2022 Yankees In Season Discussion

[jon abbey]

All: what is up with Stanton? His advanced metrics (barrel %, WOBA, xBA) indicate that he should have better production than he's shown. Nursing an injury? Or just random bad luck?

My casual analysis is just that he hasn't gotten back into a groove since being hurt and missing a couple weeks, and he has always been very streaky. He had a stretch in mid-May where he went 10-16 in 4 games with 4 HRs, I'm sure he will have another hot streak before too long. I definitely don't think he is nursing an injury, he made some impressive throws from RF to 2B last night and has looked very solid defensively.

 

[Bread of Yaz]

My casual analysis is just that he hasn't gotten back into a groove since being hurt and missing a couple weeks, and he has always been very streaky. He had a stretch in mid-May where he went 10-16 in 4 games with 4 HRs, I'm sure he will have another hot streak before too long. I definitely don't think he is nursing an injury, he made some impressive throws from RF to 2B last night and has looked very solid defensively.

He seems fine . . .

 

[jon abbey]

Hehe, was just coming here to post this...

View: https://twitter.com/droppedballspod/status/1540117732422606848

 

[Looch]

Stuff happened after that. This game has an electric vibe.

 

[Looch]

Rizzo works a 15 pitch walk and now Stanton is up with one out and Valdez tiring.

 

[jon abbey]

We have a Yankee game thread, this is not it.

 

[jon abbey]

If Cashman is trying to move Gallo in an 'addition by subtraction' move (seems likely from all reports), the Bryce Harper injury makes PHI a very good fit. The money doesn't matter to them (they are over the $230M line anyway) and they badly need a good defensive player, Gallo could play one of the corners and Castellanos and Schwarber can cover DH.

 

[Max Power]

Benintendi would be a better fit in Philly, but KC will be looking for a better return than a bucket of balls and salary relief the Yankees would get for Gallo.

 

[jon abbey]

Yeah, what makes me feel better is that they have been doing it since last deadline, 82-38 now since trading for Rizzo. Teams are going to come at them hard the next two weeks though:

3 TB
3 @ TOR
3 @ TB
4 HOU

As I said above, we will know a lot more after that, that will be 73 games in.

9-4 in this stretch after some gutty comeback wins this week.

3-0 TB
2-1 @ TOR
2-1 @ TB
2-2 HOU

NY has still only lost two series this season, one early on in BAL, one to CWS at home.

 

[Murderer's Crow]

So, when do we start the trade deadline thread. I feel like we are carefully avoiding that subject.

 

[jon abbey]

You can start one, to me it’s almost pointless. Last year Cashman traded for Holmes and Rizzo who completely turned around the team, and not one person hypothesized about either of those two beforehand. This year NY has fewer holes and more potential internal solutions, so Cashman’s moves will be even harder to predict.

 

[jon abbey]

NY DFAs Banuelos to activate Chapman (Sears up and down in the spot in between), really too bad but there are only so many spots.

Manny B has no options left but is under team control for at least 4-5 years if he works out, and he impressed in spring training (he was the final cut), in AAA, and in NY in the few chances he got. He could help a lot of bullpens right now, I hope NY gets something interesting back.

 

[jon abbey]

Brett Gardner hanging out with a bunch of key Yankees last night:

View: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cfbqq1sO4d4/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY=

 

[Murderer's Crow]

Lucali is legit. Though, I once went to brooklyn crab and then walked to Lucali, the line was around the block and I was completely shitfaced so I emphatically told everyone on line they were dumb for waiting on a line for pizza when there's awesome pizza everywhere.

 

[jon abbey]

I am kind of a pizza fanatic but have not made it to Lucali yet, although I'm well aware of them. Luckily we have Razza here in Jersey City and during the start of Covid, they allowed online ordering/pickup for the first time (previously either you had to eat there or you could go there, order, wait, and take out, which was annoying) and I have taken full advantage of that.

It turns out that Lucali pic was from last season though, the guy should have known better than to post it.

 

[jon abbey]

This is incredible, NY was 29th of 30 teams in team DRS last year, currently they are way way ahead of everyone else in 1st. They are at +57, BAL is second currently at +39.

http://www.fieldingbible.com/TeamDefensiveRunsSaved

 

[jon abbey]

NY finally letting Stanton play OF was a big factor in their turnaround in mid-2021, his first game there was July 30 and I think NY has gone 100-46 since then. They got Clay Holmes just before that and Rizzo just after, plus Cortes joined the rotation around then, but Stanton playing about half the time in the OF has been great for both him and the team.

Cashman got a lot of flak for not making bigger moves last winter, but people didn’t realize how much he had reshaped the underperforming team around the deadline.

 

[jon abbey]

View: https://twitter.com/yankeespr/status/1546904234330923008?s=21&t=BMYt7rne1kCGke-lWeQMSA

 

[jon abbey]

View: https://twitter.com/bryanhoch/status/1546943975461888003?s=21&t=rO6_WQERvwJ6it9QPXglhA

 

[jon abbey]

Bye bye again Greg, we will never forget the ALDS HR off Andrew Miller.

View: https://twitter.com/RailRidersTT/status/1547310537037549570

 

[RedOctober3829]

Where will Benintendi hit in the lineup? Lineups are when Stanton is back.

LeMahieu 3B
Judge CF
Rizzo 1B
Stanton RF
Torres 2B
Benintendi LF
Donaldson DH
IKF SS
Trevino C

Benintendi LF
LeMahieu 3B
Judge CF
Rizzo 1B
Stanton DH
Torres 2B
Hicks RF
IKF SS
Trevino C

 

[jon abbey]

Hmm, I was going to wait for things to settle down, but let's take a shot:

Against RHP:

LeMahieu 3B
Judge CF
Rizzo 1B
Stanton RF
Benintendi LF
Torres 2B
Carpenter DH
IKF SS
Trevino C

Against LHP:

LeMahieu DH
Judge CF
Rizzo 1B
Stanton RF
Hicks LF
Torres 2B
Donaldson 3B
IKF SS
Trevino C

Something like that, Hicks and Donaldson sit against RHP, Benintendi and Carpenter sit against LHP.

 

[Apisith]

If Judge keeps this up and you guys win the World Series, does it put Cashman under more or less pressure to re-sign him? My gut instinct says if you guys win it all, Cashman's team building method is vindicated and he gets a grace period, meaning he can let Judge go. But if you don't win, then there's a lot of pressure to re-sign him because you can't let a 7 (or 8!) win guy leave for money (because you're the Yankees). I can also see the opposite argument, though, that if you guys win it all, there's pressure to run it back with the same core guys meaning Judge has leverage to ask for $300m.

 

[jon abbey]

Pressure from who? The fans would build a $400M 70-92 team if you let them make decisions.

 

[Murderer's Crow]

There’s immense pressure to sign him no matter what. Cashman will make a great offer but it remains to be seen if he’ll top anything, which I doubt. Hell, maybe after all this Ohtani talk, the Angels go Trout, Ohtani, Judge.

 

[EvilEmpire]

Regardless of what happens in the playoffs, I think Judge will hit the market, establish his value, and Cashman will pay it. Maybe Judge will be pissed off by the process and will want to see if there are greener pastures out there and leave anyway, but if he leaves, I don't think it will be over money.

 

[BaseballJones]

I wonder what that market for Judge will be though? Obviously an immense force in the sport, but he's already 30 and hasn't had the best track record in terms of health.

Dude is on pace for 66 homers and 143 rbi though. Holy smokes.

 

[jon abbey]

View: https://twitter.com/garyhphillips/status/1553760937777266688?s=21&t=AUQqPpsR404FjHBPERwLbQ

 

[Murderer's Crow]

I wonder what that market for Judge will be though? Obviously an immense force in the sport, but he's already 30 and hasn't had the best track record in terms of health.

Dude is on pace for 66 homers and 143 rbi though. Holy smokes.

All of Judge's injuries have been short term kind of injuries that aren't really recurring like back and hamstring issues. I'm not sure he's any more or less of a risk to be an albatross than any other 30 year old getting a 10 year contract.

That said, there really is a part of me that is okay with the Yankees letting Judge walk. If he goes to any team other than the Red Sox, including the Mets, I'm fine with it. If the Mets don't get Judge, they'll pay $350m for another big hitter another day and they're in the NL, so it really doesn't matter to me personally.

 

[Wingack]

View: https://twitter.com/pcaldera/status/1554837999703187456?s=21&t=KPV4KZ0UBm0Q39hQvBxGNQ

 

[jon abbey]

Yeah, also rosters expand to 28 in Sept, so it will be easier to fit Bader and Severino and maybe Britton in.

 

[trapperkeeper]

View: https://twitter.com/mikeaxisa/status/1554881895061766145?s=20&t=cE-xqzQOyuM-ImFf5JccwQ


First few months of the season looking like a mirage. I also think that the way that they have been playing the past month is closer to what I expected them to play like before the season started instead of how they actually played the first three months.

 

[jon abbey]

They need Stanton back, hopefully soon. The 98 Yankees had a 22-18 stretch to finish the season and no one thinks these are the 98 Yankees.

 

[jon abbey]

And Peraza really needs to be up and playing SS, bench IKF, DFA Marwin.

 

[EvilEmpire]

Too many close games lost in the last month or so.

 

[Wingack]

Too many close games lost in the last month or so.

Not today!

 

[jon abbey]

Oswald Peraza since June 11:

.344/.408/.618, 9 HR, 24 RBI, 9 doubles, 14 SB (2 CS), 170 wRC+

 

[ThePrideofShiner]

Andujar is up with Carpenter going to the IL.

 

[jon abbey]

Andujar is up with Carpenter going to the IL.

I think it will only be a couple of games and then Stanton will replace him (although they could keep Andujar up and send down Locastro), but I bet Miggy Two Bags gets a start tomorrow afternoon against the lefty Ray.

 

[EvilEmpire]

I know injuries are just part of the game, but damn.

Guys like King and Carpenter help make this season fun to watch.

 

[jarules1185]

Another guy who makes the season fun to watch, who I know everyone appreciates (yet I feel kind of gets forgotten when you have Judge on pace for 10 WAR, Carpenter blowing up and then getting hurt, Torres and Donaldson being kind of frustrating, Stanton doing his usual sometimes awesome, sometimes seeming like he's never seen a breaking ball ever, sometimes hurt thing) is LeMahieu.

Currently 6th in ALL of MLB in position player bWAR. WAR by year with his salary:

2019: 5.6 bWAR, $12M
2020: 3.0 bWAR in 1/3 of a season (tied for 4th in all of MLB), $4M prorated I think
2021: 1.5 bWAR, $15M, not great but still useful considering his defensive flexibility
2022: 4.6 bWAR and counting, $15M

That's insane value, 3 all-star-level years out of 4. Assuming he doesn't age terribly (he's a weirdly big guy but he has great contact skills and doesn't rely on speed so who knows), that's still likely a very good contract going forward.

It's funny to remember how much the Yankees were kind of pilloried on his signing. To be fair, it was partially because they cheaped out on Machado, but it still worked out.

 

[jon abbey]

I don’t think they were pilloried, people were confused because Gleyber should be playing second and so should DJ, so no one considered him a possibility for NY.

This is the first season that either of those two has played good D at any other position, DJ has been great at 3B and solid at 1B.

 

[EvilEmpire]

The love for DJ around here is well documented, goes back a couple of years, and rarely needs to be stated.

We love DJ. Love him.

 

[jarules1185]

I don’t think they were pilloried, people were confused because Gleyber should be playing second and so should DJ, so no one considered him a possibility for NY.

This is the first season that either of those two has played good D at any other position, DJ has been great at 3B and solid at 1B.

True, the defensive alignment was questionable at the time.

My main recollection of that offseason was general fan frustration of it seeming like they were one of the likely landing spots for Machado, and then the door being likely shut with the DJ signing - another infielder who would play a lot of 3B. At the time, he'd only had an OPS+ over 100 once, so it seemed like an enormous potential downgrade from a HOF player in his prime to an average regular.

The love for DJ around here is well documented, goes back a couple of years, and rarely needs to be stated.

We love DJ. Love him.

I'm not trying to overstate anything, I think it's just interesting to look at the numbers in context with DJ.

Everyone knows he's very good, but I'm not sure people see him as clearly the 2nd best player on NYY. 3 out of these last 4 years he probably has been best or 2nd best behind Judge, even including the pitching staff.

 

[jon abbey]

I think it was pretty clear to anyone paying attention at that point that NY wasn't going to sign Machado. NY fans (maybe most teams?) would make fucking awful GMs, that was also the same offseason everyone was furious at Cashman for not outbidding WAS for Patrick Corbin.

 

[jarules1185]

I think it was pretty clear to anyone paying attention at that point that NY wasn't going to sign Machado. NY fans (maybe most teams?) would make fucking awful GMs, that was also the same offseason everyone was furious at Cashman for not outbidding WAS for Patrick Corbin.

Yeah the Corbin thing is certainly funny in retrospect. Nobody talks about that one now.

Was it that abundantly clear they weren't signing Machado prior to the DJ signing? I guess this is a Hal / luxury tax thing, but obviously that isn't going to add wins. Fans (including me, honestly, although I'm wasn't nearly as annoyed as many) thought they should be in on one of Harper and Machado, and everyone knew Harper was unlikely given the Stanton/Judge corner outfielder setup.

DJ over Machado felt like cost savings for cost savings sake, given at the time DJ had been mostly average. Obviously the front office has been proven right on DJ's talent. That has to be one of the best true-free-agent-signing values in all of MLB in recent years.

 

[jarules1185]

Here's a example of some moderate criticism of the DJ signing from Fangraphs. Last paragraph kind of crystallizes it.

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/yankees-go-a-different-route-on-the-infield/

Anyway, he's awesome.

 

[jon abbey]

People didn't understand the reverse Coors effect yet, and also it didn't make sense to anyone to sign a guy to play all over the infield who had literally never played anywhere but 2B. As is often the case, if you look up our reactions at the time here, I'll bet you'll find that they're more thoughtful than the consensus.

Also, for the record, the ideal move here was almost certainly to follow up the DJ signing by trading Gleyber near his peak value. Now that would have been an impressive set of moves, but as it is, this ended up pushing Gleyber to SS for a while, which didn't work out, it led to them taking on Donaldson for big money (jury is out on this somewhat), so I think it's a little more complicated than you're making it out to be.

But yes, DJ has been awesome for NY, especially when you chalk up 2021 to him trying to play through a hernia. Actually the funniest part of this signing is how many people said right afterwards "why didn't they sign Jed Lowrie instead?".

 

[jon abbey]

If you are curious, this is where our discussion at the time began:

https://sonsofsamhorn.net/index.php?threads/2018-yankees-offseason-discussion.25178/page-21#post-3230652

 

[jon abbey]

Just reading through a page or two there, there were a lot of underlying numbers that made it pretty clear that DJ was being very undervalued in that market. For instance:

Most hard-hit (95+ mph) batted balls, 2016-18

1. Manny Machado: 736
2. Mookie Betts: 668
3. Christian Yelich: 663
4. DJ LeMahieu: 645
5. Nelson Cruz: 641