Yankees patient approach will save the season in July, or sink it in June

The Yankees Brian Cashman has taken a very a patient approach to the player’s struggles so far. But now the team reaches a critical deadline. It is time to see if Cashman’s patient gambling will be too little, too late for the 2017 New York Yankees or be the key to it’s deep playoff run. Is Cashman’s approach patient and wise, or tentative and foolish?

The Yankees are either in real trouble or they have all of baseball right where they want them. It all depends on your perspective. Well, it depends on Brian Cashman’s perspective.

He sees the same things we do: The starters and relievers are collectively crashing this promising season. The team has lost eight of its last nine games. It went from a comfortable lead in the division to a tie with Boston. And they are playing better while the Yankees are playing worse.

The team’s pitching is slowly sinking the team. Cashman’s current response might do the same.

Uber is Not Just a Paid Ride

The Yankees are taking an uber-slow approach to their problems. Take the lack of production and quality play at first and third.

There was, and perhaps still is, a case to be made that the three best non-first basemen are Starlin Castro, Didi Gregorius, and Ronald Torreyes. And if it’s not true today, it certainly was true for most of May and the beginning of June.

That should have put Chase Headley on the bench, although he has played better recently. I could make the same argument for Chris Carter. Both have retained their starting roles. Those two non-moves are acceptable because the offense has not been the problem.

And this works for the Yankees long term plan because they want to wait for July when teams are more willing to listen, to bench and/or trade these players.

Chase Headley is still a major league player with a reasonable contract for next year. He is a viable if not exciting player. Teams have taken back much worse players in trade deals. But no one cares about that in June.

Things start to change in July, however. Then will be clubs desperate to shed salary or upgrade their farm systems. As outlined here, there are plenty of good but not blue-chip prospects to trade. But the receiving team would have to take Headley as part of the package, either with the Yankees eating a bit of salary of kicking in one extra medium prospect.

That is a possibility, just not in May or June. But that same approach might prove disastrous for the pitching.