Once one of the most feared hitting catchers in baseball, Gary Sanchez appears to be wearing out his welcome with the New York Yankees.
According to Dan Martin, Ken Davidoff and Joel Sherman of the New York Post, the Yankees are at least open to a possible Sanchez trade. The team is willing to listen to offers for the catcher, though the team is unwilling to get rid of him for whatever it can get.
Sanchez has never been a great defensive catcher, which is what made his offensive numbers cratering such a concern in 2020. He hit just .147, and was replaced as starting catcher by Kyle Higashioka once the team made the playoffs.
The Yankees would be selling low on the 27-year-old catcher. Still, he’d likely attract interest, as he has a solid record of hitting for power and being a dangerous hitter. It wasn’t that long ago that the Yankees were actually rebuffing trade interest in him.
Marcus Stroman will be one of the top starting pitchers available on the free agent market this offseason, and it remains to be seen whether opting out of the 2020 MLB season will hurt his value. As you might expect, the right-hander remains as confident as ever in his ability.
Barstool Sports baseball writer Jared Carrabis predicted in a tweet on Wednesday that Stroman is going to wind up being the steal of the offseason for some team. One of Carrabis’ followers then said he believes Stroman will sign with the Yankees. Carrabis pointed out that Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said at the trade deadline last year that he does not believe Stroman is a difference-maker.
Stroman caught wind of the exchange and chimed in. The 29-year-old criticized the Yankees for having a massive payroll and a staff loaded with pitchers who don’t perform when it matters.
Stroman said Cole is the only pitcher on the Yankees’ staff who has a chance of out-performing him in the coming years. He then added Luis Severino to the mix and said Severino is “unreal” when healthy.
As for whether or not he would sign with the Yankees, Stroman said he doesn’t hold grudges.
Stroman was supposedly hoping for a trade to the Yankees last year, but he wound up with the New York Mets. He may feel differently after Cashman said Stroman would probably be a bullpen arm in the postseason, but money talks. The Yankees could quickly change their stance and blow other offers away, which they have done countless times in the past.
Stroman has never been afraid to speak his mind, so it’s no surprise he was critical of the Yankees for underachieving.
The MLB community lost another legend on Friday, as former New York Yankees pitcher Whitey Ford has died.
Ford, who pitched in the majors for 16 seasons, was 91. The Yankees shared the news on Twitter.
Ford was born in New York City and won six World Series titles with the team, so it goes without saying that he was a fan favorite. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1974 and had his No. 16 jersey retired by the Yankees the same year.
Ford finished with a career record of 236-106. He was 10-8 with a 2.71 ERA in the postseason and set a record with a stretch of 33 1/3 consecutive shutout innings in the playoffs.
Trevor Bauer will be one of the top free agents available this offseason, and he is already doing his best to create a market for himself.
The NL Cy Young Award favorite sent a tweet on Wednesday night after seeing the New York Yankees lose Game 3 of their ALDS with the Tampa Bay Rays 8-4. Bauer thinks the Yankees could use a pitcher like him.
He’s not wrong.
Masahiro Tanaka allowed five runs in four-plus innings on Wednesday. Aaron Boone pulled Deivi Garcia after just one inning against Tampa Bay on Tuesday and went to J.A. Happ, who allowed four runs and took the loss. Gerrit Cole, the team’s big free agent signing last offseason, delivered with a win in Game 1.
Jordan Montgomery is scheduled to start in Game 4. James Paxton is the team’s other starter, but he has been out since August with an elbow injury.
Bauer is right; the Yankees could use some ace-level pitching. Bauer went 5-4 with a 1.73 ERA this season and pitched 7.2 scoreless innings in the postseason for the Reds. He has said he will only sign one-year deals.
It’s obvious that the 29-year-old free agent is willing to sign with just about anyone.
Sports categories tend to be some of the most difficult for “Jeopardy!” contestants to conquer, and we saw yet another example of that with the episode of the long-running game show that aired on Thursday night.
The latest episode of “Jeopardy!” had a category that was dedicated to the New York Yankees. Things got off to a simple enough start with a clue about Babe Ruth, but it quickly went downhill from there. Let’s just say none of the three contestants studied their Bronx Bombers history before going on the show.
Those clues weren’t exactly simple, but you would think even casual baseball fans could piece together one or two of them. That was not the case with this trio.
When you consider that even Alex Trebek has zinged “Jeopardy!” contestants in the past over their lack of sports knowledge, the Yankees debacle is not exactly a surprise.
Aaron Judge had a blunt and savage comment about the New York Yankees’ performance in Game 1 of the AL Wild Card Series against the Cleveland Indians on Tuesday.
The Yankees handed Shane Bieber his worst outing of the season, tagging him for seven runs over 4.2 innings. Judge smacked a 2-run home run off Bieber as the second batter of the game.
The Yankees hit four home runs in all.
“We got mistakes and we didn’t miss them. Those mistakes, you got to do damage on them,” Judge said after the game.
Their hitters didn’t miss much. Even Giancarlo Stanton, who began the game 0-for-4 with two strikeouts, homered in the ninth. Judge said that the team did a lot of video studying of Bieber and that helped prepare them.
The Wild Card Series is a best-of-3 affair, meaning the Yankees just need to win one of the next two games to advance to the ALDS. Game 2 will be on Wednesday.
The Tampa Bay Rays are definitely not apologizing for antagonizing their AL East division rivals.
During a virtual media session on Wednesday, Rays pitcher Charlie Morton showed off a T-shirt that he and some other teammates were wearing. The shirt depicted several horses in a stable. It was an obvious reference to Rays manager Kevin Cash’s remarks towards the New York Yankees earlier this month when Aroldis Chapman nearly hit Rays infielder Mike Brosseau in the head with a pitch. An angered Cash said afterwards that “I have a whole damn stable of guys who throw 98 mph.”
Here is a look at the shirt:
Yankees manager Aaron Boone rebuked the comment from Cash at the time. It is clear though that the Rays are really doubling down now. The timing could not be better either with Tampa on the cusp of clinching the division.
Tampa Bay Rays manager Kevin Cash seemingly issued a threat toward the New York Yankees following a heated game on Tuesday night, and Aaron Boone did not appreciate it.
Benches cleared with two outs in the ninth inning of New York’s win over the Rays when Aroldis Chapman nearly hit Tampa infielder Mike Brosseau in the head with a 100-mph fastball. Cash was furious, and he ripped Boone and the Yankees after the game.
“It’s poor judgment, poor coaching, it’s just poor teaching what they’re doing,” Cash said. “The chirping from the dugout — somebody would have to tell me who’s hit who more, but I can assure you other than three years ago there hasn’t been one pitch thrown with intent from any of our guys, period. Somebody’s gotta be accountable. The last thing I’ll say on it is I have a whole damn stable of guys who throw 98 mph.”
The Yankees felt earlier in the season that the Rays were intentionally throwing up and in on them. Cash believed what happened on Tuesday was a response to that. Boone didn’t say much about the situation, but he condemned Cash’s “whole stable of guys who throw 98 mph” comment.
The Yankees are 3.5 games behind Tampa in the AL East following Tuesday’s win. While Boone wasn’t anywhere near as fired up as we saw him during a game against the Rays last year, the ongoing feud is worth watching.
The Boston Red Sox have won more World Series than any MLB team since 2000 — including a recent win in 2018 — but the New York Yankees have owned them lately.
The Yankees beat the Red Sox 11-5 on Saturday, dropping the rebuilding Sox to 6-15.
As The Boston Globe’s Pete Abraham pointed out, the Yankees have now won eight in a row against Boston, which is the longest streak since 1985. Additionally, the Yankees have won 13 of the last 14 games between the teams.
The Yankees won on Friday 10-3 and swept the Red Sox in a three-game series earlier this year.
Boston won World Series in 2004, 2007, 2013 and 2018, eliminating the Yankees from the postseason in 2004 and 2018, so they’re probably hardly fretting. In fact, they have had the ultimate edge in recent history. But the Yankees have really been pounding on them lately.
Longtime New York Yankees radio voice John Sterling spent several days in the hospital recently, but he is expecting to return to work at some point this week.
Sterling told Andrew Marchand of the New York Post that he was hospitalized for four days due to an infection in his blood. The 82-year-old said the infection fortunately did not reach his heart and that “everything is cool” now.
Sterling, who also tested negative for COVID-19 during his hospital stay, is planning to return to work either Tuesday or Wednesday, which would be in the middle of the Yankees’ series against the Philadelphia Phillies. He said he believes he would feel well enough to return Tuesday but may just wait until Wednesday with rain in the forecast for Tuesday, anyway. WFAN could also insist he take more time off to recover.
Marchand noted that Sterling sounded as though he was in good spirits. The longtime announcer has been doing the radio play-by-play work for the Yankees for more than 30 years. He took time off last year for the first time since 1989 because of some health issues. Fans of the Bronx Bombers will be happy to hear him back on the airwaves.
