Yankees' wasteful roster move is playing a dangerous game with Carlos Lagrange

Congratulations to David Bednar! The Yankees placed the closer on the paternity list as he's expecting the birth of his child. Exciting stuff. That definitely explains why he pitched two innings on Sunday night.

While our best wishes are with Bednar, they are not with the Yankees front office after they opted to promote Jake Bird in his place. Jake Bird. The same guy who gives up a run every single damn time he takes the mound. During a stretch when the Yankees need run prevention more than they ever had. During a time when they have an easy top prospect promotion to make as they attempt to navigate the upcoming trade deadline and discover what bullpen pieces they need.

Why are they refusing to promote Carlos Lagrange? Well, for one, he just pitched on Sunday and he got rocked to the tune of five earned runs on four hits and two walks in just 2/3 of an inning against the Indianapolis Indians. It's up for debate whether or not he's ready for MLB, but the Yankees are never going to find out if they keep him wasting away at Triple-A.

They don't need Lagrange until Wednesday, too. The entire bullpen hadn't been overused in Boston since the games were so predictable. In fact, Bednar and Fernando Cruz didn't appear at all until Sunday evening.

Whatever the reasoning is, the Yankees are not learning anything. Shuttling Bird back and forth from Scranton is something you do to manage the bottom of the bullpen when you have a capable unit. It's not a move out of necessity when you are currently searching for answers.

The front office is putting itself in position to promote Lagrange at some point in late July/early August, which will only put more pressure on the top prospect. At that point, he'll be required to minimize his mistakes/ineffectiveness and won't be given the grace period he would be in June or the beginning of July. It's not a recipe for success. It's only going to take things down to the wire and potentially ruin the development of another promising prospect.

The alternative is what? Using what you already know you have in Bird? We can be optimistic for a moment and believe the Yankees are hopeful to burn Bird the next few days during their series against the Tigers, at which point they could option him back and call up Lagrange ... but their treatment of Bird has been the same since they acquired him at last year's trade deadline. Until we see otherwise, there's no reason to suggest it will change. He'll remain run-of-the-mill roster fodder and will be sent back when Bednar returns.

The Yankees are the must vulnerable they've been all year, and once again they are doing very little to address it. Aaron Boone is putting out horrible lineups, the team's top hitters are slowly disappearing into the background, and there's very little chemistry at the moment.

Lagrange wouldn't fix that, but he'd at least be a step in the right direction. Perhaps the Yankees should have pitched Bird on Sunday instead of Lagrange, knowing Bednar was nearing a trip to the paternity list. That would've given them the chance to get the small sample size from Lagrange before making a bigger decision.

Nope, you'll all get some more Jake Bird. And you'll like it. DraftKings has it at -100000 odds he'll give up a run his first appearance against the Tigers. (Not really, but they would if they were smart).

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