“Do your best, or you’re only cheating yourselves.”
My parents often said exactly this to us quite often when we were kids, usually the night before a big test. Though we didn’t know it, it was essentially them saying, “Don’t just know the material. Know it your best.”
You’d think that for all of the annual crowing about World Series contention and always building a lineup expected to win one, the Yankees would understand this.
Well, career minor leaguer Duke Ellis got the call when rosters expanded on Sunday. DJ LeMahieu was not designated for assignment despite Anthony Rizzo returning from injury. Rookie Ben Rice was sent back to the minors.
And waiting for Rice at Triple-A Scranton is the man the Yankees should have called all along: alleged top prospect Jasson “The Martian” Dominguez.
Forget that the Yankees are still in first place. Don’t give any of the “Alex Verdugo is hitting again” BS. Him batting .366 over his last eight games doesn’t fix his batting .234 with a .654 OPS on the year. Don’t believe me? He hit .278 over a nine-game stretch in early August before going 0 for his next 21.
You know which player hasn’t been busy pulling Verdugo’s reverse Blackjack? Jasson Dominguez. He came back for the Doylestown game versus Detroit last month, went 0 for 4, and was sent back to Triple-A Scranton Wilkes-Barre. He’s hit .333 since.
But hey, Duke Ellis has that good old-fashioned upside, right? All of that .238 lifetime batting average in the minors with minimal power.
Certainly beats Jasson Dominguez— a switch-hitter, in case anyone forgot— batting .313 with nine homers in 51 minor league games. Surely he must need more time to rehab his Tommy John surgery, plus that pesky oblique! Can’t take a single risk with him in such a close playoff race.
As the great pro wrester The Iron Sheik said so aptly:
Fox Sports’ Deesha Thosar put it best following the Yankees: 14-7 loss to the St. Louis Cardinals on Sunday. It was their second consecutive series loss and she spared no words regarding the asinine decision to keep Dominguez in Triple-A.
“The decision to leave the switch-hitting outfielder in the minor leagues,” Thosar writes, “is an organizational mistake that doesn’t just anger the fan base but insults those expecting the Yankees to do one simple thing: field the best team possible.”
Are Brian Cashman and Alex Verdugo sweating yet? Because that’s only the beginning.
“Sunday’s announcement — or lack thereof,” she continued, “broadcasts that the Yankees are not, in fact, doing what’s necessary to win. In a consequential year that requires cutthroat decision-making and an all-in mentality, the Yankees have decided to tread lightly and play it safe.”
And look, manager Aaron Boone was correct in his assessment before Sunday’s game. The Yankees aren’t calling Jasson Dominguez to the Bronx unless they plan on playing him every day. We don’t have to like it, but Verdugo is indeed swinging a hot bat as of late and has been a strong fielder all season. Why bench the hot hand when Dominguez isn’t guaranteed to play better, plus isn’t as strong a glove in the field.
Simple answer: BECAUSE HE’S STILL JASSON F***ING DOMINGUEZ!!!!!! WHY IS THIS SO HARD TO UNDERSTAND?!
If you think flaying Cashman alive via the pen is next, this isn’t the piece for you. He’s still a fantastic general manager who knows how to build winning teams. The Yankees not having a losing season since 1992 proves that, even though Cashman didn’t become the GM until ’98.
Except two things can be true. Brian Cashman can be a great executive capable of building a winning team. He’s also someone capable of making moves which make absolutely no sense.
Take, for example, former Mets general manager Frank Cashen. He built the infamous “Bad Guys” team that won the 1986 World Series. One of the more popular players that season was rookie outfielder and hard-partier Kevin Mitchell, who hit .277 with 12 homers on the season before batting a clean .250 in the playoffs.
Cashen, who wanted to clean up the Mets’ coke-and-booze-fueled clubhouse, made the fateful decision in December, months after his team clinched the series. He traded Mitchell to the Padres for outfielder Kevin McReynolds, whose legacy is the classic “great player, hated baseball” trope.
Kevin Mitchell, on the other hand, played for 13 seasons and won an MVP with San Francisco in 1989.
Cashman isn’t on the cusp of trading Jasson Dominguez, but you have to wonder what he actually thinks of his prized prospect to not promote him for the most important stretch of the season.
We cannot sugarcoat this. The New York Yankees have a chance to seize momentum and run away with the AL East in September. It’s been a long hard season, all building up to a month in which they play only two playoff teams. Two.
Forget any mealy-mouthed company line crap from the organization. Let’s just call it like it is, plain and simple.
The New York Yankees did not promote Jasson Dominguez because, for some reason or another, Brian Cashman had a lapse in judgment.
That’s it. Nothing more, nothing less. Verdugo’s numbers can be distilled down to every last decimal point and Dukes’ deeds in Doulbe-A may have been great once, but not right now. To say either man is better than Jasson Dominguez in a lineup isn’t just indefensible.
It’s just plain stupid.
There’s still time for Dominguez to be promoted, but Yankees fans aren’t getting their hopes up. This is how Cashman has operated the farm system for a long time, perhaps too long.
Even so, we’re going to try and hope the words work.’
Mr. Cashman, make the call and bring Jasson Dominguez to the big club. Or you and your beloved New York Yankees organization are only cheating yourselves.
FOR FULL STORY ON STANDARD WEBSITE: The New York Yankees have officially cheated themselves | Elite Sports NY