TIRED: Yankees placing Carlos Rodón on the injured list, as everyone expected, for the second time in 2023.
WIRED: Yankees placing Carlos Rodón on the injured list, as everyone expected, and then sneaking in bombshell news at the bottom of the transaction tweet.
This. Team! It was already enough of a nightmare watching Rodón limp in the series finale against the Astros and get removed from the game with an apparent injury after just 2.2 innings of work and five earned runs. Fans knew an injured list stint was coming, they were just waiting for it to become official.
That news alone wouldn't have hurt. Fans are conditioned to watch a dud of a campaign from Rodón, which was evident the moment he went down in spring training. It's sad. There's no analysis to be had. We'd rather not talk about it.
But the Yankees decided to make it something when they also lumped into the Rodón updated that they had designated former top prospect Deivi Garcia -- who started an ALDS game in 2020! -- for assignment. Unbelievable.
Yankees DFA Deivi Garcia and place Carlos Rodón on injured list
NOW was the time they realized it was the end of the road for Garcia? They wasted a 40-man roster spot on him for nearly THREE YEARS! Since 2021, he's appared in four MLB games and has gotten absolutely shellacked at the Triple-A level, but the Yankees simply had to see this experiment through.
Here are his numbers from the last three seasons:
- 2021 - 6.85 ERA and 1.88 WHIP in 24 games (22 starts) with Triple-A
- 2022 - 6.89 ERA and 1.44 WHIP in 20 games (13 starts) with Triple-A and Double-A
- 2023 - 5.67 ERA and 1.76 WHIP in 28 games (one start) with Triple-A
And Erik Boland couldn't have said it better -- watch for Garcia to get scooped up by any team and manage to be productive, and somewhere down the road crack the whip on the Yankees in his journey back to relevance. It's clockwork.
Hat tip to the Yankees, once again, for making another routine roster move a discussion for fan outrage.