Wednesday, July 31, 2019

Striking Out

The Major League Baseball trade deadline has come and gone.  And with it, so, too, has the chance for the Yankees to fix the gaping holes in their starting rotation.  We've heard the excuses: the price was too high, our prospects are untouchable, we just got outbid.  That's all well and good, but a team that wants to get better -- NEEDS to get better -- either gets better or it doesn't.  The Yankees did not get better today.  Brian Cashman swung and missed.

To be fair, the Yankees are on a pace to win 104 games this season.  They have an 8-game lead in the AL East.  Outside of a remarkable collapse, this team is going to the playoffs.  But as we've seen year after year, playoff baseball is different.  Good pitching beats good hitting.  A team built around hitting 3 home runs a game, for whatever reason, doesn't hit them in October.  The Yankees needed a top-flight starter and didn't get him.

We're not inside Cashman's office. We don't know what other teams were asking in return for their pitchers.  But we do know what it looks like when a team goes all in:

  • The Cubs parted with Gleyber Torres, who blossomed into an All-Star, in return for Aroldis Chapman.  Chapman closed it out as the Cubs won the World Series
  • The Astros took a chance on Justin Verlander.  All he did was pitch Houston to a World Series title
  •  And today, the Astros pushed their chips to the center of the table and came away with Zach Greinke.  They are now the favorites to win again
It's easy today to chastise Cashman for not making a move.  But the season isn't over.  The Yankees might somehow win the World Series and Cashman will look like a genius for hanging on to his prize prospects.

But there remains a very real possibility that the Yankees' flawed rotation pitches like they have over the past few weeks and the Yankees make an early exit.  Clint Frazier or Deivi Garcia are not going to help them in 2019.  Who knows what 2020 or beyond will hold?  Just ask the Nationals about the perils of misjudging a championship window.

Fortunately, it will be very easy to judge how Brian Cashman handled the trade deadline come October.  The Yankees should either be holding a World Series trophy, or interviews for their next GM.