8:58 am: Indeed, the Yankees announced this morning they’ve activated Montgomery and Sánchez from the injured list. Luis Gil has also been recalled as the 27th man for today’s doubleheader.
8:20 am: The Yankees announced last night they’ve returned reliever Stephen Ridings and catcher Rob Brantly to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. Both players were selected to the big league roster as replacements for players who had tested positive for COVID-19, so they could removed from the active and 40-man rosters without being exposed to waivers.
While New York has yet to formally announce corresponding roster moves, it’s apparent they’re made with the intention of activating left-hander Jordan Montgomery and catcher Gary Sánchez from the COVID-19 injured list before today’s doubleheader against the Red Sox. New York had already indicated Montgomery would get the ball for one half of the twin bill. It was less clear whether Sánchez would be ready to return today, but Brantly’s removal leaves Kyle Higashioka as the only catcher on the big league roster — suggesting Sánchez will indeed make it back onto the field this afternoon.
Ridings was selected two weeks ago and has made his first five MLB appearances this year. He allowed two runs over five frames, punching out seven while issuing a pair of walks. Ridings averaged a huge 97.2 MPH on his sinker and generated swinging strikes on a fantastic 18.9% of his offerings during his brief big league time. Between that impressive showing and his ludicrous minor league numbers this season — a 1.24 ERA with a 38.2% strikeout rate split between Double-A and Triple-A — the 26-year-old figures to get another MLB look before long.
Brantly has come up as a COVID replacement on two separate occasions, tallying 21 plate appearances in a backup role. He’s had a very good season with the RailRiders, hitting .286/.397/.496 over 141 plate appearances.
The Yankees are moving closer to returning to full strength after the recent spread of the coronavirus throughout their clubhouse. Assuming Montgomery and Sánchez are activated today, that’ll leave just Anthony Rizzo and Clay Holmes on the COVID IL. It’s an opportune time for New York to get two key players back, as the Yankees kick off a three-game set against their archrivals in Boston, whom they trail by two games in the American League Wild Card race (with the A’s 1.5 games up on New York for the final AL postseason spot).
Why send down Ridings. He’s actually shown some promise. The Yankees needed to send down Nelson or Koerner. Next send down Davis and bring Greg Allen back up to the Bronx.
Probably has to do with the fact they have to make a 40 man move in order to keep him up. They can send him back without the that and make a decision on that at a later date.
Good point. They should just cut Kriske from the 40 man, but they need pitchers at AAA. Otto gone in trade. Gil, Nelson, Ridings, Kriske and Koerner with Yanks.
They also need arms at the ready short term on the MLB level. Ridings has no doubt secured a 40-man roster spot after the season, but they may not want to sacrifice someone like Koerner to waivers and a likely claim until the season is over.
Absolutely….pitching short teams like the Dodgers, or Padres would be all over anyone available trying to find innings over the last 50 games of the season.
No reason to help any team you might be playing against in the playoffs.
Kriske should be gone. Someone needs to lose their job by choosing Kriske over Whitlock
Is this a statement in support of losing games at the major league level to assure you have Kriske available later this year?
You don’t demote good players in favor of bad players without impacting wins and losses.
That means you accept losses in a pennant race to improve depth in order to win games later this year that you could win right now.
Amen!
Cashman just can’t resist dumpster diving and no one seems to be able to stop him.
They have medication for people who can’t focus like this and when you have a GM of a team like the Yankees who can’t stop sifting sand for loose change while asking the players to give 100% focus to every single game you simply aren’t all pulling in the right direction.
It’s time to move on. Buy Cash a shopping cart as a retirement gift and let him wander out of the stadium & focus on the dumpster treasures he seems to value so highly.
Redsox have the leader raiding the dumpster named Bloom. So far he hasn’t found anything worth the effort.
D’accord, @mlbnyyfan –
Ridings looked really good. 4-seam, 2-seam, & cut FB’s all thrown in the 90’s. I know it was just a handful of games, but his stuff will play.
Unfortunately, the same reason he got sent down is also the reason Davis remains up as opposed to Allen. 40/26 man roster stuff. In the short term, yeah, we could have a couple nice little upgrades.
However, the Yanks are trying to hold as much depth as they can right now. Don’t blame ’em. Just a day ago, we had 21 players on an IL of some type.
Our depth saw us through that.
Who holds on to depth like Davis when you’re clinging to a playoff berth?
There is a time for development and there is a time for a coordinated effort to win using every cylinder.
Depth has a financial value. So does winning. Winning is close to 100 million dollars. Low end depth is usually in the tens of thousands.
The Yankees have had 2 big covid outbreaks over the last month alone so it’s understandable for them to be concerned about depth. Most Yankee fans would agree they’d rather see Allen and Ridings over Davis and Kriske but it’s not that simple
Yanks are still making up ground.
I’d argue that the tightness of the race is directly responsible for how the Yanks are conducting themselves, @emac.
Davis is absolutely not there for “development”.
He is nothing more than roster churn. When Gleyber or Urshela return we will need to bounce someone from the party. Allen is currently not on the 40 man. So Davis will be the casualty & not Allen whom the Yanks like more.
Looking at how Cash & Hal responded at the deadline it seems pretty obvious that they understand the financial stakes in play. Those moves were entirely about making the playoffs.
Point is, there are oftentimes more factors in play than merely: Player A > Player B or whatever. Which can be frustrating at first glance.
@Ducky Buckin Fent–
Well said.
And yet – Davis made a very fine running catch in last night’s game, coming close to the CF wall. Made it look easy too.
Here’s hoping the offense heats up against Boston. A sweep would be stunning.
Every once in awhile, uh, @Joe?
Was a pretty catch. From what I understand – however – his defense has really never been a question/problem. But: a sub .500 OPS is untenable in any type of long term situation.
Offense had another ugly one last night.
We did have a nice series smacking the White Sox around. So: more of the same. We can’t seem to get on any kind of sustained roll with the bats.
Well you know me…as opposed to “stunned” I’ll just take it in stride.
Truthfully, just hoping for (yet another) series win which is a proven way to make up ground.
Davis did make a nice catch yesterday but I think Allen would’ve been able to catch that ball as well. A sweep would be fantastic vs our long time nemesis, heck I’ll be very happy taking 3 of 4. Yankees were out 9 games a few weeks ago and now only 5.5.
My grandpere used to say, “well begun is half done.” Or…was it the other way around?
Anyway: got game 1. Let’s take the night cap now.
Davis is a bit better in defense than Allen, but I don’t think there’s a comparison on offense. Davis is a pinch runner, Allen has been a productive top-of-the-order bat. Yankees are making a move to keep him long-term like Ducky said.
Yankees have finally woken up. Yankees realize that:
1- Playoffs are not a guarantee unless they play 70/30 baseball
2- Their team as they know it will be somewhat dismantled if they don’t make the playoffs. Yankees must go in a different direction if this current team that has been together is regressing (this is based on Hal’s/Cashman’s statements, not my personal opinion of what they should do with the team).
Yanks are comin’….. in the words of the great Ken Singleton – “Look out!”
Yee-up.
Choo-choo, @Clip. The train is rolling…
Mercy, did Gil ever rise up there.
Good stuff.
Gil has been fantastic! Didn’t expect Boston to fall apart like this, 2-11 in last 13 games on the road. A DBH sweep of the red stockings is sweet!
Right?
We get no style points but we keep just grinding out all these ugly games.
Have a good feeling about this series. Had work stuff, so had to keep checking in during game 1. But caught almost all of gm 2.
Heaney going tomorrow. The Angels fellas on the board have said he’ll throw a real nice game every few starts. Tomorrow would be an excellent time for one of those, uh?
We keep getting our guys back too.
This squad may just actually peak at the Right Time.
Hopefully (fingers crossed) Heaney will not throw a BP game. We cannot afford losses to teams we need to beat. Any loss is monumental at this stage; we need to lose only those games we are supposed to (if that makes sense).
Go YANKEES! #28
sox are staggered a bit here.
But we’ve had some issues finishing off sweeps this season.
Something gotta give.
Hope Heaney can at least keep us in the game like his last start. Be nice to see the bats go off.
This squad seems to prefer doing things the hard way though…
Game Over.
Frazier? Davis? Andujar? Bring back Allen and Florial.
Florial should be brought back up but who knows are the Yankees now worried about the service time clock
No. But with Allen, they don’t want him up because he’s got no more options. In essence, if anyone returns they will have to DFA him and they want to keep him. The only reason that didn’t apply the first time he promoted was because it was specific to Covid IL replacement. Davis is in the same boat but already in the Majors. Sending him down puts him back on the market. It’s a long-term personnel decision playing out due to options.