Thursday, July 28, 2016

Checking In With Adam Warren Open Thread


The New York Yankees are off tonight which gives us enough time to finally get caught up on somethings. There’s only so many hours in the day and only so many posts I can type up in a day so tonight we finally get caught back up with a former friend and current teammate (again) Adam Warren.

Warren has not had the best time of it pitching in the National League this season and will look to bring back some of those great memories and performances that he had while here to his 2016 season. Here is a quick look at what Warren did as a Chicago Cubs player in 2016 and here are his 2015 stats as well. I know that they don’t compare but a homecoming of sorts can only help in my opinion so here’s to helping and to improvement for the rest of the season.


Enjoy the off night Yankees family. 

Year Tm W L ERA G GS GF SV IP H R ER HR BB SO ERA+ FIP WHIP H9 HR9 BB9 SO9
2015 NYY 7 7 3.29 43 17 5 1 131.1 114 51 48 10 39 104 121 3.59 1.165 7.8 0.7 2.7 7.1
2016 CHC 3 2 5.91 29 1 4 0 35.0 31 24 23 7 19 27 68 5.82 1.429 8.0 1.8 4.9 6.9

Meet a Prospect: Rashad Crawford


We touched on this a bit earlier this morning in our check in post with this player but now we want to expand on that and officially welcome them to the team. Rashad Crawford was considered by some to be a “throw-in” type player and was the final piece in the deal that sent Gleyber Torres, Adam Warren and Billy McKinney to New York and Aroldis Chapman to the Cubs. We’ve met Torres, we’ve met McKinney and been reintroduced to Warren so now it’s Crawford’s turn to be introduced to the Yankees family. This is Meet a Prospect: The Rashad Crawford Edition.

Crawford is currently 22-years old, turning 23-years old in October, and comes from a long line of stellar and underrated prospects to come out of the Atlanta, Georgia area. The Chicago Cubs drafted Crawford in the 11th round of the 2012 MLB Draft and the 6’3” 198 lb. outfield comes with a left-handed swing and a right-handed outfielder’s glove. I never fully understood that but okay.

Crawford’s biggest issuer at the plate has been his strikeouts throughout his career and those numbers have decreased in 2016 while his walk numbers have increased, both encouraging signs for a prospect. On the bases Crawford uses his great speed to steal bases with ease and has already eclipsed the 20 stolen base plateau this season while only being caught six times at the time of the trade.

Crawford is raw, not as “sexy” a name as Gleyber Torres or Billy McKinney but like I’ve said multiple times today he is far from a thrown in type prospect or organization filler. He has a lot to work on but he seems like a kid willing to put in the work to get better and sometimes that’s all you need. We’re rooting for you Rashad, welcome to the family.


Yankees Off Day Yankee Stadium Walk Up Music Recommendation


The New York Yankees are off today as they travel from Houston back to the east coast to begin a three-game weekend set inside Tropicana Field against the Tampa Bay Rays. Many thought this second half schedule would kill and bury the Yankees but the team has made the most of the opportunities against tough teams and against teams in front of them and have impressed many. That doesn’t mean you can lay down against one of the worst teams record wise in the American League. Beat the Rays!

Unfortunately these games won’t happen inside Yankee Stadium (which begs the question… if no one is there to see these Rays and Yankees games did they really happen?) but that doesn’t mean we can’t listen to some music that blares inside Yankee Stadium every time Andrew Miller enters from the bullpen to now close games for the Yankees. Does it?

Every time Andrew Miller enters a game inside Yankee Stadium the song “God's Gonna Cut You Down“ by Johnny Cash is played. Let’s listen to that today as we sit and look out the window like Lou Gehrig used to just waiting on baseball to return.


Enjoy the off day Yankees family and enjoy the song as well. 

So the Marlins Want a Yankees Starter? Okay.


The New York Yankees have shown at least a willingness to sell at this year’s trading deadline after already completing a deal with the Chicago Cubs involving Aroldis Chapman and at least discussing deals involving others. We’ve heard it for the better part of a month now that the Miami Marlins need starting pitching and pitching upgrades across the board and the organization may be interested in some arms currently wearing Yankees pinstripes so if Miami wants one of the young arms currently on the Yankees staff I have a few demands before we make this work.

The problem for Miami is there farm system is almost as barren as Brian Cashman’s head (that’s a bald joke for those who are looking to deep into this) which means the Marlins would have to trade from their MLB team to facilitate a trade in my opinion. Now I know what you’re thinking, that kind of defeats the purpose. No? Well yeah it does unless you consider that injured players can be traded as players to be named later. Enter Carter Capps.

Carter Capps had tommy john surgery back in March of 2016 and will miss the entire season and likely part of the 2017 season with the ulnar collateral ligament surgery. Would the Yankees be willing to take a waiver on Capps for say an Ivan Nova, Michael Pineda or Nathan Eovaldi in hopes of him coming back better and stronger than ever after rehabbing? Maybe.


Capps posted a 1.16 ERA in 2015 with a whopping 16.8 strikeouts per nine innings with a blistering 98.1 MPH fastball that would fit in quite well with Dellin Betances and Andrew Miller. Wait a second. D for Dellin. M for Miller. C for Capps? The return of No Runs DMC? I like it. 

Trade Deadline News & Notes

Joel Sherman is reporting that the Yankees will indeed trade away Ivan Nova before the Trade Deadline.

They will not extend the qualifying offer to Nova, which makes total sense. Ivan is not worth the estimated $16.5 million that the QO would give a player, which means that the Yankees would lose him and get nothing in return.

And when you look at the fact that the team will have Masahiro Tanaka, CC Sabathia, Nathan Eovaldi, Michael Pineda, and Luis Severino in 2017, there's no reason to spend that much on a middle to bottom of the rotation starter.

To put that another way, the Yanks already have Eovaldi, Pineda, and Sabathia to fill the 3-4-5 spots in the rotation, and Nova is certainly not a 1 or 2. And when an injury pops up next season, the Yankees will have either Chad Green or Luis Cessa to fill in.

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Yesterday I was thinking that a player about to hit free agency would probably love to be traded. That way they can not be given a qualifying offer, which could very well hurt their chances of a contract since the team that signed him would lose a draft pick. That's especially true for a guy like Ivan Nova, who is not good enough for a team to disregard losing that draft pick.

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The Yankees are about to run into a problem. Mind you, it's a nice problem to have, but a problem none-the-less.

The manager of the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Railriders says that Aaron Judge is about four or five days from being activated from the disabled list. That means there would be quite the logjam in the outfield, with Judge, Ben Gamel, Jake Cave, Mason Williams, and Cesar Puello. And that's not including Tyler Austin, who the Yankees would probably like to keep putting out there to get familiar with the position.

Furthermore, that's not counting on the fact that newly acquired Billy McKinney and Dustin Fowler are right there in AA, about ready to make the jump to AAA.

Like when it comes to losing Nova, the Yankees should find a trade involving one or more of these prospects to clear things up. Perhaps they could package one of them with Ivan Nova to get a stronger return.

Meet a Prospect: Billy McKinney


The New York Yankees traded former closer Aroldis Chapman to the Chicago Cubs for a package of players and prospects including the Cubs top prospects Gleyber Torres, former Yankee and current Cubs reliever Adam Warren, outfielder Rashad Crawford and the prospect we will meet today, Billy McKinney. If McKinney’s name sounds familiar it is because he is a former first round pick in the 2013 MLB First Year Players Draft and was included in another big trade recently, the trade that sent Jeff Samardzija to the Oakland Athletics. Let’s meet him. This is Meet a Prospect: The Billy McKinney Edition.

Billy McKinney was drafted in the first round of the 2013 MLB First Year Players Draft by the Oakland Athletics as an outfielder. Like we touched on earlier McKinney was included in the Jeff Samardzija for Addison Russell swap between the A’s and the Chicago Cubs and was ranked as Baseball Prospectus’s 74th best prospect prior to the start of the 2016 season.

McKinney has spent the entire season in Double-A for Chicago and was posting a .252/.355/.322 triple slash with 31 RBI in 88 games at the time of the trade. These stats are down from his 2015 stat line that saw him post a .300/.371.454 slash with 64 RBI between High-A and Double-A so hopefully he can turn things around while wearing pinstripes.

McKinney has a lot of Brett Gardner in him but he may grow into more of a corner outfielder than the center fielder that he is today. His left-handed swing is quick and he has great hand-eye coordination and an even better batters eye which should translate into a lot of walks in his career. He will hit for contact but the power may never come, and that’s okay as long as he hits for extra bases every once in a while.


So welcome to the club Billy and more importantly, welcome to the family. Make us proud, enjoy your stay and we’ll see you in the Bronx before you know it. 

Weekly Prospects Check In: Rashad Crawford


What can you say about Rashad Crawford that probably already hasn’t been said by now? The final piece in the deal that sent Aroldis Chapman to the Cubs but he is more than just a throw in. The latest member of the Tampa Yankees and latest teammate to Jorge Mateo and Gleyber Torres but he’s not a top prospect. Crawford isn’t going to make any top prospects lists but he has the makeup and the potential to go far with this organization so let’s get caught up with him and see what he has been up to as a member of the Chicago Cubs and since joining the Yankees.

Welcome to the organization Rashad:

YearAgeLevGPARH2BHRRBISBBBSOBAOBPSLGOPS
201622A+83370598418330223373.255.327.386.713

This Day in New York Yankees History 7/28: David Cone is a Yankee


David Cone had a very interesting tenure as a member of the New York Yankees that all started on this day in 1995 when the Yankees gave up Marty Janzen and two minor leaguers, Jason Jarvis and Mike Gordon, for his services. The trade was considered early to be one of the best deals in franchise history as Cone was an integral part of the dynasty and World Series championships in the late 90's.

Cone hit a wall in 2000 though and on this day was sent to the team's minor league camp in Tampa by Yankees owner George Steinbrenner. Cone was demoted after not being able to pick up a win in over four months. The struggling Cone was placed under the supervision of Billy Connors, the Yankees vice president of player personnel.

The Yankees grabbed David Cone on this day on 1995 and they also grabbed Ruben Sierra and Jason Beverlin from the Oakland Athletics for Danny Tartabull. The Tartabull era started when the Yankees signed him a deal worth over $5 million a season after the 1991 season but he never lived up to the hype like he did as a Kansas City Royal.

Finally on this day in 1983 the American League president Lee MacPhail decided that George Brett's "Pine Tar" home run should be allowed. The game will be finished on August 18 and the Royals would win the game 5-4.