The Yankees have acquired minor league catcher Brian Navarreto from the Twins in exchange for cash considerations, as first reported by Mariana Guzman (Twitter links). He’ll give the club some depth with Gary Sanchez on the injured list.
Obviously, this minor swap isn’t of the magnitude that most fans would hope with Major League Baseball’s trade deadline just around the corner, but adding some low-cost depth to help cover current injury troubles is a logical course of action for the Yankees. For the Twins, they have multiple minor league catchers ahead of Navarreto on the organizational depth chart.
Navarreto, 24, was Minnesota’s sixth-round pick back in 2012. He’s a quintessential glove-first backstop, as evidenced by a whopping 47 percent caught-stealing rate and consistently strong framing marks in his minor league career. He’s enjoyed a modest bump in power this season but has been a poor hitter overall — both in 2019 and throughout his minor league tenure. Navarreto is a lifetime .215/.265/.308 hitter in the minor leagues, including a lackluster .177/.229/.331 slash (five home runs, five doubles) in 140 plate appearances at the Double-A level this season.
There it is.
#28.
This may cinch as far up to #30!
Will he displace Refsnyder as best ever ? = )
No, Refsnyder was unequaled.
Well played dobsonel
Biggest yanks deadline move for the year?
Humongous
Twins are getting a lot of Cash Considerations lately
I just hope it’s actually money, not “personal favors” from Brian Cashman…
Yeah. The Pohlads are cheap owners. Get as much cash as they can.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Cashman trades for one more catcher.
Everyone was telling me i was crazy here 2 months ago when i said the Indians have a run coming, even though the twins had a 12 game lead, it was not safe. Now look at this division. Twins fans thought this division was over.
I look at the division and the Twins are in First.
12 game lead down to a 2 game lead….but rn Twins are choking, bad!
All anyone had to do was look at the two teams’ schedules in July to realize that the Indians were going to make up substantial ground. Minnesota has a much easier schedule next month while Cleveland gets a tougher draw than they’ve had recently. Not that that’s hard, considering that these have been their opponents for the past month
Royals (Indians have gone 7-2)
Tigers (7-0)
Blue Jays (2-1)
Orioles (1-2)
Reds (2-0)
Twins (1-2)
Not a knock on Cleveland, just saying that some restored balance in the division was foreseeable.
I still think the Twins will take the Central, but fans who thought they were going to run away with some kind of 15-game lead in the division were, as you suggest, sorely mistaken.
Does not change the fact that the Twins did poorly against the better teams in the AL. How does that help their chances? Looking at toughness of schedule is not an accurate way to look at things either. You still have to go out there and win games. Saying that the reason the Indians have caught up simply because of their schedule is not giving them enough credit. Not an Indians fan but they STILL need to go out there and perform well against the bad teams. I say Indians take this division. At the end of the day, Indians have been in this position before. Twins have not. I like the experience of Cleveland more than the sluggers of the Twins. Plus Terry Francona always finds a way to make it to the playoffs–i see no difference this year. Twins get a wild card spot not the division imo. we will see. Bottom line is any team can beat you on any given day and the Indians are hot, and i think they ride this into September.
Certainly sound like a Cleveland fan to all of us.
Having just played the Twins, they can bring more offense to the equation than Cleveland can any day in the week. And, they are road warriors as far as record goes.
Pitching will determine and while it should be a close race, the toughness of schedule does play into a teams chances of either remaining in position, falling out, or climbing up.
And, the Twins have the prospects and impetus to go out and get some pitching while all Cleveland would do if they indeed sold Bauer, would be to weaken themselves in what is considered to be their strongest suit…..namely pitching.
Tito is good but he doesn’t suit up and play!
Twins above .500 against the “better teams in the AL”. Cleveland, New York, Houston, Tampa is who I consider the better teams in the AL. 16-14 against those teams and 33 games left against the Royals, White Sox, and Tigers. Indians have Houston, New York, Tampa left and only 20 against the “rest” of the Central. A couple moves and Twins will be fine in Central.
I don’t believe that the Twins have done poorly against the better teams in the AL. Of course, I don’t have all the numbers on hand, but I seem to remember seeing that Minnesota’s record against teams at .500 or better was decent (i.e., several games over .500); not the best, but certainly not poor. And I believe Steve meant that Cleveland’s July schedule was one factor, not the only factor in their resurgence. Obviously, good teams beat the teams they are supposed to beat, and Cleveland did just that. But also, as the Twins have been playing some very good teams since the All-Star break, you have to take into consideration run differential in those series, Cleveland and the Twins met up for 3 games in Cleveland (Twins won series 2-1, +5 run diff.), followed by a 4-game match-up with the A’s (split 2-2, + 1 run diff.), and then the series against the Yankees, which was one of the best two-team offensive displays I’ve ever seen in a regular season series (NYY won series 2-1, -3 run diff.). And yes, I left out the two games with the Mets because we are talking about how the Twins have done against good teams, and it would only hurt my argument because it was a beatdown at the hands of the Mets. Point being, the post-break sample of games above illustrates that Minnesota has at least held their own against other good teams, and at least once, they outperformed a very good team in Cleveland.
I only presented a small sample of contests, but I think it fairly represents how the Twins have done against “good” teams throughout the season. To say they “did poorly against the better teams in the AL” is without merit, and is rather a willfully misinformed and preposterous statement.
That said, Cleveland could very well take the Division. I don’t think they will, but that’s just a Twins fan’s opinion. Baseball is baseball, and I’m kind of excited that it has turned into a legit race. Should be fun! (Sorry the post was so damn long…)
As a Yankees fan, I think the Twins were pretty scary in the last series. There was a huge amount of thumping on both side; and generally, those kind of games end up with a coin-flip outcome, or depend on the last man standing in the bullpen. The Yankees tend to win on protracted, multi-game bullpen wars, since they tend to go 10-12 deep and can shuttle pretty good arms in several times a week, even with the 10 day waiting rule. Other than bullpen depth, the two teams are comparable.
Totally agree Steve. I also like to look at the run differential when looking at teams in the standings. I remember the Orioles plummeting after their seemingly successful season that saw them resign Chris Davis. Turns out, they won something like 75% or more of their 1 run games. Its been a few years, so I’m shakey on the details.
Long story short:
Run Differential Twins: +108
Run Differential Indians: +52
Less then half of the run differential. Short of an Orioles-esque string of winning every 1 run game, this clarifies the superior team in the central quite easily IMO.
A similar run differential exists between the Yankees and Rays and the Yankees have a 10 game lead. That Central lead will open back up in August, I believe.
The twins were never going to run away and hide. The Indians have too much pitching. They lost kluber and didn’t even miss him, with the emergence of Bieber. Him and Clevinger have made Indians the sleeper of the AL
alot of fans and media said this division was a wrap a while ago. Never believed it for a second.
Bieber isn’t in addition to Kluber though. Kluber has been way off this year. Bieber basically replaces what they had in Kluber.
I think the Indians would be in fantastic shape if Kluber was pitching lights out like usual. Unfortunately, I find it tough to believe the next few months will go any differently. He’s walking almost 4 per 9. He’s had much harder contact and much more hard hit balls (see fangraphs) the last 2 seasons now. Luckily, he’s still getting ground balls and his BABIP makes me think he will see some improvement. But 6 innings 3 runs are looking like his good games this season. The off-season should do him some good. Bauer also has been faltering of late.
Naquin is swinging well again. If Jose Ramirez can continue what he’s done since the all-star break and Lindor stays healthy, they definitely could overtake the Twins. But they have a much tougher schedule in August. Will be interesting. I just don’t see it happening if the Twins make even some small moves at the deadline. Love what the Indians have been doing and obviously a big Tito fan!
Yeah because you just spent a month playing the worst teams in baseball and the twins have been playing mostly the best teams in baseball. Get back to me Sept 1st when those two roles are reversed.
No Twins’ fan that I know thought the divisional race was over. Nearly everyone I know was begging for the Twins to make a pitching move months ago so that we would even have a chance to hold on. Cleveland tends to come on strong in the second half.
This should guarantee us the world series.
Guess they underplayed the press about G.S.’s injury…..
No they just needed a guy they could send to the minors when Sanchez gets back. If they went out and acquired another every day type of catcher, I’d say Sanchez is worse then we think. But I think this is a clear indicator Sanchez is back sooner then later.
Just a depth move for almost nothing (cash considerations).
Yeah the options definitely make this a no brained but Sanchez will miss 4 to 6 weeks at least.
Why rush him back being 10 games up in first place?
A 4 syllable last name. Must be a backup catcher.
Did the math, just for fun. Twins – 25 games left against teams @ or above .500. 36 against teams below .500. Indians – 38 games against teams @ or above .500. 23 against teams below .500. Margin of 2 will be increasing again soon!
Go Cashman go!
Is Navaretto a more souped up version of a Navarro? Like with mud flaps and spoilers?
Yes, but with maybe 5% of a Navarro’s (offensive) horsepower. Here, Navarro is a 2020 Cadillac Escalade and Navaretto is a 1994 Geo Metro with said mud flaps and spoilers, sitting on a dusty rural used car lot with 7 other automotive beauts of similar masculine mystique.
Man, Mitch Garver (9th Rd.) really saved that 2013 Twins draft class from being an unmitigated clusterf*** rather than what it ended up being, a slightly mitigated clusterf***. The Twins brass did bring us our lord and savior Zack Granite with the organization’s 14th round pick. Where would the Twins be without Granite, who had many Twins fans believing there was no need for a blossoming prospect named Byron Buxton manning center in Minneapolis?