While writing about Johns Sickels yesterday, my mind immediately wandered to Cito Culver. He’s about as unexciting, while still a solid prospect, as a #1 pick can be. When Dante Bichette Jr. was picked, he was criticized as being a pick in Culver’s vein – unexciting and low-ceiling. Unlike Culver, Bichette pretty much quashed those [...]
(The following is being syndicated from An A-Blog for A-Rod) The Yankee outfield trio of C-Grand, Swish, and Gardy slowly started to establish themselves as one of the best all-around outfields in baseball in 2010, especially after Curtis got the Dr. Long treatment on his swing in the second half. In 2011, that trend continued [...]
This title is, admittedly, a bit hyperbolic. First off, it assumes that Hioryuki Nakajima would be a sizeable upgrade over Eduardo Nunez. Second, it overly inflates the role that either infielder would play on the Yankees. Granted, either one would probably get a fair amount of playing time, given the aging left side of the [...]
In a very good post about the Yankees’ lack of success developing pitching prospects under Brian Cashman that everyone should read in full, newly minted TYA contributor Alex Geshwind offers what I think is a very wrong way to look at the business of trading prospects:
Perhaps the most telling of developments from these few draft classes came in the person of Ian Patrick Kennedy. After a dominant minor league stint he did practically nothing at the big league level in New York. The organization gave up on him and he was moved, essentially an afterthought in a trade for Curtis Granderson. He went on to a 21-4 season with a 2.88 ERA and a 5+ WAR for the Diamondbacks last season. The Yankees had the resources and the desire to go out and get one of the top college pitchers in the 2006 draft and yet question remain as to whether Kennedy could have developed as well in this organization.
The non-committal language is doing a lot of work here. Are there “questions” about how Ian Kennedy would have developed if he’d stayed with the Yankees? I suppose there are, but then, there are always questions with counterfactuals. I think it’s safe to say Kennedy probably wouldn’t have gotten a chance to start the year in the rotation in 2010, since all of the slots were effectively allocated already, and that made him a bit expendable in the short-term.
(click “view full post” to continue reading)
(The following is being syndicated from The Captain’s Blog). It’s been several weeks since Albert Pujols signed a mega-$250 million deal with the Anaheim Angels, but Prince Fielder seems no closer to finding a home. Even for a Scott Boras client, the slow developing market for the All Star slugger has been somewhat of a surprise, but that can probably [...]
The Yankees have until Friday afternoon to reach an agreement with Japanese infielder Hiroyuki Nakajima after winning his rights last month. However, Marc Carig and Ken Rosenthal have both reported that an agreement is unlikely to be reached between the two sides, with the problem being that the Yankees see Nakajima as a bench player and want to pay him as such, including, one would imagine, the cost of the posting fee.
There’s nothing profound to say about that gap, but it does raise an interesting question about the posting system. Assuming Nakajima’s demands aren’t unreasonable, neither he nor the Seibu Lions are going to be happy if a deal isn’t reached. And if a similar situation plays out in Milwaukee, on top of last year’s fiasco in Oakland, this trend could portend real trouble for the posting system. Not that that would be a bad thing, of course, because the current system is pretty ridiculous and just about anything would be better.
Before I get into this, my first post at The Yankee Analysts, I’d like to thank everyone here for giving me this opportunity and for welcoming me so fully to the team. I have accepted this position knowing that TYA is not only among the best Yankees blogs on the internet, but among the best [...]
Going into the 2011 season, I expected Phil Hughes to complement Sabathia at the top of the Yankees’ rotation. Phil was our number two. A year later I find myself refreshing twitter and a smorgasbord of blogs to see who Cashman and company chose to replace Hughes. The once top pitching prospect that Baseball America [...]
What a player gives is what the team gets. Sure, that’s a fairly obvious statement that’s likely too broad a generalization. There is more nuance to it, both on the SABR side (marginal value of a win) and the more traditional side (chemistry, etc.), but let’s take a look at the statement at its face [...]
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