When we last spoke, Rob Refsnyder had enjoyed his first Big League hit, first Big League homerun and first error of his young career. All the talk was that he was here to stay and SU was among the Yankee faithful that saw allowing him to play everyday at 2nd base as a no-brainer. But alas, it was not to be. After playing Friday and Saturday, he was demoted yesterday. Joe Girardi said that he needs to continue working on getting better.
SU asks: is this just another bad move by Brian Cashman who was upset that the team average age might dip below 29.5 if Refsnyder stayed on the roster? Or is he being clever here? SU actually believes the plan, now, is to get Refsnyder back to the Major League roster within the next 2 weeks. Cashman wants the other teams to believe that he is comfortable finishing out the year with Stephen Drew and Brendan Ryan, and leaving Refsnyder in the minors. But in reality, this is a head fake. Cashman doesn’t want to appear desperate but he is going to move Drew now to some team that needs a shortstop for the rest of the year. The sportswriters are all missing this. They think that Refsnyder was sent down for “seasoning.” Not so: he is ready now and showed nothing in his audition that he isn’t ready. Drew will be dealt in the next week or so and Brendan Ryan, who they probably want to keep but just is another injury waiting to happen, will go back on the DL. Refsnyder will return and give SU a 2nd player on the team other than A-Rod to get excited about.
Yankee pitching is actually fine. The American League is truly mediocre. There is no team that you would be scared on in the playoffs. SU says do not give up any of your top prospects to rent a pitcher for the 2nd half as you will then be stuck with CC in the bullpen.
SU caught the end of the Met game yesterday (as in the 14th – 18th innings. Man, they are bad offensively. But… the pitching continues to hold up and they remain only 2.5 games back. If ownership makes a couple of moves and the Mets stay in the race, SU predicts the City will rally behind the Mets more than the Yankees because they are younger. They are poised to take over the town but it’s not clear if ownership will seize the moment. Clearly, Met fans need to buy more hot dogs and beer at the game to make it happen.
Sports Update Intergalactic 
Your chess game comments on what the Yankee think tank makes sense. Moving Drew out and getting a real solid bat or a solid offensive player in the Minors or a first rounder next year might be a good deal as we need to continue getting younger. What will carry us into the playoffs remains how healthy we remain. Getting Beltran back on track and Ellsbury back to an almost elite status coupled with what we have going for us offensively might be enough to get us into the 3rd week of October. It certainly looks that way right now.
The Met’s taking over the town is ridiculous. Like the NY Jets there are many loud mouth fans, but once we smell the finish line as we enter September our fans will be out in force. It should be fun listening to all the trash talk as it will keep our minds free of the NY Knicks just a little bit longer.
Andy, you are right when it comes to health with this team. Beltran has had so many issues it’s hard to envision him being out there consistently for any length of time. I guess the key guy health wise will be Teixeira as he has been very productive all year. I think you are under-estimating how many Met fans there are in town and how they dominate WFAN certainly. Their young starting staff is exciting. The Yankees are as dull as you can get. Even in a tight race, it’s hard to get that jazzed up about them.
The “Imperious” one doesn’t seem to have bought into the Mets yet, but it does seem that all the other have (led by none other than Boomer and Carton (well Carton more….)).
Sasha, Mike Francesa will never go all in on the Mets. But he fields his share of calls from Met fans so I expect we will see an uptick. There are many, many callers on WFAN who are Met fans – that’s for sure.
Cashman quoted today as saying there is a “strong possibility” that Yankees do nothing at the trading deadline- this is a surefire guarantee that something major is in the works.
Exactly. Cashman is the master of misdirection. The Yankees are so left-handed already. Why wouldn’t you want to play Refsnyder who bats from the right side to help balance all of the everyday lefties, i.e., Gardner, Ellsbury, Gregorious, McCann and Drew? Drew is a good fielder but to be honest, he isn’t faced with very many tough plays from what I have seen. There is no way he is not back up playing 2nd base every day. And talk of dealing him for Ben Zobrist would also be disappointing. But we know Cashman is in love with the idea of fielding a team of all utility infielders. He tried that last year.
It’s very, very hard to see the Mets taking over the town if the Yankees are in the playoffs and the Mets are not. For the Mets to take over the town they will need at least two the following (a) a trade for a big-name player, (b) a playoff berth (c) and the Yankees eliminated. They will remain a hot topic on talk radio but that’s always the case. They have a solid passionate fan base but they have a long way to go before they get the whole town excited on a regular basis. (Note, they started to make a dent earlier the season but it took a combination of Harvey’s return and a ridiculous winning streak.) Another plus could be a collapse by the Nationals which certainly seems possible but can’t be expected
I’m not sure what Drew could do the next two weeks that would make him appealing to another team. Don’t the last two seasons speak for themselves? Even if he were to hit a couple HRs and catch the eye of some GM who has been asleep since 2013, wouldn’t the analytic software running every organization automatically change that GM’s password before he could make a move?
The Refsnyder demotion makes little sense other than in the context of the way every team is using the minor leagues like an extra couple seats on the bench. Back in the day it was fun to check who was being shipped off on the Columbus Shuttle, knowing that they had disappointed a manager or GM with their performance. Now the Yankees will send people to/from Scranton based on how many left-handers they expect to face in the next series. MLB should do something about this. It’s fun for the fans to root for a new guy to stick around based on performance but that fun fades away when you know he’s going to be sent down regardless because they want another arm in the pen.
I can see the SU subscriber base is not sold on the enthusiasm of the Met fans. My hypothesis (based on running thousands of statistical models) is that the Mets, because of the youth of their starters, are much more interesting than the Yankees. Seth, you’ve been to the stadium this year. It’s deadsville. Do Ellsbury, Chase Headley and Carlos Beltran get your pulse racing? I think not. But Matt Harvey throwing near 100 mph along with DeGrom, etc in a tighter race come August has potential. I stand by my prediction.
Certainly no thrill when Headley and Beltran step up to the plate. But the Met’s 4-5-6 last night were Flores, Mayberry and Campbell.
Can Sports Update explain the Blue Jays? .500 record with a +89 run differential.
Seth, my take on the Blue Jays is that they have a potent offense and can slug their way to some lop-sided wins. But their pitching is suspect and my guess would be that they lose their share of close games along the way. But it is strange; usually run differential correlates with a high winning percentage with a number like that.