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Yankees and Orioles rained out again, doubleheader scheduled for August 25th

June 3, 2018 by Mike Axisa Leave a Comment

Once again, the Yankees have been rained out. Today’s series finale with the Orioles at Camden Yards has been postponed due to rain and will be made up as part of a split doubleheader on Saturday, August 25th. At least they called this early and didn’t make everyone sit through a long delay.

This is already the sixth rainout of the season for the Yankees, including the suspended game against the Nationals. They have three and a half doubleheaders on the schedule now, all on the road:

Monday, June 4th: Doubleheader in Detroit.
Monday, June 18th: Completion of the suspended game plus another game in Washington.
Monday, July 9th: Doubleheader in Baltimore.
Saturday, August 25th: Doubleheader in Baltimore.

Good grief. To make matters worse, the Yankees will play the ESPN Sunday Night Baseball game in Toronto on July 8th. So they have to play an 8pm ET game in Toronto one day and a doubleheader in Baltimore the next, while going through customs and all that. Terrible. Aaron Boone called it “not a good situation” yesterday, which is an understatement.

I suppose the good news is today’s rainout means the Yankees won’t have to call up a spot starter to deal with tomorrow’s doubleheader against the Tigers. They can go with this pitching arrangement:

Monday: Two of Domingo German, Luis Severino, and CC Sabathia.
Tuesday: Whichever one of German, Severino, or Sabathia doesn’t start Monday.
Wednesday: Sonny Gray.
Thursday: Off-day.

The Yankees haven’t announced anything yet, though I’d bet on Severino starting Monday and Sabathia starting Tuesday, which was the plan before today’s postponement. That would give German, today’s scheduled starter, the other doubleheader start. The Yankees will also have a 26th man available Monday, so, all things considered, the pitching is in good shape. The rainout helps there.

This August 25th doubleheader will be played during the middle day of a three-game series, so the Yankees will already be in Baltimore and won’t have to worry about travel issues or anything like that. Because of all the rainouts, the Yankees have played only 54 games this season, the fewest in baseball. The other 29 teams average 58 games played.

Update: Severino will start the game day (1:10pm ET) and German will start the night game (7:10pm ET) against the Tigers tomorrow, the Yankees say. That means Sabathia on Tuesday, Gray on Wednesday, an off-day on Thursday, and Masahiro Tanaka on Friday. Everyone will be on normal or extra rest.

Yankees vs. O’s rained out, doubleheader scheduled for July 9

May 31, 2018 by Mike Axisa Leave a Comment

Once again, the Yankees have been rained out. Today’s series opener with the Orioles at Camden Yards has been postponed due to rain, it has been announced. The game will be made up as part of a single admission doubleheader on Monday, July 9th.

This is the fourth rainout for the Yankees this season, not including the suspended game with the Nationals. They were rained out twice in Detroit, once in Washington, and now once in Baltimore. The Yankees now have multiple games on three of the next six Mondays.

Monday, June 4th: Doubleheader in Detroit.
Monday, June 18th: Completion of the suspended game plus a makeup game in Washington.
Monday, July 9th: Doubleheader in Baltimore.

Pretty terrible! The Yankees and Orioles will open what was originally a three-game series on July 9th. Now they’ll play four games in three days. At least they’re not losing an off-day this time. The Yankees will be Toronto prior to the makeup doubleheader in Baltimore. Travel’s not too bad.

The weather forecast for the rest of the weekend in Baltimore isn’t looking so great, so we’re just going to have to hope for the best the next few days. Getting real sick of these rainouts, you guys. The Yankees will now play three games against the Orioles this weekend, the doubleheader in Detroit, then two games against the Blue Jays before Thursday’s off-day.

At the moment it’s unclear what the Yankees will do with their pitching staff the next few days. Chances are they’ll just push everyone back and use the postponement to give the starters extra rest. They’re still playing six straight days beginning tomorrow, so they’re going to need to use a spot starter at some point, either during the doubleheader or otherwise. The Yankees won’t be able to skip Domingo German like they did following the Washington rainout.

Update: The Yankees will stay on turn with their rotation this weekend, so it’ll be Sonny Gray on Friday, Masahiro Tanaka on Saturday, and German on Sunday. They have not announced their plans for Monday. They could go with CC Sabathia and Luis Severino in the doubleheader Monday with a spot starter Tuesday, or Sabathia or Severino and a spot starter in the doubleheader, with Sabathia or Severino on Tuesday. We’ll see.

Saturday Links: Pettitte, Mock Draft, Jersey Deal, Juiced Balls

May 26, 2018 by Mike Axisa Leave a Comment

The Yankees and Angels continue their three-game series later tonight, but not until 7pm ET. Saturday night games are The Worst. Here are some notes to check out before first pitch.

Pettitte to make Old Timers’ Day debut

Andy Pettitte is officially an Old Timer. The Yankees announced the 2018 Old Timers’ Day roster earlier this week and Pettitte is among the first-timers, along with Jason Giambi, Nick Swisher, Dion James, and (of course) Aaron Boone. The usual cast of characters will be in attendance as well. Here is the press release. Old Timers’ Day is Sunday, June 17th, this year.

Pettitte, who turns 46 next month and recently became a grandfather, retired for good following the 2013 season. He will be Hall of Fame eligible for the first time later this year. Mike Mussina has been unable to get over the hump and into Cooperstown, and based on that, I don’t think Pettitte is getting voted in anytime soon. I do think he’ll stay on the ballot for several years though. Going to be fun to see him at Old Timers’ Day.

MLB.com mock draft v5.0

Another week, another mock draft from MLB.com. Jim Callis provided this week’s mock. He has the Tigers selecting Auburn RHP Casey Mize with the No. 1 pick, which should be no surprise if you’ve been following mock drafts these last few weeks. The Yankees hold the 23rd overall pick. Here is Callis’ mock selection for the Bronx Bombers:

23. Yankees: Brice Turang, SS, Santiago HS (Corona, Calif.)
Turang was mentioned as a candidate to go No. 1 overall entering last summer, and while he hasn’t lived up to those expectations, he’s still a talented shortstop in a Draft thin at that position. A variety of high school position players get mentioned with New York, including Adams, Casas, Edwards and outfielder Mike Siani (Pennsylvania).

Here are my write-ups on Turang, Siani, and Triston Casas. Could’ve sworn I wrote one for North Carolina OF Jordyn Adams, but apparently not. Florida HS SS Xavier Edwards is still on my list of draft prospects to profile. Anyway, once again the Yankees are connected to bats. That has been the case all spring. Aside from guys expected to go in the top 5-10 picks, this draft class is light on college bats, so it’s no surprise the Yankees are connected mostly to high school kids. The draft is a week from Monday.

Nike, not Under Armour, to get MLB apparel rights

According to Terry Lefton, Nike is expected to get MLB’s next apparel rights deal, which begins in 2020. Under Armour was getting the deal but is backing out for financial reasons. “They were a different company when they did the deal. It’s just not affordable for Under Armour anymore,” said a source to Lefton. You may remember Under Armour was set to slap their logo on all jerseys, like so:

It’s unclear whether the Nike swoosh will appear in a similar spot going forward. Majestic currently provides MLB apparel and their logo appears on the sleeves of all jerseys except the Yankees. The Yankees were granted an exception. They weren’t getting an exemption from Under Armour. No idea what’s up with the Nike deal.

I’m of the belief it’s only a matter of time until there are advertisements on MLB jerseys — they’re not going to look like NASCAR cars or anything, but I bet we see advertisement patches on sleeves in the near future — and a logo on the chest of jerseys is step one. Well, no, step one was the Majestic logo on jersey sleeves and step two was the New Era logo on the side of caps. A logo featured on the front of jerseys is step three. Jersey ads are coming. Maybe not with the Nike deal, but eventually.

MLB releases study on “juiced ball” study

Earlier this week MLB released the results of a study into the “juiced baseball,” or, in English, they looked at whether changes to the ball led to the uptick in home runs. Here’s a breakdown of the results. The study found the baseball itself has not changed. Everything is within specifications, though, to be fair, those are wide-ranging. From the study:

There is also no evidence that any variations in the ball occur either intentionally or through substandard quality control by Rawlings. If anything, they would be inherent to the manufacturing process, which relies on substantial “by hand” labor.

The committee in charge provided recommendations, which include potentially establishing standards for storage (i.e. a humidor in all parks). Homers are actually down this year — teams are averaging 1.12 homers per game, down from 1.26 last year and 1.16 homer the year before — but they’re still flying out of the park at one of the highest rates in history. I like dingers. Dingers are cool. If MLB does something to reduce dingers, I’ll be bummed, but I’d understand.

Yankees and Nationals rained out, makeup games scheduled for June 18th

May 16, 2018 by Mike Axisa Leave a Comment

Once again, the Yankees and Nats have been rained out. Both of tonight’s games — the completion of yesterday’s suspended game and the regularly scheduled game — have been postponed, it has been announced. The two games will be made up on Monday, June 18th, starting at 5pm ET.

The makeup games come in the middle of a homestand. The Yankees will play four games against the Rays at Yankee Stadium, travel to Washington for the makeup games, then go back to New York for a three-game series with the Mariners. Not great, not terrible. The Yankees will play 17 games (well, 16.5 games) in 16 days from June 12th to June 25th though. That bites.

Both the Yankees and Nationals have an off-day tomorrow, though apparently it is not available for makeup games due to travel arrangements. I’m not sure how those rules work, but whatever. Between off-days and rainouts, the Yankees will play five and a half innings of baseball from Monday through Thursday this week. They open a four-game series with the Royals on Friday.

The good news? The overworked bullpen is getting a much-needed breather. Guys like Chad Green, Dellin Betances, David Robertson, and Aroldis Chapman have all worked hard lately, and now they get a nice little four-day break. None of them even warmed up last night. Also, fewer games now means more games with Greg Bird, Tommy Kahnle, and Adam Warren later. Hooray for that.

In addition to these makeup games, the Yankees also have to travel to Detroit for a doubleheader on June 4th, so they traded two off-days for three and a half games next month. Sucks, but what can you do? The Yankees still have three off-days in June, and none of their road series involve long travel. Could be worse.

The Yankees have not yet announced anything, though I assume CC Sabathia will start Friday’s series opener in Kansas City. He was scheduled to start tonight and it seems likely the Yankees will keep everyone on turn to ensure all their starters get extra rest.

Pitching Update: The Yankees will start Sabathia, Luis Severino, and Sonny Gray in Kansas City in that order. Domingo German is being pushed back to next week and will be available out of the bullpen this weekend, if necessary.

Yankees & Nationals suspended due to rain, game will resume at 5pm Wednesday

May 15, 2018 by Mike Axisa Leave a Comment

The Yankees have grabbed a suspended game from the jaws of defeat. Tuesday night, their series opener with the Nationals was suspended due to rain after the top of the sixth with the score tied 3-3. The game will resume at 5pm ET tomorrow, with the regularly scheduled series finale still set for 7pm ET. Here is the box score for the still ongoing game.

Thanks mostly to Tyler Austin, the Yankees rallied to tie the game after falling behind 3-0 early. Austin smacked a two-run home run in the fourth inning and added a long game-tying sacrifice fly in the fifth inning. Had the Yankees still been trailing after the top of the sixth, it would’ve been an official game and a Nationals win rather than a suspended game.

Masahiro Tanaka had a shaky start, allowing an Anthony Rendon solo homer in the first and two more runs in the second. He settled down and retired the final eleven batters he faced. Interestingly enough, Tanaka abandoned the windup and pitched exclusively from the stretch after the second inning. Hmmm. That suggests his mechanics were out of whack and he wanted to simplify things.

Both teams had chances to tack on runs early in the game. The Yankees left runners on second and third bases in the first and second innings — they had men on second and third with no outs in the second and didn’t score — and came away with only one run after loading the bases with no outs in the fifth. Gio Gonzalez put ten men on base in five innings and the Yankees scored only three runs. Annoying! Washington stranded a runner on third in the second.

Wednesday’s weather forecast isn’t much better, and although both teams have an off-day Thursday, Aaron Boone said it is his understanding that day is not available for makeup games because the Yankees are leaving for Kansas City tomorrow night. I dunno. We’ll see. Also, both teams are allowed a 26th man for tomorrow night’s regularly scheduled game, though the 26th man won’t be eligible for the completion of this game.

As best I can tell this is the Yankees’ first suspended game since Game One of the 2011 ALDS against the Tigers. Remember that? I’m convinced the Yankees lost the series because of the rain. It forced them to use CC Sabathia and Ivan Nova in Game One rather than Games One and Two. Oh well. I can’t find New York’s last regular season suspended game. I seem to remember one against the Royals when A-Rod was going for his 600th homer? Whatever.

I assume both teams will go right to the bullpen rather than get cute with a starter or something when the game resumes tomorrow. When the game does resume, it’ll be the start of the bottom of the sixth, with Bryce Harper due to lead off. (Chasen Shreve had been warming before the rain.) The Yankees are due to bring Giancarlo Stanton, Gary Sanchez, and Didi Gregorius to the plate in the top of the seventh.

Update: Yankees, Red Sox will play two-game series in London in June 2019

May 8, 2018 by Mike Axisa Leave a Comment

May 8th: The London games are officially on. MLB announced it this morning. The Yankees and Red Sox will play two games at London Stadium on June 29th and 30th of next season. The BoSox will be the home team for the two games.

“To have the opportunity to participate in this historic baseball endeavor and showcase our game in London is something our entire organization is thrilled to be a part of,” said Hal Steinbrenner in a statement. “Bringing these storied teams together for British fans — who have such a profound appreciation for sports at the highest level — only adds to the unique allure of one of the world’s greatest sporting rivalries. We expect an exciting and intense pair of games and appreciate the significance of representing our sport in such a meaningful way.”

You can register for pre-sale tickets right here. MLB estimates London Stadium will hold roughly 55,000 fans in a baseball configuration. This is a two-year agreement with another two-game series scheduled to be played in London in 2021, though the teams have not yet been announced.

March 19th: According to Ronald Blum, MLB is working to finalize plans for a two-game series between the Yankees and Red Sox in London in June 2019. Joel Sherman hears the Red Sox would likely be the home team for the two games, which means the Yankees won’t lose two home gates.

“We would love to participate in a series in London against the Yankees but this is a decision that MLB and the MLBPA will make,” said Red Sox CEO Sam Kennedy to Evan Drellich.

Assuming plans are finalized, the series will be played at London Stadium, which hosted the 2012 Olympics and is currently used for soccer and track and field events. June is the only time the building is available for baseball. An official announcement is expected some time within the next two months.

Any time MLB holds an event like this, it’s a good bet the Yankees will be involved because they are the most popular team in the sport. The Yankees will help pump up attendance and generate buzz. Also, players will get a $60,000 bonus for participating in the series per the Collective Bargaining Agreement.

MLB has been working to globalize the game in recent years — they didn’t start the World Baseball Classic out of boredom, you know — and this April the Twins and Indians will play a series in Puerto Rico. MLB tentatively plans to have two teams play their season opener in Tokyo next season.

Saturday Links: Didi, Gleyber, Corbin, Lind, 154-Game Season

April 28, 2018 by Mike Axisa Leave a Comment

Later tonight the Yankees and Angels will continue their three-game series in Anaheim. West Coast night games stink. West Coast night games on a Saturday stink even more. Oh well. What can you do? Here are some links and notes to check out while you’re waiting for tonight’s game.

Still no contract talks with Didi

According to Jon Heyman, there have still been no contract extension talks between the Yankees and Didi Gregorius. Gregorius said he is open to a long-term deal earlier this month, though signing him now would complicate the luxury tax plan. This is something the Yankees will have to revisit in the offseason. “Didi wants to be a Yankee,” said one Yankees source to Heyman, for what it’s worth.

The luxury tax plan means an extension won’t happen during the season — because the regular season has started, signing Didi now would result in his 2018 salary being recalculated for luxury tax purposes, which means it’ll increase — and, frankly, this isn’t the best time to discuss an extension. Gregorius has had a monster start to the season and he has all the leverage. After season, once his numbers inevitably come back to Earth a bit, the Yankees will be in better position to negotiate a deal that is sensible for both sides.

Yankees pursued Gleyber as an amateur

Way back in the day the Yankees pursued Gleyber Torres as an international free agent out of Venezuela, reports Ken Rosenthal (subs. req’d), but he wound up signing with the Cubs. Chicago beat the Yankees to the punch, secured a commitment, and hid Torres at their complex until the signing period opened. Standard procedure in Latin America. Gleyber received a $1.7M bonus. The Yankees’ top signing that signing period was outfielder Leonardo Molina at $1.4M.

“Players you want in the draft who you don’t get, players you want internationally who you don’t get, it’s hard to let them go. They’re always in the back of your mind,” said Brian Cashman. The Yankees continued to have Gleyber on their radar after he started his pro career, and when it came time to talk Aroldis Chapman trade with the Cubs, Cashman “locked in” on Torres, according to Rosenthal. It took a little longer than they’d hoped, but the Yankees did eventually get their man.

Yankees have their eye on Corbin

Earlier this week Diamondbacks southpaw and impending free agent Patrick Corbin made some headlines with his effusive praise for the Yankees, and according to Heyman, the feeling is mutual. The Yankees have their eye on the southpaw leading up to free agency. The D’Backs are in the first place and figure to stay in the race all summer, so a trade deadline deal is presumably a non-option. The Corbin pursuit will have to wait for the winter.

“His fastball is back, his slider is better than ever and he’s an uber-athletic and competitive guy, which is the kind of guy to bet on,” said one scout to Heyman. The Yankees reportedly pursued Corbin this past offseason, so it’s no surprise they have their eye on him for free agency. Manny Machado and Bryce Harper are the big free agent names, understandably, but the Yankees will probably need pitching more than another bat. We’ll see what happens after the season. I suspect we’re in for many more Yankees/Corbin rumors in the coming weeks and months.

Lind’s contract details

The Yankees re-signed Adam Lind to a new minor league contract last week, and now we know the terms. According to Bob Nightengale, Lind will make $2M at the big league level, and he can opt-out of his deal on May 1st, June 1st, and July 1st if he’s not on the MLB roster. That first opt-out is only four days away. Lind has played a handful of games with High-A Tampa since signing. I imagine he’ll move up Triple-A Scranton soon.

Despite Greg Bird’s injury, first base has been a strength this season, mostly because Tyler Austin is hitting .290/.362/.629 (167 wRC+) in the early going. Couldn’t have asking him for more. Hopefully he keeps it up. Bird is on the rehab trail following ankle surgery and is expected back within a few weeks. It seems like Lind is first base insurance in case Bird suffers a setback or Austin gets hurt. Otherwise I’m not sure there’s a path to playing time. Replacing Neil Walker with a first base only guy is really going to limit the bench and roster flexibility.

MLB researched 154-game season

According to Jayson Stark (subs. req’d), MLB performed “extensive background research” on shortening the season to 154 games in advance of the most recent Collective Bargaining Agreement talks. The MLBPA didn’t push for a shorter season as hard as expected, however. “Basically, eight teams wouldn’t do it. They said, ‘We can’t make up all those lost gates or all the TV revenue. So you need to make us whole,'” said one MLB source to Stark.

Trimming the season from 162 games to 154 games would help the league avoid some nasty weather in April and November, but it would also mean each team loses four revenue-generating home games. I assume the Yankees and other big market clubs like the Dodgers, Cubs, and Red Sox are among the eight teams that objected to a shorter schedule. Four games is only 5% of the home schedule, but it does equal millions of dollars. Perhaps the solution is tweaking the revenue sharing formula and making the revenue up that way? Not sure. The MLBPA is expected to push hard for a return to a 154-game schedule in the future.