Yankees: 4 players the organization ruined in 2021

The New York Yankees can’t help it. They always find a way to ruin some of their promising talent, whether it be through misuse, lack of playing time, or a delayed promotion to the bigs. Joba Chamberlain remains the premier example of the modern era to this day.

We’ve seen it happen to others over the years, but 2021 might take the cake with the amount of guys that have regressed beyond comprehension, lost their jobs for little to no reason, or were tinkered with for the worse.

Does anyone care to explain any of these gaffes? Because they clearly were mistakes made by the organization. You can’t pin all of the blame on the players for what’s happened, especially since the mental aspect of it all has played an enormous role.

And, what’s even more frustrating, is that we have to wonder how different this arduous year would’ve been had some of these decisions been altered before things got way worse than we could’ve imagined.

It’s always the little things in baseball, but it seems the Yankees forget that over and over, removing the human/instinct element from it all … while sometimes just abandoning logic altogether.

The Yankees truly ruined these four players in 2021.

4. Deivi Garcia

Just last year, Deivi Garcia was a future cornerstone for the Yankees starting rotation. He showed gumption when called upon during the shortened 2020 campaign and stopped the bleeding against the Blue Jays, which helped right the ship and eventually get the Bombers a Wild Card spot.

His 4.98 ERA in those six starts wasn’t overly impressive, but that number was inflated by one really bad outing against the Boston Red Sox. It happens.

Fast forward to 2021, and the right-hander owns a 6.78 ERA in 22 games with the Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders. How?! He’s only gotten two starts at the MLB level this year despite the countless injuries that have befallen the rotation.

Previous reports indicated that a suggested change in Garcia’s mechanics was responsible for his horrible backslide, which, hey, wouldn’t be surprising! On top of that, the Yankees screwed with him in Game 2 of the ALDS when they tried to psyche out the Rays by “opening” with Garcia and quickly transitioning to the hated JA Happ. It didn’t work.

Then, Garcia started the year off in the minor leagues as the organization backed Domingo German, who hadn’t pitched since Sept. of 2019 because of domestic violence allegations. That couldn’t have sent the wrong message to the 22-year-old, now could it?