Thoughts on Sean Casey, Gleyber Torres, and the Trade Deadline

The All-Star break is over, it’s back to baseball tonight, and the Yankees obviously need to get their act together because fourth place in the AL East is unacceptable to all of us, and it should be to them, too.

As I said the other day, I did a cold call and invited a few hundred new people to the newsletter and I just want to say welcome once again. I hope you enjoyed what you’ve seen so far. I know some non-Yankee fans will bail, but I hope most of you stick with our group here because the more readers I write for, the more rewarding this gig is.

Since I have no games to recap, I thought I’d use today to share a few thoughts on a few topics as we go into the proverbial second half of the season, which is actually only 71 games.

⚾ Sean Casey is the new hitting coach

OK, whatever. I honestly believe hitting coaches for MLB teams are about as important as bullpen coaches. No offense to Mike Harkey out there in the Yankees bullpen answering the phone and then telling the requested reliever to start warming up, but come on, you and I can do that job and be spectacular at it.

The Yankees fired Dillon Lawson immediately after last Sunday’s terrible loss to the Cubs, but is it really his fault that some of these aging players are having horrendous seasons? Of course not. If they suddenly start hitting now that Casey is the new hitting coach, is it going to be because Casey imparted some never before heard wisdom that unlocks everything? Again, of course not.

Firing Lawson was a move to make a move, nothing more. They weren’t firing Boone, and they weren’t DFA’ing Giancarlo Stanton, Josh Donaldson, DJ LeMahieu and several others who are barely hitting their weight this season.

Casey is an old buddy of Boone’s from their days playing together with the Reds. He had a very nice 12-year big league career with Cincinnati and four other teams with a career average of .302. That’s right, .302! The best average on the current Yankee roster is Aaron Judge’s .291, followed by Anthony Rizzo and Harrison Bader at .257.

Casey said he believes his experience as a major leaguer will help him as a coach, but the reality is, he’s never coached at any level - he’s been an MLB Network analyst since he retired. So no, I don’t think changing from Lawson to Casey will mean much of anything. The bottom line is these players know their swings better than any coach, and it’s on them to figure it out.

⚾ Trading Gleyber Torres is still on my mind

I said this before the season, and nothing has really changed: The Yankees should trade Torres while he still has some value. Torres drives me nuts. He clearly has talent, but his continued lack of focus should not be tolerated. Is there a player on this team who makes more boneheaded plays, either physically or mentally, than Torres?

From booting routine grounders like the one Sunday against the Cubs, to silly baserunning mistakes, to his sometimes laughable approach at the plate in certain situations, it’s just maddening. True, Torres has been one of the Yankees’ more reliable hitters this season (.251/.325/.413 with an OPS of .739), but is that really saying much on a team that ranks 28th in batting average (.231) and 26th in on-base percentage (.300)?

Torres looked like a budding star in 2019 when he hit 38 home runs in 604 plate appearances. But in 1,623 PA’s since then he has 49 homers and he’s been moved from shortstop to second base. He’s still only 26 and any team acquiring him would have control through 2024. Move him now, call up Oswald Peraza to play second, and if he struggles, you can always fall back to LeMahieu.

⚾ Be wary of the trading deadline

Now, that being said, unless the Yankees go on a totally unexpected hot streak in the next couple weeks before the Aug. 1 trade deadline, I am not going to be a proponent of Brian Cashman being active in the market. The reason for trading Torres isn’t about improving their chances for a push to the postseason this year, it’s about getting rid of the particular player and getting as much back as you can while also clearing a roster spot for a potentially emerging young player like Peraza.

If Torres can fetch a couple useful pitchers who won’t be free agents at the end of the season - a nice bonus would be if they also aren’t damaged goods like Frankie Montas - Brian Cashman shouldn’t blink. Make that deal. What I don’t want him to do is be fooled into the false narrative that if he acquires a few middle-of-the-road veteran rentals that they will make the difference and turn the Yankees into a viable championship contender at the cost of further diluting the farm system.

Again, the next few weeks might dictate which way he goes. If they come out and play like shit and are still buried in the division and on the periphery of the wild-card race, Cashman should stay quiet and keep his prospects.

They finally moved one of them up to the roster this season, Anthony Volpe. Stop trading these guys away for the purpose of short-term players who most likely aren’t going to elevate the team to where it needs to be to contend with the best the AL has to offer. Of course, I’m barking at the moon because you know damn well he’s going to make trades at the deadline.

⚾ The sacred pinstripes are no more

You knew it was going to happen at some point. Last year, MLB approved teams wearing advertising patches on their uniforms and several jumped all over it, but the Yankees abstained. For a year. The other day they announced that Starr Insurance - I’ve never heard of the company - has signed a lucrative deal through 2031 to be the Yankees’ “signature partner” and the team will rake in at least $20 million per season.

Yes, it kind of sucks, but my take is this: The patch is on the left sleeve of the uniform, it’s not really all that noticeable, and if that extra money ultimately helps in player signings, then fine. What I don’t ever want to see is the Yankees wearing any of these stupid alternate uniforms because that will be a stark offense to my sensibilities.

I can’t stand when MLB makes them wear pink caps for Mother’s Day and light blue for Father’s Day, and camouflage on certain holidays. I fully support the causes, but I hate changing the uniform. I want pinstripes at home, gray on the road, period. A little patch on the sleeve doesn’t bother me at all.

⚾ Pinstripe People survey results

So, not quite as much participation as I had hoped, but I still got a decent enough sample size to show some clear trends in what you think of the newsletter, and what you’d like to read. Thanks to all who filled it out. Some of the key points:

I was very happy to know that 71.2% of you love the newsletter and read them all. The next most popular response was 17.1% said sometimes you aren’t available to read it at 7:30 a.m. and then later in the day forget it’s in your inbox. That’s OK, I can live with that.

As for Hardball Hyperbole, 69.3% are reading and enjoying it, and 87.6% say that getting it once a week is fine.

On the questions about me possibly expanding my newsletter offerings down the road, 82.4% approve of that idea, and 75.2% would not mind receiving perhaps five or six mailings from me per week. As for a sports history newsletter, on a scale of 1 (low) to 10 (high), 47.1% graded their interest between 8 and 10; the interest in a baseball newsletter outside of Pinstripe People maybe three times per week was scored 8 to 10 by 65.8% of you; and season-long projects like Hardball Hyperbole (next would be on the 1956 Yankees) was scored between 8 and 10 by 54.3%.

Lastly, the topic of whether you would ever pay a subscription fee for all of this at some point (not happening right now), the good news is only 16.3% said no, while the great news for me is that 34% said yes they would. The other 49.7% was in the maybe category, so to quote the old movie, “you’re telling me there’s a chance!” I’ll just have to work harder to bring you on if that times comes.

To pull the curtain back, researching and writing two Pinstripe People newsletters and one Hardball Hyperbole per week, plus the editing and production that goes into it, takes about 18-20 hours per week. Obviously if I added more newsletters, it would become a full-time job (which I would love) so I’d be working hard for your loyalty and support. But again, that’s not happening right now.

Here’s the link one last time for those who want to add their choices to the survey:

 ➤ July 12, 1951: During the two seasons that Allie Reynolds and Bob Feller were Cleveland Indians teammates in 1945 and 1946 (Reynolds was with the Indians since 1942, but Feller was away three years serving in World War II) the two pitchers became good friends and at times were roommates on the road.

That’s why, outside of the obvious, this day was so special for Reynolds. The obvious is that he pitched the first Yankees no-hitter since Monte Pearson’s in 1938, and the added bonus is that he did so while outdueling Feller in a taut 1-0 game at Cleveland Stadium in which Feller held the Yankees hitless through 5.1 innings.

Feller already had three no-hitters on his resume (including one against the Yankees in 1946) and just 11 days earlier, he pitched his third against the Tigers. But Mickey Mantle broke up his bid for a fourth with a sixth-inning double, and while Feller left him stranded to keep the game scoreless, Gene Woodling hit a one-out home run in the seventh for the only run Reynolds needed.

Reynolds walked three batters, but after the last free pass to Larry Doby in the fourth he retired the final 17 batters he faced, striking out Bobby Avila to complete the no-hitter.

“I nearly knocked these guys off the bench,” Reynolds said afterward about how he balked the long-standing tradition of not talking about in progress no-hitters. “I walked in at the end of the seventh, sat next to Eddie Lopat and said, ‘Hey pal, do you think I can pitch a no-hitter?’ Then in the eighth I had to talk to Berra about it. He wanted me to throw fastballs on the first pitch to every hitter. I told him I couldn’t do that because somebody would guess right and ruin my no-hitter.”

Regarding the strikeout of Avila, Reynolds said, “I got two strikes on him, the next pitch was over the plate but a trifle low and the next one missed by a fraction of an inch, a borderline pitch. I looked at Avila and asked, ‘Bob, how can you have the never to take those two kind of pitches at a time like this?’”

The Yankees are at Coors Field for three games against the awful Rockies who have the third-worst record in MLB at 34-57. Maybe playing in that haven for hitters will wake up the Yankees bats, though I have my doubts about as much as I have my doubts about Casey making a difference.

What might be more important is going against the Rockies pitching staff which has a 5.72 ERA, second-worst in MLB ahead of only the A’s. Playing half their games in Coors at least gives the pitching staff a bit of an excuse, but how does one explain the Rockies’ offense ranking 20th in OPS (.716), just ahead of the Yankees?

They have a couple nice players including third baseman Ryan McMahon who leads the team with 14 homers, 45 RBI and an .811 OPS. Catcher Elias Diaz just belted the game-winning home run in the All-Star Game and he’s hitting .277 with 45 RBI. Kris Bryant, who the Rockies signed to a $182 million contract before 2022, is hitting just .261 with six homers. As a Cubs fan, it’s amazing to me to see how mediocre Bryant now is. One guy to watch is Randall Grichuk who during his career, some of it with the Blue Jays, has killed the Yankees with 17 homers, the third-most he has hit against any opponent.

The pitching matchups are as follows: Friday at 8:40 p.m. on YES it’s Carlos Rodon (3.38 ERA) making his second start against Austin Gomber (6.40); Saturday at 8:10 p.m. it’s Clarke Schmidt (4.40) against Connor Seabold (6.65); and Sunday at 3:10 p.m. it’s Gerrit Cole (2.85) against Chase Anderson (6.89).