Yankees smartly retain red-hot Triple-A reliever amid Aaron Judge injury shuffle

The New York Yankees saw Bradley Hanner's Triple-A gambit and countered it with the exact move he was hoping for. With bullpen games looming in their rotation's No. 5 spot until Max Fried is ready for primetime, now is the perfect time to avoid losing a top performer for nothing.

Hanner, who triggered an opt-out in his contract earlier in the week to force the Yankees into a decision, has been added to the 40-man roster and optioned back to Triple-A, for the time being. Of course, this could just be a procedural thing. The Yankees have a bullpen game coming on Tuesday, and Hanner's presence among the corps would be perfect for the occasion - Ryan Yarbrough should start over Brendan Beck, then we go from there.

And, yes, while the eyeballs go immediately to Judge being shuffled off to the 60-Day IL, that's merely procedural, and it was an obvious secondary move the Yankees had to make in order to keep Hanner humming down on their farm.

Yankees moving Aaron Judge to 60-Day IL is meaningless when it comes to injury update

The 60-Day IL move is retroactive for Judge, not a reaction to yesterday's half-update. Things still don't sound too promising; Judge has healed, but isn't healed, and can't do upper-body workouts or baseball activities. That's all the more reason not to keep using a 40-man roster spot on him for the time being, while letting Hanner walk for nothing.

Judge is now eligible to return the first week of August, but almost certainly won't consider it until late August or September at the earliest.

As for Hanner, the ex-Guardians prospect and sidewinding righty has struck out 50 men in 40 2/3 innings at Triple-A, carrying a 1.99 ERA and 1.16 WHIP. He's not going to walk through those doors in the Bronx as a gunslinging savior, but we all laughed at Angel Chivilli's re-promotion, and look how that's turned out so far.

The Yankees aren't in a position to treat any amount of relief talent as expendable, and they now get 2.5 weeks to see if Hanner could potentially serve as one of their (many needed) trade deadline upgrades - as long as they promote him on Tuesday.

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