Heaney signs, Verlander auditions, and Gallo grows gloves with loving care

Three weeks until the Dec. 2 lockout. As Stephen Colbert would say, meanwhile...

1. Andrew Heaney signs with LA. Eight million per. WTF? Did this guy's feeble twin pitch for the Yankees last season?

Eight million? Good to see the Dodgers tightening their belt. Maybe they watched footage of the ONE GAME last year when the Heanster pitched well for us. It was Aug. 18, midway into our 13-game win streak, when we drank from the Maas Mountain Fountain. Heaney threw seven glorious innings against Boston - two hits, one run. Afterwards, YES awarded Brian Cashman the Nobel Prize for Trading, and we penciled in The Heannie Genie as our No. 3 horse. 

Next start, he lasted four innings, then two, then 0.1. We hot-potatoed him for the one-game Wild Card roster. Now, he's a Dodger, and they're suggesting he's next year's Robbie Ray. Good luck with that.

2. Yesterday, Justin Verlander threw for a gaggle of scouts, hoping to secure another fat contract. (Speaking of fat, Kate Upton's modeling career - case of the Mommys? NYC is a great place for a paparazzi revival.) Should we bid on a guy who, over the years, was a Yankee Killer?

Of course, yes, of course! In another time, under another owner, it would be a no-brainer. The Yankees should bid on everybody, even if only to drive up the price for our rivals - as they do to us. But Harmony Hal likes to be greeted warmly in the Owners' Club Lounge, thus he annually, arbitrarily draws his happy line on spending. 

Still, is Verlander worth a shot? He turns 39 in February, and the Corey Kluber alarm is sounding. (Corey last year was 35.) Verlander missed all of 2021, after missing nearly all of 2020. (He started one game.) But two years ago - 2019 - he went 21-9, best in the AL. That's almost identical to Kluber's history; he'd missed almost two full years. 

So, what did we get from Kluber? An enigma burger. He started slow, found his stride - was steadily improving, until the no-hitter! - when YES awarded Brian Cashman the Nobel Prize for Signings - then, poof... gone. When he returned, he was rusty. If the Yankees had beaten Boston in the Wild Card, who knows what Kluber might have delivered in the Divisional Round? My guess... a two-inning start.

Anybody who signs Verlander should expect him to pitch well for a while, then get hurt. Maybe the Yankees should sign both, and use them intermittently? Ah, just thinking of what Old George would have done...

3. Joey Gallo wins the AL Gold Glove in right field. Okay, I hear heads scratching on this. Two conclusions: 

1) The Gold Glove award aint what it used to be. (A year ago we were looking at Clint Frazier as a finalist, which Yankee fans all knew was a bullshit fluke of some algorithm.) Gallo played half-a-season in RF, and he didn't look that great in our LF. Another resounding WTF? 

2) Could there be a Gallo we simply didn't see? Did we miss something? (Just asking, don't shoot me.) Because, as a Yankee, Gallo was certifiably awful - Hall of Fame Awful - so wretched that we should wonder if we actually saw the guy - who now has two Gold Glove awards?

Last year, Gallo led the AL in walks and strikeouts, making him the poster child for boring baseball. But his OPS in Texas was .869. (With the Yankees, it was .707.) His OPS for the season stands at .808 - that's second among AL left-fielders, behind Randy Arozarena, with .815. Was he quietly better than we think?

I dunno. I just dunno. Frankly, I hope they trade him. I've seen enough. Gallo was terrible. But you do have to wonder: Could he really be that bad?