Manny thanks, Didi!
If Machado gets mega-deal from Yanks, he’ll owe it all to Gregorius’ ALDS injury
Manny Machado will be coming to the Bronx on Wednesday as part of his attempt to hustle up a $300 million-plus free agent deal. The likelihood is he will be greeted with open arms and open wallet by the Yankees, who seem to have concluded the starting pitching portion of their off-season with the signing of J.A. Happ on Monday. And the smart money has to be betting that when the Yankees take the field on Opening Day 2019, Machado will be their shortstop.
Which begs the question: Had Didi Gregorius not blown out his elbow making a throw from the Fenway Park outfield in the ALDS against the Red Sox, would any of this be taking place?
Would the Yankees really be considering adding another albatross of a contract to go along with Jacoby Ellsbury’s anchor to their payroll, in addition to the nine more years and more than $260M they have committed to Giancarlo Stanton? The answer is, probably not. Gregorius is the forgotten man in the Machado saga, but his misfortune turns out to be Manny’s lucky break. Obviously, Machado was going to sign for big bucks somewhere. But now, the chances of him signing with the Yankees have increased exponentially.
Had Gregorius not ruptured the existing tear in his UCL that night in Boston, and had he come through the rest of the postseason intact, the Yankees would have been heading into 2019 with the left side of their infield anchored by Miguel Andujar, who probably should have been the AL Rookie of the Year, at third base, and Gre- gorius, who for much of 2018 played like an MVP candidate, at shortstop.
Aside from vanity and the desire to add another shiny object to their display case — the motivations that brought Stanton to the Bronx last winter — there would be no compelling reason to even consider sinking $300 million and the next decade into Machado, a generational talent who also has the potential to be a colossal headache.
With Andujar and Gregorius both under team control for 2019, pursuing Machado would not be a question of need, but of want, and my guess is the Yankees would not have wanted to take that risk. They might have been more inclined to pursue Bryce Harper, perhaps not re-signing Brett Gardner to relieve some of the logjam in their outfield.
Take away Gregorius’ horrendous May, in which he batted just .149, and his season numbers would have been outstanding: .302 with 26 home runs and 81 RBI. His OPS for those five months of the season was .925, higher than any other Yankee’s. And oh yeah, higher than Machado’s.
And his WAR, if you’re into that sort of thing, was 4.2 to Machado’s 2.8.
That is not to say that Gregorius is a better player than Machado, only that he was a better value and a known and respected quantity in the Yankees clubhouse. The odds are the Yankees would have weighed all those factors and decided it was best to stick with what they had in Gregorius.
But his injury changed all that and now, the Yankees are no longer in the position of just wanting Machado. Now, they probably need him.
For all their talk about being willing to stick out half a season with someone like Ronald Torreyes or Adeiny Hechavarria while Gregorius recovers, you know they’re not going to do that.
For one thing, while they are useful fill-ins, both Torreyes and Hechavarria have demonstrated to everyone’s satisfaction that they are not everyday players. And for another, there is no guarantee that Gregorius will miss just half a season, or even that he will play at all in 2019.
To take a player as important as he was to the Yankees offense out of the lineup and replace him with either of those two is the same as conceding the division before a pitch is even thrown in the 2019 season.
That is why the Yankees will not be dealing from a position of strength when Machado and his agent, Dan Lozano, come knocking on their door on Wednesday.
So far, GM Brian Cashman has improved his club incrementally this offseason in an attempt to make up the eight-length gap between his Yankees and Red Sox. Adding James Paxton and J.A. Happ to the starting rotation is a definite improvement over Jordan Montgomery and Sonny Gray from last season. No doubt, Cashman will soon make a move to solidify his bullpen, either re-signing David Robertson and/or Zach Britton or renewing acquaintances with Andrew Miller to go along with Aroldis Chapman, Dellin Betances and Chad Green.
But none of those moves would be enough for the Yankees to overtake Boston, or make them into a more formidable playoff team than they looked like last October.
And without Gregorius, they are an even less formidable team, even with the pitching additions.
That is why what had looked like a luxury four months ago becomes practically a necessity now.
Machado brings more baggage than any player arriving at the Yankees clubhouse since Alex Rodriguez showed up in 2004. He is likely to be a teammates’ annoyance, a manager’s headache and a tabloid columnist’s dream. He is everything that Cashman seems to have wanted to weed out of his roster since ARod’s enforced retirement two years ago. B ut on the other hand, the Yankees need a shortstop and a productive bat in the middle of their order. They had that in Gregorius, but one errant throw in a playoff game in Boston deprived them of both. Enter Manny Machado. If he winds up signing with the Yankees, he won’t have just Brian Cashman and Hal Steinbrenner to thank.
He’ll owe a debt of gratitude to Didi Gregorius, too.