As we’ve discussed over the past couple weeks, if the New York Yankees elect to sell off this summer, they will have a variety of extremely attractive bullpen options available to market. Among them, lefty Andrew Miller could be especially appealing to the Cubs, given his overwhelming dominance and his team control on a reasonable contract through 2018.
Joel Sherman adds to the growing group of voices who see the Cubs and Yankees as a good fit on a Miller deal, should it come to that, suggesting that no team is a better fit for Miller right now than the Cubs. Given the window in which the Cubs figure to be especially competitive (i.e., this and next season, before Jake Arrieta (likely) departs in free agency, and while Jon Lester is still in his early-30s), I would agree that Miller could be especially useful to the Cubs.
[adinserter block=”1″]Sherman also checked in to see if the Cubs would be willing to part with Kyle Schwarber, who is recovering from a serious knee injury, in a deal for Miller, but discovered that they would not. “Their love for Schwarber is just too great.” I doubt anyone around here will be all that surprised by that revelation, but it does remind us that there would definitely be a ceiling to what the Cubs would offer in a deal for Miller, whose price tag would be steep.
Among the names Sherman mentions – not in any particular trade scenario, just names that could/would interest the Yankees – Javy Baez, Jeimer Candelario, and Ian Happ. It’s interesting that the Cubs’ top two prospects – Willson Contreras and Gleyber Torres – are not mentioned, but I suspect that’s mostly a product of Sherman’s list not being exhaustive. Plus, I don’t think there’s a realistic deal out there right now in which the Cubs would include Contreras, and Torres may be too far away from the Majors right now to pique the Yankees’ interest as a center piece.
For now, this remains an academic discussion, though, as Jon Heyman reports that the Yankees conferenced yesterday about their plans, and they’ve decided not to sell for now. The “for now” is probably an extremely fluid thing, as the Yankees stand four games under. 500, 6.5 games out in the AL East, and behind three teams. They are also 5.0 games out in the Wild Card, with six teams ahead of them before they’d pull into the second Wild Card spot.
In other words, absent a dramatic turnaround in the next few weeks, I think we will see the Yankees starting to gear up to sell. Of course, even then they might decide to hold onto Miller, as opposed to Aroldis Chapman, who is a free agent after this season.[adinserter block=”2″]