Matt Imbrogno, Author at River Avenue Blues

Sunday Mini Mailbag: Gleyber, Rotation, Infield

January 7, 2018 by Matt Imbrogno Leave a Comment

Happy Sunday, RAB readers. I sincerely hope you’re keeping warm as you read this. As I write this, I’m wearing two hoodies and multiple pairs of socks. A touch dramatic? Sure, but I’m okay with it. To invoke a common metaphor, the Hot Stove season seems to have frozen along with the temperatures. Yeah, the Yankees signed Jace Peterson to a minor league deal, but that’ll keep the stove about as warm as lighting up a single piece of newspaper would. To cope with this, I turned to social media to see if anyone had any burning questions (I promise I’ll stop it now). Here are the results.

Harsh asks: How should Yankees fans temper expectations for Gleyber Torres if he does start at 2B (presumably after 2 weeks)?

The answers should be self-evident, but after what an expectation-shattering year 2017 was, we may need to remind ourselves of a few things. If the Yankees do call Torres up in a timely manner, he’ll be making his debut well short of his 22nd birthday; he just turned 21 in December. As such, he’ll be one of the youngest players in the Majors, as he has been at almost every level he’s been at in his career; he’s never been more than 2.8 years younger than his competition and was 6.7 years younger than his counterparts at AAA in 2017. That alone should be enough to temper expectations. On top of that, he is also coming off of an injury and still learning a new position, and would be doing so at the highest level possible. It’s hard enough to succeed when you already know how to play a position, let alone when you’re trying to master a new one AND learn how to be a Major League quality hitter at the same time. Chances are that Torres will be a good player, but it might not happen right away.

Harsh (also) asks: Why are/were the Yankees looking at SP when they have 5 capable starters (Sevy, Tanaka, Sonny, CC, Montgomery), Chad Green coming to ST as a starter, and a couple of guys in AAA (Adams and Sheffield)?

Say it with me, everyone: You can never have too much pitching. I’m a big fan of the Yankee rotation, but to play Devil’s Advocate for a moment, there are some question marks. What if Masahiro Tanaka keeps giving up homers at a high clip? What if 2017 was an extreme outlier or Luis Severino? What if CC Sabathia falls off a cliff, as old guys are prone to doing? What if Sonny Gray gets hurt again and Jordan Montgomery takes a step back? Every team has questions about their rotations that are similar to these ones. Additionally, the Yankees may have concerns about the workloads of their pitchers and another starter could help mitigate that. While Chad Green is preparing as a starter, I think that’s mostly for show and a fallback option, just like it was for Adam Warren when he would come to camp prepped for starting. Green’s best role is likely as a long reliever/swingman, with the ability to make an emergency spot start if needed.

As for Chance Adams and Justus Sheffield, they’re great depth and I’m sure we’ll see them–and their upsides–at some point in 2018, but if they’re major parts of the rotation this year, something may have gone wrong. Getting another starter allows the Yankees to be more patient with Adams and Sheffield and bring them up when their time is right, not just when the team’s time is right.

Rich asks: 2018 Yankees as Star Wars characters?

In the interest of brevity, I’m going to limit this to one character and one player, the first thought that I had: David Robertson as BB-8. Both are relatively ‘compact’ and both are very good at getting those around them out of tight spots.

Nick asks: Is it possible the limited prospect sacrifice for Stanton jaded Yankee fans into thinking one doesn’t need to sacrifice quality pieces to bring back value? The outrage over dealing a Clint Frazier for an average to above average MLB arm seems silly.

Part of me agrees wholeheartedly with Nick’s first assertion. Consciously or not, we’ve got the robbery that was the Giancarlo Stanton trade in our minds and we’ve forgotten what a real MLB trade looks like. Then again, we were also told that the Yankees made and were rejected on offers for Chris Archer and Michael Fulmer, which is a ‘nice’ dose of reality. As to Nick’s second point, again, my gut is to agree. The thought of trading a prospect for a need shouldn’t scare anyone off. But as I laid out a few weeks ago, not all trade targets are created equally. I’m fine with trading Frazier in the right deal, but it has to be the right deal. Despite what I said above, the Yankees do have five capable starters and could go without trading for a sixth. Holding out on trading Frazier until you make sure you’re getting back talent and control seems most prudent.

Sam asks: Given where the Yankees are today what combo do you start at 3B/2B on opening day?

As the team is currently constituted, I might bite the bullet and roll with Miguel Andujar at third and a platoon of Tyler Wade and Ronald Torreyes at second, with the latter two submitting to Gleyber as soon as he’s ready. With Stanton, Aaron Judge, Gary Sanchez, and a hopefully healthy Greg Bird, the Yankees can absorb a bit of lost offense at those positions. Wade and Andujar have offensive upside–even if it’s in different ways–and Toe is a competent defender who can put together good at bats. Wade is also a good defender. This combo should be able to hold down the fort. If not, a veteran who can play either position, like Stephen Drew or Howie Kendrick, might be worth a shot. He .could then slide to a bench role with minimal fuss or long-term damage once a solution–Torres–presented itself.

The Yankees are likely taking the long view with the infield. My guess is that they’re going to go hard after Manny Machado when he is a free agent and they won’t want anyone blocking third. This will shift Torres to second with Didi Gregorius still at shortstop. That means that Andujar probably won’t be with the organization long term. It’s possible (probable?) that if the Yankees sign Machado, Andujar will be traded.

Rob, a Mets fan asks: Will the Mets ever win anything in my lifetime? Plz advise

No.

Next Steps

December 24, 2017 by Matt Imbrogno Leave a Comment

2019. That was supposed to be the year that the Yankees were going to be legitimate contenders. That’s what I thought when they sold off players in 2016. That’s what I thought when 2017 started. The Yankees were rebuilding. Well, that lasted all of five minutes.

The team rode a hot start in April all the way to the seventh game of the ALCS, falling to the eventual world champions. Considering that I thought the 2017 would compete for the wild card if everything went right, it’s hard to imagine a season going much better. What, then, is progress for this team, a team that overshot expectations and seems to have ‘arrived’ well ahead of schedule?

If we go the most literal route, then a World Series appearance–if not a win–is the true mark of progress for the 2018 Yankees. On its face, this seems to give credence to the old Steinbrenner/Jeter “World Series or the year is a failure” mentality, that most of you reading this have long abandoned. Still, it’s not necessarily wrong….just not because of that mindset. Rather, the team was obviously strong last year and has improved this year, just by adding Giancarlo Stanton. If (when) they add a pitcher, the team is likely to be even stronger. A World Series appearance–with the usual ‘playoffs are pretty random’ caveat– is a definite reality for this team in ways that it hasn’t been for the Yankees since 2012.

If we go the more nuanced route–at the team level, that is–then a division title is certainly an indicator of progress. The Yankees weren’t able to get that last year, but should be able to do it this year. Taking the dispassionate angle, winning a division is probably more indicative of success than winning 11 or 12 games in the month of October. But if this team won a division and fell short of at least returning to the ALCS, I think we’d be rightly disappointed.

On a more granular level–the player level–success can take all different forms. For Aaron Hicks and Greg Bird, health and consistency would mark progress. For Gary Sanchez, it’s blocking balls in the dirt. For Aaron Judge, it’s lowering his strikeout rate a bit. Didi Gregorius has to find a way to keep up his semi-powerful power.

Masahiro Tanaka needs to rein in the dingers. Luis Severino and Jordan Montgomery need to build on their levels of success.

This is all a bit roundabout and a bit vague and general I admit. So, to me, what would progress be? It would be moving into the mid 90’s for wins. It would be winning the division. It would be making it back to the ALCS. Those are all things this team is capable of doing. Baseball has a funny way of messing with your plans and expectations for progress, but if you steel against that–as the Yankees have with their lineup and seem to be doing with their rotation–things can bounce your way. This is a team that should have things bounce their way.

Assessing Trade Targets

December 17, 2017 by Matt Imbrogno Leave a Comment

Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but the Yankees are looking for pitching. It’s shocking, I know, but it’s going on. Even though they ‘found’ a pitcher yesterday by re-signing CC Sabathia to a one year, $10 million contract, it’s unlikely that they’ll just settle in with what they have. Sure, a rotation of Luis Severino, Masahiro Tanaka, Sonny Gray, Sabathia, and Jordan Montgomery is solid, but that doesn’t mean they can’t and won’t add to it. We’ve seen the Yankees connected to free agent Alex Cobb a bunch of times this offseason. However, most of the buzz around the Yankees and pitching seems to be concentrated around the trade rumor mill.

Over the past two weeks or so, the Yankees have been linked to no fewer than four starting pitchers in trade rumors. One is division rival Chris Archer of the Rays. Another, also in the AL is Tigers’ starter and 2016 AL Rookie of the Year, Michael Fulmer. The other two hail from the National League–Gerrit Cole of the Pirates, the Yankees’ first round draft pick in 2008, and Patrick Corbin off the Diamondbacks (who became an absolute monster in one iteration of franchise mode in The Show for me many moons ago).

When considering a trade, we’ve got a multitude of factors to weigh, but they can be boiled down to three fundamental categories: cost, control, and performance.

Cost operates on two fronts: How much money and how many players will it take to get your target? Control considers the player’s current contract and that/those of the player(s) you’re giving up. And performance deals, of course, with whether or not the guy is any good or has done well. All three categories can and will intersect when evaluating whether or not to make a trade.

To bring work home with me even more than an English teacher already does, I developed a quick rubric of sors to judge each trade candidate using the aforementioned fundamental categories.

Category/Score	3	2	1
Cost $	Low $	Medium $	High $
Cost player	Low player	Medium player	High player
Control	3+ years beyond 2018	1-2 years beyond 2018	Impending free agent
Performance	High performance consistently AND recently	Some inconsistencies, may be a rebound/regression candidate	Consistently poor performance

For the acquiring team, you obviously want the cost to be low and the control and performance to each be high. The better that combination, the more desirable the trade target. Let’s use Giancarlo Stanton as a test case or model to implement this rubric. We have hindsight here and in a vacuum, without the Marlins’ apparently dire financial situation, Stanton would be high on all three categories. He’s got a big contract for a long, long time, and just won NL MVP; in a “normal” world, he would’ve cost an arm, a leg, and then some. But, in reality, Stanton was acquired for a low player cost and even the big cost of his contract–which has him under control for a long time, a double-edged sword, perhaps–is somewhat mitigated by the Marlins kicking in $30 million. By any rubric or measure, this was a no brainer trade for the Yankees to make.

Let’s lead off by looking at Gerrit Cole, the pitcher most consistently linked to the Yankees recently. Cole is projected by MLBTR to make $7.5 million in 2018. That’s not bad at all. Additionally, he’s also under control for 2018 and 2019. The former puts him at a 3 for Cost $ and a 2 for control. Not a bad start. The player cost is where we hit a bit of a bump or a snag. Yesterday, it got out that the Pirates were going to ask for Gleyber Torres in exchange for Cole, which is, uh, not gonna happen. Good for them for asking, but I’d sooner bet on the snowball in hell. Failing Torres, though, it’s likely the Pirates will then ask for Clint Frazier and more–Chance Adams, perhaps, and another lesser piece. At first blush, that seems to be the going rate for a pitcher of Cole’s reputation, so that could just be the cost of doing business, right? You’ve gotta give to get and all that, and if both sides are hurting, then the trade is probably good. But Cole seems to have more in the bank on reputation than on performance lately. He was downright elite in 2015 but then just sorta good in 2016–and hurt–and pretty meh overall in 2017. He had a big home run spike last year–his HR/FB% more than doubled from the year before–which could explain a lot. But when you’re poised to give up someone as talented as Clint Frazier and a potential league-minimum, back of the rotation guy in Chance Adams, AND another piece, I’d want something more than a guy who’s pretty much the definition of a 2 on my rubric. The idea of Cole seems to be better than the reality.

Starting with the money, we get another manageable situation in Diamondbacks lefty Patrick Corbin. He’s projected to make $8.5 million. Another 3 in the Cost $ category. Where he loses out, though, is that this is his last year of team control and he’s a free agent at the end of the year. Big time 1 in the Control category. That would likely bring his player cost down, too, as would performance that was okay-ish in 2017 (4.03 ERA, 4.08 FIP), his second full year back from injury after missing all of 2014. 2016, by the way, was pretty ugly for Corbin (5.15 ERA, 4.84 FIP). What stands out is a garishly high HR/FB% of 15.8% last year; his career mark is 13.8%. Granted he plays in a homer friendly park, but that wouldn’t be likely to move down in Yankee Stadium and the AL East. If I’m feeling generous, I give him a 1.75 in the Performance category and probably a high 1, low 2 for player cost. Overall, I don’t think this one would be worth it unless that player cost dipped way down low.

Chris Archer is a pitcher who, on the face of things, passes every mark for a Yankee trade target. He’s got a good reputation and has spent his entire career in the AL East. Beyond that, he’s got a team friendly contract that has him making $6.25 million in 2018, $7.5 million in 2019, $9 million in 2020, and $11 million in 2021; the latter two are club options with buyouts of $1.75 million and $250, 000 respectively. That all makes for a fantastic mark in both Cost $ and Control. Unfortunately, that also means he’d likely be a 1 in Cost Player. Add on the fact that the Yankees would be trading with a division foe and you’re looking at a very steep cost. In terms of the Performance category, Archer is sort of in the same territory as Gerrit Cole; based on the way we think and talk about him, you’d think his stats would be a lot more glowing. While he hasn’t been bad by any real stretch, he’s failed to repeat the great season he had in 2015. A big home run spike in 2016 and 2017 is likely the cause of that. Still, he throws lots of innings (200+ the last three seasons), strikes out lots of guys, and doesn’t walk a ton of batters. Throw in that with the with the contract and this is someone who, unlike Cole, I could see giving up some top-flight talent for.

Michael Fulmer is about to start his third year of MLB service, so his first shot at arbitration won’t be until a year from now. Per Cot’s , Fulmer is also going to qualify for Super 2 status, meaning he’s got an extra year of arbitration, giving his team control of him through 2022. Hot damn. That’s a 3 and then some on the Control category. Even if he signed some sort of extension or contract, his mark in Cost $ is going to be a 3 pretty much no matter what. In terms of performance, Fulmer more or less repeated his ROY season, though with a lower strikeout rate. He kept up a big ground ball rate, though, and did a good job of keeping the ball in the park. That would probably change in moving from Comerica Park to Yankee Stadium, of course. Still, he’s got good control and command and keeps the ball on the ground; if you’re not going to strike people out, those two are the next best things. All this, though, of course means that Fulmer’s player cost is going to be sky high. The Tigers would be justified in asking anything–non-Torres division–in exchange for Fulmer. While there would be doubts in my mind about paying the player cost for Cole and some minor ones in paying the player cost for Archer, those more or less don’t apply to Fulmer. A young, supremely controlled pitcher with history of solid performance? Yep.

Given all this, my preferred order of acquisition would look like this:

Fulmer, followed by Archer, then a toss up between Corbin and Cole. While Cole is definitely the better pitcher, the cost for Corbin would likely be a lot lower, which evens them out a little bit. I’m not sure, obviously, what’s going to happen, but if the Yankees are going to go hard for one of these guys, it should be Fulmer. The farm system would take a hit and it would suck to say goodbye to someone as fun and cool as Clint Frazier, but Fulmer would make an immediate impact and a lasting one.

Sorting Things Out

December 10, 2017 by Matt Imbrogno Leave a Comment

A year and a half or so ago, the Yankees traded Andrew Miller, Aroldis Chapman, and Carlos Beltran. A year and a half ago, the Yankees were looking at a rebuilding process that, hopefully, wouldn’t be too painful. A year and a half ago, the present reality of the Yankees seemed completely unfeasible. But here we are: after a season of unexpected success from unexpected avenues, the Yankees made their biggest splash in an already splashy year by acquiring Giancarlo Stanton from the Marlins for Starlin Castro and two prospects.

With Stanton aboard and Castro gone, there’s plenty to sort out, but let’s start with the emotions of this. Hell, yeah, huh? A week ago, it seemed like Stanton would land in San Francisco or St. Louis, but as the week went on, that all went away and we got word he’d listed the Yankees, Dodgers, Cubs, and Astros as his preferred destinations. Even then, I thought that there was little or no shot he’d actually end up on the Yankees. To say this was a pleasant and invigorating surprise would certainly be an understatement. Thanks to my son being sick, I was up for most of the morning hours on Saturday and caught a lot of the development of the trade that way. I woke up with him at around 2 AM and didn’t bother trying to go back to sleep–I didn’t want to miss anything.

This felt like a slower version of what happened when the Yankees signed Mark Teixeira out of no where in 2008. Were the Internet the way is now back then, I’m sure the Alex Rodriguez trade would’ve felt the same, too. Regardless of the comparison, the level of shock that this actually happened is sky high. I can’t wait to see what Stanton does in this lineup. Speaking of, things are a bit crowded now, aren’t they?

Even before acquiring Stanton, the Yankees were probably heavy one outfielder. Aaron Judge, Brett Gardner, Aaron Hicks, Jacoby Ellsbury, and (maybe? Probably?) Clint Frazier were all going to have to figure out how to share time in the field and at DH. As has been the looming case for a while, it seems that time has run out for one of Ellsbury and Gardner as well; if the Yankees–and, I’m willing to bet, most of us–get their way, Ellsbury will be gone with Gardner, Hicks, Judge, and Stanton as the main outfielders and DHs. Perhaps they let Frazier hang on the bench and fill in depending on matchups, as I’ve suggested in the past. Or, they could send him to AAA again and let him get every day at bats there.

Minus Starlin Castro, the Yankees now have a void at second base. Enter Gleyber Torres? Eventually. Unless he has a Spring Training like Aaron Judge did last year, I don’t see him breaking camp with the team. If he doesn’t, though, the Yankees could sign a stop gap for one year, or run a platoon of Tyler Wade and Ronald Torreyes out there, or run a competition between those two during Spring Training. No matter what they do, the Yankees won’t need to get much production out of second, given what the lineup will look like with Stanton included now.

I’m still in shock this trade happened, frankly, but it’s a damn good shock. And even when the shock wears off, the feeling will be great, grand, wonderful. In a cliche of cliches, the Yankees have certainly given their fans an early holiday gift; given the surprise of this one, I can’t help but wonder if more is in store.

On to the Next

December 3, 2017 by Matt Imbrogno Leave a Comment

The Yankees have made their choice, naming Aaron Boone their next manager. Mike offered his thoughts here, so take a look. My thoughts? Cool? I guess? I wanted Hensley Meulens for a variety of reasons, but I can’t really complain about the Boone hire–or any, really. Brian Cashman and the rest of the front office have bought themselves a lot of credit over the past two years of baseball and I trust their decision making. Would I have preferred a candidate with experience? Sure. But I wasn’t in that room conducting the interview.

For whatever reason, the Yankees think Boone is the best man for the job, and I’ve got no real choice but to trust in that. I understand some of the immediate concerns fans had on Friday when news came down that Boone got the job. Here’s how I allay those concerns, internally at least. While I don’t recall Boone ever being a proponent of advanced analytics and the like on his ESPN broadcasts, there’s no way the Yankees would have even interviewed–let alone hired–him if they weren’t confident in his ability to understand and explain those things. He’s completely new at this, for sure, but Boone will be backed up by a fully stocked and intelligent baseball operations department. And, this isn’t the 1950’s; Boone won’t be making decisions on his own. The baseball ops team will make sure he’s well-informed and well-ready to make the right call on the field.

As for the on the field things, again, it’s 2017; tactics in baseball are fairly uniform at this point. The overwhelming likelihood is that Boone’s tactics look very similar to Joe Girardi’s. What matters is the stuff behind the scenes. Clearly, the Yankees feel that Boone can handle that stuff better than Girardi could have going forward after his long tenure. We talk mostly about the on-field stuff because it’s what we see. But the stuff we don’t see–communication, interaction, etc–is where the job is its hardest. Boone wouldn’t have gotten the nod if the organization weren’t confident he could handle that heavy lifting.

The secondary effect of the manager situation being wrapped up is that the Yankees can move on to other pressing business. First up, they’ve got to sew up Cashman’s contract. He’s been reportedly working on a handshake agreement, but it’d be nice to see the agreement made official. I wonder if this contract will come with a promotion to president of baseball ops with someone else moving into the GM role, but if that hasn’t happened for Cash yet, I don’t think it will this time.

Then there’s the roster, specifically the pitching rotation. And even more specifically, Shoehei Ohtani. While I’m sure the pitch would’ve been good either way, having a manager in place when presenting to Ohtani can’t hurt. It shows the ducks are in a row, at least for the next few years, and that the team has a clear direction in which it’s going. Despite its present success, this team is all about the future. Boone and Cashman are obviously a big part of that, and Ohtani can be, too. It’s impossible to know what he wants in a team until he signs and comes out and says it, but the Yankees seem like a great fit.

The offseason in general has been more of a cold stove than a hot one, mostly thanks to Ohtani and the Giancarlo Stanton trade discussions. For the Yankees, that’s been doubly so thanks to the relatively long search for a manager that’s now over. Now that that’s done, on to the next.

Hall of Fame Season

November 26, 2017 by Matt Imbrogno Leave a Comment

2018hof-ballot

I love the smell of rehashed arguments in the morning. Welcome, folks, to another season of Hall of Fame voting. It’s that most wonderfully awful time of year again that I swear I’m going to quite every year. But, like Michael Corleone, every time I’m out, they pull me back in (that’s pretty much the only thing I know about The Godfather Part III). I think this happens because when I was first truly active about baseball on the internet, my first “cause” was the candidacy of Bert Blyleven. From there, it moved on to Mike Mussina and I can’t help but be drawn into this stuff year in and year out.

Some general thoughts, given the Joe Morgan letter and what not…First, the idea of purity in any generation or at any tie of baseball is complete and total garbage. Segregation, gambling, juiced balls, amphetamines, steroids, you name it–there has never been any sort of “pure” competition in baseball. To say that steroids are any worse than these things is specious at best. The Steroid Era, or whatever you want to call it, happened and we can’t ignore that, and neither can a museum about baseball. Not including players from that era is irresponsible at best and damaging to the history of the game at worst.

I’ll never have a real Hall of Fame ballot, but if I didn’t do this next part, this post wouldn’t be worth much, would it? First, I’m just gonna list the ten players on the above ballot I feel are most deserving of enshrinement in the Hall of Fame, regardless of circumstance.

Three locks: Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Chipper Jones. Bonds and Clemens are two of the best player’s in the game’s history, hands down. Their numbers and accomplishments speak for themselves and don’t need input from me. Chipper was incredible, probably a bit underrated, even. There aren’t a lot of guys, let alone third basemen, who went .300/.400/.500 for their career and he’s one of them.

Two pitchers: Mike Mussina and Curt Schilling. Though I dislike the latter player off the field, it’s hard to deny he was one of the best pitchers in baseball during his career. Mussina, as I’m sure you all know, was a fantastic pitcher as well, and criminally underrated. These two deserve to be in.

Two first timers: Jim Thome and Scott Rolen. Scott Rolen was Adrian Beltre before Adrian Beltre became what we all know him as today. An incredible fielder and a great hitter. Rare would be a situation in which two third basemen were inducted at once, but if anyone deserves to be alongside Chipper Jones, it’s Rolen. They were the two best at their position in the game. Thome as a tater-mashing (612 career) OBP (.402 career) machine whom everyone liked. He’s in.

A lefty and two righties: It took a bit of convincing for me over the years–and I don’t know why–but I’m on board with the Larry Walker thing. He was an absolutely great hitter and it wasn’t just Coors. Even with spending a ton of time there, his career OPS+ is still 141 and his career wRC+ is 140. He was not just a product of his environment. Remember the .300/.400/.500 thing? It applies to Walker, as well as Edgar Martinez, one of the best right handed hitters of his time and the best ever at his position. Another one of those? Manny Ramirez. Love him, hate him, whatever, he’s another .300/.400/.500 guy and he’s on the shortlist for best righty hitters ever.

No use for the podium this year. (Photo via WLWT Cincinnati) — (Photo via WLWT Cincinnati)

If I could add players to this ballot and supersede the arbitrary ten person limit, I’d also add Vladimir Guerrero, Andruw Jones, and Gary Sheffield. And, despite my hands off stance regarding steroids, I can see the argument in not voting for Manny since he was caught and suspended twice. The one guy I really want to see in but I’m not sure if he should be in is Johan Santana. There were few–if any–pitchers better than him from 2004-2010, but I just can’t fully convince myself that it was a long enough time for him to play, regardless of his absolute dominance. One thing in his favor is that he actually compares very favorably to Sandy Koufax, another pitcher who was all peak and little longevity. In fact, Johan even beats him in ERA+, 136-131. Something I’ll have to hypothetically wrestle with for my hypothetical ballot.

Regardless of what people may think, given their various positions and interests, the Hall of Fame is a great museum to the history of baseball. To tell the history of baseball, all the best players need to be included or else the Hall is lying to its patrons and customers. We can’t ignore an era or the accomplishments of certain players because we don’t like them or don’t like what they did. Doing so is intellectually dishonest and ignores the complexity of both baseball and life.

Assorted Thoughts: MVP, Manager, New York Sports

November 19, 2017 by Matt Imbrogno Leave a Comment

No one ever takes pictures of the third base coach. (Al Bello/Getty)

Happy Sunday, RAB. I hope you guys are all doing well. Since I won’t “see” you until then, I wanted to wish you readers–at least you American ones–a Happy Thanksgiving as we approach my favorite holiday. How do you beat a holiday devoted to food? If only there were all day baseball instead of all day football. Alas. In the spirit of said holiday, I did want to give thanks to you all for continuing to read my work and the (incredible) work of everyone here at the site. It’s beyond rewarding to know that you come here for your Yankee news and discourse when there are so many other options available out there. At the same time, it’s both humbling and a great source of pride. Thank you for your continued support. Yankees only.

Let’s start our Sunday musings by discussing the league MVP awards that were handed out last week. Every year, I tell myself I’m going to care less and less about this stuff and it generally holds true. I may make a case for someone or hope someone wins, but this isn’t like ten years ago on the internet when I lived and breathed this type of stuff. Back then, it was a way to flex analytical muscles and show your deeper understanding of the game, especially when you confronted someone more ‘traditional.’ Thankfully, I’ve (mostly) given up that ghost and just sort of take these things as they come. We live in an information age and players who might have lost undeservingly still get lots of recognition and will continue to do so, thanks to sites like Baseball Reference. Case in point? Luis Severino. I was totally fine with him winning third place for the AL Cy Young Award this year. He was clearly a step behind Corey Kluber and Chris Sale, and there is no shame in that, especially after his 2016. But then there was the AL MVP award.

Jose Altuve beat out Aaron Judge and I was, temporarily, Mad Online about that fact. This isn’t to say Altuve isn’t deserving or anything like that. I just think Judge was more deserving. With a few exceptions, Judge beat Altuve soundly in most statistical categories. At the end of the day it doesn’t matter that much because they were pretty close in overall value, even if they got there in very different ways–that’s the cool thing about baseball–but I’m still a bit chapped Judge didn’t win. Altuve had a better narrative–and didn’t have a six week slump–and that’s why he won. Bah humbug. Whoops, wrong holiday season.

As for the next Yankee manager, consider me firmly in the camp of Hensley Meulens. He’s relatively young. He’s got coaching experience both acutely–hitting coach–and broadly–bench coach and Netherlands manager during the WBC. As an added bonus, he’s a polyglot who speaks English, Spanish, Japanese, Dutch, and Papiamento. All of those languages are crucial to players on the Yankees and Bam Bam’s skills in speaking them would only serve to make better communication between manager and players. That seems to be what he Yankees are looking for, first and foremost, and it’s the overall trend in baseball. 95% of what a manager does is behind the scenes anyway; there isn’t that much variation in on-field tactics at this point in baseball history, so having a guy who can connect to his players and communicate with them most effectively is what’s most important. From what we can see on the outside, Meulens seems to be the man for the job.

Ignoring the actual records of some of the teams, it seems that we’re in a pretty damn good place with New York sports, huh? The Giants may be a disaster, but they could have their next franchise QB soon. The Jets have played a little better than expected and have some exciting young talent. The Nets are at least interesting and the Knicks, led by the Unicorn Kristaps Porzingis, seem to have a bright future as well. I can’t speak well to hockey, but that leaves us with the Yankees and Mets. The Mets may be a question mark, but things are unquestionably optimistic-looking for the Yankees after this surprise season. We could be seeing a renaissance in New York sports and that would be great for the city and the area.

Again, Happy Thanksgiving, all. I hope you have a great holiday with friends and family. Thanks as always for reading.