Melky Demoted-Sexson Released

The Melk Man has left the building, presumably riding out on the back of The Big Sexy like an excited young boy taking his first pony ride. Melky Cabrera has been demoted to Scranton-Wilkes Barre, replaced on the roster by Brett Gardner. In a corresponding move, Richie Sexson has been released and replaced on the roster by utility infielder and 32-year-old career minor leaguer Cody Ransom.

Glad to see Gardner get another shot with the big club. He’s an unbelievable threat on the bases and he grinds out long at-bats. Granted, speed and grinding didn’t help Gardner do better than a .153/.227/.169 line in his first stint, but the message is clear: ineptitude to the level of Melky’s will not stand, even if it was allowed to for three months too long. A real pessimist could argue that this is making a change for the sake of making a change and that it doesn’t change anything for the Yankees 2008 playoff hopes, and that pessimist would be hard to argue with because they’re mostly right. But addition by subtraction is a real concept, and perhaps both these moves are meant to do a little wake-up work for all parties directly affected:

Melky Cabrera: Pretty obvious, but it can affect him a lot of ways. He can’t take for granted that he’s a part of the team anymore, either this year or for next year, meaning it’s crystal clear that he’s going to have to earn whatever future he’s going to have with the Yankees. It’s a shame that he will undoubtedly be a September call-up when rosters expand, which is what makes this move too little too late. Instead of letting him stew in the minors and recalibrate and maybe figure out how to hit again via an extended stay, he’s really getting a 2-week excommunication to western Pennsylvania. In the bigger picture, though, it means that Austin Jackson’s chances of cracking the big league team in 2009 have increased exponentially, and it’s open season for who plays CF for the Yankees on Opening Day 2009.

Robinson Cano: It takes away his number one buddy, and it means he’ll have to fly solo if he’s going to head out to Manhattan clubs to get ripped and pick up ladies dying to hang out with one or more of the New York Yankees. Also, Cody Ransom’s call-up shows that maybe his virtually unwavering playing time isn’t going to be guaranteed if he continues to play lazy, uninspired baseball. A start at 2nd for Ransom against a left handed starter would be an eyebrow-raiser, for sure.

Brett Gardner: A chance to redeem his putrid offensive performance upon his first go-round with the Yankees. He has notoriously been a slow starter when he’s advanced a level through the minors, and the jump from AAA to MLB is arguably the hardest a professional player makes. It will be interesting to see if he adjusts to big league pitching the 2nd time around, if he’s more aggressive early in counts when he gets fat pitches, or if he sticks to always running a 2-strike count and too often being called out on strikes.

Johnny Damon: He will be expected to play more CF than he has in the last 2 years. His arm is still terrible so teams will still run on him when they have the chance, but his legs have been healthy all year. Hopefully he can still track down balls when he has to, and hopefully an extra level of exertion on his body by playing center won't negatively effect his sterling performance at the plate so far this year.

Wilson Betemit: Inexplicably, he backs his way into a bigger role on the team. Since I doubt Gardner will be seeing a starter’s amount of playing time, the lineup will frequently feature Johnny Damon in CF, Nady in LF and Betemit or Giambi as DH. Joel Sherman of the Post broke the news of these roster moves, and in his write-up he brings up the potential increase in his P.T. To me, this is a boneheaded move if it occurs; granted, tonight’s lineup does not feature Betemit (Gardner is in CF and Damon is the DH), but I don’t see that lasting, especially if Brett continues to struggle at the major league level.

Cody Ransom: He’s a 32 year old guy whose never played in the bigs before; to him, this is the chance of a lifetime. Hopefully he can get himself a couple of hits and play some good D when he’s on the field, and maybe catch another organization’s attention, maybe parlaying a big league roster spot for 2009.

Richie Sexson: Well, not a good couple of years for The Big Sexy. I’m sure some team will take a flier on him for Spring Training 2009, but he has suffered a precipitous fall from one of the league’s biggest power threats and a decent 1B option. He didn’t do a terrible job with the Yankees, but he also didn’t seem to be taking any different of an approach at the plate—meaning still a lot of swings and misses, and not much production.

Current Dark Days Make Future Decisions Loom Large

Today is dark on the schedule, so it makes it easier to let the ineptitude of the team’s now mercifully completed road trip really sink in. 3 wins out of 10 games away from the Bronx. Utterly pathetic, even when you consider that three of the losses were against baseball’s best team—two of those games the Yankees were in positions to win, so you can’t chalk it all up to being overmatched or outclassed by a better team.

Even the off days seem dark considering how far behind the team has fallen and how little time is left to make this season relevant. Based on how bad the team looks right now, I’m driven to consider what the roster might look like next season as an alternative to dwelling on the present. It is going to be an extremely interesting offseason for the Yankees, and it is extremely premature to be speculating on what will happen, but I am going to run through a short list of moves I think need to be made:

A) Bring back Brian Cashman. He has a plan that needs to be carried out for a while longer—he has put the organizational onus on drafting the best players available and being willing to overpay them, thus stocking the farm system for the first time in a long time. It has not been all sunshine and roses (See: Expectations for Hughes and Kennedy in 2008), but there is still so much talent in the organization. It should be Cashman who decides which of those guys to keep and which of those guys to move, and he should be given the chance to use all the pieces he picked to put together a championship. Sign him to a 3 year deal, and if he hasn’t produced a winner by year 2, maybe he doesn’t live to see year 3.

B) Say goodbye to Jason Giambi, Bobby Abreu, Richie Sexson, Wilson Betemit, Ivan Rodriguez and *gulp* Carl Pavano. These guys are either flat-out free agents, or have team options that should not be picked up (Giambi & Pavano). That’s 20% of the active roster already deleted right there. Out of the group, Abreu is the one that I would consider bringing back, but only if he wanted to take an incentive-laden 2 years guaranteed/3rd and 4th year option deal. On the open market, though, he will certainly get a better offer than that.

C) Offer a ton of money to CC Sabathia to return to the American League, not drift further west towards his Oakland hometown. Out of all the other “marquee” free agents (Mark Teixeira, Ben Sheets, Adam Dunn for sure, guys like AJ Burnett and Rich Harden have options), Sabathia is the best fit for the Yankees. Much debate revolves around replacing Giambi with Teixeira, but he will demand a long (7 year) contract for money that supposes that he’s on the level with Albert Pujols or other elite-type first basemen, which he isn’t. Plus, there are enough position players on this team under long-term contracts, and adding another extremely long deal to the mix removes any of the gained financial flexibility from the departures of those 5 players I mentioned earlier.

D) Try to fill the voids created at first base and in the outfield through trades and potentially low-key free agent signings. This is where Brian Cashman can get really creative. The team has stockpiled a lot of prospects since the organizational philosophy shifted in 2005—this is probably the best offseason to start exchanging trading chips for major league talent. You have to go out there and scour the Earth to see if there is a first basemen that is not aging, has athletic ability, is a decent situational hitter and can play good defense. The philosophy shouldn’t be, “We need a new power threat who can mash 30 HRs!”. It should be, “We need to find the best baseball player available at this position, who fits our needs both financially and on the field”. First base has to be the priority in terms of trades, but if a deal came along for an outfielder who fit that previously mentioned profile, AND has experience playing CF, I would hope that Cash would jump at that.

E) This last point kind of goes along with Point D. Decide the fate of the hideously obnoxious tandem of Melky and Robbie by asking some tough questions. Cano is going to end up having his worst full year in the majors, and he has looked God awful while doing it, but we’ll talk about his buddy in CF first

Melky has become an abomination at the dish, and is quickly losing playing time to Johnny Damon and Justin Christian. His value is much lower than it was during the offseason last year, but he is still only 24. Do you try and deal him in any trade you want to make to fill other voids left by Abreu and Giambi? And if you do, are you signing a stopgap to replace him, or giving Brett Gardner a chance to win the job in Spring Training, or what? And if Melky is still around, you absolutely have to tell him that he must earn any playing time he’s going to get in 2009. He didn’t have any competition for the job this year, and it burned them in the end because it seems like he now takes his job for granted.

As for Cano, the Yankees have to decide if he is their best option as a second baseman for the next 3 years. They have to recognize that other teams would want Cano due to his previous success, age, and cost-controlled nature, on top of a lot of raw talent that teams would think they could tap in to. All those things combined, Cano is the commodity that would land the Yankees the biggest return of talent if traded. If you can land a difference-making offensive player, or if you miss on Sabathia but there is another bigtime pitcher available, you have to consider trading Cano.

All these things considered, it will certainly be an interesting offseason in the Bronx this fall.

Change You Can Believe In

When a team looks as bad as the Yankees have in the last four days, the days leading up to a game are excruciating. You want to fast forward from 1 p.m. to, in tonight's case, 8 so the game can get here already and the team can try and erase their recent awful play. If you're like me and you read the comments of other Yankees fans across the vast internet wasteland, you really want to see the overwhelming negativity about the team and its players silenced for at least 3 hours. I know those negative vibes won't totally go away until the Yankees are breathing down the necks of either Boston or Tampa, a scenario looking less and less likely as the days wear on, but days like today make you dream.

In my dream scenarios, here are five things that will happen across the remainder of the regular season to get this fast-sinking ship turned around:

#1--Melky Cabrera is optioned to AAA Scranton/Wilkes Barre and told to get his mind right and work extensively on his offensive game. He is promised a call-back when rosters expand on September 1st. Called up for the millionth time this year is reliever Chris Britton. Johnny Damon and Justin Christian split the time in CF, with Damon playing center against righty hurlers and Christian spotting him against lefties.


#2--Phil Hughes, after a strong rehab start in Scranton tonight, returns to the rotation this weekend against Kansas City and starts a string where he pitches the kind of baseball that everyone expected from him at the beginning of the season.

#3--Hideki Matsui has a successful rehab stint and rejoins the team as full-time DH during next weekend's series in Baltimore (wishful thinking, early next week in Toronto, but why risk his knee on the artificial turf?).

#4--Joba Chamberlain works himself back with a clean bill of health and returns to the rotation when the team opens a series on the road in Tampa at the beginning of September, taking Dan Giese's spot after he did a serviceable job filling in. The rotation for the stretch run is Mike Mussina, Andy Pettitte, Joba Chamberlain, Phil Hughes and Sidney Ponson.

#5--Jason Giambi, Robinson Cano and Derek Jeter's offensive games come alive, and with the re-insertion of Matsui, the lineup consistently performs to the level that they were expected to coming in to the season.

Basically, all five of those things have to happen for this team to have any chance at making the postseason. The Melky Cabrera demotion, actually, doesn't have to happen--Johnny Damon playing 90% of the time in CF would suffice, although why not at least give Melky a chance to succeed at AAA and get his confidence up?

I don't believe all 5 will happen, and I don't believe this team is postseason bound. I just hope that they don't cash in their chips now and keep playing like a team that is giving in to the fact that injuries and inferior performances from expected contributors have already ended their season. Hank Steinbrenner today basically said he doesn't have a ton of confidence in the team rebounding this year but is psyched for next year. I don't want to give up yet, regardless of what he says.

Another Lost Night

Much was made of how Joe Girardi would be a great motivator, how he was a natural leader of men and would bring a spark that the Yankees had been missing during the stoic and calm Joe Torre years.

But this year has been full of nights like tonight, where the team looks as though it is going through the motions. It's as though the offense fails once early on, and then starts pressing and pressing, attempting to make it all up with one swing. Not the right way to get what is supposed to be a good offensive team off the snide.

Ivan Rodriguez and Melky Cabrera spit the bit bigtime tonight, stomping out the only rally the Yankees were able to muster against randomly unhittable Glen Perkins. It is amazing to me that Melky Cabrera has nine lives this season. How does a team that presents itself as a contender, plugs in 3 major league veterans at the deadline, allow a literal automatic out all year long to remain in the everyday lineup?

It's not as though Cabrera is some 10-year veteran who has a long track record of steady play. He's had one good full offensive season. This year he looks completely out of sync at the plate. Girardi seems to love Justin Christian enough to sit Johnny Damon, who is only leading the AL in hitting, but he won't sit Cabrera for an extended stretch after he keeps burning the Yankees' offense with a terrible approach and complete offensive futility?

The problem is that Gardner and Christian are not good enough to make anyone forget Melky. At the same time, though, they can't be too much worse at the plate. Gardner looked pretty terrible in his cameo, but are there no repercussions for 4 straight months of terrible baseball? Atlanta demoted what they considered a future offensive star, Jeff Francouer, for his terrible hitting throughout the year in an effort to get him started. Didn't work.

Isn't it worth a shot? And, this is in no way intended to point all the team's offensive blame at the feet of Melky, the expected #9 hitter who in a perfect world would be an offensive afterthought. But if he's going to remain in the lineup, there's going to be a chance for him to have important at-bats. And if he fails in those at-bats all year long, why does he keep getting the opportunity?

4 straight losses and a 2-6 road trip is a complete disaster. Best case scenario of 4-6 is ugly, and just getting to that point seems like an extremely up-hill climb considering Rasner throws on Wednesday afternoon. Things are looking bleaker by the day with the 2008 Yankees.

Johnny B. Not Done Yet

So, Johnny Damon came into this season off an extremely disappointing 2007 that led many Yankees fans to believe that his best days were long behind him, he was no longer equipped to play the bulk of a 162 game load in the OF, and the 4-year contract he was given was a huge mistake.

He didn't start off too hot in '08, but lately he's been doing more than hold his own at the top of the lineup. It's funny becuase Damon has been so insistent in the press on the fact that when he hits, the whole lineup hits. It seems like an egotistical stance to take as a player that's never been a middle-of-the-order, run producing masher. However, it seems to ring true for this particular Yankees lineup, as his success at the plate has frequently corresponded to the team's victories thus far this season.

When Damon is on base, Jeter becomes the ideal #2 hitter, evinced by his performance in the 1st inning of today's game. Following Damon's leadoff hustle double, Jeter's uncanny ability to hit the ball the other way was imminently useful and important, as his inside-outing a ground ball to second base got Johnny to 3rd with only one out. The fact that Abreu delivered an RBI single is important, not so much because a Yankee hitter finally drove in a runner in scoring position.

The lineup, since its current composition lacks the depth, lacks the threats from top to bottom, must operate differently than how Yankees fans are used to over the last few years. With A-Rod and Posada subtracted and Giambi and Cano performing as if they're as injured as the previously mentioned pair, the lineup goes from containing an intimidating presence from 1-9, to only making that boast from 1-5.

Giving those 2-5 hitters a chance to create as many runs as possible is Damon's job. Today, he did that in spades, even creating a few runs of his own with his upper-tank bomb. His value, however, now increases when the team can't rely on the bottom of the order to come up with consecutive hits, consecutive walks, or baserunners in general. When some combination of Morgan Ensberg, Alberto Gonzalez, Shelley Duncan and the Jose Molina/Chad Moeller Monster are the bottom of the lineup, Damon's success becomes more vital. He has to be on base so that the actual productive major leaguers left in the starting lineup have a chance to drive him in.

Jeter, Abreu, Matsui and Melky seem to be the heart of the order these days, so the more opportunities they have to produce runs, the better. It's amazing, on a side note, that Melky Cabrera has become a part of that group this year. Yet his performance speaks for itself, and it seems like he's made the jump from simply a "defensive specialist" in center field to a potent threat with the stick in his hands. It's not to be completely unexpected, since his production in terms of HRs and RBIs has increased yearly over his early career, but it seems surprising considering the poor performance of his companion and allegedly more talented hitter, Robbie Cano.

Melky's success, just like his other fellow real live professional major league hitters (Jason Giambi and Robinson Cano need not apply), depends greatly on Johnny, though, and games like today make it as clear as day.