Sunday, June 5, 2016

Available First Base Options for the Yankees


The New York Yankees have seemingly lost Mark Teixeira for a bulk of the 2016 season, best case scenario, or for all of the 2016 season, the likeliest scenario, and have found themselves exposed on their roster. The team did very little to address their first base depth problem after losing Greg Bird to a shoulder injury and now find themselves trying to patch together the first base position once again. Dustin Ackley is gone, Robert Refsnyder is learning the position and Chris Parmelee, not Nick Swisher, has been called up from Triple-A to serve as a warm body but what if the Yankees aren't happy with this combination of players? Are there any presumably available players that can fill the void either by trade or free agent signing to help fill the position for New York?

The first place I went to when looking to do some research for this blog post was MLB Trade Rumors list of free agents for the 2016-2017 season and the pickings were slim to say the least. Most options are either on teams that aren't looking to sell, Justin Smoak (TOR), Carlos Santana and Mike Napoli (CLE), James Loney (NYM), and Edwin Encarnacion to name a few, so I went a little above and beyond and scoured the Independent League to find a familiar face and a face we may see before the end of the season.

I have to admit I didn't scour the entire Independent League and instead stuck to the Lancaster Barnstormers, the former team for Phil Coke. While looking at their roster I saw a pair of players who on their own aren't game changers but may both be better options than Parmelee and Swisher. The reason behind my thinking that the Yankees may need a new minor league deal is that Swisher owns a June 15th opt out date in his minor league contract and may choose to try and latch on with another club here in less than two weeks. The two members of the Barnstormers who could potentially replace Swisher and/or Parmelee down in Triple-A are former Yankees prospect Josh Bell and Kevin Ahrens.

RkNameAgeGPARH2BHRRBISBBBSOBAOBPSLGOPS
1Kevin Ahrens27401712047842941627.307.374.451.825
2Josh Bell#293716120371142402026.266.360.446.806
Like I said neither of them are going to propel the team back to the top of the division but both may be better options than Parmelee or a vacant Swisher. What say you?


5 comments:

  1. If you say Nosaj three times in the bathroom mirror, the ghost of jason giambi will appear, covered in dirt, ready to bat .100 and hit nothing but homeruns, slightly resembling the koolaid guy.

    ReplyDelete
  2. They are better than what we have right?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Better than Swisher or nobody, which is what we have, yes.

      Delete
  3. Dodgers designate Crawford and his 20 Mill contract. Another team unafraid to eat money and the Yanks sit there with all these contracts and pay for the sub par performances. Even if Tex wasn't hurt they would continue to trot him out there for a 180 BA

    ReplyDelete

Sorry for the Capatcha... Blame the Russians :)