Giants extending former Yankees division rival represents another Brian Cashman whiff

How many times can the New York Yankees front office get it "wrong" outside of the most obvious impact additions of all time? As much as we'd like to "credit" Brian Cashman for signing Gerrit Cole, extending Aaron Judge, and trading for Juan Soto, he's out of a job if he doesn't do all of those things. Or at least we'd like to think so.

Notwithstanding a few flashes in the pan (Clay Holmes, Nestor Cortes, DJ LeMahieu, Jose Trevino, etc.), Cashman and the front office have largely failed. The Yankees have gotten significantly worse since 2019 and it can't all be chalked up to "bad luck."

This past offseason, the Yankees had a really good opportunity to make an actual smart stopgap signing. No, not an unproven shortstop Isiah Kiner-Falefa to fill the most difficult position on the field. Matt Chapman was hanging around for $18 million on a one-year deal, which is what he landed with the San Francisco Giants.

The Yankees had no third baseman and suffered greatly at the position defensively in 2023. Instead, they opted for a platoon of LeMahieu and Oswaldo Cabrera — two guys who don't even play regularly anymore. And then they named Jazz Chisholm Jr. — a lifelong second baseman and center fielder — the starting third baseman after the trade deadline.

Couldn't the easy solution have been to sign Chapman, trade for Chisholm and use him at second base and center field, elevate Cabrera to the primary utility player, and eventually kick LeMahieu and Alex Verdugo to the curb? We'd say hindsight is 20/20, but this was very much a talking point in the offseason.

Now, the Yankees won't even have a chance to take a look at Chapman this offseason because his impressive 2024 campaign just earned him a six-year extension with the Giants.

Giants extending former Yankees division rival represents another Brian Cashman whiff

Chapman's player profile has plenty of issues. He strikes out a ton. He's a right-handed bat, one that the Yankees didn't necessarily need. He's a career .241 hitter and .329 OBP guy. We've seen better for sure.

But he's a Gold Glove third baseman on the defensive side of the ball, and he actually slugs. In 2024, he has 33 doubles and 22 homers. He's logged a career-high 13 stolen bases, nine higher than his best mark in 2023. His peripheral metrics are great, too.

Perhaps most important of all, however, is that he's a bonafide everyday major leaguer with a track record of consistent production and a clean bill of health (he's played in at least 140 games since 2018, with the exception of 2020, and will hit that mark by the end of the weekend for 2024). The Yankees, on both sides of the ball, have struggled with consistency and health.

Right now, Chapman is having his best campaign since his 2019 All-Star season. He's slashing .247/.333/.445 and has been good for a 6.0 bWAR. His 121 OPS+ suggests he's out-playing his surface numbers, too. Had he been entrenched behind Juan Soto, Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton, Austin Wells and Jazz Chisholm, we could be talking about even better production.

Let's even be generous here and take Chapman's middling 2022 season, which featured 27 homers, 76 RBI, a .757 OPS and 116 OPS+. Think about how much of an upgrade that would've been on top of his 93rd percentile mark in OAA.

The Yankees played games with the third base position, and then witnessed instability across the roster. At different points of the season, all of first base, second base, shortstop and left field have been major problems. Only until the last few weeks did they have a viable everyday third base option, and the player isn't even a third baseman.

Another front office miss to throw onto the pile. Wonder when Hal Steinbrenner is going to catch on.