Sunday, July 1, 2012

New York Yankees upgrades at the Trade deadline

Well the Yankees rotation took a terrible blow by losing CC Sabathia and Andy Pettitte with Pettitte being out until September. That being said the Yankees have enough rotation depth that losing Sabathia in the short term and Pettitte in the long term will not impact them terribly as they can fill the hole with Garcia and Phelps depending on who does better. With the struggles of Corey Wade the Yankees could target a bullpen piece but they do have some good pieces in AAA if they give up on him and I doubt they will make a significant move for a bullpen piece, especially with Joba and David Aardsma on their way back. If they do feel the need to get a starter than i expect they will target middle of the pack types like Ryan Depster or Bartolo Colon. The offense is also something that the Yankees cannot really change unless Gardner is going to be out longer and then they will probably target a player that could fill in for Swisher next year too but that is not the case as of now.
The biggest note going into the trade deadline is that Derek Jeter has batted .232 in June and has only had five extra base hits and the reason goes beyond a slowdown from a hot start, its also the fact that Jeter has had to play shortstop in 62 of the teams 71 games which is not something that the 38 year old should be doing. The Yankees demoted Eduardo Nunez because of his poor defense and they are feeling the repercussions of it now as they do not trust Jayson Nix to play shortstop even once a week which is what they really need.What this really means is that the only real upgrade that I think the Yankees need to look at is their bench and they do need a better player than Jayson Nix. Its not that Jayson Nix has been that bad its just that he can't really play shortstop and so Derek Jeter has been wearing down as a result. This may not seem like a big deal but We have all seen how Jeter has been wearing down and the Yankees have made it clear that they aren't going to use Nunez in a utility role right now. If they change their mind and Nunez can be decent defensively then that problem solved, but I really doubt that they will. The problem is that the Yankees obviously want a guy who can use the bat or else Ramiro Pena would be up but guys who can hit and are good defensively are generally starting shortstops. A couple names that jump out to me are Wilson Valdez of the Reds, Irving Falu of the Royals and Jonathan Herrera of the Rockies. However I doubt that Wilson Valdez will be available unless the Reds make a move because he has been getting a lot of at bats from Dusty Baker.
I would expect that Falu and Herrera would both warrant similar packages and they would probably be a pitcher and a replacement bench player like Kevin Russo, Ramiro Pena or Jayson Nix. I do not know if either Herrera or Falu is available but the Yankees do need to try and upgrade Nix because they need Jeter to be better and he can only do that if he gets regular rest.

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