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Yankees Rumors

Brett Phillips Attempting Comeback As Pitcher, Agrees To Minors Deal With Yankees

By Darragh McDonald | July 31, 2024 at 2:18pm CDT

Longtime MLB outfielder Brett Phillips is attempting to get back to the big leagues as a pitcher. Earlier this week, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times wrote about Phillips and his recent journey, then relayed on X that he had a agreed to a minor league deal with the Yankees.

Phillips, 30, appeared in the majors as an outfielder from 2017 to 2023, not hitting to much but providing value via his speed and defense. He hit .187/.272/.347 over 395 games for the Brewers, Royals, Rays, Orioles and Angels, stealing 39 bases in 45 tries. In just over 2,300 outfield innings, he was considered to be worth 41 Defensive Runs Saved and 32 Outs Above Average.

Most recently, he signed a minor league deal with the White Sox in January but was released in May after hitting .120/.228/.280 in 57 Triple-A plate appearances. It seems he has been focusing on carving out a new career path on the mound with some encouraging signs.

Phillips tells Topkin that he has a fastball that has been clocked at 95 miles per hour as well as a curveball and split-change. In another piece at the Tampa Bay Times, Topkin notes that Phillips recently pitched in a National Baseball Congress game and was hitting 97 miles per hour with his fastball.

“I feel like I’m going to pick it up pretty quickly,” Phillips said. “The whole reason I’m doing this is I feel like I can still compete. I feel like my body can still allow me to compete. And I feel like I could help. I love the game. And I want to continue to play the game, especially at the highest level.”

While he was still working as an outfielder in the majors, Phillips was generally beloved within the baseball world for his ebullient personality, perhaps best exemplified by his celebratory run into the outfield after the Rays walked off the Dodgers in Game Four of the 2020 World Series (video from MLB.com). That will undoubtedly mean that many will be in his corner as he attempts to navigate this unusual second act for his career.

Phillips already has 5 1/3 innings of pitching experience, which mostly involved him lobbing the ball over the plate in blowout games. If he manages to get back to the majors now that he’s pursuing pitching in a more serious fashion, he is out of options but has four years and 60 days of service time, meaning he could be retained via arbitration for at least one additional season.

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New York Yankees Transactions Brett Phillips

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Yankees Reportedly “Backed Out” Of Jack Flaherty Trade Following Medical Review

By Nick Deeds | July 30, 2024 at 11:59pm CDT

The Yankees and Tigers had a “preliminary” trade agreement in place that would’ve sent right-hander Jack Flaherty to New York prior to the trade deadline earlier today, according to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic, but the Yankees ultimately pulled the plug on the deal after reviewing the right-hander’s medical records. It’s not clear what the Yankees would’ve traded to Detroit to acquire Flaherty had the deal gone through. The righty, of course, ended up traded to the Dodgers just before the deadline.

Flaherty, 28, was long expected to be one of the most coveted starters on the market this summer after a sensational start to the season with Detroit where he delivered a 2.95 ERA and 3.11 FIP through eighteen starts. He hasn’t been fully healthy this year, however, as he skipped a start due to back discomfort early this month. He’s looked good with a 1.53 ERA and 18 strikeouts in three starts since then, but evidently the Yankees nonetheless had concerns after reviewing his medicals. The club was rumored to be in “extensive trade talks” with the Tigers after Detroit scratched the righty from his scheduled start yesterday, but ultimately no deal came together.

It’s not necessarily a surprise that New York would be somewhat gunshy about the possibility of trading for an injured pitchers. As Rosenthal notes, the club traded for right-hander Frankie Montas in a deal with the A’s at the 2022 trade deadline despite lingering concerns about his shoulder, and Montas ended up struggling in a brief stint with the club before undergoing surgery. Given the fact that the Yankees reportedly planned to shop southpaw Nestor Cortes before the deadline in the event that they landed Flaherty, it would’ve been a substantial risk for the club to deal away an established arm to make room for a pitcher who they had some level of injury concern about. The Yankees instead focused their attention on the bullpen today, shipping out lefty Caleb Ferguson while adding righties Mark Leiter Jr. and Enyel De Los Santos.

By contrast, the Dodgers have a deep staff of internal rotation options led by Tyler Glasnow and Clayton Kershaw with even more arms like Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Walker Buehler expected back from the IL later this year. Given the club’s deep group of starters, it’s understandable why they’d be willing to stomach injury risk in acquiring a rental arm like Flaherty. The addition of Flaherty was paired with the addition of center fielder Kevin Kiermaier in a deal with the Blue Jays today to bolster the club’s depth after the Dodgers added Tommy Edman and Michael Kopech in a three-team trade yesterday, as well as infielder Amed Rosario in a separate deal.

According to Rosenthal, word spread around the league that the Yankees had concerns regarding Flaherty’s medicals in the run-up to the deadline, although the only other team to actually see those medicals for themselves was the Dodgers. It’s unclear to what extent other offers for Flaherty’s services were impacted by concerns coming out of the Bronx about his medicals, though it’s worth noting that Jon Heyman of the New York Post highlighted the Red Sox alongside the Dodgers and Yankees as among the teams known to have interest in Flaherty. Boston’s only established starting pitching acquisition ended up being DFA’d veteran James Paxton as they instead opted to shore up their bullpen with Lucas Sims and Luis Garcia alongside the addition of a young, unproven potential starter in Quinn Priester.

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Boston Red Sox Detroit Tigers Los Angeles Dodgers New York Yankees Newsstand Jack Flaherty

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Yankees To Acquire Enyel De Los Santos

By Tim Dierkes | July 30, 2024 at 5:43pm CDT

The Padres traded reliever Enyel De Los Santos and minor league pitcher Thomas Balboni Jr. to the Yankees for outfielder Brandon Lockridge, according to team announcements.  The Athletic’s Chris Kirschner was first with the deal.

De Los Santos, 28, has a 4.46 ERA, 28.2 K%, 7.6 BB%, and 34.6% groundball rate in 40 1/3 innings for the Padres this year.  He’s been stung by the longball, allowing 11 bombs on the season.  Padres manager Mike Shildt has lost trust in De Los Santos in recent weeks, perhaps due to a 7.62 ERA over his last 14 games.

Signed for $15K by the Mariners out of the Dominican Republic a decade ago, De Los Santos was traded to the Padres in December 2015 in a deal for Joaquin Benoit.  He was dealt to the Phillies a couple years later for Freddy Galvis, making his Major League debut with that team.  De Los Santos went on to log big league innings with the Pirates and Guardians, with the Padres picking him up in last November’s Scott Barlow deal.

De Los Santos is earning $1.16MM this year, and was expendable for the Padres particularly after they added Jason Adam and Tanner Scott in trades.  De Los Santos is under team control through 2026 as an arbitration eligible player.  The Yankees supplemented their bullpen earlier today by acquiring Mark Leiter Jr. from the Cubs.

The Yankees also add Balboni, a 24-year-old A ball reliever.  Balboni, drafted by the Padres in the 15th round in 2022, owns a 38.2 K% and 12.7 BB% on the season.

Lockridge, 27, was a fifth round pick by the Yankees in 2018.  He’s mostly played center field this year at Triple-A, riding a strong walk rate to a 114 wRC+.  Known for his speed, Lockridge also has 34 stolen bases on the season.

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New York Yankees San Diego Padres Transactions Enyel De Los Santos

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J.D. Davis Not Traded To Rays

By Darragh McDonald | July 30, 2024 at 5:26pm CDT

The Rays have not acquired infielder J.D. Davis from the Yankees. Jon Heyman of The New York Post reported on X that Davis was going to the Rays but later recanted it, also on X. Davis had been designated for assignment by the Yankees a couple of days ago and is presumably still in DFA limbo. He’ll have to be put on waivers in the coming days now that the trade deadline has passed.

Davis, 31, has had a strange year. Back in February, he and the Giants went to an arbitration hearing, which he won. That set him up to make $6.9MM this year instead of the $6.5MM figure the club requested. But after the Giants signed Matt Chapman, they put Davis on waivers and released him.

Under the terms of the collective bargaining agreement, arbitration salaries are guaranteed if they agreed to prior to a hearing, but not if a hearing takes place. The Giants only had to pay Davis about 30 days’ termination pay, which was roughly $1.1MM. He then signed with the A’s, earning a $2.5MM guarantee. Even when combined with the termination pay from the Giants, he was making only about half of what he thought he earned in arbitration.

He hit .236/.304/.366 in his time with Oakland, leading to a subpar 96 wRC+. The rebuilding A’s likely hoped to turn Davis into a deadline trade chip but it wasn’t trending that way so they designated him assignment and flipped him to the Yankees in a small deal. But he didn’t receive much playing time as a Yankee, getting into just seven games in over a month before being designated for assignment again.

Davis slashed .268/.352/.443 from 2019 to 2023 for a wRC+ of 120. Though he has struggled this year, teams looking for roster upgrades won’t have much choice now that the deadline is done, so perhaps his past track record will draw someone’s attention. He has more than enough service time to reject an outright assignment while retaining all of his salary, so he’ll end up a free agent if he clears waivers. At that point, a team could sign him for just the prorated league minimum with that amount subtracted from what the Yankees pay.

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New York Yankees Tampa Bay Rays Transactions J.D. Davis

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Yankees Trade Caleb Ferguson To Astros

By Anthony Franco | July 30, 2024 at 3:17pm CDT

The Astros have acquired lefty reliever Caleb Ferguson from the Yankees in exchange for minor league pitcher Kelly Austin and international signing bonus space, according to an announcement by New York. Houston is reportedly sending $750K in bonus room.

New York acquired Ferguson from the Dodgers over the offseason. He has had a difficult season, pitching to a 5.13 ERA over 42 appearances. That’s in part because of poor sequencing, as he has only stranded 62.2% of baserunners. Yet Ferguson has also been somewhat homer prone and is issuing walks at an elevated 10.3% clip.

Ferguson is still missing a decent number of bats. He’s striking out 26.5% of opponents behind an 11.5% swinging strike rate. Those are each in line with his career marks, although his 93.7 MPH average fastball speed is a bit below the 95-96 MPH range he’d posted over the previous two seasons.

Over parts of five seasons with the Dodgers before last winter’s trade, Ferguson turned in a 3.43 earned run average. He had an identical mark across 60 1/3 frames last season. Ferguson doesn’t have much in the way of a platoon split for his career, so he’s not an ideal fit as a situational specialist, but he’s only a year removed from being a solid overall middle reliever.

The Astros have been light on left-handed relief for the past few seasons. They signed Josh Hader to a five-year contract last winter, but he’s obviously holding down the ninth inning. Houston hasn’t had much in the way of a middle innings option for manager Joe Espada, though that generally hasn’t been a priority for their front office. Aside from Hader, only rookie Bryan King and Parker Mushinski have logged any action out of the bullpen as southpaws.

New York is similarly light on left-handed bullpen options, though they might take a bigger swing on the trade market in the next three hours. Tim Hill stands as the only southpaw in their current relief mix. The Yanks could be involved on top rental lefty Tanner Scott or a less exciting target like Tanner Banks or old friend Justin Wilson.

Ferguson is making $2.4MM in his final year of arbitration. There’s a little less than $800K in salary for the stretch run. The Yankees are paying a 110% tax on salary, so offloading Ferguson saves them around $2MM. Houston is in the second luxury tax bracket, so they’re paying a 32% tax — around $250K — to pick him up. He’ll be a free agent next offseason.

Austin, 23, is a former undrafted free agent out of UCLA. He has worked out of the bullpen in the low minors this season, turning in a 2.21 ERA across 36 2/3 innings. The 6’0″ righty has dominated low minors competition, striking out 31% of opponents while issuing walks at a meager 4.7% clip.

Jack Curry of the YES Network first reported the Astros were acquiring Ferguson for a minor leaguer and international bonus pool space. Chandler Rome of the Athletic identified the player as Austin and reported the $750K figure.

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Houston Astros New York Yankees Transactions Caleb Ferguson

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Yankees Scratch Gerrit Cole With Body Fatigue, To Select Will Warren

By Anthony Franco | July 30, 2024 at 2:59pm CDT

The Yankees scratched Gerrit Cole from tonight’s scheduled start against the Phillies due to general body fatigue. Well-regarded pitching prospect Will Warren is getting the call for a spot start in what’ll be his major league debut. The Yankees will need to select him onto the 40-man roster, which has two vacancies pending their deadline activity.

There’s no indication this is anything more than a day-to-day issue. Yet it’s at least worth monitoring after Cole missed the first half of the season with elbow inflammation. Cole has made seven starts since being reinstated in the middle of June. He owns an uncharacteristic 5.40 ERA thanks largely to nine home runs allowed.

If the Yankees are at all concerned about Cole’s health, it could impact their approach to the deadline over the next two hours. They’ve already been tied to starting pitchers, including to Jack Flaherty at the top of the market. There are rumblings the Yanks could even add an impact starter like Flaherty and look to flip Nestor Cortes.

Warren, 25, is a former eighth-round pick who has developed into one of New York’s top prospects. He ranks seventh among Yankees farmhands at Baseball America. Warren’s arsenal is headlined by his mid-90s fastball and potential plus slider. He has a shot to be a mid-rotation starter. The Southeastern Louisiana product has started 20 times in Scranton. His 6.11 earned run average is disappointing, but Warren has an impressive 27.1% strikeout rate against a manageable 8.2% walk percentage.

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New York Yankees Transactions Gerrit Cole Will Warren

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Alex Verdugo Receiving Trade Interest

By Mark Polishuk | July 30, 2024 at 2:48pm CDT

An unknown number of teams have been in touch with the Yankees about Alex Verdugo’s availability, according to reporter Francys Romero (X link).  There doesn’t appear to be any sense that a trade is particularly close, though another source tells Romero that it isn’t out of the question that Verdugo could be moved.  Verdugo would be a pure rental for any acquiring team, and he is owed roughly $2.9MM for the remainder of the season (from his $8.7MM salary).

New York just picked up Verdugo this past offseason, as a rare trade between the Yankees and Red Sox resulted in the outfielder coming to the Bronx for his final arbitration-eligible season.  Verdugo got off to a nice start with his new team by hitting well over the first five weeks of play, but his production has since gone south, with a .222/.264/.346 slash line in his last 297 plate appearances.  He is providing strong glovework as the regular left fielder, but Verdugo’s 90 wRC+ for the season has added to the Yankees’ overall difficulty in finding consistent offense beyond Aaron Judge and Juan Soto.

Giancarlo Stanton’s return from the injured list fills one hole in the lineup, and with Stanton getting the bulk of DH duty, Judge will resume the everyday center field role.  Trent Grisham and utilityman Oswaldo Cabrera could get some left field work in the event of a Verdugo trade, but the likelier scenario would be that the Yankees would again call up star prospect Jasson Dominguez, who was recently activated from the Triple-A injured list.

Dominguez didn’t make his 2024 debut until mid-May due to his recovery from Tommy John surgery, and he got only about a month’s worth of action before an oblique strain shelved him for roughly six weeks.  With only 25 games under his belt this season, the Yankees might want to give him a bit more Triple-A time to make sure Dominguez is fully healthy and ramped up, though his big numbers at the plate indicate that he doesn’t have much less to prove against minor league pitching.  Dominguez wowed baseball with a .980 OPS in his first 33 PAs as a big leaguer last season before the TJ surgery brought his debut year to an abrupt end.

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New York Yankees Alex Verdugo

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Yankees Acquire Mark Leiter Jr.

By Darragh McDonald | July 30, 2024 at 1:20pm CDT

The Yankees announced that they have acquired right-hander Mark Leiter Jr. from the Cubs. In return, the Cubs will receive infielder Ben Cowles and right-hander Jack Neely. The Yankees had two open 40-man spots and jump to 39, while the Cubs drop down to 38.

Leiter, now 33, has been great for the Cubs over the past few years after a late-bloomer trajectory. The son of Mark Leiter and nephew of Al Leiter, the younger Mark made it to the big leagues by 2017 but didn’t impress in his first tastes of the show. By the end of 2018, he had a 5.53 earned run average in 114 big league innings. He then required Tommy John surgery early in 2019 and was on the shelf for an extended period of time. He signed a minor league deal with the Tigers in 2021 but didn’t get a call to the show.

A minor league deal with the Cubs going into 2022 turned into the opportunity he needed. He was selected to the big league roster by mid-April that year and eventually tossed 65 2/3 innings for the Cubs with a 3.99 ERA. He struck out 25.9% of batters faced while giving out walks at an 8.9% clip and kept the ball on the ground at a 48.9% rate.

Despite that generally strong work, he was nudged off the club’s roster in January of 2023. He had exhausted his final option year and so the Cubs designated him for assignment, with all 29 clubs passing on the chance to grab him off waivers. He elected free agency but re-signed with the Cubs on a minor league deal prior to the next season.

He was added back to the roster for Opening Day and has been a key part of the Chicago bullpen since then. Going back to the start of 2023, he has a 3.75 ERA in 100 2/3 innings. His strikeout rate is up to 30.9% in that time while he still has decent walk and ground ball rates of 8.8% and 47.1% respectively.

This year’s 4.21 ERA doesn’t look pretty but that’s mostly due to a tiny strand rate of 55%, well below the 71.9% league average. Since he’s striking out 34.9% of batters faced and also getting grounders at a 50.6% clip, his 2.11 FIP and 2.42 SIERA suggest he’s been about two runs better than his ERA would have you believe.

The Cubs have been balancing present and future needs at this deadline. Just over a week ago, president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer said that the club would be prioritizing “2025 and beyond” in their transactions. That didn’t necessarily point to a deadline selloff, as the club then went out and acquired Isaac Paredes from the Rays and Nate Pearson from the Blue Jays, with both of those players having multiple years of control.

But there were also some rumors that they might make some pitching available and there’s a logic to Leiter being moved out. Due to his unusual trajectory, Leiter still has a couple of years of club control remaining after this one. But given his age, the Cubs probably didn’t consider him a core piece of their future-focused agenda and made him available.

Those circumstances are likely also why the win-now Yankees wanted to get him. He only just qualified for arbitration for the first time coming into this season and is making $1.5MM, not much above this year’s $740K league minimum. The Yankees are slated to pay the competitive balance tax for a third straight year and finish well above the top tier. That means they face a 110% tax rate for any new spending, so Leiter’s minimal salary fits in nicely for them, and they can keep him around for two more years beyond this one.

While Leiter is cheap in terms of dollars, the Yankees have paid the price of two prospects to get him. Neely, 24, was an 11th-round pick in the 2021 draft. He’s been exclusively a reliever in his professional career, racking up significant strikeout totals. In 160 1/3 minor league innings overall, he has a 2.75 ERA, 38.8% strikeout rate and 9.4% walk rate. That includes 41 2/3 innings this year between Double-A and Triple-A with a 2.81 ERA, 36% strikeout rate and 9.1% walk rate. Baseball America currently lists him as the #20 prospect in the Yankees’ system.

Cowles, 24, was a 10th-round pick in 2021 and has played in 88 Double-A games this year. His .294/.376/.472 batting line leads to a strong 141 wRC+, indicating he’s been 41% better than league average. His .340 batting average on balls in play is high but he’s also got strong walk and strikeout rates of 10.3% and 17.7%, respectively. He also has 14 steals and has lined up at the three infield spots to the left of first base.

Both Neely and Cowles are Rule 5 eligible this winter, so the Yankees would have been facing a decision about whether or not to add them to their 40-man roster. Instead, they have cashed them in for an immediate bullpen upgrade, meaning those decisions will now transfer to Chicago.

Rob Zamparelli first reported on X that Leiter was headed to the Yankees. Jeff Passan and Kiley McDaniel of ESPN relayed the full trade on X.

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Chicago Cubs New York Yankees Newsstand Transactions Mark Leiter Jr.

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Yankees Interested In Luis Rengifo, Kyle Finnegan, Lucas Erceg

By Darragh McDonald | July 30, 2024 at 11:53am CDT

11:53am: Jorge Castillo of ESPN reports that the Yanks are more focused on pitching and acquiring Díaz is unlikely, which could perhaps apply to Rengifo as well.

11:49am: The trade deadline is just a few hours away now but teams are still scouring the market for upgrades. Per Jon Heyman of The New York Post on X, the Yankees have infielders Yandy Díaz and Luis Rengifo on their radar, as well as relievers Tanner Scott, Pete Fairbanks, Kyle Finnegan and Lucas Erceg. He adds that they could also look to add a starting pitching but might not meet the asking prices.

Some of those guys have already been connected to the Yankees in rumors. The connections with Rengifo, Finnegan and Erceg are new but also in line with their previously-reported pursuits. Even after adding Jazz Chisholm Jr. to the roster, they have seemingly still been looking for more infield help, which Rengifo could certainly help with.

The 27-year-old is in his third straight above-average offensive season. Since the start of the 2022 campaign, he’s hit .272/.323/.433 for a wRC+ of 110. He’s also stolen 35 bases in that time while bouncing to all three outfield spots and three infield positions to the left of first base. He’s not considered a strong defender at any one position but the ability to move all around is certainly attractive.

The Yanks are still trying to figure out their best alignment at the moment. Chisholm’s first game as a Yankee was in center field, where he has been spending most of his time in recent years. But then the Yanks moved him to third base last night, a position he had never played before. Now that Giancarlo Stanton is back and in the designated hitter slot, Aaron Judge moved to center field, flanked by Juan Soto and Alex Verdugo. Acquiring another infielder could result in Chisholm moving to second and bumping out Gleyber Torres, or perhaps Verdugo will get nudged out of the outfield mix.

Rengifo is making a modest $4.4MM this year, with roughly $1.5MM left to be paid out. That’s likely attractive to the Yankees as they are slated to be a third-time payor of the competitive balance tax and well above the top tier, meaning they will pay a 110% tax on anything they add to the ledger. He can also be retained via arbitration for 2025 and could perhaps slide into next year’s second base job with Torres slated for free agency after the current season. Verdugo is also an impending free agent, so perhaps Chisholm could be in the outfield with Rengifo on the infield. There’s also the looming Soto free agency to consider, though the Yanks are expected to be aggressive in trying to re-sign him. Rengifo has also been connected to clubs such as the Red Sox, Dodgers and Royals in recent weeks.

The extra year of control means that the Angels don’t have to move on from Rengifo but there would be logic in doing so as they haven’t been meaningfully competitive for quite some time. Now that Shohei Ohtani is gone and Mike Trout is having annual trouble staying on the field, the odds of them turning things around between now and the end of 2025 seem long.

Bullpen adds are generally on the radar of all contending teams and the Yanks are surely exploring all options there. Finnegan has been the Nationals’ closer for quite some time but is nearing the end of his window of club control, with one year remaining after this one. The Nats have already traded Hunter Harvey and Lane Thomas, two players that were also controllable through 2025, and Finnegan seems likely to move today as well.

He has a career 3.52 earned run average in 272 appearances. He has struck out 23.9% of batters faced, given out walks at a 9.4% rate and kept the ball on the ground at a 46.8% clip. That includes racking up 28 saves this year with a 3.48 ERA, 24.6% strikeout rate, 7.8% walk rate and 40.5% ground ball rate. He’s making $5.1MM this year.

Erceg can still be retained by the Athletics for five seasons beyond this one, but he’s a late bloomer who is now 29 years old despite his limited experience, which could tempt them to sell high. He has a 3.68 ERA this year, 26.3% strikeout rate, 8.3% walk rate and 50.5% ground ball rate. The fact that he’s pre-arbitration and therefore making a modest salary is surely appealing to the Yankees but the cost might be high. Even rental relievers are netting big returns at this year’s deadline so getting Erceg might take an uncomfortable haul.

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Athletics Los Angeles Angels New York Yankees Tampa Bay Rays Washington Nationals Kyle Finnegan Lucas Erceg Luis Rengifo Yandy Diaz

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Garrett Crochet Rumors: Deadline Day

By Steve Adams | July 30, 2024 at 7:40am CDT

White Sox ace Garrett Crochet has been the hottest name on the trade market this month, both because of the Sox’ own failed attempt to extend him and because his camp has since indicated that the left-hander wants an extension before pitching in October for a new club. Crochet’s 114 1/3 innings this season have already eclipsed his prior career total. He’s said to be against a move to the bullpen, believing that staying on a starter’s routine is best for his health, and aiming for financial security before pushing his workload even deeper into postseason waters.

It’s rubbed many fans the wrong way to see such a business-like approach, and it’s taken many in the industry aback — White Sox GM Chris Getz included, apparently. Via Sox Machine’s James Fegan, Getz spoke with reporters yesterday and acknowledged that he was “surprised and taken back” by how Crochet’s camp handled the situation, particularly as he’d had a conversation with the left-hander’s agent at CAA just the night before.

“I think most fans and even players without knowing everything, it makes sense,” said Getz. “We understand why a stance would be taken. Now how you go about expressing that is what was a bit hurtful, quite honestly, considering I felt like we could have handled it a little bit differently and still I think everyone accomplished what they wanted to accomplish. … But Garrett and I are fine, we are good. I’ll continue to be one of his top supporters. In regard to how it affects the coming days, tough to tell.”

We’ll round up today’s Crochet chatter here and break out any major developments into their own posts…

  • USA Today’s Bob Nightengale reports that the White Sox have become increasingly optimistic that they’ll find someone to meet their asking price on Crochet even in the wake of his extension revelation. Per Nightengale, the Sox believe that they’ll trade Crochet between now and the 5:00pm CT deadline but expect to hang onto center fielder Luis Robert Jr. — as was reported to be the case regarding Robert just last night.
  • Both Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic and Bruce Levine of 670 The Score suggest that Crochet’s market remains strong. Rosenthal lists the Padres, Dodgers, Braves, Phillies, Red Sox and Orioles as teams with varying levels of interest. Levine echoes much of that same list and quotes an executive from a rival AL club stating the relative obvious: “You don’t get a chance to find a top pitcher like that often. You must get creative.”
  • The Yankees inquired on Crochet at some point but were told in those initial talks that the two parties “didn’t match up” in a trade, reports Jon Heyman of the New York Post. The Yankees could always revisit talks, particularly with so many alternative rotation options off the board. New York has been tied to Tigers righty Jack Flaherty as well, and the Yankees are seeking a rotation upgrade as they simultaneously explore the possibility of moving Nestor Cortes in a separate deal.
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