River Avenue Blues

DotF: Wagner homers again in Tampa’s loss

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Not surprisingly, SS Gleyber Torres was held out of the lineup today after leaving last night’s game with back stiffness. Aaron Boone told Bryan Hoch it’s not serious and Torres is tentatively scheduled to return to the lineup tomorrow. Triple-A Scranton has a 12-hour bus ride coming up after tomorrow’s game. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Yankees play it extra safe and sit Gleyber tomorrow too.

Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders (8-4 loss to Gwinnett)

  • RF L.J. Mazzilli: 1-4, 1 R, 1 K
  • CF Shane Robinson: 2-4, 1 R, 1 K
  • DH Mike Ford: 2-4, 1 R, 1 RBI, 1 K
  • SS Abi Avelino: 0-3, 1 BB, 2 K — went 11-for-24 (.458) during his seven-game hitting streak
  • LHP Josh Rogers: 5 IP, 11 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 0 BB, 6 K, 1 HR, 1/7 GB/FB — 63 of 92 pitches were strikes (68%) … allowed three runs total in his first two starts and 12 innings
  • RHP Anyelo Gomez: 0 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 0 K — eight pitches, four strikes … he left the game with the trainer, so that’s no good

[Read more…]

Luis Cessa heading to disabled list with oblique strain

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(Presswire)

Yet another Yankee is heading to the disabled list. Following tonight’s game Brian Cashman confirmed Luis Cessa will be placed on the 10-day DL with an oblique strain. Cessa was called up earlier today to replace Tommy Kahnle, who was placed on the 10-day DL with shoulder tendinitis.

Cessa exited tonight’s game with the injury after throwing two innings and 28 pitches. Jonathan Holder and Jonathan Loaisiga are the only healthy 40-man roster pitchers not in the big leagues right now, so I’d bet on Holder getting called up tomorrow. Cessa’s injury also means Domingo German is the unquestioned sixth start right now.

Cessa joins Kahnle (shoulder), Greg Bird (ankle), Brandon Drury (migraines), Jacoby Ellsbury (oblique, hip, foot), Clint Frazier (concussion), Ben Heller (elbow), Billy McKinney (shoulder), and CC Sabathia (shoulder) on the disabled list. Sabathia is due back Thursday. Everyone else is out more long-term.

Update: I’m a dolt. The Yankees will probably just activate Sabathia and plug him into Cessa’s roster spot rather than call up Holder. There’s an off-day Wednesday and Sabathia is Thursday’s scheduled starter. Duh.

Game 16: Tanaka Tuesday

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(Elsa/Getty)

The Yankees did what they were supposed to do against a bad Marlins team last night. They didn’t just beat them, they blew them out. It was a laugher. Tonight the Yankees will try for the quick two-game sweep and their first three-game winning streak of the season. Securing the first three-game winning streak before suffering the first three-game losing streak is a modest goal.

Masahiro Tanaka is on the mound tonight and, like Luis Severino last night, he’s looking to bounce back from a yucky start last week. Severino was great yesterday. Hopefully Tanaka will be great today. With another off-day tomorrow, I imagine Aaron Boone will have the bullpen ready to go at the first sign of serious trouble. Those guys have had plenty of time to rest since Friday. Here are the starting lineups:

New York Yankees
1. CF Brett Gardner
2. RF Aaron Judge
3. DH Giancarlo Stanton
4. SS Didi Gregorius
5. C Gary Sanchez
6. CF Aaron Hicks
7. 2B Neil Walker
8. 1B Tyler Austin
9. 3B Miguel Andujar

RHP Masahiro Tanaka

Miami Marlins
1. LF Derek Dietrich
2. SS Miguel Rojas
3. 2B Starlin Castro
4. DH Justin Bour
5. C J.T. Realmuto
6. 3B Brian Anderson
7. 1B Tomas Telis
8. CF Cameron Maybin
9. RF J.B. Shuck

LHP Jarlin The Marlin Garcia

It’s another chilly and windy evening in New York. Par for the course these days. Tonight’s game will begin at 6:35pm ET and you’ll be able to watch on YES. Enjoy the ballgame.

Injury Updates: Greg Bird (ankle) hit off a tee today and said he believes he’ll begin full baseball activities by next week. He’ll likely go to Tampa to continue rehabbing when the Yankees go to the West Coast next weekend … Brandon Drury (migraines) took ground balls today for the first time since being placed on the disabled list, so he’s making progress … In case you missed it earlier, Tommy Kahnle was placed on the 10-day DL with shoulder tendinitis. Luis Cessa was called up to fill the roster spot.

Ezequiel Duran and the next big thing in the farm system

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(PinstripedProspects.com)

Almost four years ago now, the Yankees made a mockery of baseball’s international amateur talent acquisition system when they blew their bonus pool out of the water and signed basically every highly regarded prospect during the 2014-15 international signing period. They spent roughly $30M on prospects in one day. Other teams soon followed suit and MLB had to change the rules.

The 2014-15 spending spree has not worked out as hoped. Much of the big name talent has stalled out, with lower profile signings like Estevan Florial ($200,000) and Freicer Perez ($10,000) emerging as the cream of the crop. The Yankees have a great Latin America scouting system and they consistently find low-cost gems like Florial and Perez. Luis Severino ($225,000) and Jorge Mateo ($250,000) were also small bonus guys back in the day.

The 2017-18 signing period doesn’t end until June 25th, but already the next great low-cost Yankees prospect is generating buzz. Dominican infielder Ezequiel Duran, who signed for $10,000 last July, is earning high praise early in his pro career. Kiley McDaniel ranked Duran as the No. 14 (!) prospect in the farm system last month, and earlier this week, the great Ben Badler (subs. req’d) wrote him up as a sleeper prospect.

It is not often a recently signed international prospect generates this much buzz this early in his career. Most international draftees sign contracts that begin the following the season, so a 2017-18 signing period kid who signs on July 2nd would sign a 2018 contract. That wasn’t the case with Duran though. He’s already 18, which allowed him to sign a 2017 contract and play last summer. Why didn’t he sign earlier? McDaniel explains:

Duran was a mid-six-figure prospect whom the Yankees scooped up last year for $10,000 because he failed to register with MLB and fell off the radar of many teams as they quickly spent their bonus pools.

Huh. The kid could’ve signed a signing period or two ago and likely received a much larger bonus, but because he didn’t register with MLB, he kinda got lost in the shuffle. The Yankees swooped in and got him for a pittance this signing period. Duran authored a .393/.415/.754 (220 wRC+) batting line with three homers and four steals in 15 Dominican Summer League games last year, and the Yankees brought him to minor league camp in Tampa this spring rather than leave him in the Dominican Republic. From McDaniel:

He just got to America for the first time this (March), so some Yankees staff members aren’t even that familiar with him. Nevertheless, he’s made some noise in March, including hitting an opposite-field homer at 109 mph in a spring training game. He’s posted some exit velos up to 112 mph in the Dominican and projects for above-average to plus game power, as his feel for hitting is also advanced.

Badler backs that up, saying Duran “has a knack for barreling balls with explosion off the bat,” adding he is “recognizing pitches well for his age with a sound approach.” There’s not much video available, but here’s an at-bat from Spring Training:

Duran profiles as a bat-first second baseman, and given his age and last year’s DSL performance, as well as the fact he’s already in Tampa, it’s safe to assume he’ll spend the summer with one of the Yankees’ three rookie ball affiliates. Either the Pulaski Yankees or one of the two Gulf Coast League teams. There’s no reason to take it slow here. Duran’s bat is advanced and he’s already 18, so let’s get the show on the road.

Now, it’s important to keep things in perspective. This is an 18-year-old with 15 pro games under his best, none of which were played in the United States. It’s great he looked good in Spring Training. But it is only Spring Training, and the kid has only played in the lowest levels of professional baseball. Duran has a very, very, very long way to go before being any kind of factor for the Yankees. So much can go wrong in the coming years. That’s baseball.

That said, when an international prospect gets this much attention this quickly, he’s usually a top prospect. Gary Sanchez or Vlad Guerrero Jr., someone like that. Not a kid who signed for $10,000 at 18. (Most worthwhile international prospects sign at 16.) McDaniel and especially Badler are two of the best on the international baseball beat. It’s not one random dude praising Duran. The heavy hitters are in on him. The hype machine is fired up.

Even with the obvious caveats that apply to an 18-year-old who has played only 15 pro games, Duran is suddenly a prospect to watch this season because the early reports from reliable reporters are glowing, and because the Yankees have a very good track record in Latin America. Maybe Duran works out, maybe he doesn’t. Generally speaking though, players who get this much attention this early in their careers tend to become highly regarded prospects down the road, and that bodes well for Duran and the Yankees.

Tommy Kahnle placed on 10-day DL with shoulder tendinitis

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(Tom Szczerbowski/Getty)

The Yankees have placed right-hander Tommy Kahnle on the 10-day DL with right shoulder tendinitis, the team announced. The move is retroactive to yesterday. Not sure why they didn’t (or couldn’t) backdate it further, but whatever. Luis Cessa was recalled from Triple-A Scranton to fill the roster spot.

“We’re hoping that this is something that we can knock out with a few days of rest,” said Aaron Boone to Bryan Hoch this afternoon. Kahnle had an MRI earlier today and the Yankees are optimistic this is a minor injury. Pete Caldera said all the strength tests checked out okay.

Kahnle, 28, has struggled so far this season, allowing seven runs (five earned) in 7.1 innings. He’s struck out nine and walked eight in those 7.1 innings, so yeah. Furthermore, Kahnle’s velocity has been down, which was a pretty good indication something wasn’t right. To wit:

On one hand, at least we now have a possible explanation for Kahnle’s missing velocity and ineffectiveness. On the other hand, a shoulder issue is never good. Tendinitis is intentionally vague too. Doesn’t really tell us what’s wrong. Kahnle did warm up last night, so I guess this is a fairly new injury.

Cessa was sent down Sunday and was scheduled to start for Triple-A Scranton today before being called up. He’s made two one-inning appearances for the Yankees this season, retiring all six men he’s faced with three strikeouts. I wonder if we’ll see him in short relief more often. I’d be open to it.

Masahiro Tanaka is taking the Yankees’ anti-fastball approach to the extreme

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(Maddie Meyer/Getty)

Later tonight Masahiro Tanaka will make his fourth start of the season in the second game of this quick little two-game series against the Marlins. Tanaka has a 5.19 ERA (4.34 FIP) in three starts and 17.1 innings so far this year, though those numbers are skewed a bit by last week’s rough outing in Boston. His first two starts of the season were quite good.

So far this season Tanaka has continued a trend that started sometime last June, when he was in the middle of the roughest stretch of his MLB career. Tanaka simply scaled back on his fastball, his worst pitch, and started to emphasize his slider and splitter. A graph of interest:

Tanaka throws other pitches (four-seamer, cutter, curveball), but those are his three main pitches in the graph. The slider and especially the splitter are his money pitches. That’s how he gets his outs. Whatever Tanaka was doing early last year was not working, so he changed it up, and he pitched pretty well the final few weeks of the season.

The Yankees in general are an anti-fastball team. Tom Verducci wrote about it last year and more recently Jeff Sullivan wrote about it as well. The Yankees collectively throw fewer fastballs than just about any other team in baseball. Last year they had the lowest fastball rate by nearly five percentage points. This year:

  1. Yankees: 46.1% fastballs
  2. Tigers: 51.1%
  3. Rays: 51.9%
  4. Angels: 54.2%
  5. Phillies: 55.7%

Intuitively, it makes sense. Breaking balls are harder to hit than fastballs. The numbers bear that out. Here’s what the league is hitting against various pitch types:

  • Fastballs: .261 AVG and .169 ISO (.368 xwOBA)
  • Breaking Balls: .198 AVG and .124 ISO (.268 xwOBA)
  • Offspeed Pitches: .227 AVG and .128 ISO (.292 xwOBA)

Throwing fewer fastballs means you’re throwing more pitches that are harder to hit, which will lead to more success (in theory). Every pitcher is different, so an umbrella one size fits all policy doesn’t make sense. Telling Luis Severino to throw fewer fastballs may not be such a good idea. In Tanaka’s case though, his slider and splitter are clearly better than his fastball, so he’s a good candidate for the anti-fastball approach. Here is the bottom of the fastball usage leaderboard:

  1. Masahiro Tanaka: 22.0% fastballs
  2. Alex Wood, Dodgers: 35.3%
  3. Jordan Montgomery: 35.4%
  4. Zack Greinke: 36.0%
  5. Lance McCullers Jr.: 38.3%

Given the team’s pitching philosophy and Montgomery’s arsenal, it doesn’t surprise me to see he’s near the bottom of the fastball usage leaderboard. Those five pitchers are the only starters who have thrown fewer than 40% fastballs so far this season. Clayton Kershaw (43.7%) has the seventh lowest fastball rate this season, so the anti-fastball thing is something bonafide aces do too.

The anti-fastball approach is relatively new, and I have two questions. One, does it put the pitcher at greater risk of injury? Popular belief is that bendy pitches are harder on the elbow than fastballs — Tanaka’s partially torn elbow ligament has widely been blamed on his heavy splitter usage — yet recent studies found conflicting results. One said throwing more fastballs leads to injury. Another said pitch type doesn’t make a difference. Who knows?

The Yankees (and Astros, another anti-fastball team) are one of the smartest and most progressive organizations in baseball, so they I’m sure they considered the physical ramifications of throwing fewer fastballs. They didn’t do this on a whim. The Yankees aren’t sending Tanaka and his $22M a year salary out there to do this without first thinking long and hard about it.

My second question is at what point do we start seeing diminishing returns? Tanaka’s slider and splitter are very effective pitches, but if he continues throwing them at this rate, will they eventually be less effective? Hitters aren’t stupid. They know about the anti-fastball approach, and the more they see Tanaka’s slider and splitter, the better they may get at hitting them. How well will this work the fifth and sixth time he sees the Red Sox and Orioles this year, for example?

There is a point of diminishing returns somewhere. I don’t know where it is, and for all I know, it could be years away. It could be so far away that it’s not worth worrying about. The Yankees are a win-now team that will (and should) prioritize the present over the future. If throwing fewer fastballs helps you win in 2018 but hurts in, say, 2020, so be it. You take the good with the bad.

Tanaka, maybe moreso than any other pitcher in baseball, is the poster boy for the anti-fastball movement. He’s thrown 54 fastballs total in three starts so far. Chad Green, a reliever, has thrown 104 fastballs so far this year. Nearly twice as many. The anti-fastball approach has mostly worked for Tanaka since he made the adjustment midway through last season. Will it work long-term? My hunch is yes, though I do think Tanaka and the Yankees will see diminishing returns at some point.

The looming Gleyber Torres promotion, and the signs it may happen sooner rather than later

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Gleyber comin’. (Matt Rourke/AP)

Tomorrow is the day. Tomorrow is the earliest teams can call up their 40-man roster prospects with no MLB experience and still gain that extra year of control. Gleyber Torres is one of those prospects. The Yankees can call Torres up tomorrow, have him for the remaining 146 games of the season, and still get six full years of team control from 2019-24.

The Yankees aren’t going to call Torres up tomorrow, however. I know that with a great deal of certainty. Why? Because tomorrow’s an off-day. No point in calling the kid up on an off-day, you know?

Thursday is another matter. The Yankees very well might call Torres up Thursday, and install him as a starting infielder. Gleyber is a highly regarded young player, he’s hitting .366/.386/.537 (159 wRC+) through eleven games for Triple-A Scranton, and no one is really standing in his way for playing time. The Greg Bird and Brandon Drury injuries have opened at-bats.

“I’d say anything’s possible,” said Aaron Boone to Erik Boland over the weekend when asked whether Torres could be summoned at some point this week. “We have have conversations about that kind of thing. Possible? Yes. Likely? Not necessarily.”

A diplomatic answer, that is. Unless we’re talking about a starting pitcher filling a specific rotation spot, I can’t remember the last time a manager or team executive gave a firm call-up date for a prospect. Especially when service time manipulation is involved. Even if the Yankees are planning to call Torres up Thursday, Boone wouldn’t say so.

Whenever the Yankees call up Torres, they don’t want to ever have to send him back down again. They’ll call him up when they’re confident he’s ready for the big leagues. They’re not going to call him up just because the service time cutoff passes. Calling a prospect up too soon can screw up his development and that’s the last thing the Yankees want to do with Gleyber. Here’s what Boone told Randy Miller about this:

“I think there’s a lot that goes into it as far as evaluating him,” Boone added. “We see he’s getting a couple hits a game. Is he where we think we want him to be physically? Is he having the at-bats that we want him to have to where he’s ready to come up and impact us.

“And with a guy that we think is going to be such an important part of our organization for a long time, we want to feel really good that he’s in a really good place when we do bring him here because he’s not a guy that we want to just pull up to plug a hole for a second and go back and forth (between Triple-A and the Yankees) for a while. We want him to be in a good place, so when he comes up here he’s ready to impact our club for the long haul.”

It’s easy to equate a potential Torres call-up to the Robinson Cano call-up in 2005, but there are some key differences. Cano was a year older, he wasn’t coming off a major injury, and the 2005 Yankees were desperate for a spark. The 2018 Yankees have been mediocre to date, but desperate they are not. Gleyber may not be Robbie (few are), though there are still signs the Yankees are considering a call-up in the not too distant future.

1. Naehring has watched him recently. One of the most important things an organization can do is self-scout. You have to know your own players better than anyone. Because of that, it is commonplace for the brain trust to visit the minor league affiliates throughout the season. It’s not often the team will send a high level executive to see one specific player like the Yankees have done with Torres, however.

Over the weekend Boone confirmed vice president of baseball operations Tim Naehring, Brian Cashman’s right-hand man, was in Scranton to get eyes on Torres. That whole “is he having the at-bats that we want him to have?” thing Boone talked about? A box score won’t tell you that. Surely Naehring watched other players while tailing the RailRiders, but the fact the highest ranking non-GM executive in the front office — or, to put it another way, the highest ranking executive with a scouting background — was watching the top prospect suggests promotion conversations are afoot.

2. The Yankees have already changed his development plan. This, to me, is the biggest indication a call-up is on the table. At the end of camp Boone and the Yankees said the plan was for Torres to split his time 50-50 between second base and shortstop. Shortstop is his natural position and they wanted him ready in case something happened to Didi Gregorius, but second base is likely his long-term home. (Because Gregorius is awesome.)

Less than two weeks into the season, plans changed. Torres is now splitting his time between second and third bases, not second and short, and it’s not a 50-50 split. Gleyber has started his last six games at third base now. Drury went down with migraines and the Yankees immediately shifted Torres to third. Teams do not change development plans on a whim. Drury’s migraines mean third will be open for the foreseeable future and the Yankees want Gleyber ready to play the position.

I will note I do find it interesting Gleyber has started six straight games at the hot corner, only because it would seem the greater need is at second. Miguel Andujar has started to swing the bat better recently, and Drury took batting practice yesterday, so he is inching closer to a return. Maybe Gleyber is comfortable enough at second base that he doesn’t need a ton of work there? I dunno. Point is, the plan for Torres called for one thing, but as soon as injury created a need at the MLB level, the plan changed.

* * *

A wrench may have been thrown into any potential call-up plans yesterday when Torres exited last night’s game with back stiffness. The move was precautionary and Triple-A Scranton manager Bobby Mitchell told Conor Foley it’s nothing serious. “He’s fine,” said Mitchell, specifically. The Yankees will of course play it safe with Torres, especially with something like a stiff back, so this could change any imminent call-up plans.

I know this much: As long as the Yankees continue to get little production from Tyler Wade (and Andujar), the calls for Torres are only going to grow louder. The “he can’t be worse” reasoning is specious at best, but at some point when the players you’re running out there aren’t doing the job, you have to make a change. The challenge here is making sure Torres is big league ready and making sure he’s 100% ready to go after last year’s injury.

I’m pretty sure Gleyber has already shown he’s over the injury and shaken off any rust, so the question is when will the Yankees deem him MLB ready? Could be Thursday, conveniently. Might be later. When it comes to determining a prospect’s big league readiness, I will always defer to the team. A box score only tells you so much. Expecting Gleyber to come up and be Cano circa 2005 is unfair. But, whenever he gets the call, Torres could step in and give the Yankees a real shot in the arm.