Yankees have one last chance to learn their lesson from Jorge Mateo

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The Yankees are in a position to add some outside help and become a contender. And if they just learn from their past mistakes with Jorge Mateo, they can set the franchise up for years to come.

The Yankees have what is called a good problem to have. They have a great young nucleus on the field with more promising youth in the pipeline. To create a team that can challenge for a championship, they have to trade some of that unborn talent, a process they have already begun.

But which players should they trade, and when?

We must understand the nature of an MLB GM to answer that question. That part is easy: they are all greedy con men. You see, while an honest man cannot be cheated because he wants something for something, a con man wants to trade you nothing for something.

And that makes them susceptible to being conned. All the Yankees have to do is flip the script and trade a whole bunch of nothing for something precious. That part is hard.

For instance, Cashman should want to trade top performing players who are not real big league prospects. The trade of Jesus Montero serves as a good, but not great, example. Montero was the number three prospect back in 2011, at least according to Baseball America.

The Yankees may or may not have thought of him as a future star, but they traded him as one. Montero went to the Mariners for young, All-Star pitcher Michael Pineda. Jesus was a complete bust and, well, you already know what happened with Pineda.

The Yankees won the trade but not by much. But the point is they got maximum value for a big league bust. Unfortunately, the did not have as much foresight with Jorge Mateo.

Attitude is Everything

Last year at this time Jorge was the Yankees 3rd ranked prospect and 18th overall. But he was also in the middle of a disappointing year. Mateo spent most of 2015 hitting only .268/.338/.378. But he did steal 82 bases. He did worse than regress, however, in 2016, by slashing a mere .254/.306/.379, while stealing fewer than half as many bases (36).

Worse yet, he began to show that he has an attitude problem and plays accordingly. His abilities got him named to the Futures Game last year; his position forced the Yankees to suspend him and miss playing in that game. He was not nominated for it this year.

The Yankees should have traded Mateo then. And if not last year, at least this off-season. They had the far better Gleyber Torres in the fold, with Didi and Starlin already on the team. They were always going to have to trade at least one or two of these players and should have focused on Jorge if for no other reason than his attitude.

He Who Hesitates

Instead, they waited. And now it might be too late; too late to get maximum value, at least. Within the last two weeks, those who rank minor league players finally saw what everyone but they and the Yankees had seen for almost two years: Jorge Mateo is not a top talent.

MLB moved Mateo down to the team’s eighth best prospect and out of the top 100.

So much for his trade value. He is a throw in piece now, instead of the player the team can build a trade around. And since they did not trade Mateo when he was a top prospect, they now have to trade an actual top player. If the Yankees trade Esteval Florial this year, it’s because they failed to trade Mateo last year.

Take a Chance on Me

Or, is he no longer a top prospect? The evidence and attendant press are mixed. First, he still grades out as an 80 for his speed. That is the top score for any tool in the chest, and Mateo is one of the few to receive it for any skill. And he did steal 82 bases in 2015; teams won’t forget that.

But more importantly, he has been playing like a great player. He was promoted to Double-A and, against that better talent, he has raised his game. His current slash is .320/.403/.573, and he looks like the best player in the Eastern League.

At least for now. His numbers are getting worse by the day, only batting .231 in his last ten games. That makes now the right time to trade him before he plays again.

The Yankees have one last chance to make up for their earlier mistake. If they trade him now, instead of Florial or any of their other top prospects, they can keep their best players, lose a bad attitude from the organization, and add a pitcher that can help them win now and over the next two years.

Now that’s a good trade. And there is another player they need to apply this thinking to Jake Cave.

Red Hot

There are some similarities with Jake Cave. Jake has never had any attitude issues, but he has gone up and down as a prospect. He was so highly thought of by the Yankees that they promoted him to Triple-A at the age of 22. And the Cincinnati Reds thought enough of him that they took him in the 2016 Rule Five draft.

But Cave failed to impress and was returned to the Yankees and Double-A ball. With little power, and suffering from the comparisons to other top outfield prospects in the system, Cave has fallen from the Yankees eighth ranked prospect to its 24th.

It seemed as if Jake would be of little use to the Yankees.

Now, however, that might have changed. Cave was promoted back to Scranton earlier this year and is putting up astounding numbers. He’s had 139 at-bats—no small sample size—and is slashing .374/.428/.662. And he is hitting for power as he has ten home runs in those AB’s and fifteen overall for the season.

That makes now the right time to trade him. Jake is 24 and could just now be rounding into form. Or he could just be hot for half of a season. Evaluators all over baseball are wondering just that; the Yankees need to convince the Athletics that the former is the real Jake Cave.

Hey, Almost Anything Could be True

And it could be true. Only time will tell. But time is already telling the Yankees to trade Cave, while his play is so tantalizing. Teams will hope they are getting this year’s Ben Gamel, another Yankees Triple-A player who did well in the minors but was undervalued by the prognosticators. Gamel would be in contention for Rookie of the Year, if not for Aaron Judge.

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Most importantly, the trade scenario is perfect. The Oakland Athletics want to trade Sonny Gray for a centerfielder. Mateo has been playing center at Trenton to rave reviews. Cave has been playing mostly left field lately, but no report makes it seem as if he cannot play center. And neither player figures into the Yankees long term plans.

In life and the MLB trade deadline, timing is everything. Brian Cashman and the Yankees missed their chance last year to trade an under performing Mateo at top value.

That window looks like it opened up again. If the Yankees strike now, they can maximize their entire farm system, trading who they don’t want and keeping the best players for themselves.

Next: Take a Look back at Rob Refsnyder's Yankees career

Here’s another tip that might help Brian Cashman: when you sit down to lie about how great Mateo is, don’t look Billy Beane in the eyes; that can be a tell. Instead, watch the space above his nose and between his eyes. It’s an old con man’s trick.

And it’s how I got my wife to believe I would not sleep with her twin sister a second time.

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