Around the Empire: Yankees news - 11/12/19

NY Daily News | Kristie Ackert: The offseason renovation to the coaching staff continued on Monday with news of quality control coach Carlos Mendoza’s promotion to bench coach, replacing Josh Bard who had held the role for the past two seasons. The move follows the first major change that the Yankees made to the coaching staff with Matt Blake taking over for Larry Rothschild, and we’ll have to wait and see if it’s the last significant one.

NY Post | Ken Davidoff: The first hurdle of the offseason for Brian Cashman is here, as the GM meetings began. The Yankees have struck early around this time in recent years making some quality moves on the trade market. They acquired Aaron Hicks and Justin Wilson in this timespan years ago, began to piece together a three-team trade for Didi Gregorius in December back in 2014, and put in motion the James Paxton trade around this time last year. The Yankees will be active in looking for improvements and won’t be alone, so be on the lookout for some type of move potentially coming soon.

NJ.com | Mike Rosenstein: One of the moves that they could make is a run at the former Met Zack Wheeler. Wheeler still has to decide whether to accept his qualifying offer from the Mets, but the expectation is that he will not and that expectation is based on the market he could draw. Several agents and executives are speculating that Wheeler could see a deal approaching $20 million in AAV this offseason, and the Yankees will have to gauge if he is worth that kind of commitment. Depending on their answer, there are a host of other candidates that the team could also consider.