Yankees Rumors

At the recent owners’ meeting, Yankees boss Hal Steinbrenner chatted about the summer trade period, as David Lennon of Newsday was among those to report. Unsurprisingly, Steinbrenner made clear he expects starting pitching to be the focus for the Yanks now that slugger Edwin Encarnacion is in the fold. But his most interesting comments were related to the team’s financial approach.

Notably, the top organizational decisionmaker expressed some willingness to consider deals that’d put the team into a higher luxury tax bracket. Estimates put the Yanks at about $15MM of salary (as calculated for competitive balance tax purposes) shy of the $246MM payroll line, at which point a team would pay 62.5% tax on spending over the first luxury line and see its next top draft choice fall by ten spots.

Steinbrenner says he’d okay a decision that triggers those penalties, “if I really felt we needed that deal, that it takes us over the top.” That’s a bit of a different position than was enunciated recently by GM Brian Cashman, who indicated that the team wass “trying to stay under the second luxury tax penalty” when it capped its offer to free agent starter Dallas Keuchel.

That’s not to say that Steinbrenner necessarily expects to need to make such a call. He noted that the club has “a decent amount of cushion” before it’d reach the top tax bracket. That’s true, though there are certainly some high-end players who’d be of potential interest that would require the Yanks to do some soul-searching — or find creative means of shedding other salary.

If you don’t want to take on money, you typically have to give up good young talent. The Yankees’ current roster is loaded with bats, leading many to wonder whether outfielder Clint Frazier will be dangled. Steinbrenner said he believes Frazier has a “great career a head of him” and expects the youngster to be “a big part of this team going forward,” though he certainly also left conceptual room for a deal.

The Yankees have optioned outfielder Clint Frazier to Triple-A, tweets Kristie Ackert of the NY Daily News. Frazier’s demotion will clear a spot on the active roster for the newly-acquired Edwin Encarnacion.

The demotion represents the continuation of a rocky Yankees stint for the 24-year-old Frazier, who has long been the victim of roster crunch despite adequate performance at the MLB level. To be sure, Frazier has not disappointed in his MLB career, which has spanned parts of three seasons: his career OPS sits at a tidy .793, including a career-best .855 this season. His outfield defense has certainly lagged behind the bat, but defensive struggles are not uncommon for young outfielders, and Frazier has demonstrated that his bat-first profile can play at the Major League level.

Despite that promise, Frazier has managed to appear in just 106 MLB games since debuting in 2017. In years past, Frazier has been blocked by the Yankees’ prolific outfielders, but the team’s injury woes have allowed Frazier to receive 186 ABs in 2019. At this point, though, it appears that time is running out on that expanded opportunity.

The acquisition of Encarnacion, coupled with the impending return of outfielders Giancarlo Stanton and Aaron Judge, has made it clear that Frazier’s opportunities with the big league club will be even further limited for the remainder of the season. With Encarnacion’s addition to the lineup, it appears that the most likely lineup configurations will feature Stanton and Judge joining Aaron Hicks in the outfield, leaving Frazier without a spot in the starting nine.

With that in mind, it would appear that Frazier’s best chance to catch on in the Bronx would come as a depth outfielder; however, a player with Frazier’s combination of youth, performance, and prospect pedigree would perhaps provide more value to the contending Yankees as a trade chip, especially considering the presence of Brett Gardner and Cameron Maybin, each of whom has provided serviceable—if unspectacular—outfield production in the absence of the Bombers’ stars.

As a result of his limited opportunities, Frazier has often been the subject of trade discussions, a trend that will no doubt continue given the Yankees’ need for—and interest in—starting pitching. Madison Bumgarner, Marcus Stroman, Trevor Bauer, and Zack Wheeler have all been linked to the Yankees, and Detroit’s Matt Boyd has also drawn attention as a trade candidate. Of course, it remains to be seen just how much the Yankees could fetch for Frazier, but it seems that he could be a key piece in a trade to bolster the rotation. Of course, there’s no indication that Frazier’s demotion is the precursor to such a move, but speculation will certainly abound as trade season approaches.