Yankees Looking for Outfielders, Not Pitchers

Jon Heyman reports, or mongers, or whatever you want to call it, that the Yankees "aren't too concerned about their rotation, as CC Sabathia is returning soon, and Andy pettitte is expected back by early September," and as such, "are looking harder at the outfield market than the pitching market, as they still have concerns about Brett Gardner's elbow situation."

As well they should, given that Gardner (A) seems to be having setbacks on his setbacks, and (B) no one should confuse Gardner with Vulcan, the God of Fire (no, I don’t know where that comparison came from either). When everything is working right, the combination of a smattering of hitting, a good number of walks, a lot of steals, and excellent range in left field makes him quite valuable, but subtract any of those elements and there wouldn’t be enough remaining to carry what is one of baseball’s offense-first positions.

Heyman notes that "Raul Ibanez and Andrew Jones have done very well filing in," a curious statement because Ibanez has been neither filing nor filling—despite a little surge during the month of July, since the end of April he has hit .241/.301/.453 (.232/.281/.402 on the road) with his usual problematic defense in left; whether you prefer WAR in Baseball-Reference, Fangraphs, or Baseball Prospectus flavors, all three rate him as about a replacement-level player so far this year.

Heyman identifies Shane Victorino and Justin Upton as among the Yankees’ targets.