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Open Thread: March 2nd Camp Notes

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The Fighting Spirit showed up today. The Yankees rallied from down 4-0 to beat the Braves 5-4 this afternoon. Tyler Austin hit a walk-off two-run homer. I guess he’s not happy about the Adam Lind signing? Giancarlo Stanton had two doubles and Didi Gregorius had three hits. The red hot Miguel Andujar doubled in two runs. The double was smoked over the left fielder’s head.

Masahiro Tanaka started and was not sharp at all. Everything was up in the zone. The result: Four runs on four hits and a walk in 1.1 innings. Ouch. Chasen Shreve, who seems to be a lock for the Opening Day roster, tossed 1.2 scoreless innings in his spring debut. Tommy Kahnle struck out two in a scoreless inning in his spring debut. Jordan Montgomery struck out five in three scoreless innings. Here are the box score and video highlights, and here’s the rest of the day’s news from Tampa:

  • Jacoby Ellsbury was scratched from today’s lineup with tightness in his right side and tests revealed a “mild oblique strain,” according to Aaron Boone. Even mild oblique strains can linger. They’re tricky. There’s no timetable for Ellsbury’s return. [Coley Harvey, Bryan Hoch]
  • Clint Frazier is still experiencing concussion symptoms and went for an MRI today. “Yesterday when we upped his workload, it didn’t go as well as we had hoped. With the concussion thing, we’re just going to be very careful, very cautious with it,” said Boone. [Pete Caldera, Erik Boland]
  • Russell Wilson pinch-hit today and struck out. He’s leaving camp Sunday. Wilson went out to dinner with several Yankees last night and spoke about needing “consistency and obsession” with having a good daily routine. “Winning is a habit. You have to train that way,” he said. [Caldera]
  • Chance Adams will be on the mound tomorrow afternoon. The game will be televised. Andujar, Bird, Gregorius, Brandon Drury, Estevan Florial,  Aaron Hicks, Austin Romine, Justus Sheffield, and Gleyber Torres will all make the road trip as well. [Caldera, Pete Abraham, Mike Mazzeo]
  • MLBPA chief Tony Clark visits all 30 teams in Spring Training, and today he was with the Yankees. He said Yankees players have “significant” concern about the free agent market. “They all understand how what happens with one (player) effects another,” he said. [Boland]

This is tonight’s open thread. This afternoon’s game will be replayed on YES (7pm ET) and MLB Network (6am ET). MLB Network will replay a different game tonight. All the local hockey and basketball teams are in action except the Nets, plus there’s some college basketball on as well. Talk about anything here as long as it isn’t religion or politics. Thanks in advance.

The $20 Million Fifth Outfielder [2018 Season Preview]

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(Kathy Willens/AP)

We are in year five of the Jacoby Ellsbury Experience, the end of which is kind of in sight if you squint just a little bit. There are three years, including this one, left on the deal, plus a $5 MM buyout for a 2021 team option that has a less than zero percent chance of being picked-up. The Yankees have all but openly acknowledged that Ellsbury’s place on the roster is solely a product of that contract, given that his name was bandied about in salary dump talks throughout the off-season (as well as the fact that the team’s given every indication that he isn’t a part of the starting lineup), and that’s perfectly reasonable. There may be other reasons to keep him around, but that’s largely a function of pessimism, as opposed to a means to construct the best possible roster. And, regardless of the sentiment about his place on the roster or the nature of his contract, he’s here to stay (for now).

Is He Still Good?

… maybe.

Ellsbury was, on a rate basis, a league-average center-fielder in 2017. He slashed .264/.348/.402 (101 wRC+) in 409 PA, which is a virtual doppelganger of the positional average of .262/.333/.426 (101 wRC+) in 2018. He was also a genuine weapon on the basepaths, with 22 steals in 25 attempts, and 4.7 BsR; and that latter stat, an all-encompassing base-running metric, is a counting metric – and it ranked 18th in baseball.

Those base-running numbers have ranged from good to great throughout Ellsbury’s career, so it stands to reason that we can expect that facet of his game to remain strong. However, we can’t overlook the fact that he hit .260/.324/.361 (87 wRC+) in 1127 PA between 2015 and 2016; nor can we ignore his age – he’ll be 34 for the entirety of this season.

The metrics didn’t like Ellsbury’s defense last year (-3 DRS, -8.0 UZR/150), which isn’t great. But he still flashes elite running speed on the offensive side of the game, and his defensive numbers were much better as recently as 2016. Defensive metrics are notoriously fickle, so taking the long view and factoring in that speed might be the way to go, pragmatically speaking. And that could point to him being a competent defender in center.

Was He Doing Anything Different In 2017?

Maybe!

Ellsbury’s walk rate jumped to a career-high 10.0% last year, up from 8.6% in 2016 and 7.4% for his career. He also struck out in 15.4% of his plate appearances, the second-highest mark of his career, and 1.7 percentage points above his personal norm. Walks and strikeouts did increase league-wide last year, but Ellsbury’s gains in both outstripped those bumps. And he was at least a bit more patient last year, too, with his 3.82 pitches per plate appearance representing his highest mark since 2013; though, to be fair, that’s only slightly above his career rate of 3.77 (a difference of 32.5 pitches every 650 PA).

His batted ball profile was basically the same, though, with one exception: he pulled the ball more than ever before.

(FanGraphs)

As one may expect, almost all of Ellsbury’s power came when he pulled the ball, as he had a .236 ISO on pulled balls. However, his wRC+ was just 88 to the pull side, as opposed to a 141 wRC+ to center, and a 116 wRC+ to left. That’s the opposite of his career norms, though – so if he continues to pull the ball maybe, just maybe, there’s more left in the tank offensively than we might suspect.

Does It Matter If He’s Still Good?

Again, the answer is maybe.

In an ideal world, Ellsbury is not on the Yankees right now. In an ideal version of the real world that we live in right now, Ellsbury is not playing all that much. He is currently behind Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton, Aaron Hicks, and Brett Gardner on the depth chart, and I suspect that he’d be behind Clint Frazier if all things were equal, as well. And I don’t think the Yankees are moving him ahead of anyone based on the merit of his performance in Spring Training, nor are they likely to make a panic move based on Hicks or Gardner struggling for a couple of weeks.

That being said, having a competent big league outfielder on the bench isn’t the worst thing in the world.

The Projection Systems

  • Steamer: .258/.328/.389, 6 HR, 10 SB, 8.7% BB, 16.1% K, 274 PA
  • ZiPS: .265/.331/.385, 8 HR, 20 SB, 8.2% BB, 15.2% K, 390 PA
  • PECOTA: .258/.318/.368, 3 HR, 7 SB, 8.1% BB, 15.7% K, 180 PA

The mathematical powers that be effectively see 2017 as a blip on the aging and declining radar, and also see Ellsbury garnering significantly less playing time. That last bit is both a product of his place on the depth chart, as well as his own lengthy injury history. Ellsbury has missed 50-plus games in two of the last three years, and has a laundry list of maladies dating back to his age-26 season. That doesn’t bode particularly well for an aging center-fielder.

My Take

I don’t know if this is a product of me buying into 2017 too much, or some natural urge to go against the grain … but I think Ellsbury has something to offer to this team. He shouldn’t be the starter, and it probably means something went terribly wrong if he is – but I could see him being a good hand in the event the Yankees need someone to fill-in around the outfield. It’s difficult to predict the shape of this sort of expectation, given that it requires guessing what happens to at least another player or two, so I won’t throw any sort of numbers on it. Suffice it to say that I could see him being the same guy in 2018 as he was in 2017, with the only variable being playing time.

Where does each 2018 Yankee hit the ball the hardest?

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(Mike Ehrmann/Getty)

Exit velocity is inescapable these days. Statcast puts the data at our fingertips and now you see it everywhere. On Twitter, on broadcasts, even on the scoreboard. The Yankee Stadium scoreboard showed exit velocity after balls in play this season. I’m not joking. It was right next to pitch velocity.

The Yankees have made it no secret they use exit velocity as an evaluation tool. I remember Brian Cashman saying a factor in the Chase Headley trade was an uptick in his exit velocity after he came back from an injury. We heard Aaron Judge had elite velocity while he was still in the minors. Here is the 2017 exit velocity leaderboard (min. 300 balls in play):

  1. Aaron Judge: 94.9 mph
  2. Nelson Cruz: 93.2 mph
  3. Khris Davis: 92.2 mph
  4. Giancarlo Stanton: 91.9 mph
  5. Paul Goldschmidt: 91.4 mph
    League Average: 86.6 mph

We’ve known hitting the ball hard is a good thing basically since the dawn of baseball. Now we can measure it and that’s cool. Exit velocity is just one tool in the shed though. Launch angle and direction is important too. After all, the hardest hit baseball during the Statcast era is a 123.9 mph grounder that went for a 4-6-3 double play. True story. Stanton hit it two years ago.

The best contact is hard contact in the air. Yes, a hard-hit grounder has a better chance to go for a base hit than a weakly hit grounder, but hit the ball hard in the air and good things will happen. On average, fly balls and line drives had a higher average exit velocity (92.1 vs. 82.5), batting average (.468 vs. .249), and isolated power (.454 vs. 022) than ground balls last season. Last season and every season.

So with that in mind, let’s take a look at where each current member of the 2018 Yankees hit the ball the hardest last season. I don’t mean where he hits it on the field. I mean within the strike zone. Some guys can only put a charge into the ball when it’s middle-middle. Some guys are low ball hitters. Others can do damage on pitches pretty much anywhere. Those guys are the very best hitters in the game, the ones who can make great contact anywhere in the zone.

For the purposes of this post, I’m going to consider a hard hit ball a fly ball or line drive with an exit velocity of at least 100 mph. Hitting the ball in the air is good, and 100 mph is a nice round number, so let’s go with that as our cutoff. Here’s where each 40-man roster member — not including Jake Cave, Thairo Estrada, Billy McKinney, and Gleyber Torres because they didn’t play in the big league last year — hit the ball the hardest last season. This post is image heavy, so everything is behind the jump.

[Read more…]

A Tepid Defense of Jacoby Ellsbury’s Place on the Roster

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(Getty Images)

We’re rapidly approaching the end of January, and Jacoby Ellsbury is still a Yankee. That’s not much of a surprise, given that he’s 34 years old and owed a minimum of $68.3 MM over the next three calendar years (including the buyout for 2021’s team option), but the vast majority of the team’s fans – and, one imagines, the front office – is disappointed. And, to be perfectly blunt, I count myself among those disappointed fans.

In trying to wrap my head around the increasing likelihood that Ellsbury is going to be donning the pinstripes in 2018, I began to realize that his presence on the roster is, in a vacuum, somewhat defensible; and for several reasons, at that.

1. Jacoby Ellsbury is not a complete sunk cost.

For all of the handwringing over Ellsbury’s awfulness, his actual performance in 2017 is perpetually overlooked. He batted .264/.348/.402 (101 wRC+) with 7 HR, 22 SB (3 CS), and 4.7 BsR (FanGraphs’ all-encompassing baserunning metric). That production came in just 409 PA, and his 4.7 BsR, which is a counting stat, ranked 18th in baseball. The league-average center-fielder hit .262/.333/.426 last year, which translates to a 101 wRC+ … which is right in-line with Ellsbury’s production.

Defense is another issue, of course. Both DRS (-3) and UZR (-3.7) saw him as a negative last year, but that was the first time those numbers agreed with each other in his Yankees tenure:

  • 2014: -3 DRS, 0.5 UZR
  • 2015: 1 DRS, -3.2 UZR
  • 2016: 8 DRS, 0.7 UZR
  • 2017: -3 DRS, -3.7 UZR

There’s a distinct possibility that Ellsbury’s defense took a legitimate tumble last season, given his age and the wear and tear on his body. At the same time, though, it wouldn’t be shocking if he was still an average defender in the position. Or, alternatively, if he could be something of an asset in the corners. What we do know is that, per Statcast, he isn’t slowing down.

The overarching point is simply this: he was surprisingly solid last year, and was really only truly bad in 2015.

2. The Yankees have injury concerns.

Aaron Hicks missed nearly half of 2017 with oblique injuries, and he missed time in 2014 and 2016 with assorted leg injuries (mostly involving his hamstrings). Aaron Judge battled a shoulder injury for the last third or so of 2017, and needed surgery to correct the issue after the season ended. Brett Gardner is almost always battling nagging injuries, and he’s actually a few weeks older than Ellsbury. Clint Frazier missed a month with an oblique injury. And Greg Bird (more on him to come) missed all of 2016 and the majority of 2017 with injuries.

And then there’s Giancarlo Stanton. My excitement over him being in pinstripes has yet to settle down, but the reality of his injury history is staggering. Sure, some of it can be chalked up to freak accidents – but last year was the first time since 2011 that he didn’t spend time on the disabled list, and it ended a stretch of three straight seasons that ended with a DL stint.

Ellsbury is no portrait of health, but the simple fact is that the Yankees were not a terribly healthy team last season, and the injury bug did hit their outfield.

3. There are four positions to fill in some combination.

Much of the off-season’s discussion has revolved around having five or six outfielders (Judge, Stanton, Hicks, Gardner, Ellsbury, and Frazier) for three spots. That’s not quite accurate, though, as the Yankees don’t have a designated hitter at this point in time. It’s true that Gardner and Ellsbury aren’t traditional DH’s, and you don’t want to lose defensive value by having a good defender DH – but somebody needs to start there.

And Bird’s injury history comes into play here, too. If the Yankees end up with semi-full-time DH, it’ll almost certainly be someone that can take over in the event of a Bird injury. There are still options out there, to be sure, but with the team clinging to the luxury tax plan it may behoove them to utilize what they have. Why not let Ellsbury take a whack at first base? He’s not a traditional fit, but the team isn’t exactly brimming with options otherwise.

Or, alternatively, if Judge or Stanton learns first and is needed there, there’d be an opening in the OF/DH rotation.

4. The other outfielders aren’t all sure things.

I’m a believer in Hicks, but he is far from a sure thing. His career has been incredibly up and down through five major-league seasons, and, again, he has had injury issues. Frazier is still essentially a rookie, and is entirely unproven. And, in a non-performance way, his apparent availability in trade talks coupled with his prospect shimmer make his place in the organization a bit less certain. We all know about Judge’s slump in the second-half, as well as the fact that he overachieved relative to all reasonable expectations last year. And Gardner is 34, and Stanton has his injury issues.

Ellsbury is obviously not a masterstroke of an insurance policy, but he is more than competent. And he’s already here. Which, well…

5. He’s already here.

Ellsbury is under contract with the Yankees. He probably isn’t going anywhere, because he’s not a hugely desirable asset and he has a no-trade clause and doesn’t seem to want to leave. And dead money kind of sucks, lest we forget the $5.5 MM they’re sending to the Astros for Brian McCann this year; and that may well be the difference between Yu Darvish and staying the course.

So, clearly, this is a massive exercise in playing devil’s advocate. This team would probably be better with Ellsbury gone and an extra $5 MM or so to play with this year, and there’s a real possibility that his absence wouldn’t be felt at all. And yet there is a distinct possibility that his small role on this team could turn into something larger, and he is capable of filling a major league role competently. Maybe that’s a good enough silver lining to stop worrying about pairing him with a real asset just to free up a bit of payroll space.

Saturday Links: Darvish, Ellsbury, Extended Netting

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Darvish. (Tom Pennington/Getty)

In five weeks and six days, the Yankees will host the Tigers for their Grapefruit League opener in Tampa. Less than six weeks until real live baseball is taking place. I can’t wait. Here are some bits of news to check out in the meantime.

Yankees among six finalists for Darvish

According to Jeff Wilson, the Yankees are one of five teams free agent right-hander Yu Darvish is still considering. It’s the Yankees, Astros, Cubs, Rangers, and Twins. On Twitter, Darvish said he is also considering a sixth team, so that’s fun. He’s been setting the record straight on rumors all offseason. My guess is the Dodgers are that sixth team, but who knows. Maybe it’s a surprise team like the Mariners or Angels.

The Yankees have been connected to Darvish for a few weeks now — Darvish confirmed they’ve made an offer — but unless he takes a deep discount, they won’t be able to fit him under the $197M luxury tax threshold. They have about $22M to spend, though the team needs to set some money aside for midseason additions. Adding Darvish would mean a Brett Gardner or David Robertson trade to free up payroll space, and even that would mean no money for anything else, like an infielder. I don’t see this happening. The Yankees are interested in Darvish because he’s really good, but realistically, the math doesn’t work.

Yankees willing to eat half Ellsbury’s contract

The Yankees are willing to eat half the $68.5M remaining on Jacoby Ellsbury’s contract to facilitate a trade, reports Jon Heyman. That would turn Ellsbury into an $11.4167M a year player. Do you think Ellsbury would get three years and $34.25M as a free agent this offseason? I mean, maybe, but probably not. The market is moving slow enough as it is, and the younger and better Jay Bruce just signed for three years and $39M. So yeah.

It is no secret the Yankees would love to unload Ellsbury, and reportedly he might be willing to waive his no-trade clause to join certain teams. Eating half his remaining contract probably won’t cut it. The Yankees will have to eat more. But, this is only a first offer. Start by saying you’ll eat half, then adjust as necessary. Don’t start out with your best offer because who knows, some team actually might take Ellsbury at $11.4167M a year. I wouldn’t hold my breath though.

Extended netting details announced

Back in October the Yankees announced they will “significantly” extend the protective netting at Yankee Stadium — it only took a little girl being hospitalized after taking a Todd Frazier line drive to the head — and earlier this week, the team announced the extent of the new netting. From the press release:

Netting attached to the roofs of both dugouts will extend to a height of nine feet above each dugout during games. The bottom portions of these nets will be upwardly retractable by up to three feet, allowing fans the opportunity to fully interact with players during batting practice when the protective batting cage is being employed around the home plate area of the field. Prior to the start of the game, the nets will connect to the dugout roof, where they will remain in place throughout the game.

Beyond the dugout, netting will extend to Section 011 on the first-base side and Section 029 on the third-base side. The netting in these locations will rise to eight feet above the playing field (approximately 5.5 feet above the wall surrounding the field of play), and will remain in place from the start of batting practice through the end of the game. These sections of netting may be removed for soccer matches or other events held at Yankee Stadium.

Dyneema fiber Ultra Cross 1.2 mm-wide knotless netting — the same as was used for Yankee Stadium backstop netting in 2017 — will be utilized for all netting in the 2018 season. Additionally, all netting will be “field green” in color to minimize its visible impact for those in attendance and viewers watching on television.

Here’s part of the image the team sent showing the extended netting:

(Yankees)

The Yankees say the extended netting will be in place for the start of the regular season. Also, the netting has been extended at George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa as well. That’ll be ready for the start of Spring Training. Good news. Extended netting has been long overdue around the league. Now, what about netting to protect fans in the bleachers from Giancarlo Stanton and Aaron Judge?

The four possible backup plans at first base behind Greg Bird

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(Abbie Parr/Getty)

One thing the Yankees have made clear over the years is that they love Greg Bird. Love him. Brian Cashman has said the Yankees internally rated him as their top prospect a few years ago, and on Opening Day last year, it was Bird who hit third in the lineup despite missing the entire 2016 season with shoulder surgery. Heck, during the postseason, Aaron Judge called Bird the team’s best hitter.

And really, what’s not to love (aside from the fact he is incredibly slow)? Bird turned only 25 in November and he returned from his ankle injury last year to hit .250/.355/.555 (~136 wRC+) with eleven home runs in 42 games between the regular season and postseason. He took lefty destroyer Andrew Miller deep in the postseason and hit six homers in the span of eleven regular season games at one point. Considering how much time he’d missed the last two years, that is a mighty fine showing.

But — there’s always a but, isn’t there? — Bird did miss all that time the last two years. He missed the entire 2016 regular season with shoulder surgery and missed a big chunk of last season with his ankle injury. The ankle injury was a fluke — it started when he fouled a pitch into the ankle at the very end of Spring Training– but the damage was done. Bird also missed time with back and shoulder trouble in the minors. Injuries have been a career-long problem.

Because of that, it stands to reason the Yankees will go into the 2018 season with some kind of first base backup plan in mind. The starting job is Bird’s. There’s no doubt about that. But what happens if Bird gets hurt again? It’s happened frequently enough that it is something the Yankees have to actively plan for. I see four potential first base backup plans, and, in theory, the Yankees could employ all four at some point.

1. Give Austin one last chance. The 2018 season will be Tyler Austin’s last chance to carve out a long-term role with the Yankees. It is his final minor league option year, so there is no going to the minors without waivers after this season. Austin has had his own injury issues over the years, and to date, his big league performance has been generally underwhelming: .236/.294/.447 (94 wRC+) in 136 plate appearances. Then again, that right field power.

Because this will be his final option year, the 2018 season is essentially the club’s last chance to find out whether Austin can hack at the big league level. Is he a viable platoon bat? A potential starter? Nothing more than a Quad-A up-and-down guy? Because he is already on the 40-man roster, Austin is the obvious in-house Plan B at first base behind Bird right now. The Yankees could simply stay with the status quo and pencil Austin in as Bird’s injury replacement, should he get hurt again.

2. Sign a bargain free agent. The Yankees did this last year with Chris Carter and it didn’t work out so well. Does that mean they should stop? Of course not. Keep signing 40-homer power dudes to cheap one-year contracts and eventually you’re going to strike gold. First base types are having a hard time getting paid these days, and the free agent market isn’t moving at all anyway, which means there will be several first base types looking for jobs in the days and weeks before Spring Training.

Among the unsigned free agent first basemen (not named Eric Hosmer) are Lucas Duda, Adrian Gonzalez, Adam Lind, Logan Morrison, Mike Napoli, and Mark Reynolds. Duda is familiar with New York. Lind and Morrison can fake the outfield. Reynolds can fake third base. Gonzalez is luxury tax plan friendly because he’ll only cost the pro-rated portion of the league minimum after being released. Napoli is a good clubhouse guy. There are cases to be made for and against each of those guys.

Signing a bargain free agent right before camp is a sound idea. The only real problem is a potential lack of roster flexibility. If the Yankees were to sign, say, Duda or Gonzalez, how do you squeeze two left-handed hitting first base only types on the roster? The Yankees already have five outfielders for three spots and will need some infield protection. Carrying Bird and another lefty hitting first baseman isn’t the best roster construction. So maybe that pushes the Yankees to Reynolds or (ugh) Napoli.

3. What about Stanton or Judge? Inevitable question is inevitable. Chances are both Giancarlo Stanton and Judge will finish their careers as first basemen. They’re physically huge and all that running around in the outfield is doing to do a number on their legs. At some point down the line, hopefully not until they’re in their 30s, both guys will have to transition to first base because their outfield defense won’t cut it. That’s usually how this goes.

Both Judge and Stanton were first basemen in high school — the Marlins turning two high school first basemen (Stanton and Christian Yelich) into above-average defensive outfielders is a hell of a player development success story — so it’s not like they have zero experience at the position, but playing first base in high school and playing first base in the big leagues are very, very, very different things. Receiving the throw from the other infielders is the easy part. Cutoff plays and positioning are where the learning curve comes into play.

Considering they play the same position and one guy will have to move elsewhere anyway, why not have Stanton or Judge learn first base? It seems simple enough. In Stanton’s case, I don’t think the Yankees want to overload him too much. He has to adjust to his new city and his new league and the new ballpark and all that. Stanton has enough on his plate already. Judge had offseason shoulder surgery — minor surgery, but still surgery — and has only one (great) year in the show. He’s still finding his way at this level.

Also, I don’t think the Yankees want to move either Stanton or Judge down the defensive spectrum yet. We have yet to see either guy play left field — my guess right now is Stanton will stay in right while Judge shifting to left, with necessary — and maybe one of them will be great in left. Or maybe they’re so bad in left that a move to first base makes sense. Stanton or Judge at first could be the best defensive alignment. I don’t think the Yankees will ask either to work out at first base yet, but it is definitely a possibility.

4. What about other guys with no obvious starting spot? Specifically Jacoby Ellsbury. He is at best fifth on the outfield depth chart right now. Give Ellsbury a first baseman’s mitt in camp and tell him you’re trying to find a way to get him in the lineup. Easy enough, right? The downside here is that Ellsbury derives most of his value from his defense these days. Move him from center to first and he might be straight replacement level given the offensive standard at the position. (First baseman collectively hit .265/.347/.487 in 2017.)

Now, that said, the Yankees might be stuck with Ellsbury. They’re trying to trade him, but right now, it doesn’t seem all that likely. Chances are Ellsbury will be on the roster this coming season, and in that case, asking him to learn first base would be a way to maximize his value to the team. Either Ellsbury could be the fifth outfielder, or he could be the fifth outfielder/backup first baseman. That’s how he would be most valuable to the Yankees.

* * *

Behind Austin, the next natural first baseman on the depth chart is Ryan McBroom, who came over in the Rob Refsnyder trade last year. He hit .247/.323/.395 (98 wRC+) in 134 Double-A games as a 25-year-old last season. McBroom isn’t a big league option at the moment, to put it kindly. There’s also Billy McKinney, who started working out at first base in the Arizona Fall League. He has eleven games of experience at the position. With Mike Ford a (temporary?) Seattle Mariner, the first base depth chart is:

  1. Greg Bird
  2. Tyler Austin
  3. ???

Last week we heard the Yankees have made an offer to Ji-Man Choi, so we know they’re looking for some first base depth. Lower cost first base depth at that. That seems like the most likely outcome to me. The Yankees import a first baseman on a minor league deal, either Choi or someone like that, then go into the season with Bird as the starter and Austin as the primary backup plan, with he free agent signing the backup backup plan. I don’t think they’ll spend limited payroll dollars on another first baseman, even a cheap one a la Carter last year.

In a perfect world, Bird will stay healthy this coming season and join Stanton, Judge, and Gary Sanchez to form the most devastating lineup foursome since … I don’t even know. The 2009 Phillies were the last team with four 30+ homer guys (Ryan Howard, Chase Utley, Jayson Werth, Raul Ibanez), so I guess them? Whatever it is, hopefully Bird stays healthy and rakes. But because he’s had serious injury problems the last few years, the Yankees have to go into 2018 with a Plan B at first base in place.

Hot Stove Notes: Fulmer, Archer, Ellsbury, Longoria

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(Elsa/Getty)
(Elsa/Getty)

The hot stove has slowed to a crawl during the holidays, as it always does. Things will pick up after New Years. It has to, right? So many top free agents remain unsigned, and there are some big name trade chips still waiting to be had. Anyway, here are some bits of news and notes to check out.

Yankees made offers for Fulmer, Archer

According to Bill Brink, the Yankees made trade offers for Michael Fulmer and Chris Archer, which were rejected by the Tigers and Rays, respectively. The offers are said to be on par with what the Yankees are offering the Pirates for Gerrit Cole, so I guess that means Clint Frazier plus other stuff? Both Fulmer (five years) and Archer (four years) come with more control than Cole (two years).

I wonder how seriously the Yankees pursued Fulmer and Archer, both of whom I prefer to Cole. Were they cursory “here’s an offer what do you think?” offers, or were there counteroffers and continued negotiations? I guess it’s possible the Tigers are holding out for Gleyber Torres given Fulmer’s five years of control, and an intradivision trade with the Rays may be too complicated, so any talks with those teams could have ended quickly.

Yankees tried to engage Giants on Ellsbury

The Yankees recently tried to engage the Giants on Jacoby Ellsbury, reports Jon Heyman. San Francisco is looking at other (i.e. better) outfield options first. They’ve been linked to Jay Bruce a bunch in recent weeks. We recently heard Ellsbury might be willing to waive his no-trade clause for select teams, including possibly the Giants. Supposedly Ellsbury wants to stay with the Yankees, but who knows.

I get the sense that, if an Ellsbury trade does go down, it won’t happen until late in the offseason, after free agents like Lorenzo Cain, Carlos Gomez, Jon Jay, Jarrod Dyson, and Austin Jackson sign. Any teams that miss out on those guys could then shift focus to Ellsbury and see how much the Yankees are willing to eat. The problem with an Ellsbury trade taking place late in the offseason is the Yankees won’t know whether they’ll have any extra money to spend under the luxury tax threshold. They have to plan as if Ellsbury will be on the roster in 2018.

Yankees had interest in Longoria

According to Marc Topkin, the Yankees were one of many teams with interest in Evan Longoria before he was traded to the Giants. It’s unclear whether the two sides actually talked about a trade at some point. Longoria is owed $86M from 2018-22, though he would only count as $11.1653M against the luxury tax payroll given the timing of the two team friendly extensions he signed way back when.

I know the Yankees have an opening at third base, but I have to say, I would not have liked a Longoria pickup at all. He just turned 32 and he hit .261/.313/.424 (96 wRC+) in 2017. He’s hit .265/.325/.457 (113 wRC+) in over 3,400 plate appearances dating back to Opening Day 2013. Longoria’s best years are behind him. The Yankees don’t need to trade prospects and take on salary for a guy like that. What are the odds Miguel Andujar outproduces Longoria from 2018-22? Better than I think most people realize And I’m talking on the field only. Once you factor in salary, forget it.