AL EAST IS LEAST
Yankees have major flaws in already terrible division
Amazingly, we are barely two weeks into the baseball season and already the American League East is an absolute train wreck. We’ll start with the Yankees, everybody’s favorite to win the division and the American League pennant as well. For the longest time, scouts have been saying the Yankees will never win a World Series with Gary Sanchez as their catcher. They’re still saying that, even though Sanchez has shown periodic signs of improvement behind the plate this spring. Now the new, more vocal critique is the Yankees can never win a World Series with Gleyber Torres as their shortstop. Not quite so vocal, but getting more and more repetitive is “the Yankees will never win a World Series with Aaron Hicks as their No. 3 hitter” refrain. All of these are legitimate questions, but none more so now than Torres, who is clearly out of his element at shortstop, with the yips only likely to get worse.
Putting aside the latest Aaron Judge mystery side muscle injury, Brian Cashman probably didn’t foresee having to do some major lineup re-evaluations this quickly. But there’s no getting around the fact this Yankee team has major flaws. In an effort to help counter their vulnerability to hard-throwing right-handed pitching, Cashman picked up Rougned Odor, yet another swing-and-miss guy, but at least he’s left-handed. The much bigger issue, however, is shortstop. Cashman cannot afford to turn a blind eye to Torres’ shortcomings — as he’s done with Sanchez. The wise move would be to trade Torres now, while his stock is still high, find himself a stopgap defensive shortstop to get through this season, then make his play in next year’s free agent market of premier shortstops.
Their thrashing of the Yankees in their home opener Friday notwithstanding, the defending champion Rays are finally feeling the effects of their payroll-pinching ways. After losing Charlie Morton to free agency and trading Blake Snell, the Rays signed their oft-injured former ace Chris Archer for an out-of-character $6.5 million. He was shelled in his first outing, a relief effort, and then left his first start for them Saturday against the Yankees in the third inning with forearm tightness. Already the Rays had three of their primary relievers —
Fairbanks, Chaz Roe and Nick Anderson — on the injured list. Their highest paid player Kevin Kiermaier, who’s had only one full season (out of seven), is hurt again (quad), and their third-highest paid player, Yoshi Tsutsugo has been largely a bust, since signing a 2-year, $12 million deal as a free agent from Japan last year. Before their favorite patsies, the Yankees, came to town this weekend, the Rays — one of the best teams in baseball in runs prevented the last 10 years — had neither pitched or defensed particularly well so far.
After taking two out of three from the Bombers at Yankee Stadium to open the season, the Blue Jays lost two of three to the lowly Rangers and it remains to be seen if they’re going to have enough quality starting pitching to win the division. More concerning, however, was the loss of George Springer, in whom they have a five-year, $150M investment. The 31-year-old Springer, who the Blue Jays are counting on to be a veteran leader and difference-maker for their young nucleus, missed most of spring training with a strained left oblique and just as he was ready to come off the injured list, he strained a quad. He’ll likely now be out another couple of weeks, and it’s understandable if the Jays are privately beginning to worry if these kinds of injuries are going to be chronic for Springer.
While the Orioles (MLB-leading 91 strikeouts in their first seven games) figure to again be one the worst teams in baseball (except on the days John Means pitches anyway) and amid all the injuries besetting the floundering three division favorites, there has been one unexpected ray of optimism in the division coming out of Boston. Swept (by the Orioles of all teams) in their home opening series at Fenway Park for the first time since 1948, the Red Sox got a strong (8K, BB, 2 ER) outing from Tanner Houck, their No. 1 draft pick in 2017 who they are hoping will be able to fill one of the rotation voids behind Nathan Eovaldi and Eduardo Rodriguez. Equally impressive, out of the bullpen, has been Garrett Whitlock, the Rule 5 draft pick from the Yankees who after missing all of last year with Tommy John surgery, is also heading for the rotation as soon as his arm is built up.