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Yankees Thoughts: Busiest Week of Offseason

A lot has happened this week. It was easily the busiest week for the Yankees this offseason as the team made two trades, finalized two contracts and let a great Yankee leave.

A lot has happened this week. It was easily the busiest week for the Yankees this offseason.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees.

1. I wrote all there is to write about the Yankees’ approach to the imaginery salary cap and said all there is to say about the team’s decision to cut payroll by $50 million this offseason for the second time in three years, and here it is for the last time. It’s sad, disappointing, frustrating, annoying and embarrassing, but it is what it is at this point. Hal Steinbrenner would rather save a homestand’s worth of hot dogs than do everything he can to win the World Series for the first time in 12 years.

2. The Yankees dumped Adam Ottavino’s salary on the Red Sox. But not all of it. The Yankees will pay Ottavino $850,000 in 2021 to pitch for their hated rival and to pitch against them. The Yankees will play the Red Sox 19 times (if the season goes as planned) or 12 percent of their season. Not only did the Yankees essentially give Ottavino to the Red Sox, they also attached a prospect to him. So when the Red Sox are buried in the standings at the trade deadline, they can then move Ottavino, who’s an impending free agent, as a rental and acquire even more prospects. The Yankees not only made the Red Sox better and set up their own right-handed heavy lineup to fail against Ottavino, they are also helping the Red Sox expedite their rebuild. When the prospects the Red Sox obtain for Ottavino in July become cornerstones for them and haunt the Yankees for the next decade, Steinbrenner’s fear of the luxury tax will be to blame.

3. The Yankees traded away Ottavino and then turned around and signed Darren O’Day, who does what Ottavino does from a different arm angle. The 38-year-old side-winder is as tough ones right-handed hitters out of the bullpen as anyone in the league, but what attracted the Yankees to O’Day was his price: around $2 million.

4. Why did it have to be O’Day instead of Ottavino? Why couldn’t it be both. Two years ago, the Yankees were going to go into the 2019 season with six elite relief options: Ottavino, Chad Green, Tommy Kahnle, Dellin Betances, Zack Britton and Aroldis Chapaman. Unfortunately, Betances got hurt and they never got to experience the full “super” bullpen, but they still had five elite relievers for 2019. Then they let Betances walk and sign with the Mets, and they had five options for 2020. Then Kahnle got hurt, and they had four for 2020. Then Ottavino fell out of Aaron Boone’s bullpen circle of trust, and they had three. They Kahnle leave and sign with the Dodgers and traded Ottavino to keep it at three for 2021. Adding O’Day gives them four again, but that’s still not enough. After O’Day, there’s Luis Cessa, Jonathan Loaisiga, Michael King and Nick Nelson. The bullpen is top heavy and old. Britton is 33. Chapman will be 33 next month, and O’Day is 38. The Yankees need to be adding to their bullpen like they did with O’Day, not subtracting from it like they did by moving Ottavino. The illusion of the luxury tax is preventing the Yankees from putting together the best possible roster.

5. Thankfully, DJ LeMahieu finally signed. The delay was waiting for a 40-man roster spot, but now the Yankees have their best player back. (I wish Aaron Judge were still considered to be the team’s best player, but you have to actually play to be the team’s best player, and not just half the season.) I lost a lot of sleep, staring at the ceiling in the middle of the night, wondering if the Yankees were going to let LeMahieu walk, so I’m glad his contract is finalized.

6. The Yankees also traded for Jamseon Taillon to bolster their rotation. On paper and when healthy, the Yankees have a great rotation: Gerrit Cole, Luis Severino, Corey Kluber, Jameson Taillon and Jordan Montgomery. But “on paper and when healthy” can’t be a thing for the Yankees. A year ago right now, the Yankees’ rotation “on paper and when healthy” was Cole, Severino, James Paxton, Masahiro Tanaka and J.A. Happ with Montgomery as insurance. How did that turn out?

7. Taillon gives the Yankees another unknown. This is the Yankees’ potential rotation at full strength:

Cole: Nothing wrong (knock on all of the wood)
Severino (unavailable until midseason): Five starts and 20 1/3 innings since start of 2019
Kluber: Eight starts and 36 2/3 innings since start of 2019
Taillon: Seven starts and 37 1/3 innings since start of 2019
Montgomery: 12 starts and 52 innings since start of 2019
Deivi Garcia: Seven career starts and 35 1/3 innings (including his “start” in Game 2 of the ALDS)
Clarke Schmidt: One career start and 6 1/3 innings

Severino is coming back from Tommy John surgery, which was preceded by a lat issue, which was preceded by a shoulder issue. Kluber is coming back from a shoulder injury. Taillon is coming back from his second Tommy John surgery. Montgomery is 52 innings removed from Tommy John surgery.

8. Taillon does give the Yankees’ depth. Before the Kluber signing and Taillon trade, Montgomery was the No. 2 starter. Now he’ll be the No. 4 to start the season if everyone stays healthy (knock on all of the wood again) and the No. 5 when Severino hopefully returns (knock on all of the wood again). Garcia and Schmidt go from getting rotation spots on Opening Day like Phil Hughes and Ian Kennedy did in 2008 to insurance options in the event of injury (knock on all of the wood again) or underperformance.

9. Unfortunately, Masahiro Tanaka won’t be returning to the Yankees. The seven-year Yankee is returning home to pitch for the Rakuten Golden Eagles. I think Tanaka only wanted to remain in North America if it were with the Yankees. He probably said he wanted $X and if he didn’t get it, he would just go home and pitch, and the Yankees’ desire to not go past $210 million meant he wouldn’t get what he wanted. I wanted Tanaka back, but the non-existant salary cap ended his time with the team. (I will have more on Tanaka in a separate blog.)

10. The 59-day gauntlet that is January and February is about halfway over, and that means there’s less than three weeks until scheduled spring training. Less than three weeks! I’m afraid to get too excited for the return of baseball because I still think the league and the owners will do everything they can to delay the start of the season. If they don’t, there will be baseball in no time. That makes me happy.


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David Quinn Believes Rangers Have ‘Played and Competed for 60 Minutes’

David Quinn is getting moodier with each loss, and now that there have been four straight, his postgame press conferences are growing more tense.

The Rangers have now played 11 percent of their season and they have one win. One. That win came five games ago when they avenged their season-opening loss to the Islanders with an impressive 5-0 win over their New York rival. Since then, it’s been losing, losing, losing and more losing.

The Rangers’ season is in trouble. As crazy as that sounds after six games, it’s true. The Rangers’ season began on Jan. 14. There’s a good chance it could be over playoff-wise on Feb. 1.

It’s been a while since I broke down the postgame press conference from a Rangers coach following every game. It’s been eight years actually since John Tortorella gave wild, entertaining, but also outlandish postgame press conferences in what would be his final season as Rangers head coach. Quinn isn’t at the end of his leash in New York the way Tortorella was when he helped usher Marian Gaborik out of town because the dynamic scorer wouldn’t muck it up in the corners or block shots with his face. But Quinn’s seat is heating up. Rangers fans are starting to turn on the third-year coach after the sluggish start to the season coupled with his unfathomable lineup decisions.

Quinn could help himself by making simple yet logical changes to his current in-game strategy. He could remove Ryan Strome from PP1, stop dressing Jack Johnson, not shuffle lines every other shift and play Artemi Panarin and Mika Zibanejad together at even strength. If the Rangers were to still lose with these changes, then so be it. At least they could say they were doing everything possible to try to win. Instead, they will continue on their current course, which has them in last place in the East, tied for the worst record in the league with Ottawa.

Quinn is getting moodier with each loss, and now that there have been four straight, his postgame press conferences are growing more tense. So it’s time to revisit the tradition built during Tortorella’s final season in New York and analyze Quinn’s postgame press conferences after the team loses, using the same format from eight years ago.

On the team’s face-off struggles.
“A face-off is a battle, not only with the centerman, but the flanks and the wingers, and too often we weren’t ready to compete in those battles.”

The Rangers won 30 percent of the face-offs in the game. Thirty percent! Quinn used the word “abysmal” to describe his team’s effort on face-offs and that might be a generous description. The Rangers haven’t been good enough this season in several areas, but face-offs have easily been their most glaring weakness.

On the play from the first two lines.
“Yes, we’re not getting enough from our Top 6, for sure.”

This answer is almost like a trick because no one know who the Top 6 forwards on the team are because of how frequently Quinn shuffles his lines. We know for certain that Panarin, Zibanejad, Chris Kreider, Pavel Buchnevich, and unfortunately, Strome, are in the Top 6. Filip Chytil’s injury takes him out of the conversation, leaving the other spot to either Alexis Lafrenière or Kappo Kakko. Here’s the thing: the 2020 No. 1 pick and 2019 No. 2 pick should both be in the Top 6. Only on the Rangers would only one of them be in the Top 6, and at times neither of them are.

You would think the Rangers were stacked with forwards to be unable to give Lafrenière and Kakko first- or second-line minutes. That’s poorly Quinn is utilizing his roster. Sadly, Strome is going to continue to be used as the second-best center on the team, if he isn’t any good, and Kreider is going to keep his spot based on seniority and money owed. (Once again why the team should have moved on from him). That means less ice time for Lafreniere and Kakko, the two forwards who should receive the most ice time of anyone not named Panarin or Zibanejad.

To put into perspective how bad the Rangers’ top forwards (whoever they are) have been, Phil Di Giuseppe has as many points (4) as Kreider and Zibanejad combined. Colin Blackwell has as many points (2) as both Kreider and Zibanejad, and as many goals as Zibanejad (1). Lafrenière doesn’t have a point.

I went back and looked at how each No. 1 overall draft pick has started their career since Steven Stamkos was selected first in 2008, and here is the game number each recorded their first career point.

Jack Hughes: 7
Rasmus Dahlin: 4
Nico Hischier: 2
Auston Matthews: 1
Connor McDavid: 3
Aaron Ekblad: 1
Nathan MacKinnon: 1
Nail Yakupov: 2
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins: 1
Taylor Hall: 2
John Tavares: 1
Steven Stamkos: 8

Lafrenière needs to get on the scoresheet on Thursday to tie Hughes and beat Stamkos. Otherwise he will need to score on Saturday to tie Stamkos. Even if he hasn’t at least picked up a second assist after Monday’s game against Pittsburgh, oh boy.

On the team’s play during the four-game losing streak.
“I thought for the last four nights we were skating and competing, for the most part, 60 minutes.”

If the scoreboard counted expected goals and if the standings counted moral victories, the Rangers wouldn’t own a 1-4-1 record, instead, they’d be 4-1-0. But their knack for blowing leads, allowing soft goals and collectively underachieving has lost them five of six games.

Yes, the Rangers have deserved better. They outshot the Devils 50-28 and controlled play and lost 4-3. They had a 3-1 lead against the Penguins and lost. Then they had leads of 1-0 and 2-1 against Penguins and still lost. They had those same leads against the Sabres and lost again. Some goals against have been soft, but not all of them.

It’s nearly impossible to say your team competed for 60 minutes for four straight games when you lost all four games, but Quinn did just that. Either Quinn has accepted losing or he has yet to realize he is a big reason to blame for some of the losing. (The Rangers haven’t scored a goal when his favorite player Johnson has been on the ice this season.)

On turning the season around.
“I’m still stewing about tonight. We’ll figure that out here in the next 48 hours.”

The Rangers had less than 48 hours until their next game against the Sabres by the time Quinn said he had 48 hours to figure out how to right the season. If the Rangers don’t start turning their moral victories into actual victories over the next three games, there won’t be a season to right.


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Hal Steinbrenner Shows True Colors in Adam Ottavino Trade

The Yankees say their goal each season is to win the World Series, but after the trade of Adam Ottavino, Hal Steinbrenner made it clear there’s a limit to how badly the wants to win it.

The Steinbrenners are poor. At least that’s what they want Yankees fans to think. That’s why Hal Steinbrenner went on the radio after the team’s disappointing postseason loss to the Rays and made sure to mention how the team didn’t make as much money as they normally do because of the shortened, fan-less season. And that’s why Adam Ottavino was traded to the Red Sox as part of a salary dump on Monday.

The Yankees didn’t have to trade Ottavino, especially to the Red Sox, but it’s clear Brian Cashman was told to keep the 2021 payroll below the $210 luxury-tax threshold. So rather than keep the right-hander in the Yankees’ bullpen during the team’s supposed championship window, Ottavino will now come out of the Red Sox’ bullpen and likely embarrass the Yankees when he does.

Ownership was so desperate to avoid paying any sort of luxury tax for 2021 that they were fine with Cashman sending Ottavino to their direct rival. The Steinbrenners are so worried about losing a home game’s worth of beer sales to payroll tax that they are completely accpeting of trading a right-on-right specialist to a team they play 19 times when eight of the Yankees’ nine everyday bats are right-handed hitters. The Yankees play 12 percent of their season against the Red Sox, and that means there will be an abundance of opportunities for Ottavino to strike out Aaron Judge, Luke Voit and Giancarlo Stanton in order with sweeping low-and-away sliders. I’m scared to think of what a Gary Sanchez at-bat against Ottavino will look like. There will come a game this season when the Yankees need a big hit against the Red Sox and Ottavino will come in the game and get the job done against them. Actually, there will likely be many games when the situation arises considering how many times they play each other.

Not only did the Yankees trade Ottavino within the division and to their hated rival, they will be paying him to pitch against them this season. As part of the deal, the Yankees are paying $850,000 of Ottavino’s salary, as he becomes the latest ex-Yankee in a long list of former Yankees who were paid to play and pitch against the Yankees (and beat them while doing so).

Ottavino wasn’t expendable either. Not the way he might have been, at least on paper, during spring training in 2019 when the Yankees had Dellin Betances, Tommy Kahnle, Chad Green, Zack Britton and Aroldis Chapman. But then Betances got hurt and eventually became a Met and Kahnle got hurt and became a Dodger. For as inconsistent as Ottavino might be at times and for as bad as he is at holding runners on, he would still be at worst the Yankees’ fourth-best reliever to start 2021, and could very well become their best the way he was for a large part of 2019.

Now that Ottavino is gone, the Yankees have three trustworthy relievers in Green, Britton and Chapman, and I only put Chapman with the other two because of his career numbers. At this point, I don’t trust Chapman to tell me what day of the week it is. After those three, it’s Jonathan Loaisiga, Luis Cessa and I guess Michael King and Nick Nelson? Maybe Tyler Lyons and Nestor Cortes? It’s some combination of pitchers you never want to see warming up and pitchers you never want to see come into games. The Yankees gave away a valuable reliever in the middle of a championship window. Actually, they didn’t even just give him away. They are paying him to not pitch for them!

There’s no salary cap in baseball. If there were, maybe this move could be praised since it keeps the Yankees under the $210 million threshold and gives them the ability to re-sign Brett Gardner and still have enough money for midseason call-ups and potential trade deadline acquisitions. But there’s no salary cap in baseball, just the illusion of one, and because of that, this move is simply disgusting.

The Yankees’ payroll is now $50 million less than it was a year ago. $50 million. Whenever the Yankees don’t win the World Series, Hal Steinbrenner likes to apologize to the fans the way his father used to, but at least when his father would, it meant something. It wasn’t an empty gesture made between figuring out how to best keep fans out of the lower bowl during batting practice and making sure concession stand workers were putting the right amount of fries in each container to maintain margins. After the Yankees’ ALDS loss to the Rays, Steinbrenner said:

“I’m very disappointed, obviously. We invested a lot of time, energy, money into the team last offseason, and we all felt that we had a team that could win a championship, and we failed to do that. We didn’t even come close. So right now, at this point in time, all I can do is apologize to our fans. They deserved a better outcome than they got. Period. I mean, they just did.”

If the Yankees fail to win the World Series for the 12th straight year in 2021, he needs to have a better apology than that one. Cutting payroll by $50 million for the second time in a championship window (the team did the same thing after coming within one win of the World Series in 2017) is inexcusable for the franchise which makes more than any other in Major League Baseball.

The Yankees say their goal each season is to win the World Series, but after the trade of Ottavino, Steinbrenner made it clear there’s a limit to how badly he wants to win it.


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Rangers Thoughts: Leading the League in Moral Victories

The Rangers had leads in both games in Pittsburgh and they lost both games. With three straight losses and one win in five games, the Rangers are in trouble not even two weeks into the season.

The Rangers had leads in both games in Pittsburgh and they lost both games. They blew a two-goal lead on Thursday and two one-goal leads on Sunday. With three straight losses and one win in five games, the Rangers are in trouble not even two weeks into the season.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Rangers.

1. In a week, we might know if the Rangers will have a season. They have currently lost three straight and four of five and are now headed to Buffalo for two games followed by two against the Penguins at the Garden. At the end of next Monday’s game against the Penguins, the Rangers will have played nine games, or 16 percent of their season.

2. Maybe the front office isn’t evaluating David Quinn and his team on wins and losses this season, in what should be the last rebuilding season for this roster. Maybe it’s still only about experience and development for the youngest team in the league. A bad week against the Sabres and Penguins and gaining experience and developing will be all the Rangers have to play for this season.

3. That’s not an exaggeration. I wrote (blogs) and spoke (on the podcast) at length before the season and in the first week of it about the importance of every single game, and continuously brought up the magic number of 1.2, which is the amount of points per game the Rangers need to reach the playoffs. Through five games, they have 3, when they need to have 6. They are in last place in the East and tied with Ottawa for the worst win percentage (.300) in the NHL.

4. Joe Micheletti continues to praise the Rangers in each broadcast about how good they look. Looking good while losing is still losing, and the Rangers have done that in all but one game. Outshooting the Devils 50-28 is nice, but shots don’t determine points in the standings. The youngest team in the league having leads in both games in Pittsburgh against a team in a Penguins team in a win-now window is nice, but blowing the lead in both games and losing both games isn’t impressive.

5. Micheletti would be better off saying “some Rangers have looked good” because that’s more accurate.

Here are the Rangers who have looked good this season:

Pavel Buchnevich
Filip Chytil
Phil Di Giuseppe
Adam Fox
Kaapo Kakko
K’Andre Miller
Artemi Panarin

6. That’s it. Mika Zibanejad has one goal. Alexis Lafreniere doesn’t have a point in what has to be the longest pointless streak at any level for the No. 1 pick. Jack Johnson … why even bother. Jacob Trouba and Ryan Lindgren have been inconsistent. Tony DeAngelo has been awful. Chris Kreider hasn’t been good and neither has Ryan Strome. Igor Shesterkin is giving up goals from the half-wall and hasn’t won a game, and Alexandar Georgiev erased his shutout with a disaster against the Devils. The fourth line hasn’t necessarily been bad, but they also haven’t done anything special, unless you count Colin Blackwell accidentally scoring.

7. I guess the one thing you could say is the Rangers could have won every game except their opening night embarrassment despite all of the issues and underachievers on the roster. Unfortunately, that’s not going to put four games back on the schedule and make it easier for the Rangers to reach the postseason.

8. The David Quinn Fan Club is dwindling by the day. It’s either this year or next year when results will matter to the front office, and if it’s this year, Quinn better figure it out and fast. I do believe the 2021-22 season will be when Quinn is finally evaluated on the team’s success in the standings, so he has 51 games (and possibly some playoff games) to learn how to win at the NHL level.

9. Here’s some advice for Quinn: Stop waiting until you desperately need a goal until you pair Panarin and Zibanejad; Stop playing Strome on PP1; Don’t play Johnson, but if you need to in the event of an emergency, never pair him with DeAngelo; Give Lafreniere as much ice time as possible, and Kakko too. These are all very simple things that could instantly begin to translate into wins, yet Quinn continues to make winning even harder than it already is.

10. At 1-3-1, the Rangers have 3 points and will need about 64 points over the next 51 games to make the playoffs. That’s now 1.26 points per game, up 0.06 from the start of the season. They will need to go something like 30-17-4 the rest of the way to reach the postseason. It’s still doable, but they can’t continue to stack losses or it will be impossible be a Top 4 team in the East. The all-division schedule won’t allow for the Rangers to go on the kind of run they want on in January, February and early March of last year. These next four games could be the season.


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Last Chance for Gary Sanchez as a Yankee?

This August will be five years since Gary Sanchez hit his first career home on Aug. 10, 2016 in Boston. Five years since he hit 20 home runs in only 229 plate appearances. Five years

This August will be five years since Gary Sanchez hit his first career home on Aug. 10, 2016 in Boston. Five years since he hit 20 home runs in only 229 plate appearances. Five years since his at-bats became must-see TV. Five years since he temporarily became the face of the Yankees.

Over the last three seasons, Sanchez has fallen out of favor with Yankees fans to the point the majority of them have (wrongfully) clamored for Kyle Higashioka to be the team’s starting catcher. And he has fallen out of favor with his manager to the point Aaron Boone gave into the idiotic fans and actually benched Sanchez in the postseason.

Recently, Marly Rivera of ESPN spoke with Sanchez from his home in the Dominican Republic, and he had a lot to say about the state of his career.

On being benched during the playoffs.
“I played the second game in Cleveland, and I played well. Then we went to San Diego, to the bubble … After almost a week without playing, it didn’t go well for me in the second game … I struck out three times, but I felt like I was taking good cuts, good swings. I felt so much better. But I didn’t play.”

If Sanchez doesn’t play in Game 2 against Cleveland, the Yankees’ season ends the next day in Game 3 and they never get to embarrass themselves in the ALDS against Tampa Bay. (So maybe he shouldn’t have played Game 2 in Cleveland because it would have prevented Yankees fans from enduring the worst managerial strategy in team history in Game 2 of the ALDS). It’s over because if Sanchez doesn’t play, they lose Game 2 to Cleveland, and then J.A. Happ starts Game 3 against Cleveland and they would have lost with Happ on the mound.

Sanchez’s two-run home run in the sixth inning of Game 2 in Cleveland gave the Yankees an 8-6 lead. (Zack Britton and Jonathan Loaisiga combined to blow that lead in the seventh.) After Aroldis Chapman did what he does best in the playoffs in the eighth inning by allowing a run, the Yankees trailed 9-8 for the ninth. The Yankees loaded the bases with no outs for Brett Gardner, and he struck out, bringing Sanchez to the plate. Because of Gardner’s inability to put the ball in play and score the tying run, the game was essentially all on Sanchez. If he failed to bring in Giancarlo Stanton from third, the Yankees would no longer be able to tie the game by making an out. Sanchez drove the 1-1 pitch to deep center fielder to tie the game with a sacrifice fly, and after a DJ LeMahieu single, the Yankees took the lead for good.

After that game, Sanchez started and played in one more game in the postseason: Game 2 of the ALDS. To be benched for the remainder of the series and the final three games because of his Game 2 performance (0-for-4, 3 Ks) was completely ridiculous and unfair. If Sanchez was going to be benched, then why wasn’t Aaron Judge (0-for-5, 3 Ks) or Luke Voit (0-for-3, 3 Ks)? Why didn’t Boone bench himself for his irresponsible pitching plan with Happ? The Yankees needed a scapegoat to hide Boone’s disastrous managing and the team’s Game 2 loss and they chose Sanchez. The Yankees have said they don’t believe in hot or cold streaks, though they apparently believe players should be able to hit Tyler Glasnow after six days off.

Boone wasn’t even willing to use Sanchez as a pinch hitter in Games 3 or 5, choosing to go with Mike Ford, who had been sent down to the team’s alternate site in the regular season. Ford wasn’t good enough to be a Yankee in September, but he was good enough to be a Yankee in October and get at-bats over Sanchez (and Clint Frazier).

On speaking with Boone about his postseason benching.
“I asked for and had a respectful and very positive conversation with Aaron Boone. I explained to him that I thought I deserved an explanation for what happened. We had a good conversation, and we talked about all of that and cleared things up.”

Joe Girardi’s tenure at as Yankees manager came to an end because of his supposed lack of communication with the (at the time) young Yankees. In hiring Boone, Brian Cashman and the Yankees praised his communication skills, even though he had never managed or coached at any level of baseball in his life. Our new manager is awesome at this skill he has never actually performed! Well, so much for being a great communicator since Sanchez had to seek him out to talk about being removed from the lineup.

Sanchez has been the Yankees’ starting catcher since August 2016. If he’s suddenly not going to play, he should be told why. It’s bad enough he doesn’t play when Gerrit Cole pitches because the supposed best pitcher in the world needs to coddled, but to bench him outright in games not started by Cole in the postseason does deserve an explanation whether he hit .147/.253/.365 in 49 games or not.

Sanchez has had bad stretches in his career before, like any player. If 2020 hadn’t been a shortened season and he had time to correct himself and enhance his numbers, I’m not writing about this right now and Kyle “Let’s Hope He Hits a Ground Ball Just Past the Outstretched Glove of the Shortstop” Higashioka isn’t starting over him in the playoffs. Sanchez had 178 plate appearances in 2020, which is one-third of his career-high 525 plate appearances from 2017. It’s easy to see how he could have had a bad one-third of a season and then rebounded over another 350 plate appearances. The shortened season needs to be treated as and evaluated on what it was: 37 percent of a standard 162-game season.

Sanchez needs to find a way to stay healthy for an entire season (which can also be said about Judge, Stanton and Aaron Hicks). The reason his career-high for plate appearances in a season is 525 is because he was hurt and missed significant time in 2017, 2018 and 2019. Sanchez needs to produce in 2021, but he also needs to stay healthy.

On being asked to change his defensive setup.
“I understand that the team is trying to help me, and I like that. I know all they want to do is see me improve. But this offseason, I have to focus on trying to recover that form from last year (2019) and be able to mix everything that I improved upon by adding lowering my right knee.”

Since the Yankees’ 2009 season, the farthest they have gone in the postseason was when they lost Game 7 of the ALCS In 2017. Sanchez was their No. 3 hitter that season and during that postseason run. In his most recent game for the Yankees (Game 2 of the 2020 ALDS), Sanchez batted ninth. Could anyone envision Sanchez batting third for the Yankees now? Imagine the shitstorm it would cause if Boone penciled his name into the 3-hole. That’s how far Sanchez has fallen in three calendar years.

I attribute his decline to two things: the first being his inability to lay off breaking balls low and away, and the second being the Yankees’ relentless attempts to try to make him Ivan Rodriguez behind the plate. The Yankees couldn’t just let Sanchez hit 30-plus home runs a season and use his exceptional arm to throw out would-be basestealers. They decided the passed balls were too much! So instead of letting Sanchez be the player they gave $3 million to as a 17-year-old and who climbed to the majors and set historical home run records upon reaching the majors, they had to screw him up. Then they decided he needed to be better at framing pitches! The Yankees are now trying to get Sanchez back to being the player he was in 2017 and 2017 and 2019 even though they played a large role, and possibly the only role in him no longer being that player.

If the Yankees were to make Sanchez the perfect defensive catcher and he were to still post 2020-like offensive numbers, he would still be criticized. No fans wants Sanchez to block every pitch in the dirt and steal a few strikes in a season and not hit. They want him to get on base 35 percent of the time and hit 30-plus home runs. They want the offense over the defense. The Yankees want it all. They want Sanchez to be the perfect, complete player. That player doesn’t exist, especially not at catcher.

On the negative criticism from Yankees fans.
“I have to listen to all the negative comments, everything that everyone has to say about me, because the truth is that I played badly at the plate. That’s why I have to take everything anyone says. Let them say what they want. I deserve it. That will make me better and stronger.”

As President of the Gary Sanchez Club (and one of the few remaining members, possibly the only remaining member), this comment broke my heart. Sanchez became the scapegoat for the underachieving 2019 and 2020 Yankees and unfairly so.

No, Sanchez didn’t hit in the 2019 ALCS against the Astros, but unless your name is DJ LeMahieu or Gleyber Torres, you are to blame for the offense failing in that series. Judge went 6-for-25 with 10 strikeouts and had one extra-base hit in the six games. Didi Gregorius: 5-for-23. Gio Urshela: 5-for-21. Gardner: 3-for-22 with 10 strikeouts. Edwin Encarnacion: 1-for-18 with 11 strikeouts. Hicks: 2-for-13 with five strikeouts.

Sanchez went 3-for-23 with 12 strikeouts in the series, but at least he hit a three-run home run in Game 5 in an attempt to keep his team from the brink of elimination.

On his 2020 season.
“It just wasn’t me. That 2020 thing, that wasn’t me. It was a bad year.”

Everyone needs to remember how good Sanchez has been. Historically good. In 2016, he nearly won Rookie of the Year (and should have won it over Michael Fulmer) despite playing in only 53 games. In 2017, he was an All-Star and Silver Slugger, hitting 33 home runs with an .876 OPS, earning him MVP votes. 2018 was a disaster, as he was hurt for most of the year, playing in only 89 games and needing offseason surgery. But the Yankees’ only win in over the Red Sox in the 2018 ALDS was single-handedly because of Sanchez, who hit two home runs and drove in four runs in Game 2. In 2019, Sanchez rebounded, and while the average (.232) and on-base percentage (.316) weren’t there, he still slugged .525 for an .841 OPS after hitting 34 home runs. And then there was 2020.

Sanchez’s 162-game averages are absurd. They would be absurd for any player, but for a catcher they are seemingly fake: 94 runs, 25 doubles, 44 home runs, 110 RBIs, .236/.320/.502. Yankees fans are upset their catcher averages only an .823 OPS over 162 games.

On getting back to being his old self in 2021.
“I went through something similar in 2018: I was hurt all year, and there was so much criticism. [In 2019], I came in proved my self and had one of the best years of my career.”

Sanchez is going to need to get off to a fast start in 2021 because the majority of Yankees fans are done with him, and Boone, the idiot, has already set a precedent that he will turn to Higashioka, considering he did in the biggest games last season. If Sanchez gets off to a slow start, the Higashiokers will be out in full, just like the Rominers (Yankees fans who wanted Austin Romine to play over Sanchez) were. This could very well be the last season of Sanchez as a Yankee even if he doesn’t play well and play well right away. Otherwise, Yankees fans will likely watch him win the 2022 World Series with the Padres.

I get why Yankees fans are frustrated with Sanchez. They remember how good he has been. I don’t get why Yankees fans have given up on him. I’m frustrated with him too, and I want him to return to being that player. I’m nowhere near ready to give up on him. I still believe in him.


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