Yankees Shutting Down Tanaka for the Season Would Be Right Move

The New York Yankees need to do what is best for Masahiro Tanaka‘s long-term health and shut down their ace for the season following his recent forearm strain.

With the New York Yankees all but eliminated from postseason contention, there seems very little reason to risk Masahiro Tanaka making another start this season after a forearm strain caused him to be scratched from taking the hill in Monday’s series finale against the Blue Jays.

While the injury is reportedly very minor, any issue with Tanaka’s pitching arm needs to be treated with the utmost severity. This is the first full season that Tanaka has made it through more or less unscathed, setting MLB career highs in both starts and innings pitched.

Even if the forearm strain isn’t a big deal, it could be a sign that Tanaka’s body is beginning to falter under this increased workload. He has already made seven more starts than last season and increased his innings by 45.2. That’s a pretty substantial jump, especially for a guy with an existing elbow injury.

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It’s impossible to overstate how important the 27-year-old righty is to the Yankees chances of contention in 2017. He was their most valuable player this season according to both Baseball-Reference and FanGraphs WAR, and only Gary Sanchez has a real chance of taking that title from him next season if he has another full, healthy season.

For his part, Tanaka told reporters including Fred Kerber of the New York Post that he wants to take the ball Saturday, even if New York is eliminated from the playoff hunt, saying, “Regardless of the situation that we’re in I would like to go out and pitch.”

General manager Brian Cashman was less adamant, revealing that the team was still on the fence about whether Tanaka would make his next start, telling Kerber, “The biggest thing is making sure he’s healthy.”

According to Tanaka, he would have been fine to make his last start Monday and has already been cleared by the team’s head physician Christopher Ahmad to play catch. He did 25 throws from 60 feet following Tuesday’s 6-4 win over the Boston Red Sox.

The only situation in which the Yankees should even consider starting Tanaka Saturday is if the the team wins its next three straight, and the other four teams ahead of them for the second Wild Card cooperate by being terrible in that span.

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If this ends up being the end of Tanaka’s 2016 campaign, it was easily his best yet in pinstripes. He pitched to a 3.07 ERA and 3.51 FIP in 199.2 IP and established himself as one of the top-five starting pitchers in the American League.