Yankees sign powerful trade deadline bust to 40-man roster spot out of nowhere

Do the New York Yankees need outfield help? They certainly need all the arms they can muster, both in the rotation and the middle innings of the bullpen (to carry water for the rotation's struggles). Slugging outfielders ... wouldn't have been my first choice for a 40-man roster spot, but hey, I'm just a guy. Clearly, the Yankees feel differently.

Enter Bryan De La Cruz out of literal nowhere on Thursday afternoon, as the Yankees have claimed the recent ex-Brave and 2024 Pirate and assigned him to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.

The corresponding move was easy: Placing Giancarlo Stanton on the 60-Day IL while he continues his recovery.

The justification was much harder, even if you acknowledge that it's likely we'll never see this tantalizing, Franchy Cordero-esque big swinger at the big-league level.

Yankees sign outfielder Bryan De La Cruz after Braves DFA, add him to 40-man roster

If you know De La Cruz at all, you probably know him from the Miami Marlins, where he hit 19 bombs in 153 games in 2023, posting -0.7 bWAR in the process. He smashed 18 additional homers prior to last year's trade deadline, which is where his nomadic stretch began. Ben Cherington and the Pirates believed in him as an outfield solution, and they were wrong to do so; he subtracted a remarkable 1.2 bWAR in just 44 games in Pittsburgh.

As if, "Pittsburgh wanted him!" wasn't enough of a reason to doubt his potential benefit to the Yankees, his 50 at-bats with the big-league Braves this season make a pretty strong argument for avoidance, too. He hit .191 with a .453 OPS. At Triple-A Gwinnett? .481 OPS in 40 at-bats.

For now, De La Cruz will report to Scranton and attempt to impact the baseball/give the Yankees reason to entertain him as a Pablo Reyes upgrade (despite a lack of tangible defensive skills and no infielder's glove). The Yankees should be proactive in looking for upgrades, but collecting Quad-A "outfielders" at a reasonable price barely qualifies as doing so. Maybe they should've gone after that other Braves outfielder. You know, the one who can't stop hitting. Something ... Verdugo?