Yankees should've pushed for under-the-radar bullpen trade with Angels at deadline

Danger is looming for the New York Yankees' bullpen. Fernando Cruz is hitting a wall, allowing 8 runs over his last 10 appearances. Tim Hill has run out of gas and might never be a consistently effective reliever again. The Yankees' most reliable relievers, Brent Headrick and David Bednar, have been awesome, but are also extremely overworked.

Brian Cashman completely botched filling New York's biggest needs at the trade deadline, and while the market was tough for both relievers and catchers with so many teams believing that they can contend, the misses are glaring.

The most surprising thing is that the Yankees didn't engage the deadline's most willing seller, the Los Angeles Angels. The Angels were open for business, even dealing controllable players like Jose Soriano.

Los Angeles didn't have the goods to provide a catcher solution (Logan O'Hoppe is underwhelming), but they did have some intriguing relievers that they moved. Chief among them was Ryan Zeferjahn, who was dealt to the Cubs for a very nice return.

Aside from Zeferjahn, there was another Angels hurler who should have been on the Yankees' radar. He would have been a bit of a gamble, but flamethrower Ben Joyce would've looked real nice in pinstripes had New York been willing to make a bold play.

The Yankees should have rolled the dice and tried to pry away Ben Joyce from the Angels

Joyce just made his season debut on August 5 after missing most of nearly all of 2025 with a shoulder injury that required surgery. That was just the latest in a series of injuries that have kept the 25-year-old grounded for most of his young career.

He missed time in 2023 with ulnar neuritis, which is essentially nerve inflammation in his right elbow. He suffered from shoulder inflammation in 2024 as well. In 2021, while he was in college, Joyce underwent Tommy John surgery. Over parts of four seasons, including this year, he's tallied just 52 innings pitched.

However, he's been effective in that brief time with a 2.94 ERA. The most intriguing thing about Joyce isn't his performance so far; instead, it's the fact that he regularly hits 105 miles per hour on the radar gun.

He's back at it now that he's fully healthy. Joyce has made three appearances since being activated from the IL and is averaging 101.3 miles per hour on his fastball. That would pair nicely with a Yankees' bullpen that lacks both strikeout stuff and high-octane velocity.

Joyce is under team control through 2029, but as we saw with Soriano and Zeferjahn, the Angels were willing to deal if the package they received promised a brighter future than their current mediocre present.

Offering too much for Joyce would have been too much of a risk, but a mild overpay for that kind of arm talent would have made a ton of sense for a team like the Yankees, who need velocity and reliever depth and relish acquiring pieces with team control. Unfortunately, it seems as if Cashman and the rest of the braintrust didn't see it that way.

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