The Yankees didn’t make any moves at the 2020 MLB Trade Deadline, but that’s not from a lack of trying from general manager Brian Cashman.
“We went all the way to the last few minutes with conversations that were up and running, but couldn’t push through on anything,” Cashman said on a media zoom call before the Yankees’ game with the Rays. “We were engaged with everybody as you would expect, but whether we got close or not doesn’t really matter, because we didn’t conclude anything.”
One thing Cashman did note is that while the team didn’t make a move because they’re waiting on several injured players to return, he feels that Zack Britton is “close” and Gleyber Torres is “around the corner,” and perhaps the Yankees’ best deadline move is getting their own players back.
“I know we have a great team, especially when we’re at full capacity,” Cashman said. “I didn’t stand down because we were waiting on these guys – if I found a proper match, I was prepared to execute – but we do have a great team, and knowing that we’re getting everybody back at some point is exciting. Ultimately, the bottom line is that something we felt was sensible was our ideal, and I’m very comfortable not doing what was asked of us.”
And, while starting pitching seemed to be the biggest need, both now and in the long-term, Cashman said he was very happy with how the organization is setting up for the latter.
“As we move forward, we believe we have a nice formulation of talented, controllable starters – eventually German will be reinstated, and you already see what Montgomery is doing and Deivi Garcia did yesterday, and we have other guys knocking on the door,” Cashman said. “There’s a lot that we can hang out hats on.”
That said, he did try, but in his usual verbiage, Cashman all but said “the price was too high.”
“The effort was to try to get a starter – controllable or short-term – to give ourselves a better chance, but the price tag associated with it was usually the subtraction of an impactful player that is playing, or is anticipated to play, an important role for this franchise,” he said. “The names that were necessary to execute certain things are names that we are going to rely on in the present and the near future. We feel we have a team that can compete for a title this year and moving forward, and to try to take from that didn’t make the sense needed for me to make any recommendations for our owner.”
That said, regardless of what it was, anything he did zero in on was meant to be supplemental.
“Leap of faith or not, I believe that for us to be where we want to be, we need those guys to come back regardless of whether I made an addition of not,” Cashman said. “I can’t acquire something at the level of a Gleyber Torres or an Aaron Judge, so whatever I was acquiring was to augment the team we have, with the expectation of those players coming back regardless.”
And, Cashman is hopeful that, much like in 2015 with Luis Severino and Greg Bird, the Yankees can count on what they have within to make an impact.
“At the end of the day, if we could have made a trade prior to yesterday and brought in a starter, maybe Deivi Garcia doesn’t make that start, but he got that chance because the need arose and he earned it,” Cashman said. “The goal of mine was to add to what we already have, but not at the expense of what we’re relying on, and I feel comfortable that we made the right decisions with what was in front of us.”