Welcome to This Offseason in Yankees’ Baseball. This surely has been a slow offseason for the Yankees until 2021 started. We’ve heard rumors about a hypothetical Darvish-Stanton trade, back when the offseason started but that didn’t happen. Then, we heard about Joe Musgrove. He was traded to the Padres as well, now Yankee fans are panicking and confused on what is the plan? Many thought Bauer, Lindor maybe Trevor Story? Wrong, wrong, and wrong. We missed out on Lindor to the…… Mets? Bauer apparently could be getting record breaking AAV from the…… Mets? That story turned out being fake, thanks Bob Nightengale. Then, the Yankees say they won’t be going over the Second Surcharge Threshold so that takes lots of names out the list. The Yankees still have approximately $9M left. They can either resign Gardner, sign RP Trevor Rosenthal, or trade for someone. However, before we get into hypotheticals let’s review the new Yankee acquisitions.

Yankees Resign INF DJ LeMahieu

Woah this was a huge move by the Yankees. I have said it before and I will say it again, sometimes Cashman could be the best GM and sometimes the dumbest GM. In this case, he pulled off a brilliant move. When I was hearing DJ may want a 6 year deal worth $20-25M per year I was worried that Cashman would feed into that. The last thing we need 4 years from now is to be paying a 36 year old $20M if he’s not playing at a worthy rate. Anyways, the Yankees resigned DJ to the perfect price of $90M for 6 years, that is $15M per year. DJ is arguably coming off of the best year of his career, yes it was only 60 games but he had a .364 batting average which led the league for best BA. He is the only player to ever win the batting title in the AL (Yankees) and NL (Rockies). In the postseason he made multiple clutch hits to keep the Yankees in it. This is a great deal for the Yankees and I am surprised DJ settled this low after coming off of a great year. It shows how much he wanted to be a Yankee.

Yankees Sign SP Corey Kluber “Klubot”

The Klubot is in the Bronx! It’s about time Kluber became a Yankee, the rumors have been swirling for years. He signed a one year deal worth $11M. It was a high price for a risky pitcher, the reason I call him a risky pitcher is because of his recent injury history. Within the last two years he’s had a fractured right arm and a torn teres major muscle, yikes. He played only one game in 2020 due to that torn teres major muscle, however this is a high risk/high reward scenario. We all know the history behind Kluber; he’s a 3x All-Star (2016-18), 2x Cy Young Winner (2014, 17), AL Wins Leader (2014, 17), and AL ERA Leader (2017). He apparently had turned down bigger offers to play in NY, which makes sense because if you want to prove yourself and make it big you do it in NY. The big questions are if he can throw that gas and if he can stay healthy. We are all rooting for this to work out.

Yankees acquire Jameson Taillon from Pirates

The Yankees found their second guy next to Gerrit Cole, his old teammate from Pittsburgh Jameson Taillon. I kind of like this move. We of course needed another pitcher next to Cole, but just like Kluber this is a hit or miss move. There is no guarantee that this’ll work. The Yanks traded RHP Roansy Contreras, INF Maikol Escotto, OF Canaan Smith, and RHP Miguel Yajure. I liked the deal all the way until I heard Miguel Yajure was apart of it. Many underestimate how good this kid is; he’s only 22, he threw in 3 games, threw 8 Ks, 7 IP, only allowed three hits and one run. He’s a up and coming relief pitcher, I was disappointed he was traded. However, Taillon is another injury-prone guy. He’s had two Tommy John surgeries and he had testicular cancer. He is a strong guy though, he’s gotten back up and is determined to pitch. The last time he played a full season was in 2018. He threw in 32 games, 14-10 record, 3.20 ERA, 191.0 IP, and he led the league in shutouts (1) and closed games (2). As I said, loads of potential just needs to stay healthy. A players best ability is availability.

Yankees trade Ottavino to Boston

The Yankees actually executed a trade with Boston. It was RP Adam Ottavino and RHP Frank German for money or a player to be named later. This was essentially a salary dump because Otto was being paid $7-8M in 2021 and he hasn’t been on his A-game lately. He didn’t even pitch in the playoff because the Yankees didn’t have confidence in him. Since we’ve traded him we now have space to sign someone. He had a 2-3 record, 5.89 ERA in 24 GP. He had a really bad inning that raised his ERA that high. The Yankees didn’t want to pay him and the Red Sox were willing to take his salary. The sad part is that Otto is a Yankee fan and now he’s traded from his favorite team and has to play for Boston. Hope he gets his game back.

Yankees sign RP Darren O’Day

Relief is on the way! The Yankees signed the side arm killer, Darren O’Day for one year worth $2.5M. O’Day had a spectacular 2020 with the Atlanta Braves. He pitched in 19 games, 1.10 ERA, 4-0 record, and 16.1 IP. Those are some NICE numbers and the Yankees can really use lots of relief help. My only complaint is that he’s 38 years old. Statistically speaking, O’Day has been good in his entire career. The Yankees will obviously need more relief help but this is a good start, next on the list should be Trevor Rosenthal or trade for Amir Garrett.

Possible targets:

As I said, the Yankees still need pitching. Here are some names the Yankees could possibly sign/trade.

– Trevor Rosenthal (Free Agent): Age 30, 1-0 record, 1.90 ERA, 23 GP, 11 saves, and 23.2 IP in 2020
– Amir Garrett (Trade): Age 29, 1-0 record, 2.45 ERA, 21 GP, 1 save, and 18.1 IP in 2020
– Roberto Osuna (Free Agent): Age 26, 4-3 record, 2.63 ERA, 66 GP, 38 saves, and 65.0 IP in 2019 (Only pitched 4 games in 2020, too small of a sample size)
– Ken Giles (Free Agent): Age 30, 2-3 record, 1.87 ERA, 53 GP, 23 saves, and 53.0 IP in 2019 (Only pitched 4 games in 2020, too small of a sample size)
– Mark Melancon (Free Agent): Age 36, 2-1 record, 2.78 ERA, 23 GP, 11 saves, and 22.2 IP in 2020 (Reunion?)
– Shane Greene (Free Agent): Age 32, 1-0 record, 2.60 ERA, 28 GP, 0 saves, and 27.2 IP in 2020
– David Robertson (Free Agent): Age 35, 8-3 record, 3.23 ERA, 69 GP, 5 saves, and 69.2 IP in 2018 (Reunion? 2019-20 was too small of a sample size)

We will miss you, Masa 💔

The Masahiro Tanaka and Yankees experience is over. Tanaka signed a deal to return to Japan to play for the Rakuten Eagles. This man is a true Yankee. Instead of chasing the bag and staying in the Majors to sign with another team he went back to Japan. In his mind it was Yankees or Japan and that means a lot. Tanaka devoted his career to the Yanks and he was balling. At one point, he was all we had when it came to pitching. His career stats are 78-46 record, 3.74 ERA, 173 GP, 1054.1 IP, and 991 Ks. I wish we had resigned him but all good things must come to an end.

This has been Jose Calderon III from FiveBoroughDispatch; have a GREAT day, everyone!