NY Yankees News, Information & Community

DotF: Gary Sanchez goes deep in rehab game with Scranton

August 27, 2018 by Mike Leave a Comment

Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders (9-6 win over Lehigh Valley in ten innings)

CF Tyler Wade: 1-5, 1 K
C Gary Sanchez: 2-4, 1 R, 1 HR, 1 RBI, 1 K — here’s video of the home run and here’s video of the single … he caught seven innings as scheduled … he’s going to DH tomorrow, catch a full nine innings Wednesday and Thursday, then be reevaluated
1B Ryan McBroom: 0-3, 2 R, 1 BB, 2 K,1 HBP
DH Mike Ford: 3-5, 1 R, 2 2B, 3 RBI — 9-for-19 (.474) with four doubles, one homer, three walks, and no strikeouts in his last five games
PR-DH Quintin Berry: 0-0, 1 R — the Yankees signed him today and it sure looks like they’re preparing him for September pinch-running duty
SS Gio Urshela: 1-4, 1 2B, 1 RBI, 1 K — Berry needing a 40-man roster spot probably doesn’t bode well for Urshela’s chances at a September call-up
LHP Nestor Cortes: 5 IP, 6 H, 6 R, 6 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, 1 HR, 4/5 GB/FB — 63 of 100 pitches were strikes … had allowed four runs total in his previous four starts and 25.1 innings

Game 131: Start of the Homestand

August 27, 2018 by Mike Leave a Comment

Welcome back to the Bronx. The Yankees won five times during their just completed six-game road trip and now they’re back at Yankee Stadium to begin their second-to-last homestand of the season. Kinda sucks, doesn’t it? It feels like the season started just yesterday, yet here we are, at the penultimate homestand of the year.

Well, anyway, the Jose Abreu-less White Sox are in town for a three-game series, and Masahiro Tanaka will be on the mound tonight to get things started. Tanaka has a 2.70 ERA (4.17 FIP) in his last eleven starts and 63.2 innings, you know. Home runs are still a problem (1.70 HR/9), but everything else has been great. I am looking forward to another strong Tanaka outing tonight. Here are the lineups:

New York Yankees
1. CF Aaron Hicks
2. DH Giancarlo Stanton
3. 3B Miguel Andujar
4. 1B Luke Voit
5. SS Gleyber Torres
6. RF Neil Walker
7. C Kyle Higashioka
8. 2B Ronald Torreyes
9. LF Shane Robinson

RHP Masahiro Tanaka

Chicago White Sox
1. 3B Yolmer Sanchez
2. SS Tim Anderson
3. RF Avisail Garcia
4. DH Daniel Palka
5. 1B Matt Davidson
6. C Omar Narvaez
7. 2B Yoan Moncada
8. LF Nicky Delmonico
9. CF Adam Engel

LHP Carlos Rodon

It has been a hot and humid day in New York. It dipped down into the 80-ish degree range last week and I thought the worst of summer was over, but lol nope. Hot and sticky again. Tonight’s game will begin at 7:05pm ET and you can watch on YES locally and ESPN out-of-market. Enjoy the game.

Injury Updates: Happy one month anniversary of Aaron Judge (wrist) being placed on the disabled list. He still hasn’t started swinging a bat. Remember when the Yankees said he’d return to game action in three weeks? … Didi Gregorius (heel) hit in the cage today but he has not yet started running at full speed. He’s making progress and will see the doctor for a checkup tonight … Gary Sanchez (groin) is with Triple-A Scranton and will catch seven innings tonight, DH tomorrow, then catch a full nine innings Wednesday and Thursday. He’ll be reevaluated after that.

Yankees sign Quintin Berry to minor league contract

August 27, 2018 by Mike Leave a Comment

Looks like the Yankees have their designated September pinch-runner. The Yankees have signed speedy outfielder Quintin Berry to a minor league contract and assigned him to Triple-A Scranton, the team announced. The Brewers released him four days ago and he is not on the 40-man roster.

Berry, 33, spent most of the season in Triple-A with the Brewers, where he hit .214/.290/.321 (32 wRC+) in 42 games and 93 plate appearances. He did steal ten bases in eleven attempts though. Berry is a career .262/.333/.364 (93 wRC+) hitter at the big league level in 345 plate appearances. He’s 29-for-31 in stolen base attempts and started his MLB career with 25 straight successful steal attempts.

Because Berry signed before August 31st, he will be eligible for the postseason roster, even if he’s not called up until September 1st. Jacoby Ellsbury’s injury gives the Yankees a position player exemption for the postseason roster. If the Yankees carry Berry on their postseason roster, he would, technically, be Ellsbury’s injury replacement. Don’t look at me. I don’t make the rules.

It should be noted Berry has experience in this designated pinch-runner role. He did it for the 2012 Tigers, 2013 Red Sox, and 2015 Cubs. I’m sure he’s not as fast as he was in his 20s, but he knows the role and has experience in it. That’s a plus. I thought the Yankees would go with Tyler Wade as their late-season pinch-runner, but it looks like it’ll be Berry.

8/27 to 8/29 Series Preview: Chicago White Sox

August 27, 2018 by Steven Tydings Leave a Comment

Adam Engel is here to rob all of your home runs. (David Banks/Getty Images)

One can truly tell the season is approaching its conclusion when you get to the penultimate homestand of the year. The Yankees host two rebuilding AL Central teams this week, beginning with the Chicago White Sox.

The Last Time They Met

The Bombers are just three weeks removed from sweeping the South Siders at Guaranteed Rate Field on Aug. 6-8.

Lance Lynn dominated the White Sox in his first Yankee start, helping to end a five-game losing streak for New York.
The Yankees needed extra innings and a solid relief appearance from Sonny Gray to escape with a win in Game 2. Giancarlo Stanton and Miguel Andujar provided the heroics on offense.
Stanton’s grand slam buoyed the Yankees to a sweep while Luis Severino went seven strong for a quality start.
The Yankees would have had a much easier time if Adam Engel didn’t take away multiple home runs.

For more information, check out Katie’s Yankeemetrics post on that series.

Injury Report

The big news since last time is that Jose Abreu, the White Sox’s lone All Star, underwent abdominal surgery and is out until September. OF Leury Garcia also suffered a hamstring injury that could finish off his season.

Their Story So Far

The White Sox remain mired in fourth place at 51-79, matching their Pythagorean record. They’re in the middle part of a rebuild, no longer at the nadir of trading all assets and not yet in a place to contend. They have plenty of talent in the minor leagues as well as some fledgling former prospects working to make it in the majors, but Chicago is still a few years from seeing a second contending team within city limits.

Lineup We Might See

1. 3B Yolmer Sanchez (.245/.312/.381, 90 wRC+)
2. SS Tim Anderson (.247/.293/.417, 91 wRC+)
3. RF Avisail Garcia (.235/.267/.437, 87 wRC+)
4. DH Daniel Palka (.239/.282/.478, 102 wRC+)
5. 1B Matt Davidson (.228/.324/.450, 112 wRC+)
6. C Omar Narvaez (.284/.378/.436, 127 wRC+)
7. 2B Yoan Moncada (.221/.303/.396, 91 wRC+)
8. LF Nicky Delmonico (.229/.319/.410, 100 wRC+)
9. CF Adam Engel (.234/.277/.345, 70 wRC+)

Expect Anderson in the leadoff spot when CC Sabathia starts Wednesday while former Twins OF Ryan LaMarre could find his way into the lineup as well.

The Starting Pitchers We Will See

Monday (7:05 PM ET): RHP Masahiro Tanaka vs. LHP Carlos Rodon
After battling injuries and high expectations for years, Carlos Rodon — the 2014 No. 3 overall pick — is starting to find a groove in his fourth season. In each of eight starts since the start of July, he’s tossed at least six innings while giving up no more than three runs. In fact, he’s only given up more than two runs once while going seven or more innings in five of the eight outings.

Interestingly, his K-BB rate has declined this season, but he’s held opponents to a .183 batting average while cutting his home run rate significantly. He has a 64 ERA- but a 100 FIP-.

Rodon works off a 93-mph fastball with an effective mid-80s slider he throws a fourth of the time and a changeup he goes to as a third offering.

Last Outing (vs. MIN on Aug. 22) – 6.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 3 BB, 5 K, 1 HR

Tuesday (7:05 PM ET): RHP Lance Lynn vs. RHP James Shields
Big Game James! James Shields was one of the worst pitchers in the American League in 2016-17, but he’s been a more average-ish workhorse this year. Still not worth trading Fernando Tatis Jr. for, but much more effective. He’s cut down on walks and home runs and sports a 4.59 ERA, much better than his 5.99 ERA as a Chicago pitcher before this season.

Shields uses his high-80s fastball a third of the time while working in a cutter, curveball and changeup each at least 18 percent. Only his changeup has a positive pitch value on Fangraphs, though his fastball hasn’t been quite the negative as it was in the past.

Last Outing (@ DET on Aug. 23) – 6.2 IP, 10 H, 7 R, 1 BB, 5 K, 3 HR

Wednesday (7:05 PM ET): LHP CC Sabathia vs. RHP Reynaldo Lopez
In a rematch of earlier this month, Reynaldo Lopez will face the task of staring down the veteran Sabathia. The young righty no-hit the Yankees until the sixth inning on Aug. 7 and allowed just one run over seven innings. However, since that start, he hasn’t completed six innings and has been lit up by the Tigers and Royals over three starts to the tune of a .321/.383/.566 batting line. Yikes.

Lopez works off his mid-90s fastball while going to a mid-80s slider and mid-80s changeup. He’ll also throw an occasional slow curve.

Last Outing (@ DET on Aug. 24) – 5.2 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 3 BB, 7 K

The Bullpen

The White Sox traded Luis Avilan to the Phillies last week, which means they are short another veteran arm in their pen. Still, the White Sox’s bullpen is much more respectable than you might expect. Here are their numbers since the All-Star break.

4.56 ERA (21st in MLB)
3.87 FIP (8th in MLB)
1.1 WAR (9th in MLB)
25.7% K rate (6th in MLB)
10.0% BB rate (24th in MLB)
0.99 HR/9 (6th in MLB)

LHP Jace Fry has picked up Chicago’s last two saves, but it seems to be more of a closer-by-committee situation. Fellow southpaws Hector Santiago and Xavier Cedeno get plenty of appearances, as do righties Juan Minaya and Jeanmar Gomez.

Yankees Connection

Only Yankees connection on the 40-man roster is Ian Clarkin, who was part of the Robertson-Kahnle-Frazier deal last season.

Who (Or What) to Watch?

Rodon has the ability to electrify, but the Yankees are quite competent against left-handed pitching, even without Aaron Judge and Gary Sanchez. The matchup between Rodon and Stanton should be fun.
Can Engel stop robbing everyone’s homers? Please and thank you.

Yanks reportedly place Andujar, Bird, Hicks on trade waivers

August 27, 2018 by Mike Leave a Comment

Hicks and Andujar. (Patrick McDermott/Getty)

According to George King, the Yankees placed Miguel Andujar, Greg Bird, and Aaron Hicks on revocable trade waivers last Thursday. This is the first bit of Yankees’ trade waiver news reported this month. I’m certain several other Yankees have passed through waivers already. We just don’t know about it.

Trade waivers are necessary to complete trades following the July 31st deadline. Here’s a real quick primer on trade waivers:

All 40-man roster players must go through trade waivers to be traded after July 31st. Non-40-man players can be traded at any time. They don’t require waivers.
Players claimed on trade waivers can only be traded to the claiming team within 48 hours of the claim. Players who go unclaimed can be traded anywhere the rest of the season.
Trade waivers are revocable. If a player is claimed, his team can pull him back and keep him.

Why place Andujar, Bird, and Hicks on trade waivers? Well, why not? There’s no risk — again, if a player is claimed, his team can pull him back — and it allows the Yankees to gauge interest in their players. Also, teams flood the market with players to “hide” the guys they want to/are willing to trade. A claim limits the market. Teams want their players to clear to give them more potential trade options.

Being placed on trade waivers last Thursday means the waiver period has already expired for Andujar, Bird, and Hicks. They’ve either cleared or been claimed and pulled back at this point. The 48-hour window to work out a trade would have expired already (I think). Even if the Yankees have soured on Bird and are open to moving him, doing it in August would be tough. That’s a move that was always going to wait until the offseason.

The deadline to acquire players and have them be postseason eligible is 11:59pm ET on August 31st and that is a hard deadline with no loopholes. Four days remain to swing a deal for a postseason-eligible player. Andujar, Bird, and Hicks have already gone through the trade waiver process. Surely other Yankees have as well. Now it’s just a question of whether the Yankees swing a deal to address their outfield (and first base) need.

Yankeemetrics: Brooms alive, Yankees sweep O’s (Aug. 24-26)

August 27, 2018 by Katie Sharp Leave a Comment

Luuuuuuuuuuuke!
The Yankees opened the series in Baltimore with a comeback win in 10 innings on Friday night. It was their first extra-inning win at Camden Yards in more than five years — since May 20, 2013 — after losing their previous four matchups there that went to overtime.

The victory improved the Yankees extra-inning record this season to 8-5, their most extra-inning wins since 2001 (8-8). It also was their eighth win when trailing at the start of the eighth inning, matching their win total from last year, and tied for the second-most in MLB this season (only the A’s had more through Friday).

The Yankees clawed back twice from a two-run deficit to win the game. The first rally was capped by a two-run bomb in the fourth inning from Luke Voit, his first homer as a Yankee. Voit boosted his pinstriped legend status with another two-run dinger in the 10th for his first career multi-homer game. Both the homers came off righties — prior to Friday, Voit had just two homers in 102 plate appearances against right-handed pitchers in his big-league career.

After the Orioles re-took the lead in the seventh, Gleyber Torres responded with a clutch, game-tying two-run single in the top of the eighth. It was his second hit this year in the eighth inning or later that tied the game; he is the only Yankee with multiple hits like that this season.

Neil Walker capped the second comeback with a solo homer in the 10th inning, and combined with Voit’s bomb in that same inning, it was the second game this season that the Yankees hit two or more homers in the 10th inning or later (also on June 6 at Toronto). #FunFact: The last time that the Yankees had two different games in a season where they smacked multiple extra-inning homers was 1941.

#TooManyHomers, It’s a Happ-y Day
A winning streak against a bad team? Yes! The Yankees clobbered the Orioles in the first game of Saturday’s doubleheader, hammering four homers en route to a 10-3 win. It was their MLB-leading 13th game this season with at least four homers; no other team had more than eight such games entering the weekend.

Miguel Andujar kicked off the home run derby with a go-ahead three-run blast in the third inning. It was his 21st of the season and 10th that either tied the game or gave the Yankees the lead. He is the youngest Yankee with at least 10 go-ahead/game-tying homers in a season since a 23-year-old Don Mattingly hit 11 in 1984.

J.A. Happ continued his outstanding run with the Yankees, winning for the fifth time in five starts as he delivered a strong six-inning, two-run effort. He now has a 2.37 in his five starts since joining the team, after posting a 6.65 ERA in his final five starts with the Blue Jays. As we always do, let’s celebrate Happ’s first month in pinstripes with a trio of #FunFacts:

First left-hander to win each of his first five games with the Yankees since Babe Ruth, who appeared in five games (four starts) for the franchise from 1920-33 and won all five games … with a 5.52 ERA.
First pitcher to both start and earn the win in each of his first five appearances as a Yankee since Bob Turley in 1955.
And finally, Happ is the first pitcher in franchise history to start in each of his first five games as Yankee, and get a win in each of those games while allowing no more than three earned runs.

Forever Sonny in Baltimore
The Yankees won 5-1 in the nightcap of Saturday’s twinbill, the first time they took both games of a doubleheader since April 16, 2014 against the Cubs at Yankee Stadium. That snapped a streak of 10 straight doubleheaders either split or lost, their longest drought since 1969-70 (14 straight).

You have to go back seven more years to find the last time the Yankees swept a doubleheader on the road — May 3, 2007 at Texas. And the last time they won both games of a twinbill at Camden Yards? July 13, 1996.

Sonny Gray, making his first start since getting demoted to the bullpen, pitched a gem as he threw 6 1/3 scoreless innings while striking out seven and allowing just three hits. If that type of performance by Gray against the Orioles in Baltimore sounds familiar … well, there’s this stat to consider:

Sonny Gray in 4 starts at Camden Yards as a Yankee:

24 IP
0.38 ERA
26 K
4 BB

— Katie Sharp (@ktsharp) August 26, 2018

That’s four straight starts at Camden Yards with no more than one run allowed, the longest such streak since Pedro Martinez had a similar stretch from 2000-02. And going back further to his last start there with the A’s, it’s five straight starts at Camden Yards with no more than one earned run allowed, the longest streak by any pitcher in the history of the ballpark.

Tommy Kahnle couldn’t close out the game as the Orioles pounded him in the bottom of the ninth, so Dellin Betances came to the rescue and struck out Caleb Joseph for the final out. It was Betances’ 33rd straight game with a strikeout, the longest such streak by a reliever in AL history (previous record of 32 was set by Jeff Montgomery in 1989). The MLB record is 49 by Aroldis Chapman with the Reds from 2013-14.

Louisssssssssssssssss!
The Yankees continued their newfound skill of beating up on bad teams as they finished off the series sweep with a 5-3 win on Sunday night. It’s their first four-game sweep of the Orioles in nearly 13 years — since September 19-22, 2005 (in New York) — and their first four-game sweep of the O’s in Baltimore since August 14-17, 2003. They’ve now won 17 of their last 21 games against sub-.500 teams.

The Yankees again jumped out to an early lead thanks to a two-run homer in the second inning by Luke Voit. It was his third homer in the last three games, after hitting five in his first 77 career major-league games. He added two singles for his second three-hit game of the series. If you’re curious, Greg Bird also has two career three-hit games (none this year) …

Luke Voit: 3+ hits in 2 of last 3 games.

Voit had 0 career games with 3+ hits before August 24.

— Katie Sharp (@ktsharp) August 27, 2018

The scorching-hot Miguel Andujar made it a 4-0 cushion with a two-RBI double in the third, his 60th extra-base hit of the season. He is the seventh Yankee age 23 or younger with 60 or more extra-base hits in a season. This is a decent list to be on:

Miguel Andujar (2018)
Don Mattingly (1984)
Mickey Mantle (1952, ’55)
Joe DiMaggio (1936-38)
Ben Chapman (1932)
Lou Gehrig (1926)
Tony Lazzeri (1926)

Andujar finished 3-for-5 with two RBIs on Sunday night; he now has at least two hits in 45 of his 124 career games. The last Yankee to pile up 45 multi-hit games this early into his major-league career was Phil Rizzuto (48 in 124 games) in 1941.

David Robertson pitched a clean ninth inning for the save, the fourth different pitcher to save a game during the weekend sweep (Luis Cessa, Zach Britton, Dellin Betances are the others). Obscure Stat Alert! Since saves became official in 1969, this is the first time that the Yankees have won four straight games with a different pitcher earning the save in each game.

Fan Confidence Poll: August 27th, 2018

August 27, 2018 by Mike Leave a Comment

Record Last Week: 5-1 (32 RS, 22 RA)
Season Record: 83-47 (679 RS, 521 RA, 80-50 expected record), 6.0 GB in ALE, +9.5 GU for WC spot
Schedule This Week: Three games vs. White Sox (Mon. to Tues.); Four games vs. Tigers (Thurs. to Sun.)