Yankees' genius plan forces them to lose stolen Mets player after just one game

What do the New York Yankees have in Rico Garcia? Is he a heat-tossing arm who threw 4 2/3 shutout frames after being recalled by the New York Mets in recent weeks? Is he a Triple-A gas can who carried a 4.45 ERA with Syracuse this year? Is he something in between, someone Matt Blake can unlock?

Unfortunately, after one poor outing, we will literally never know.

After Cam Schlittler came down with some biceps soreness after just one big-league start (of course!), the Yankees had to reshuffle their rotation coming out of the break. Max Fried's blister situation remains up in the air, and they'd rather he face the Blue Jays anyhow. Carlos Rodón is also slotted into that AL East series. So is an empty game, which could be Schlittler?

This whole mess left the Yankees woefully undermanned, and instead of recalling top prospect Brendan Beck (who threw five devilish innings at Triple-A last night) or doing ... really anything creative, they saw Spencer Strider on the opponent's mound and immediately opted for a bullpen game.

"A bullpen game? Won't that tire out all their good relievers for Will Warren and Marcus Stroman's starts?" Oh, no. No, no, no. It was a bullpen game made up entirely of their bad relievers.

That designation befell Garcia, the newest import, as well. He allowed a three-run home run in nearly three innings of work, and when Friday night rolled around - it didn't even take until the next morning! - he was gone, replaced by Allan Winans.

Yankees to promote Allan Winans, DFA Rico Garcia after literally one game

And that's the consequence of an immediate bullpen game. An arm you purported to care about five days ago is immediately gone.

There's also the other consequence of a bullpen game, of course: every fan now knows the urgency of a razor-thin AL East race took second chair behind some half-baked strategy. The Yankees deemed momentum unimportant and treated the first game out of a refreshing break not as a tone-setter, but as a white flag. The important games are still ahead of us, after all. Even if they sweep the Jays this week, it'll be one game less impactful than it could've been because of the one they handed away on Friday. But never mind that.

Hope Rico Garcia shoves in his next home. Hope it's in the National League.