2019-20 Yankees Offseason Discussion

jon abbey

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"Can confirm that Tanner Swanson to the Yankees. Had been promoted recently by #MNTwins to asst field coordinator. But source said NY gave him a MLB job as the team’s catching coach. Also in charge of quality control & will direct catching throughout org. "

"Tanner Swanson is a big loss for the #MNTwins, who also lost Peter Fatse to the Red Sox in Oct. Swanson worked directly w/ Mitch Garver on receiving. Garver went from one of MLB's worst framers in 2018 to league avg & the Twins' most improved player."

"The #MNTwins wanted to keep Tanner Swanson, but aside from the hitting coach vacancy created by Fatse leaving didn't have a major-league coaching job in the dugout to offer him."

View: https://twitter.com/DanHayesMLB/status/1191475641734041600
 

bquine

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I'm really happy to see that the Yankees have been targeting coaching so much of late. It seems to be a real market inefficiency to be exploited. I mean, if one win is worth $9M or so, think about it: you can probably hire 20+ top coaching specialists for that. And I may be wrong, but I don't think these types of coaches are typically employees under contract so organizations can evaluate what works and what doesn't fairly cheaply. Just seeing what good coaching combined with modern performance analytics has been able to accomplish with players like J.D. Martinez, Urshela, and the Houston pitching staff makes it absolutely worth trying.

Not to mention these coaching salaries don't impact the CBT at all. And unlike increasing player payroll where you get accused of "buying championships", when you have a huge, expensive coaching staff people just call you smart and cutting edge. Not to mention it makes your team potentially more attractive to free agents.
 

jon abbey

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Good post, one question:

And I may be wrong, but I don't think these types of coaches are typically employees under contract
You mean long-term contract, I guess? It's also my impression that most of these guys are year to year, but pretty sure they're still under contract for that year.
 

bquine

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Multi-year deals may be more common than I suspected, in fact. In a 2015 article while discussing minor league coaches, Fangraphs remarked:

"Tampering is a punishable offense – a fine of up to $250,000 – so poaching coaches from other organizations has its hurdles. Formal permission is needed to speak to someone under contract with another club. It isn’t always granted, although protocol is to allow an employee to talk to a team that intends to offer him a promotion.

Coaches who are free agents are obviously fair game. They’re also easy to track. According to a farm director, teams typically make non-renewals public via a player development email list. There is also plenty of networking within the industry."

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/sunday-notes-coaching-salaries-on-the-farm-bullpen-scatalogy-cards-step-more/
That said, even at the MLB level, bullpen coaches are barely making six figures so I would think they're almost certainly not under contract for more than a year. An MLB strength and conditioning coach making $50k (salary info from glassdoor.com) is almost certainly at-will. The only reason I would suspect otherwise is because these people are often called to relocate, in which case at least a one-year contract would seem like a decent thing for an organization to offer. Maybe there's also some concern about maintaining organizational "trade secrets"?

In any case, the costs here are still almost negligible with respect to the potential marginal benefit, it seems to me. An organization like the Yankees could easily eat even a multi-year coaching contract at a couple hundred thousand/year if things didn't work out.
 

bquine

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Speaking of coaches, it seems like the Yankees are concentrating on college-level coaches to fill the pitching coach vacancy. According to Kiley McDaniel, this makes a lot of sense:

26661

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/kiley-mcdaniel-chat-11-6-19/

There's always been a funny irony that college coaches often get paid more than MLB ones do. Most of this is because college coaches have a much broader role, particularly recruiting. That said, what McDaniel is saying above also makes sense. Innovation tends to happen at the lower levels of sport because that's where there's room to experiment and creative thinkers can be less scared of failure (see college and even high school football). When you pair that up with the fact that many big college programs are using the same Trackman technology that's available to MLB teams, recruiting coaches from the D1 NCAA level seems like 100% the smart move.
 

jon abbey

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I read that one of the two college coaches who reportedly interviewed for the NY job (I think the Arkansas guy?) withdrew his name from consideration (maybe in that same chat?).
 

bquine

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Wes Johnson was the former Arkansas pitching coach mentioned in that chat who went to the Twins prior to the 2018 season. The Yankees have been interested in and interviewed his successor at Arkansas, Matt Hobbs. But yeah, it appears that Hobbs backed out.

Chris Fetter from U Mich seems to be the front runner now. Though apparently David Cone interviewed??

https://thespun.com/more/mlb/yankees-david-cone-pitching-coach-interview
I love Cone and I don't know what to think of this. 1) I'd miss him in the booth, for sure. 2) I also don't think he's technically experienced enough. 3) But he's clearly hungry for knowledge and loves analytics (see point 1). 4) And he was an amazing and unique pitcher on the mound himself.

If Coney could get a year or two working with Trackman experts, he might well ascend to some kind of higher plane of baseball knowledge. :p
 

jon abbey

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I think that Cone could maybe be half of a team, him along with one of these young thirty-something college coaches, maybe Cone could be the assistant if he would accept that. But more I think that might have been a bit of a token interview trying to placate him after he publicly put himself up for the manager spot post-Girardi and didn't get an interview.
 

jon abbey

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Heyman:

“ Yankees and Brett Gardner are already talking about trying to stay together contractually. Why not? It’s been a fantastic marriage for both. Longest tenured Yankee had career highs in HR (28) and OPS (.829) in 2019.”
 

EvilEmpire

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But more I think that might have been a bit of a token interview trying to placate him after he publicly put himself up for the manager spot post-Girardi and didn't get an interview.
This sounds right to me. I'd be happy to see him as part of a pitching coach team. I think we can be confident that he'd embrace data driven coaching, and I do think his on-field experience has value, especially to young pitchers.

I really don't see it happening. He's already enjoyed a lot of career success in his life and I don't know how obsessive or driven he will be in a job like that. I think the Yankees want someone hungry who will be.
 
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Murderer's Crow

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I'm ready to move on from Brett. Love the guy but as short as the deal would be, signing Brett somewhat feels like it could prevent the Yankees from making a big splash with Cole. (Staying under $248m).

I can't find anything solid - Is the final LT threshold still $248 for 2020?
 

jon abbey

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I'm ready to move on from Brett. Love the guy but as short as the deal would be, signing Brett somewhat feels like it could prevent the Yankees from making a big splash with Cole. (Staying under $248m).

I can't find anything solid - Is the final LT threshold still $248 for 2020?
Yes, $248M, I think it was $246M last year?

If Hicks was healthy, I could see maybe moving on from Gardner, but with Hicks out half the season plus CC retiring (slight leadership vacuum), I will be quite surprised if Gardner doesn't come back, and to be honest, I will be pretty happy at this point if they don't have to give him two years.
 

jon abbey

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I said it before, but if NY thinks individual personnel moves are the best way to go (including Cole) and those moves mean they are over $248M for a season, this is the year I could see it happening. No one knows what the new CBA will be after 2021, and NY has a lot of contracts expiring in 2020.
 

Brand Name

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Just got a push saying Matt Blake, formerly the Cleveland director of pitching development, will be the next pitching coach, per Feinsand. One of a few guys who mixes analytics with coaching principles. Big into Fangraphs. Young 30s, formerly a salesman to start his own development business. Kind of reminds me of Michael Fishman in that respect.
 

jon abbey

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jeff ellis

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Biggest loss the Indians are likely to have this off season

Honestly would have rather made Matt Blake the pitching coach in Cleveland. But there is no way Tito would push out Willis. Blake was likely too new school for him, but this is about as big a loss as anything short of trading Lindor

Last point on the loss of Blake. The Indian's last two drafts have been all about highest possible ceiling pitching early, trusting in their ability to develop pitchers. Blake was a central part of that belief.

All this love for Matt Blake had zero to do with him following me either. Never have talked with him to be honest. But you could not spend time in the Indians minors without hearing his name
 

jon abbey

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Nice! Blake is the catcher there? Amazing rise up the ranks for this dude.
 

Jnai

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Yup. That's Saberseminar 2014. He helped run our trackman pitching demo by suiting up and catching in a brick pavilion.
 

jon abbey

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I put it on the other thread but Justin Shackil has great Blake stuff on Twitter, I will cut and paste all of it because that is how excited I am about this seemingly entwined wave of new young coaches Cashman is bringing in.

"Ladies and gentlemen, your new Yankees pitching coach is Matt Blake.

New Yankees pitching coach Matt Blake graduated from Holy Cross in 2007. Prior to joining the Indians, he served as the Pitching Coordinator at Cressey Sports Performance in Massachusetts.

The Indians won 93 games in '19 thanks in large part to rebuilding their rotation on the fly. Clevinger/Bieber took big steps forward. Civale/Plesac came up from MiLB & were effective. All were drafted and/or developed in-house. Matt Blake was part of that development group.

One player that new #Yankees pitching coach Matt Blake is already familiar with: RHP Mike King, who had previously worked out with Blake at Cressey Sports Performance in Massachusetts.

Another connection that should not go unnoticed: Matt Blake and new catching coordinator Tanner Swanson have known one another for several years. #Yankees

On new #Yankees pitching coach Matt Blake, from his former boss Eric Cressey: “Matt builds rapports very quickly. He's an outstanding communicator and quick learner. He assimilates information quickly and puts it into a useful format really fast.”

Cressey called Blake a forward-thinker, trend setter and someone who is phenomenal at connecting dots when it comes from putting video analysis into the hands of the pitcher. He described him as curious and motivated.

Cressey pointed out that Blake was actually the first coach to go from the private sector to pro ball, and said Blake learned video analysis on his own back in 2009. He believed Blake had the foresight that video analysis was going to become the norm.

(For those not familiar with Cressey Sports Performance, some of their current and past pitching clients include Corey Kluber, Max Scherzer, Noah Syndergaard, Miles Mikolas and Mike Soroka.)"

https://twitter.com/JustinShackil
 

bquine

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I seriously love the direction this organization is going in in terms of coaching.
 

jon abbey

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Still expect Gardner to agree to come back soon, but he could easily get multiple years elsewhere (he didn't just have a career high in offense, he is still a great baserunner and pretty good defender) and I think Cashman might insist on keeping it to one. He got 1/7.5 last year, I think Cashman will go to maybe 1/10 or even 1/12 but he will definitely be leaving money on the table if he comes back, the free agent OF market is thin.

If Gardner goes, they still have Stanton/Tauchman/Judge with Hicks back mid-season and Frazier in AAA (for now). Maybin will be thrilled to take a smaller one year deal, both Brett and he have stated a strong preference to come back if at all possible, so we'll see. Either of those guys will need another 40 man spot, Cashman needs to start clearing those soon.
 

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I'm still amazed they are bothering to hang on to Frazier. Do they really want him to hit his prospect expiration date? I mean, he's better than Lars Anderson, but they really need to give him a real shot or trade him to someone that will.
 

jon abbey

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I'm still amazed they are bothering to hang on to Frazier. Do they really want him to hit his prospect expiration date? I mean, he's better than Lars Anderson, but they really need to give him a real shot or trade him to someone that will.
Some of it has been very badly timed injuries by him, he seems to always be hurt when they need him and healthy when they don't. A bigger issue is that he is still the only real MLB-capable OF they have with options (Tauchman is out of them now) so if they move him now, not only is he well below his peak value but they have to trade for another OF with options like they did Tauchman last March.
 

jon abbey

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They haven't a hundred percent let Didi walk until he signs elsewhere, but there are a handful of teams who need him a lot more than NY does (CIN, PHI, MIL) and will probably give him 3/42 or 3/45, the Reds were his first team. NY is full up without him and the potential 1/18 offer:

1B: Voit, Ford
2B: LeMahieu, Wade
SS: Torres, Wade
3B: Urshela, LeMahieu

That's your six infielders already set, and that is with Thairo and Kyle Holder (assuming they protect him next week, please Brian) waiting in AAA, Holder is definitely the best defensive SS option there, very likely better than Didi also.

Also Andujar and Bird are still on the 40 man roster for now, both were in the Opening Day lineup last year and both are total afterthoughts now (although Andujar should get a lot of DH time if he stays and is back to 2018 form).
 

Big John

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Do you want to flesh out that opinion at all?
1. He's one of their only left handed bats. If it's Voit/Ford vs Didi in the lineup, I'll take Didi.
2. He's a solid shortstop and (from all reports) a great locker room guy. I think they are better defensively with Didi at short and Torres at 2nd. Torres doesn't make the play in the hole as well as Didi, and LeMatheu doesn't turn the DP as well as Torres.
3. There is no assurance that Urshela will sustain his production and it's pretty cleat that Andujar is gone. So LeMatheu might have to play third.
4. I do like Thairo, but not enough to dump Didi. Wade is a nice utility guy, but he has no pop.
5. They are a legitmate contender. Why pinch pennies now? It's not like the Yankees couldn't afford Didi and Gerrit Cole (or Strasburg) if that's what they really wanted to do.
 

jon abbey

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1. He's one of their only left handed bats. If it's Voit/Ford vs Didi in the lineup, I'll take Didi.
2. He's a solid shortstop and (from all reports) a great locker room guy. I think they are better defensively with Didi at short and Torres at 2nd. Torres doesn't make the play in the hole as well as Didi, and LeMatheu doesn't turn the DP as well as Torres.
3. There is no assurance that Urshela will sustain his production and it's pretty cleat that Andujar is gone. So LeMatheu might have to play third.
4. I do like Thairo, but not enough to dump Didi. Wade is a nice utility guy, but he has no pop.
5. They are a legitmate contender. Why pinch pennies now? It's not like the Yankees couldn't afford Didi and Gerrit Cole (or Strasburg) if that's what they really wanted to do.
1. Didi has a .790 OPS over the last three seasons, Voit has a .901 since coming to NY, Ford had a .909 last year.
2. LeMahieu is a superlative defender at 2B, far better than Gleyber so far. DJ won the best defender at any position in MLB at 2B in 2018 for COL. Also, I agree that Gleyber is not as good defensively at SS as Didi, but FWIW, the metrics had Gleyber better last year.
3. There is no assurance that anyone will sustain their production but if Urshela turns into a pumpkin, NY has other options.
4. Wade has everything but pop, speed, defensive versatility, he started hitting finally down the stretch last year, and he doesn't cost $18M.
5. It's not 'pinching pennies', there's a good chance they will end up over the top tax limit even without Didi.
 

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1. Didi has a .790 OPS over the last three seasons, Voit has a .901 since coming to NY, Ford had a .909 last year.
2. LeMahieu is a superlative defender at 2B, far better than Gleyber so far. DJ won the best defender at any position in MLB at 2B in 2018 for COL. Also, I agree that Gleyber is not as good defensively at SS as Didi, but FWIW, the metrics had Gleyber better last year.
3. There is no assurance that anyone will sustain their production but if Urshela turns into a pumpkin, NY has other options.
4. Wade has everything but pop, speed, defensive versatility, he started hitting finally down the stretch last year, and he doesn't cost $18M.
5. It's not 'pinching pennies', there's a good chance they will end up over the top tax limit even without Didi.
Helluva answer, Jon. Thanks.
 

Big John

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Well Jon, I'll defer to your knowledge of the Yankee organization, but I think letting a quality shortstop like Did go for nothing for mostly financial considerations is risky. How many injuries did the Yankees have last year? If they lose someone like LeMatheu for an extended period they will regret letting Didi walk.
 

jon abbey

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So assuming that the general predictions are right and Didi is in line for 3/45 somewhere, you would match that? Who are you benching in favor of him? As for letting him "go for nothing", they only would have gotten a 4th round pick if he had turned down a QO, really not a big deal or worth the 'risk' that he'd accept. Honestly I think they might have been doing the very well liked Didi a bit of a favor here by not attaching him to a pick and helping his FA case a bit.

Anyway, you can't keep/sign everyone or you end up with a $300M or $350M payroll pretty quickly, along with the penalties (not just financial) that the CBA hits you with if you are over the top limit ($248M). Contrary to the idiotic articles I keep reading everywhere, it's not about the percentage of a team's revenue that they're spending, it's about the CBA forcing teams to work within the boundaries that it's set out or deal with compounding penalties, money but also draft picks being pushed back, international money being taken, etc. It's not an accident or some kind of industry-wide collective cheapness that only the 2018 Red Sox have gone over the top barrier so far.
 

Murderer's Crow

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Well Jon, I'll defer to your knowledge of the Yankee organization, but I think letting a quality shortstop like Did go for nothing for mostly financial considerations is risky. How many injuries did the Yankees have last year? If they lose someone like LeMatheu for an extended period they will regret letting Didi walk.
Didi could still come back but regardless, the Yankees can't keep every player who they like. The benefit of developing a deep system and signing versatile players like DJL is so you can replace players who price themselves out every once in awhile. Didi is one of those guys for now..
 

jon abbey

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Also, they originally got Didi in exchange for a 15th round pick in 2009 (Shane Greene), so they pretty much got him for nothing also. :)
 

jon abbey

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Wow, projection systems for aging players are brutal. Brett Gardner has basically played 10 full seasons in the majors, from 2009-2019 with the exception of 2012 which he missed almost all of hurt. These are his fWAR numbers for those seasons:

2009: 2.3
2010: 6.2
2011: 5.1
2013: 3.3
2014: 3.3
2015: 2.5
2016: 2.6
2017: 4.0
2018: 2.6
2019: 3.6

He will turn 37 next August, but has not lost a step (literally, his sprint speed has not fallen) and he just had by far his best HR season ever. So how much fWAR does Steamer predict for him next year? 1.7, that is rough.

https://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=9927&position=OF
 

Marciano490

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Wow, projection systems for aging players are brutal. Brett Gardner has basically played 10 full seasons in the majors, from 2009-2019 with the exception of 2012 which he missed almost all of hurt. These are his fWAR numbers for those seasons:

2009: 2.3
2010: 6.2
2011: 5.1
2013: 3.3
2014: 3.3
2015: 2.5
2016: 2.6
2017: 4.0
2018: 2.6
2019: 3.6

He will turn 37 next August, but has not lost a step (literally, his sprint speed has not fallen) and he just had by far his best HR season ever. So how much fWAR does Steamer predict for him next year? 1.7, that is rough.

https://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=9927&position=OF
I think I tried to make this point before and it didn't really go anywhere (maybe with regard to Brady), but I'd bet anything we start seeing different aging progressions for athletes that grew up with the internet. Most kids I went to high school with read forums and articles and were very savvy with regard to nutrition, training and supplementation at a very early age (12ish), and my high school sucked for sports. By contrast, my dad and uncle were both D1 athletes, and like many athletes their level and higher of that generation, they never really lifted till college, always ate crappy, never used supplements and had very basic, very outdated notions of how to lift, eat and recover.

Never mind the better, easier and earlier access to steroids, testosterone and HGH - those 5-10 extra years in adolescence of doing everything right will start paying dividends in the "twilights" of athletes' careers right about nowish.

I'm not sure how far back the pool of data for WAR projections into late 30s pulls, but I'm theorizing a lot of it is no longer predictive.
 

Murderer's Crow

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I wouldn't be opposed to it. We still have no idea what happened with German and the longer it takes, the more worried I am that 1) we won't see him in 2020 or 2) it will be so bad that we don't want him on the team.
 

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I don't have much interest in Boyd, though if the new pitching coach and the analytics guys see something fixable, sure, As always, depending on the price.
 

jon abbey

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For me absolutely no on Boyd, DET way overvalues him and he was awful after the ASB.

@crow216, I work from home and get plenty of sleep but late night/early AM is my prime work time. Unlike pretty much every other Yankee fan, I love West Coast night games.
 

jon abbey

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I am becoming more enamored with the idea of Wheeler if Cole goes elsewhere, though.
 

jon abbey

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I actually think everyone is reading that wrong, people think that means $248M but the actual 'luxury tax' line is $208M which of course they will be over. Someone needs to ask him the clarifying followup, I also think he has leeway to break $248M as I've said if he thinks it makes sense, but I am not sure he is going to be so up front about that.
 

jon abbey

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Cot's has them around $210 currently including estimated arb figures, add on another $10 or $12 for Gardner. I really think we see an Ellsbury plus 2-3 prospects deal in the next week (before the 40 man rosters are set), that would put NY back around $200M and allow them to go all out for Cole and still stay under $248M. I think a team could get two of NY's top 20 prospects for taking on one year of his $22M salary, everyone wins. NY could also keep Ellsbury and go over $248M and keep the prospects, but they can't protect them all anyway, so this is my idea instead.

View: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hl2xgQQReB8qPSoa2YAaDcBfkw0qYeFQFizVP3m2JZs/edit#gid=1520401900
 

TheDivision

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So the luxury tax begins at $208 million but more punitive consequences (draft pick spots, international money, etc) begin after $248 million?