Yankees add elite outfielder after Alex Verdugo set to depart after a significant season
If the Yankees are really entertaining trading top prospect Spencer Jones and his yeesh-inducing whiff rate for Garrett Crochet, who’ll likely have to head to the bullpen by September, then it seems they’re really entertaining just about anything this summer.
If that’s the case, then why not insure against Giancarlo Stanton’s slow return from injury and do something about your total lack of left field productivity by adding another top-10 hitter in baseball?
Wait a second. One of those is available?! Let’s see, Shohei Ohtani’s under contract for 30 years, Gunnar Henderson and Bobby Witt Jr. are probably pretty safe at their current homes, Bryce Harper should’ve been a Yankee but isn’t … who are we missing here?
Yankees can trade for Oakland A’s slugger Brent Rooker. Really, they can.
Rooker at DH is ideal. Rooker in left field, as you can tell from the chart above, is not additive; he rarely plays there, totaling just 102 1/3 innings in the outfield this season. But what’s the worst he’s gonna do? Faceplant on a ball with 99% catch probability to end a hotly-contested divisional game?
Though most baseball fans have tried hard not to pay attention to what’s going on in Oakland this year out of secondhand sympathy and alignment with the disrespected fans, Rooker was likely this summer’s biggest All-Star snub, but couldn’t crack the roster because … well, because MLB felt weird giving the team they ripped away from its locale two honorees.
Thanks to a recent scorching stretch, the 29-year-old’s OPS is up to .939 with 22 bombs and 67 RBI through play on Monday, and he’s only getting stronger as the season drags on. Once thought to be a fit for the Phillies, who value slug in the way the Yankees used to (not coincidentally under Kevin Long), Dave Dombrowski has reportedly moved on. That means, if New York’s braintrust is willing to pay the price, they can allow Giancarlo Stanton to rehab at his own pace rather than rushing him back. They can protect against the three weeks of Stanton ramping back up against big-league pitching that we all know always accompanies his returns from the Injured List. He’ll be a weapon again someday, but it might take a while.
If Rooker joins the fold and Stanton returns to prominence, there’ll be days when the Yankees will be able to deemphasize Verdugo, the worst qualified hitter in MLB since June 15, whether or not Jasson Dominguez ever successfully rehabilitates his oblique injury. It’s a bit of an odd move on the surface, with a crowded DH spot (and Aaron Judge requiring half-days), but so was Edwin Encarnacion back in 2019. Remember 2019? That was the final year where the Yankees saw their surging offense and decided, “You know, we don’t have to just fill holes. We can add to strengths, too.”
Given the likely trajectory of Stanton’s recovery, Rooker would be an excellent “all in” move for a team that hasn’t gone all in in a while.
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