Friday, December 14, 2018

Alone on the hook, Sonny Gray isn't attracting any Trout

Sherman, set the Wayback to November of 2018, the good ol' days, back when the Yankees appeared to be buried in an avalanche of suitors for Sonny Gray. What was it - 11 breathless GMs sitting in the front parlor, clutching their radar guns, the testosterone thick as elephant farts. Ahh, such a gilded era! In Sonny, we possessed a highly coveted trade chip, a nugget of pure, off-season gold, which we could easily transform into a starting pitcher, a bullpen stopper or an infielder who'd make us forget Sir Didi... for at least four months.

Ahh, those were sunny days. The original, catastrophic Sonny deal of 2017 was going to work out, after all. Teams were calling, because everyone knew that once Sonny escaped the bright lights and loose hussies of Gomorrah, he'd rediscover his mojo, as did AJ Burnett, Ivan Nova and countless disappointments before them. 

Welp... the 2018 Winter Meetings have disbanded, and Sonny remains a Yankee, and in finding a taker willing to pay-up for the used car, I guess you could say Cooperstown Cashman's plans look like "a fully operational death wish."

We cannot judge Cashman's moves until the entire 2019 picture comes into focus. The devil is always in the details, and MLB rumors never involve details. 
But let's look at the various components and try to figure out where Sonny could fit in.

The Rotation: I keep hearing how the Yankees look solid here, but I'm sorry, I don't see it. Our "ace," Luis Severino, fell apart last summer, and there is absolutely no guarantee that he'll return to form. Masahiro Tanaka is still pitching with a partial tear in his elbow. James Paxton is oft-injured, JA Happ will be 36, and CC Sabathia is a ghost of what he was. In many respects - and it hurts to write this - we'd almost be better off keeping Sonny Gray and seeing what happens.

The Bullpen: Clearly, we must replace David Robertson and Zach Britton - and maybe improve upon them. Let's not forget: Aroldis Chapman and Dellin Betances have both turned into exploding cigars. Chapman's knee could go at any time, and Betances goes from maestro to meltdown. Sonny could probably bring us a veteran bullpen arm, or a couple of young, untested pitchers.

The Infield: The Great Hole of Didi remains unfilled. Until that mystery is solved - either by signing Manny Machado or finding a glove man - nothing can be projected about the 2019 Yankees. Signing Manny could unleash a hurricane of trades - Miguel Andujar, Greg Bird, Clint Frazier - yeesh - it hurts to imagine. But Sonny, packaged alone, could surely bring us a decent, glove-first shortstop. 

The Outfield: No problems here, aside from the glut. Could the relatively cost-effective Sonny be packaged along with the true death star, Jacoby Ellsbury? Or maybe with Frazier? What if he were packaged with Giancarlo Stanton? Would the Dodgers bite? Could it be worth our while? Well, we can dream, right?

Lately, the Sonny Gray market appears to be shrinking, but let's not kid ourselves: It was probably never there to begin with. We all saw what Sonny did last year for the Yankees. We all saw the many chances he blew. Seriously, how much would we give up for the guy? Because that's what we're going to get.

17 comments:


  1. it hurts to write this - we'd almost be better off keeping Sonny Gray and seeing what happens.

    Oof. It hurts just to read it.

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  2. I tend to agree with you, LBJ, even if it makes my scrotum shrink to even *think* about retaining Sonny. You KNOW we're going to need a warm body by May, and now we have nobody in Scrotum to call up from AAA.

    As for Sonny, it is not just the bright lights and hussies, Duque. As soon as ALL of those guys on your list escaped from the clutches of Larry “The Hand of Death” Rothschild - destroyer of arms and mind-fucker extraordinaire - they ALL reverted to form. It’s ABSO-FUCKING-LUTELY SHOCKING to me that he has been allowed to remain as our pitching coach.

    I do not have the experience, temperament, knowledge or time at the moment, but I would love to see one of my esteemed comrades here on this blog - paging HOSS??? - do a writeup on the Yankee pitching coaches from the past 40 years, possibly with correlations to the pitchers under their them, along with some backstory of what happened on their watch. THAT is something I’m curious about.

    If nobody else does it, I’ll think hard about it, but I’m preparing to follow the geese south soon and am too caught up with the bottomless vortex of bullshit that comes with preparing for a long haul. It’s a mental haul, as well as a physical haul, people. Perhaps the Yankees need some mental coaching on top of the physical coaching?

    Since you mentioned rumors, let me say that I have zero faith in whoever is writing the bullshit that goes into MLB trade rumors anymore. They toss around words about our rotation that have no basis in reality. I guess it’s all about click-throughs with them at this point. Our rotation - to me - resembles more the thing you see at a Whole Foods with the chickens on it. Oh yeah, a “ROTISSERIE.”

    FUCK YOU, BRIAN.

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  3. I cannot believe how badly this offseason is going.

    Oh, wait. Yes I can.

    Fuck you, Brian.

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  4. As of today, 12/15/17, the NYY 40-man roster includes:

    PITCHERS

    Sonny Gray
    Chance Adams, Parker Bridwell
    Luis Cessa, AJ Cole
    Domingo German
    and Monty, who I have liked in the past; but now -- ???

    Forget Sonny. What would you trade to the NYYs for the entire lot of these? 3 ham sandwiches and some slaw?

    Other roster standout names:

    Kyle H, C
    Hanser Alberto.....???
    Greg Bird, the poor guy
    Thairo Who Is Not Of Cairo
    Tyler Wade -- who in 133 MLB ABs has an OBP of .218

    Ellsbury (insert assorted cuss words here)
    Someone named Locastro
    Clint Frazier, a mystery at this point
    Brett Gardner, another mystery (as in....why did they sign him?)

    and

    G Stanton, who struck out 211 times in 687 plate appearances.

    Together, that's 17 of the 40. The only hope in all of these names (and prob. it ain't realistic) are that Monty comes back useful and maybe Stanton improves just a bit...he struck out only 163 times in 2017.

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  5. The Ghost of Yankees PastDecember 14, 2018 at 10:34 AM

    His ERA away from Yankee Stadium was. 3.17 last season. Someone will take Sonny. The only question is what the price will be. If the price isn’t right and we don’t get value in return, keeping him is not the worst option. Counting on him as one of the top 5 pitchers is the problem. Taking a flyer on him as a starter if someone gets hurt is a different issue.

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  6. "a fully operational death wish."

    You sir, are on a roll.

    Now to the issue of Sonny, let's share.

    I go back to his comment about being one of the top pitchers in baseball after he, finally had a good game. (Or was it one good inning or maybe one good batter - I forget.) It's good to have confidence. It's bad to extol your own virtues when you can't deliver consistent excellence.

    He is a no. You can not start the season with a guy afraid to pitch in his home ballpark. (See Whitson, Ed)

    They will get value because "Teams were calling, because everyone knew that once Sonny escaped the bright lights and loose hussies of Gomorrah, he'd rediscover his mojo, as did AJ Burnett, Ivan Nova and countless disappointments before them." Duque is right. When we traded for him he was going to be a #2. He just spit the bit in NY. It happens.

    As to the lineup and the 40 man. They just put a bunch of guys on the 40 to protect them from the Rule 5 draft. Joe FoB, they are the mystery meat. The draft is over. Everyone is safe until next year. We didn't even have to send players to Canada.

    There are six players not yet on our 40 man.

    The Didi replacement - Manny Machado (and a massive upgrade to the 40)
    Two relievers -
    Another Starting Pitcher (to take the place of Gray - an addition by subtraction or maybe a major upgrade.
    And one other guy - C'mon Harper.

    It's not even January much less opening day. So far we've added a front-line starter in Paxton, and shored up our back up in CF. Slow? Yes. Over? Not by a long shot.

    Doug K.



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  7. Fuck you Brian! But most of all FUCK YOU HAL!! You lying, bait-and-switch sack of shit!!

    The Yankees game plan was never to go on a shopping spree once they reset the luxury tax machine, but simply to infer that they were so interest in the team would stay high. If they really wanted to spend they would have signed the best pitcher available, Patrick Corbin, matching the Nat's offer. How can you believe Cashman swearing that the extra year scared him off when he has gone longer in the past in length giving Mike Mussina 8 years? And Mussina was 3 years older than Corbin!

    No, the Yankee bloated front office and executives have nothing but contempt for their fan base much like P.T. Barnum must have had scorn for all the suckers that patronized his bogus side-show attractions at his circus. At least P.T. had the common sense not to try and sell way overpriced $ 20.00/12 ounce piss warm beers and $ 12.00 raw rubber hot dogs to the rubes. Okay, maybe he did sell a few "MonkeyBoy" teeth to the customers but in today's dollars it is still less than a $ 50.00 Yankee cap.

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  8. This is what I love about this blog: a terrific post by our Peerless Leader sets off an informed, passionate, wonderfully bitter exchange, uncontaminated by the sorts of cockeyed optimism and runaway statistical folderol that, in my opinion, pollute all other Yankees sites.

    To begin with, 13bit, I'd love to see such an analysis myself, but I'm afraid these days I'm burdened by this awful thing called "work" that they're making me do to earn my daily bread (How 20th century!).

    Pitching coaches are hard to judge. Much as I absolutely loved Mel Stottlemyre from his pitching days, I always felt he was less than impressive as a coach. BUT, a friend who I trust and who used to cover the team told me that Mel was well-respected, and he produced stats to show pitchers generally did a little better with him than without, so what do I know?

    Well, this, actually: ROTHSCHILD MUST GO!

    A pitching coach under whom pitchers NEVER get better but always do worse, has no value.

    Sure, he's no Art Fowler, Destroyer of Arms. But he contributes nothing that I can see.

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  9. Meanwhile, I can't believe Brian Cashman's strategy of announcing, loud and long, 'We hate Sonny Gray and want him gone at all costs!' didn't produce immediate results. Huh. Baseball is a funny game.

    But Ghost, as you point out, Sonny's road ERA is 3.17 (I found his split's on baseball reference's new format, where it is under a caption that reads "More Gray Pages." Wasn't that a Dylan song? "My Gray Pages"?)

    CC's home ERA, on the other hand, was 3.12.

    The answer to this seems obvious: pitch CC at home, and Sonny on the road. Period. You will save wear and tear on both pitchers, get maximum production from them...and Coops will be hailed (again) as a genius.

    Problem solved!

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  10. Joe FOB, you're right: this is more of a wish list than a real roster. Monty's comeback is a long shot (and he never had all that much stuff in the first place), while only Mike King is left as a realistic possibility from the minors.

    Doug K., I admire your optimism. And sure, maybe Coops is just playing 3-dimensional chess, waiting until the Rule 5 Draft was over. But as the man has trouble playing 1-dimensional checkers, I kinda doubt it.

    And Carl, you're right: who can doubt that, if Hal said tomorrow, "Brian old son, go out there and get me the best team money can buy, money is no object!" that Mr. Genius would not do exactly as he was told?

    I also love the Barnum reference. I would rather see the Feejee Mermaid—a dead monkey sewed into a fish tail—than Sonny Gray or Neil Walker in pinstripes again.

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  11. I also love our new, "dilly dilly" style sign off: "Fuck you Brian!"

    Maybe we can make it a greeting and response:

    "Fuck you, Brian."
    "Fuck you, Hal."
    "So, how are the wife and kids?"

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  12. This, from Frank Fantino, a former pro pitcher and college pitching coach at Iona on the responsibilities and duties of a successful pitching coach:

    http://breathebaseball.com/the-pitching-coachs-role/

    LOL, does this seem like Rothschild to you? Larry always appears to be aloof and indifferent when talking to pitchers. Even when he leans on the dugout and then strolls out to the mound he looks put upon to have to walk out and converse with the guy. I bet he doesn't communicate well with his charges and makes them feel uncomfortable because of his aura of detachment. His approach is more likely "This is how we do it here" than "How can I help you"? This doesn't defuse the pressure of pitching successfully in the big leagues let alone for the Yankees. It's way past time to get a younger pitching coach with a good track record who isn't just putting in time until retirement.

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  13. Hoss,

    "CC's home ERA, on the other hand, was 3.12. The answer to this seems obvious: pitch CC at home, and Sonny on the road. Period. You will save wear and tear on both pitchers, get maximum production from them...and Coops will be hailed (again) as a genius."

    Actually that is a VERY interesting idea. So it's not a six man rotation as much as a platoon starter. I like that a lot! During home stands and road trips the other guy goes into the pen as long man. A groundbreaking solution. Seriously. Our very own Feejee Starter.

    Doug K.

    ReplyDelete
  14. ALM Directive Dialog Lesson One. Escuche y despues repiten

    Los Yankees de Nueva York.

    Brian: Hola Hal. Chingate!
    Hal: Hola Brian. Chingate! Quanto cuesto mi beisbolista nuevo?
    Brian: Yo no se. 100.000.000 dólares por quatro anos?
    Hal: Chingate!
    Brian: Adios.
    Hal: Chingate.
    (Beep)

    Doug K.

    ReplyDelete
  15. FUCK YOU BRIAN!

    FUCK YOU HAL!

    HOW ARE THE WIFE AND KIDS?

    HAHA! ...HOSS!

    ReplyDelete

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