Yankees Shift Long Term Team Building Strategy

For the last 20 years the Yankees had been known as big spenders. Any time a perceived game-changer hit the open market, the Yankees were on the list of suitors. They didn’t always win, but at least they were part of the conversation.

This year the team decided on a new approach. Instead of throwing their weight (wallet) around, they instead chose to start building their minor league system with talent and address their major league issues with the least amount of money possible, or at least that ‘s the way it seems.

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Their shift in strategy became apparent when they decided to not to chase David Robertson through the free agent market. The Yankees did offer Robertson 15.3 Million for one year as a qualifying offer, but the closer decided to test the free agent market. He later signed with the Chicago White Sox for $46 million over 4 years.

Instead of pursuing Robertson, the Yankees decided to sign Andrew Miller instead. Miller agreed to a 4-year deal worth $36 million dollars overall. With this deal, the Yankees not only signed a competent and experienced reliever, they earned an additional draft pick from the White Sox because Robertson turned down a qualifying draft pick. That draft pick will take place between the first and second round of next year’s player draft.

Another example of the Yankees strategy shift was trading Martin Prado and David Phelps for Nathan Eovaldi, Garret Jones and pitching prospect Domingo German. In other words, they traded a proven player (Prado) who hit .282 with 151 hits last season for a talented pitcher in Eovaldi, who’s never had a winning record, Jones who last year had had a BA of .248 and German, a highly-regarded prospect.

Through these deals the Yankees have proven that they are serious about building a self-sufficient organization. They finally realized that their farm system can do more than develop players for future trades. It can actually develop talent to step in when those players purchased in free agency get hurt or don’t work out.