Doug Fister Starring in “The New Adam Warren”

Earlier today on the blog I went into the available list of free agent starting pitchers and cherry picked a few that may or may not fit what the New York Yankees are looking for. I was going through the list showcasing the Wei-Yin Chen’s and the Yovani Gallardo’s of the world when I ran across the name Doug Fister and a light bulb went off. I was going to list Fister in that post but I thought he deserved his own post because he could potentially fill a much bigger role on the team, the role that Adam Warren vacated when the team traded him to the Chicago Cubs in the Starlin Castro deal. Could Doug Fister, the once great starting pitcher for the Detroit Tigers and Washington Nationals, come to the Yankees and become the Yankees swingman? Why not!

Fister had a terrible 2015 season, let’s not beat around the bush or equivocate, and was delegated to the Washington bullpen for much of the second half of the campaign. For that reason the Nationals decided against offering Fister a qualifying offer and seem unlikely to be interested in bringing back him and his services for the 2016 season. The Nationals loss can be the Yankees gain because Fister redeemed himself a bit in his time in the bullpen. Fister pitched well out of the pen for Washington in a small sample size and showed that his problems he had earlier in the season were likely due to something mechanical or physical, he did battle injuries last season as well, and not just him falling off the face of the Earth like many pitchers do.

This would be the ultimate “buy low” and lightning in a bottle type signing for the Yankees. Fister can pitch out of the pen, he’s proven it. He’s a veteran arm and the 7^th inning or 6^th inning in the Bronx is not going to fluster him. If a starter goes down, and lord knows the Yankees rotation is littered with its question marks, Fister could easily fill in for a 15 day DL stint or for a month at a time without getting exposed too much. Hell he may even thrive off of a change of scenery and getting out of the mess of a clubhouse and organization that we now know the Washington Nationals were. You never know until you sign the guy.

So a veteran arm without a ton of mileage that can excel at both starting and relieving, Fister sounds more like an Adam Warren mold than a replacement. Either will do for me though so get it done Cash before someone else catches on.