 innings around a toe injury with the Yomiuri Giants this season.)

Yankees interested in Suzuki?

According to Sean McAdam, the Yankees are among the teams “most aggressive in pursuit” of Japanese outfielder Seiya Suzuki, along with the Blue Jays and Red Sox. Brendan Kuty says Brian Cashman wouldn’t comment on the team’s interest. Suzuki’s 30-day negotiating window is on hold during the lockout. He has 21 days remaining to negotiate a deal once it ends.

Here’s what I wrote about Suzuki in October. He’s a corner outfielder and the Yankees are set on the corners with Aaron Judge and Joey Gallo. Judge isn’t going anywhere, so the Yankees would have to trade Gallo or move him to center to accommodate Suzuki in 2022. Maybe they like Suzuki’s defense more than everyone else and consider him a center fielder? I dunno.

It’s easy to see Suzuki fitting beyond next season though. Gallo and Judge will be free agents next winter, freeing up the two corner outfield spots. The Yankees could even re-sign one of those two (almost certainly Judge) and still have room for Suzuki. Sign Suzuki now and the Yankees would essentially do their 2023 outfield shopping in 2022.

I’m always skeptical of these “three rival teams in the same division want the same free agent” reports because they’re often just the agent trying to increase offers. Given each team’s outfield situation …

• Blue Jays: Lourdes Gurriel Jr., George Springer, Teoscar Hernandez, Randal Grichuk
• Red Sox: Jackie Bradley Jr., Enrique Hernandez, Alex Verdugo
• Yankees: Joey Gallo, Aaron Hicks, Aaron Judge

... the Red Sox are the most logical fit for Suzuki. Much moreso than the Blue Jays or Yankees. MLBTR and FanGraphs both project Suzuki to get $11M a year across 4-5 years, and given the needs elsewhere on the roster (shortstop, first base, etc.), I can’t say I see the Yankees giving that kinda money to a corner outfielder. Methinks they’re being used for leverage.

Verlander deal not finalized

For whatever reason the Astros and Justin Verlander did not finalize his new contract before the lockout. It seems like they expected it to get done (Houston outrighted Andre Scrubb to clear a 40-man roster spot the day before the lockout, presumably for Verlander) but it didn’t happen. Verlander is still technically a free agent despite agreeing to terms 14 days before the lockout.

Because he’s coming back from Tommy John surgery, it’s possible the Astros saw something they didn’t like in Verlander’s medicals, and they simply ran out of time before being able to restructure the contract or send him for another evaluation. That would be kinda weird though seeing how Houston should know his medicals better than anyone. Did something new pop up?

The Yankees offered Verlander one year and $25M before he agreed to rejoin the Astros, and because he’s still a free agent, I suppose it’s possible they’ll try to swoop in once the lockout is over. Medicals are like art. They’re open to interpretation. One team’s red flag is another team’s non-issue. Maybe the Yankees aren’t worried about whatever worries the Astros.

Of course, we don’t know why Verlander’s deal was not finalized prior to the lockout. We’re just speculating it could be health-related given the Tommy John surgery. My guess is Verlander and the Astros will finish up his contract right after the lockout and this is a bunch of nothing. That said, he’s still a free agent, so there’s an opportunity for the Yankees to jump back in.

Yankees in touch with Correa, Freeman

Just before the lockout it was reiterated the Yankees are among the teams to check in on Carlos Correa and Freddie Freeman, according to Mark Berman and Jon Heyman. The Yankees were connected to both players last month, so this isn’t new information, but it is making the rounds again. Did they reach out again? Or is this the same report regurgitated? Not sure.

It is in Correa’s and Freeman’s best interests to engage the Yankees because it can only raise their asking price. I am still of the belief that if the Yankees hand out a huge dollar contract this offseason, it will be to a shortstop, not a first baseman, even one as good as Freeman. Paying big for Freeman’s age 32 to 36-ish seasons doesn’t make sense given the rest of the roster.

The Freeman thing is weird. Weird as in why haven’t the Braves re-signed him yet? The guy is the face of your franchise and you’re stringing him along to maybe save a few million bucks? Right after winning the World Series too? The longer the Braves drag this out, the more likely it is Freeman leaves. I expected Freeman to be among the first free agents to sign, but nope.

Correa doesn’t seem to have many possible suitors though I would caution you not to think that means the Yankees can get a good deal. The very best players always get paid. Sometimes it just takes a little longer than expected (like Bryce Harper and Manny Machado). The Astros are still involved and don’t sleep on the Cubs, Dodgers, or even the Red Sox.

Depending how you feel about Trevor Story, Correa is the last chance for the Yankees to add an impact player at shortstop. Not just this offseason either. I mean the next few offseasons too. It will be a while until another player this good and this young at a position this important hits free agency, especially now that the Rays have locked up Wander Franco.

Padres sign Garcia

I gotta say, the Yankees corner of the internet is really slipping. Not nearly enough complaining about them letting Luis Garcia get away. The Yankees gave him a minor league deal last winter, he pitched well with Triple-A Scranton (3.19 FIP and 27.5% strikeouts), then they let him use an opt out in July to sign with the Cardinals, where he became a trusted high-leverage reliever.

Garcia, 35 in January, had a 3.24 ERA (2.72 FIP) with 25.2% strikeouts with St. Louis. He was a sinker guy before signing with the Yankees and they had him switch to an elevated four-seamer, which he took to the Cardinals. The Padres signed him to a two-year, $7M contract before the lockout. I don’t have much to add. Just wanted to say I’m very disappointed in the lack of “can’t believe the Yankees let Garcia get away!” rambling. Let’s be better, folks.

On a free agent signing deadline

The pre-lockout free agent frenzy prompted more discussion about a possible free agent signing deadline to spice up the offseason. The first day of free agency is chaos in the other three major sports whereas baseball’s free agency drags on for months. The pre-lockout signing frenzy was a look into what the hot stove could be like with a signing deadline. It was fun!

A signing deadline doesn’t hold up under even the tiniest little bit of scrutiny though. Let’s not be prisoners of the moment. Let’s think about this for more than four seconds. What happens to the free agents who don’t sign? If they’re allowed to sign in Spring Training, then it’s not really a deadline, and if they can’t sign until next offseason, who has the leverage? Exactly.

Britt Ghiroli (subs. req’d) polled a bunch of baseball people about a free agent signing deadline and the team executives were unanimously in favor of it, and it ain’t because it would be great for fans. I don’t trust teams and front offices to use a signing deadline for anything other than squeezing players and driving down salaries, and making the current labor climate worse.

The NBA, NFL, and NHL have crazy Day 1 free agent frenzies because they are salary capped leagues and players don’t want to get left out in the cold when cap space runs out. Not because they had an artificial deadline. If MLB wants to improve free agency, then incentivize winning. That’s it. Anything else is just a band-aid teams will find a way to exploit.

3. Minor league signings. Teams are still able to sign players to minor league contracts during the lockout (basically anything that doesn’t involve the 40-man roster is allowed) though they can’t invite non-40-man players to big league Spring Training just yet. That has to wait until after the lockout. The Yankees have not signed anyone to a minor league deal since the lockout. They did sign a few players right before the lockout though. Let’s run them down.

IF Jose Peraza

Looks like the Yankees have their new starting shortstop! I kid, I kid (but maybe?). The Yankees signed Peraza to a minor league contract before the lockout according to the official site, and I assume it includes an invite to big league camp. Fun fact: I once said I would trade anyone in the farm system for Peraza, including Aaron Judge. That’s why I’m just a dumb blogger.

Peraza, 28 in April, spent last season as a bench player with the Mets, hitting .204/.266/.380 (80 wRC+) in 154 plate appearances. He had a few big hits early in the season and that kept him on the roster longer than he belonged on the roster, kinda like Rougned Odor. Peraza has played plenty of second, short, and third in his career. Has a little outfield experience too.

Four years ago Peraza had what looked like a breakout season with the Reds, putting together a .288/.326/.416 (96 wRC+) line with 14 homers, 23 steals, and an 11.0% strikeout rate. Rather than build on that, he’s hit .229/.279/.353 (65 wRC+) in nearly 700 big league plate appearances since, and it’s not like there’s some great underlying exit velocity skill or anything.

Tyler Wade (trade), Andrew Velazquez (waivers), and Kyle Holder (minor league free agent) are all gone, so the Yankees’ upper level middle infield depth is basically just Oswaldo Cabrera, who has played all of nine games in Triple-A. Peraza fills that void, and if he’s on the MLB roster, he will replace Wade as the utility infielder everyone hates. No more, no less.

RHP Vinny Nittoli

Remember when Michael Kay used to say the Red Sox signed Hideki Okajima so Daisuke Matsuzaka would have a friend? As if you can just throw any two people of the same nationality in a room and expect them to be friends? I’m going to pretend the Yankees signed Nittoli just so Joey Gallo has a friend in case Anthony Rizzo leaves. Because they’re both Italian, you see.

Anyway, the Yankees have signed Nittoli to a minor league contract. He announced it himself on Instagram. Nittoli turned 31 last month and he made his MLB debut with the Mariners this past season, allowing two runs in one inning of work. Given his big league time, I assume Nittoli has an invite to big league camp (this deal was done in early November, well before the lockout).

Nittoli had a 30.2% strikeout rate and a 5.9% walk rate in Triple-A this past season (he owns an ugly career 6.41 ERA in 59 Triple-A innings spread across two seasons) and is a max effort righty reliever. Here’s video. He sits more low-90s than mid-90s with his fastball, and his slider has a pretty good spin rate. So does his fastball, to be fair.

My guess is Nittoli appeals to the Yankees for two reasons. One, his sinker, a pitch they are now emphasizing. He throws both four-seamers and sinkers, and the Yankees may have him focus on the latter going forward. And two, his slider. Here are the five pitchers who added the most horizontal movement to their slider in 2021, via Eno Sarris (subs. req’d):

1. Mike King, Yankees: +7.2 inches
2. Paolo Espinal, Nationals: +6.4 inches
3. Blake Treinen, Dodgers: +5.7 inches
4. Nestor Cortes, Yankees: +5.2 inches
5. Jonathan Loaisiga, Yankees: +5.1 inches

I’m guessing the Yankees signed Nittoli with the idea they might be able to help him improve his slider, and that he’d benefit from throwing more sinkers. If it works, great! The Yankees will have a cheap reliever with two minor league options. If not, who cares? It’s a zero risk minor league contract and Triple-A Scranton will need someone to eat up innings that don’t go to prospects.

RHP Emmanuel Ramirez

According to Chris Hilburn-Trenkle, the Yankees signed Ramirez to a minor league contract last month. Unlike Peraza and Nittoli, Ramirez doesn’t have any big league time, so he may not have received an invite to big league camp. The 27-year-old allowed 34 runs in 38 High-A and Double-A relief innings with the Braves this past season.

Once upon a time Ramirez was a good prospect with the Padres -- Baseball America (subs. req’d) wrote “his separating pitch is a curveball that rates as the best in the organization” back in 2016 -- though that was a baseball lifetime ago. The good: Ramirez struck out 59 in those 38 innings. The bad: Ramirez walked 16, threw 10 wild pitches, and gave up eight homers. Oof.

The Yankees (and every other team) roll the dice on players like this (one-time prospect who has stalled out) every offseason. They did it last year with righty Kevin Gadea, a former Rays prospect, and that went nowhere. Peraza and Nittoli could see MLB time this year. Ramirez is unlikely to do the same.

4. Roster check-in. As noted earlier, teams can not make any moves involving the 40-man roster during the lockout, so rosters are frozen. I figure this is a good time then to check in on where the Yankees stand, because even though you may have an idea what the roster looks like in your head, seeing it laid out is helpful. Here’s where the Yankees sit:

An asterisk indicates the player is out of minor league options and must go through waivers to be sent down. Abreu being out of options pushes King to Triple-A but only on paper. I would put money on King being in the Opening Day bullpen. He was so-so as a starter last year and great as a one or two-inning reliever. The bullpen feels like his calling and he can be a weapon there.

The good news is, if they had to, the Yankees could send a respectable lineup out there today. That said, it would be the same flawed (too right-handed, too many swings and misses, etc.) lineup we saw most of last season. We know they want a shortstop and I think we would all be surprised if Voit is on the roster come Opening Day, nevermind starting at first base.

The bad news is woof, that bench. Cabrera (nine games in Triple-A) and Florial (.218/.315/.404 and 93 wRC+ in Triple-A in 2021) should be in Triple-A next season and I suspect they will. I have no idea what the future holds for Andujar but there is a path to a big league bench spot. Higashioka’s not going anywhere. We know that and Cole will make sure of it.

Signing a shortstop and moving LeMahieu into a super utility role, the role the Yankees originally signed him to fill, would help the bench a bit, though the Yankees would still need a true fourth outfielder. As I said a few weeks ago, I will believe it won’t be Brett Gardner when I see it. Gardner wants to continue playing and the Yankees can’t quit the guy.

How you feel about the rotation depends how you feel about Cortes and German. I think Cortes has made real improvement. I wouldn’t expect him to be 2.90 ERA good again, but I think he’s a legitimate big league starter. Ideally he would be a swingman/No. 5 type rather than your No. 4, but he’s a big leaguer. German too. For me he’s in that same swingman/No. 5 starter bucket.

Perfect world offseason is a new lefty hitting first baseman, a new shortstop who isn’t some no bat stopgap, a good fourth outfielder who won’t kill you if he’s pushed into everyday duty, and a starter who can reliably eat innings since the Yankees will likely take it easy on Severino (and also Taillon) post-surgery. Been a while since the Yankees needed bats more than arms, huh?

I haven’t seen or heard anyone inside or outside baseball say they expect the lockout to end soon. Early-to-mid February is the most common estimate, in which case teams would have 2-3 weeks to wrap up their offseason before Spring Training. The Yankees have done nothing but re-sign Rodriguez so far this winter, so once the lockout ends, they’ll be in scramble mode. Not ideal, but it is what it is.

5. Remembering a random Yankee: Brendan Ryan. This week’s random Yankee is not a request. He’s just a player I felt like writing about. I’ll get back to the requests next week. Here’s the random Yankee archive. You can find links back to everyone we've covered there.

Born and raised in Los Angeles, Ryan wound up at Lewis-Clark State in Idaho, an NAIA powerhouse. I’m not sure what happened, but Ryan was one of several players dismissed from the team in 2003, yet the Cardinals drafted him in the seventh round anyway (Tyler Kepner says the Yankees brought Ryan to Tampa for a workout before the draft that year).

Here is Baseball America’s (subs. req’d) entire pre-draft scouting report:

SS Brendan Ryan might have been a more attractive draft pick if he hadn't been one of five starters from last year's national championship Lewis-Clark squad removed from the team for various transgressions.

Huh. Well, anyway, the Cardinals gave Ryan a $100,000 bonus and he steadily climbed the minor league ladder, making his MLB debut at age 25 on June 2nd, 2007. Ryan’s first career homer came three weeks later and was a game-winner in the 11th inning against the Mets. He hit .289/.347/.406 with four homers and seven steals in 67 games as a rookie.

From 2007-10, Ryan was a light-hitting defensive wiz at shortstop. He hit .259/.314/.344 (76 OPS+) in 415 games those years but also racked up +46 defensive runs saved. Despite the lack of offense, Ryan was worth +8.2 WAR those years. St. Louis grew tired of waiting for the bat to come around though, so Ryan was traded to the Mariners for righty Maikel Cleto in Dec. 2010. (Cleto made 13 relief appearances for the Cardinals the next three years.)

From 2011-13, Ryan remained a splendid defender at shortstop, though his bat got even worse, and the result was a .215/.286/.294 (67 OPS+) line in over 1,200 plate appearances with the Mariners. Ryan made the final out of Phil Humber’s perfect game in April 2012 because he swung at this pitch …

… which AJ Pierzynski did not catch, but was able to retrieve and throw to first for the final out. That same season Ryan played short in Seattle’s combined no-hitter against the Dodgers in June and in Felix Hernandez’s perfect game against the Rays in August. He scored the only run in Felix’s perfect game on a single, a stolen base, and a Jesus Montero (!) single.

“You remember your first day. You remember your first homer. But a perfect game? That’s history,” Ryan told Pedro Moura about Felix’s perfect game in 2016. “I remember trying to calm myself down and relax and not come off anxious. It’s like, either you get the bunt down, or you screw it up. And you don’t want to screw it up. Really, all you’re doing is letting the moment impact everything.”

The Mariners were very bad in 2013 and Brad Miller had come up and taken over as the starting shortstop. The Yankees, meanwhile, were mediocre in 2013 but only 3.5 games behind the second Wild Card spot going into September. They needed a shortstop though. Derek Jeter was hurt just about the entire season and Eduardo Nunez was Eduardo Nunez.

So, on Sept. 10th, the Yankees acquired Ryan for a player to be named later that was never named. It amounted to a salary dump, saving Seattle about $500,000 on a player who was about to become a free agent and had no future with the team. Because the trade happened after Aug. 31st, Ryan would not have been eligible for the postseason roster had the Yankees qualified. He could have helped get them to the postseason though.

“Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would play shortstop for one day in the big leagues for the New York Yankees,” Ryan told Kepner soon after the trade. “That’s as good as it gets. It’s pretty unbelievable. I don’t want to say I could die today -- we’ve still got time to go -- but it’s something I’ll never forget.”

Ryan took over at short and started the final 17 games. In those 17 games he went 13-for-59 (.220) with two doubles and a home run (video). Ryan played until 2016 but that proved to be the final home run of his MLB career. The Yankees faded in those 17 games and missed the postseason. If you believe in small sample defensive stats, Ryan was worth +0.4 WAR in those 17 games thanks to his glove.

“He’s the best I’ve seen on that field. Honestly, I haven’t seen or played against or with anybody better,” Shawn Kelley, then with the Yankees and Ryan’s former teammate with the Mariners, told Kepner about Ryan’s defense. “I was telling everybody when we got him, you’ll see balls that, normally your whole career, you just assume are hits, and it’s like, ‘Oh wait, he got to it. Oh wait, he threw it. Oh wait, he got the guy out!’”

Ryan, then 31, became a free agent after the season, though the Yankees needed a backup infielder for 2014. A good one too. Jeter was coming back from a major ankle injury, Nunez had played himself out of the picture, and Alex Rodriguez was going to serve a lengthy suspension for his ties to Biogenesis (he was originally suspended in Aug. 2013, but appealed). At the very least, Ryan was going to provide a good glove.

On Dec. 3rd, the Yankees re-signed Ryan to a two-year contract worth $5M guaranteed. The contract also included a $2M club option and a $1M player option. “I don’t know who’s playing second (because Robinson Cano signed with the Mariners). I still don’t know who’s playing third yet. There’s going to be a question mark at shortstop, even though we know who the player is,” Cashman told David Waldstein soon after re-signing Ryan.

Jeter was healthy enough to play Opening Day and the Yankees signed Brian Roberts and Kelly Johnson to handle second and third, respectively. Yangervis Solarte also made the team out of camp and eventually took over at third base full-time. Ryan? He suffered a back injury in Spring Training and did not make his season debut until May 7th.

Even when healthy, Ryan did not play a whole lot. He missed the team’s first 32 games and started only 33 of the final 130 games (plus 16 appearances off the bench). On May 23rd, Ryan came off the bench to play first base (after Alfonso Soriano pinch-hit for Johnson) while Jeter stayed at short. It was completely backwards given their defensive skills, but Jeter was king.

Five times Ryan played first base in 2014. He hit .167/.211/.202 (18 OPS+) in 124 plate appearances that season, and not even his defense was enough to make him replacement level (-0.7 WAR). That .202 SLG is the lowest by a Yankees with at least 100 plate appearances in the last 30 years. Lowest since Bucky Dent slugged .188 in 173 plate appearances in 1983. Yeesh.

In 2015, Ryan again suffered a Spring Training injury. Two, in fact. He missed the first two weeks of camp with another back problem, then suffered a severe calf strain that sidelined him until June. “It didn’t feel like a bee sting or like a hammer to the back of the calf, like I’ve heard. But then I couldn’t move. I couldn’t believe it,” Ryan told Billy Witz about the injury.

The Yankees re-signed trade deadline additions Chase Headley and Stephen Drew in the offseason and brought in Didi Gregorius to play short. While Ryan was on the shelf they cycled through a hodgepodge of utility infielders, including Cole Figueroa, Gregorio Petit, Jose Pirela, and Rob Refsnyder. Ryan returned in June, pulled an oblique, then returned for good in July.

Once back from the oblique Ryan started only 26 of the team’s final 72 games, and 15 times he came off the bench. In 47 total games in 2015 he went 22-for-96 (.229) with six doubles, which allowed him to get his slugging percentage out of the 2s (.333). Ryan also threw two scoreless innings in a blowout loss to the Astros on Aug. 25th (video). Here are the last three Yankees position players to pitch at least two innings in a game:

• Mike Ford: 2 IP, 6 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 0 BB, 1 K (Aug. 18th, 2019 vs. Cleveland)
• Brendan Ryan: 2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 0 K (Aug. 25th, 2015 vs. Astros)
• Gene Michael: 3 IP, 5 H, 5 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 3 K (Aug. 26th, 1968 vs. Angels)

Something about those August position player pitching appearances, huh? Ryan hit .201/.244/.271 (44 OPS+) in 289 plate appearances with just the one home run in parts of three seasons with the Yankees. Even with great defense – and he was still great – it worked out to -0.4 WAR. He is one of the least productive multi-year Yankees in recent memory.

The Yankees of course declined their $2M club option following the 2015 season and Ryan of course exercised his $1M club option. His time with the Yankees came to an end that Dec. 17th, when he was included in the Starlin Castro trade as a player to be named later. The full trade:

• Yankees get: IF Starlin Castro
• Cubs get: RHP Adam Warren and a player to be named

The RAB post tells me it was an open secret Ryan would be included in the trade. He was a player to be named only because the Cubs needed time to sort through 40-man roster issues, so the Yankees held onto Ryan an extra few days as a courtesy. Once the Cubs had their 40-man in order, the trade was completed and Ryan was sent to Chicago.

Ryan’s time with the Cubs did not last long. They released him five days after he was officially named in the trade. He was included in the trade to clear $1M off the books. That’s it. The Yankees replaced Ryan with Ronald Torreyes in 2016 and Ryan spent most of 2016 and 2017 in Triple-A with the Angels, Nationals, and Tigers. He did get into 17 games with Anaheim in 2016, but has been out of baseball since the end of 2017. Ryan made a little more than $12M in player contracts before the game was done with him.

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