Yankees bring Clay Holmes back, replace Marwin Gonzalez (again) in roster shuffle

The New York Yankees are welcoming back a major piece of their 2022 bullpen on Monday evening in Anaheim. The only remaining question is which version they’re welcoming back.

Relief ace/closer-in-waiting Clay Holmes, long rumored to return from a (potentially phantom) IL stint to nurse a back injury, has officially made his way back to the Yankees’ roster Monday as expected.

At this point, fans had better hope his back was barking all along, and that Holmes’ struggles were fixable this easily. For weeks prior to the injury diagnosis, his release point was dropping while his control deserted him, leading to ghastly blown saves at home against Kansas City, as well as on the road in St. Louis and Boston (twice).

Sox fans have been taking victory laps since mid-July believing that they “broke” Holmes, but if the problem is mostly physical, that’d be a much better outcome for a Yankees team that hasn’t really had a closer for months now. When Wandy Peralta locked down the save Friday night, he became the 12th Yankee to record one this season. That’s not how a contender draws it up.

Luke Bard’s demotion cleared the way for Holmes, but another offensive shuffle completed the picture midday Monday — and no, it was not a Miguel Andújar promotion. For all we know, he’s still at the Bad Bunny concert.

Yankees bring Clay Holmes back from injury, send Marwin Gonzalez to paternity list

In addition to swapping Holmes and Bard, the Yankees placed Marwin Gonzalez on the short-term paternity list, opting for the speedy Tim Locastro in his place instead of Andújar.

New York was never going to press the Oswald Peraza button for such a short-term vacancy, but it’s still ironic that after the Yankees essentially “replaced” Gonzalez with Oswaldo Cabrera on the roster two weeks ago, they were forced to replace him for a second time with Locastro this week.

Gonzalez is a redundant piece on this roster, and his spot could be far better utilized by the Bombers. You can still expect him to be welcomed back with open arms when his stint on paternity leave ends, though.

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