SSTN Mailbag: The Bullpen, Bench, And Untouchables!

I suppose that I should consider myself lucky. I've been traveling through Italy this week for work, and I've had almost zero time to obsess about the Yankees and baseball more generally. Normally, that would upset me, but given the way the Yankees continue to play overall, I'm not upset that I've missed the swoon.

I did, however, see the little bit between Jazz Chisholm, umpire Mark Wegner, and Jose Trevino. I love Jazz Chisholm and almost everything he brings to the team. He's one of the guys that makes this team watchable, and since coming off of the IL, you could make the argument that he's been the best player on the Yankees, which is incredible on a team that also employs Aaron Judge. I will also agree with the reason behind Chisholm's ire: Wegner called two balls at the shins strikes on Chisholm in a critical at-bat, and it changed the complexion of the game.

Now that I've gotten the disclaimers out of the way, Chisholm's ejection was not a good look. I don't care that Jose Trevino got Wegner's attention between innings. Jose Trevino's job is to help his team win. He knows Chisholm from last season, knew he was hot, and made fire out of a spark. That's fair game.

Jazz Chisholm also needs to be an adult and turn the other cheek for the betterment of the team. Aaron Judge, the captain of the team, asked him to cool off, and he didn't. The team went into extra innings with a thin roster with players out of position because Chisholm couldn't calm down. Jazz knows he was wrong, and has apologized publicly (and likely privately as well).

I'm going to sound like a broken record here, but I'm floored by Aaron Boone's response to the above situation. To call out Jose Trevino in a half-serious manner was purely absurd. I generally don't jump on the bandwagon for some of the other things Boone does, though I have been saying that he is an ineffective manager. Even mentioning Trevino's role as anything other than a joke is just ridiculous. Focus on the guys in your clubhouse.

Simply put, this is not a championship attitude. I hope it changes, but the history of Aaron Boone-led teams is against that idea. This situation is a microcosm of what is wrong with the team, no matter how good the roster is at a given time.

As always, thanks for the great questions and keep them coming to SSTNReadermail@gmail.com. In this week's SSTN Mailbag, I'll talk about the bullpen, the bench, and trade deadline untouchables! Let's get at it:

Fuster asks: Weaver

Williams

Loaisiga

Cruz

I think that a team hoping to get to and through the World Series needs more than 4

I'm in favor of 6

am I overlooking guys already in the organization and ready, willing and able?

and who and from where might the GM find guys to import?

Let's start with an internal option or two that might be of interest as the season moves into the second half. One thing that is sorely missing in the Yankees' is velocity. The best bullpens of recent memory had velocity monsters in spades in the back of the Yankee bullpen. Dellin Betances, Aroldis Chapman, Andrew Miller, Jonathan Loaisiga, Michael King, Chad Green, etc. The current Yankee bullpen can pitch to soft contact and work through hitters, but they hardly have anyone that can simply come in and blow smoke past hitters. That's what this bullpen is missing.

There are two guys in the Yankees' farm system who are of interest on that front. The first is Clayton Beeter. I know that we've heard that name for a long time now, and there's some prospect fatigue there, but he has really good stuff that he can rear back and throw by guys. Since returning from the minor league IL, he's thrown in 15 games with a 1.15 ERA at AAA while striking out an absurd 38.6% of batters at that level. He is still working to find the zone a bit more consistently, but the stuff is there since his conversion to the bullpen. Beeter's fastball is averaging 95.8 MPH, though it has recently sat higher than that, according to Statcast. I very much wonder when Beeter will get a shot in the Majors, because I think he could be a huge piece.

The other guy who I think would be interesting in a bullpen role is rising starting pitching prospect, Carlos Lagrange. Lagrange lives in the high-90s, touching 102 MPH this season alone as a starter. Lagrange also has a good traditional slider (as opposed to the sweeper variant now in vogue) and a curveball to keep hitters honest. It is very likely that his stuff would even play up higher out of the bullpen. Matt Blake and Sam Briend commented earlier this week regarding their preference to keep guys starters in that role as long as possible before bullpen conversion from a development standpoint, a philosophy with which I agree generally, but on a team with World Series aspirations, I think Lagrange could be the missing bullpen piece, regardless of his continued need to hone his delivery and control. I really will be interested to see if Lagrange forces the issue as the season moves along, particularly now that he's in AA.

As far as outside targets, I think the best option might be on a team that is on the fence about selling: Shelby Miller, Arizona Diamondbacks. We know that the Yankees have long liked Miller, and they even helped him rebuild his career at AAA a few years back. Miller strikes guys out, limits baserunners, uses a good fastball, and has become a really good reliever. Miller would likely be top on my list.

The other guy I like is Reid Detmers, with the Angels. He's a hard throwing lefty who strikes guys out with good stuff, and all the underlying metrics look better than the bottom-line metrics. Detmers would give the Yankees another lefty, and I can't help but think that Blake and team would help get the best out of him.

An ideal trade deadline for the Yankees would be if, in addition to handling the infield need and acquiring one of Miller or Detmers, the Yanks also bring up one of Beeter or Lagrange to add to the bullpen mix.

Michael G. asks: When they add a position player before deadline who gets kicked off the bench?

Barring injury of course.

Esccarra then you have to trust Rice to catch regularly 

Peraza then who's backing up volpe at ss

As much as they need a better option at 2b/3b how do they make it work?

I am sure that the Yankees will look to upgrade Oswald Peraza's spot on the bench, and I agree that whoever gets the call there will need to be a SS-capable infielder. The Yankees have signaled frequently throughout the last year and change that they do not view Peraza as a viable MLB player, and his performance at the plate has done nothing to dispute that notion. Upgrading Peraza's spot is further down the list of priorities, but Michael's point is well-taken: there will be a bit of a roster squeeze if the Yankees manage to find a better option at 2B/3B. Sometimes, the best answer is the most obvious answer.

The Yankees have allowed DJ LeMahieu to play consistently since his return this season. He is hitting the ball hard and taking decent at-bats, but he's not doing any damage when he connects, as most of the contact is on the ground. Through 104 at-bats, DJLM's OPS+ is just 81. He can't play 3B anymore, because his arm has diminished to the point of making him a 1B/2B only; he is slower than everyone other than Giancarlo Stanton (and I'm not even sure he's faster than Stanton); and while he's been surehanded with balls hit right at him, he has no range at 2B. Again, he doesn't impact the baseball enough to be an interesting righty bat off the bench.

Escarra has offensive upside and handles the pitching staff really well. Ben Rice is a middle-of-the-order hitter. Peraza (or his replacement) is a backup SS capable of playing all over the diamond with good defense. Jasson Dominguez appears to be turning a corner, and he may yet be an impact player this season, so it doesn't make sense to send him down.

We are quickly approaching the point where the most prudent move to make if the Yankees acquire a starting infielder is to release DJ LeMahieu.

Alan B. asks: Besides Cam Schlittler and GLJ, who else are your untouchables? 

George Lombard is the closest guy the Yankees have to an "untouchable" at the moment in the system. I came away from my first live look at him in Spring Training saying he's the real deal, and everything he's done this season has cemented that opinion both for me and prominent publications. The Yankees love him, and I don't see him getting dealt.

As all of you know, I was probably the first guy writing about the Yankees in on Schlittler. I think he's a high probability MLB starter, with the upside of a #3 if everything clicks for him. I really, really like him as a prospect. However, he is not "untouchable" by any stretch of the imagination. If the Yanks had a pitcher like Paul Skenes in their system, maybe he'd be untouchable, but the reality is that pitchers break, often irreparably. All but the very best should be tradeable assets. Schlittler is a very nice prospect, but likely on the outside of the top-100 prospects in baseball. I wouldn't trade Schlittler in any package that doesn't bring back an impact player, but that doesn't mean Schlittler would be off the table for the right return.

I love prospects and evaluating minor league players as much as Alan, but across baseball, there should really only be 15-20 untouchable prospects in deals at a given time, probably less. Lombard is on the fringes of that conversation; no one else in the Yankee farm system comes close.