MLB announces plan to save the Trenton Thunder, which was abandoned by the Yankees

Arm & Hammer Park in Trenton will host continue to host minor-league baseball.

By Mike Rosenstein

And they’re back.

On Monday, Major League Baseball announced its plan to create a new “MLB Draft League.” One of the founding members will be the Trenton Thunder. Earlier this month, the New York Yankees announced they are switching affiliates and will use the Somerset Patriots as their Double-A club beginning next season, ending an 18-year partnership with Trenton.

The move by the Yankees was the result of Minor League Baseball agreeing with Major League Baseball to cut its teams from 160 to 120.

The Yankees will keep their Triple-A team in Moosic, Pa., with the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders. Somerset replaces Trenton at Double-A. The Hudson Valley Renegades will be the team’s new High-A affiliate and the Tampa Tarpons will shift to Low-A. The Yankees will pull out of Charleston (Low-A) and Pulaski (short-season), as well.

According to the Associated Press, the MLB Draft League “will run from late May through mid-August, broken in 2 halves. The 1st a showcase for top high school, college and Juco players; the 2nd for players passed over in draft.”

Here are more details, per MLB Communications:

Major League Baseball, Prep Baseball Report (PBR), and five founding members today announced the formation of the MLB Draft League, which will become the first league in the country focused on top prospects who are eligible to be drafted by MLB Clubs that summer. With the 2021 MLB Draft moved back to July and being held as part of All-Star Week, draft-eligible players will have a unique opportunity to showcase their abilities and gain exposure to MLB Clubs and fans next summer. The new format affirms MLB’s commitment to the region and assures that communities of Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and New Jersey will continue to host high-caliber baseball and future Major Leaguers for years to come.

The founding members of the MLB Draft League will be the Mahoning Valley Scrappers, the State College Spikes, the Trenton Thunder, the West Virginia Black Bears, and the Williamsport Crosscutters. The League is in advanced discussions with a sixth team and hopes to announce in the coming weeks. Plans include a 68-game regular season with an annual All-Star Break centered around the MLB Draft. MLB Draft League participants will receive unprecedented visibility to MLB Club scouts through both in-person observation and state-of-the-art scouting technology, and educational programming designed to prepare them for careers as professional athletes. PBR will provide support for the league’s staffing, player and coach recruitment, on-field operations, and administrative functions. PBR will also use their media and technology platforms to promote the league and its players throughout the season.

Today’s announcement follows the late September announcement of the Appalachian League’s evolution into the premier college wood bat league for the nation’s top rising freshmen and sophomores, and is part of MLB’s broader efforts to modernize player development while preserving baseball in the local communities in which it is currently played. More announcements, including additional members of the MLB Draft League, other MLB-sponsored leagues as well as licensed affiliates, will follow in the coming weeks.

Kerrick Jackson will serve as President of the MLB Draft League. Prior to joining PBR, Jackson served as the head coach at Southern University, where he led a nine-win team to the NCAA Tournament in three years. For three years, Jackson was the Midwest Area Scouting Supervisor for the Washington Nationals, overseeing Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas, Iowa, Nebraska and the Dakotas. Jackson served as the recruiting coordinator at the University of Missouri for five years (2010-2015) and has held assistant roles at Nicholls State University, Fairfield University, Emporia State University and Coffeyville Community College. He has coached in the Cape Cod League and New England Collegiate Baseball League.

Morgan Sword, MLB’s Executive Vice President, Baseball Economics & Operations, said: “We are thrilled to partner with Prep Baseball Report and the founding members of the MLB Draft League to create a one-of-a-kind league that will attract the nation’s top players who are eligible for each year’s MLB Draft and allow local fans to see top prospects and future big-league stars in their hometowns. This announcement continues MLB’s commitment to preserving and growing baseball in communities around the United States.”

Sean Duncan, President of Prep Baseball Report, said: “We are honored to work with these ownership groups and Major League Baseball to assure the future of impactful, high-level baseball to the region and continue the legacy of deep community involvement from all of these teams. With more than 150 scouts and operations personnel coast-to-coast at the high school, collegiate and junior college levels, we take great pride in our ability to identify the nation’s top amateur draft prospects, which will ultimately make the MLB Draft League the preeminent league for draft-eligible players.”

Does Andy Pettitte belong in Cooperstown? You bet he does and I’m voting for him | Klapisch

Former New York Yankees left-hander Andy Pettitte was a five-time World Series champion.

By Bob Klapisch

Imagine a world so boring that Hall of Fame ballots have stopped generating in-your-grill arguments. The morals clause, historical perspective, politics, grudges – all removed from the election process. Humans have been replaced by software. Cooperstown is ruled by advanced analytics.

Wait, sounds like a much fairer process, right?

Eh. I’ll take the organic balloting any day, agonizing as it is. Every year voters must decide on PED users (confessed and suspected), players who have out-there beliefs and those who’ve been just plain jerks. The election is a challenge I take seriously. I do my research. I talk to other Hall of Famers. Ultimately I listen to my heart.

Which brings me to Andy Pettitte, one of the Yankees’ all-time post-season winners. He’s in his third year of eligibility for Cooperstown. The campaign is not going well: the left-hander picked up just 9.9% of the votes in 2019, and gained a statistically insignificant 1.4% last January. It’s safe to say Pettitte’s candidacy needs to take off like a rocket ship in the next eight elections.

It’s not impossible – Mike Mussina made it in Year 6 after starting out at 20.3%. But the voters will have to cut Pettitte slack on two key issues.

The first is his middle-of-the-pack accomplishments in the regular season, including no Cy Young Awards and a relatively high ERA (3.85). In fact, Pettitte was in the top 10 in ERA only three times in his career. Of course, there are plenty statistical arguments to be made in his favor, which I’ll get to shortly. But there’s a second red flag on Pettitte’s dossier that’ll will also require the voters’ forgiveness. And that’s PEDs.

I have a clear vision about pharmaceuticals and what they did to baseball in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Steroids turned the game into glorified softball. Hitters gained a comical advantage over pitchers. In 1987, a record number of 4,458 HRs were hit in both leagues. By 2000 the total had risen to 5,693. Eleven players went deep 55 or more times between 1997-2002.

Al Leiter once told me, “(Pitchers) would look at guys at the plate and think ‘are you kidding me?’ They were like action figures. They were so much stronger and so much quicker than what you see today. They were able to use heavier bats and stay on the ball a little longer and obviously hit the ball farther. One-bouncers over the wall became home runs. Ground balls that get caught today would get through (the infield) because they were hit harder. It trickled down to every part of the game. People say, ‘steroids don’t make you a better hitter.’ Of course they did.”

But it wasn’t just hitters who benefitted. Pitchers threw harder, too – much harder. Given that artificial advantage and the phony stats that followed, all PED users should automatically be banned from Cooperstown, right? Not so fast. First of all, steroids weren’t officially banned until 2005. And not everyone who was suspected of cheating was actually caught. It’s not my job to play detective or pharmacist. If Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens were never disciplined by MLB – and weren’t punished by the government, either – then that’s my green light. I’ve voted for both every year.

And once again that redirects the conversational road back to Pettitte, who was named in the 2007 Mitchell for suspected use of human growth hormone. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons for Pettitte’s low vote totals to date, especially since he did admit to using the enhancement in 2002 and 2004. But I’ve put an asterisk next to Pettitte’s name because he says HGH was meant to heal an elbow injury, not pump up his fastball.

One of the advantages of covering players year in and year out is learning about their character. I sensed from Day One, for instance, that Alex Rodriguez’s denials about steroids were false. He was lying relentlessly until finally admitting he’d been breaking the rules since his days with the Rangers. My intuition about Pettitte is just as strong in the other direction. I believe his explanation about HGH. I’m as cynical and skeptical as any Jersey guy, but Pettitte is no snake.

What he is, instead, is a winner – and that’s what the Hall-of-Fame ballot is supposed to measure. Here are the most compelling arguments made in Pettitte’s favor.

He has the most wins (19), innings pitched (276.2) and games started (44) in postseason history. He out-pitched the Braves’ John Smoltz in the turning-point Game 5 of the 1996 World Series and finished off the Phillies in Game 6 of the 2009 Fall Classic. Overall, Pettitte has the third-most wins (219) among Yankees legends, which is saying something considered he spent three of his 18 seasons with the Astros.

Oh, and that win total? Make it 256 for his career. There are only five pitchers since 1901 with more wins who aren’t in the Hall of Fame – including Clemens (354) who still might get there, and CC Sabathia (251) who absolutely will. Remember one more thing: Pettitte was pitching in the jaws of that aforementioned steroid era. Hitters were beasts. Pitchers, especially those unlucky enough to call the AL East their home office, were like pigeons flying into the turbines of a 757 – reduced to feathers on any given night.

Thing is, Pettitte didn’t have the game’s best fastball. The rest of his arsenal was pretty good, but not killer-caliber. But somehow he’d throw the best cut-fastball of the night in a tight spot; there’d be that extra spin rate that burrowed in on right-handed hitters, producing ground balls to Derek Jeter that started double plays and ended so many rallies. Those were the signature moments in Pettitte’s career, especially in October. That’s what I remember most. It’s why he’s getting my vote.

MLB scout calls BS on Scott Boras’ claim Yankees’ James Paxton is healthy: ‘Really skeptical about this one’

James Paxton was 1-1 with a 6.64 ERA in five starts for the Yankees in 2020 before his season ended in August due to a flexor strain.

By Randy Miller

A Major League scout whose team is looking for starting pitching this winter doesn’t trust agent Scott Boras’ recent injury update on Yankees free agent pitcher James Paxton.

The scout isn’t buying word that the left-hander is “back to normal,” as NJ Advance Media’s Brendan Kuty was told in a recent phone interview with the super agent.

“When Scott Boras comes out and says Paxton is fully healthy, he’s doing this and doing that, I’m like, ‘Come on, Scott, you’re looking for a payday trying to get Paxton his last big contract,’” the scout, who requested anonymity, said this week. “Boras makes it out like every one of his clients is great when more than half aren’t real good.”

Paxton, 32, has had a history of injuries and this year was behind in spring training due to offseason lower back surgery, then he made just five starts in 2020 due to a flexor strain that ended his season in late August.

What the scout didn’t like seeing was Paxton change his delivery and pitch with less velocity while going 1-1 with a 6.64 ERA. His fastball averaged 92.59 mph, a drop from 2019 when he averaged 95.69 mph and topped out at 100, according to Brooks Baseball.

“I wrote Paxton up and I lowered him from what I’ve had him in the past because of what I saw this year,” the scout said. “What I wrote down in my submission is that I think this guy is compensating one injury that’s leading to other injuries because Paxton was an overhand guy, and this year he was down to three quarters. Paxton lost velo. His fastball lost life. He lost sharpness to his breaking ball. The repertoire was just average.”

The scout is a big fan of a healthy Paxton, who pitched like an ace in 2019 when he was 15-6 with a 3.82 ERA in 29 starts with 186 strikeouts in 150 2/3 innings in his first season with the Yankees.

Paxton’s health concerns probably will result in him landing a short-term contract, most likely one or two years. MLB Trade rumors predicted Paxton will sign with the Chicago White Sox for one year and $10 million. FanGraphs’ projection for Paxton is a two-year, $30-million deal.

Clubs that could be in the running for Paxton include the Yankees, who have two other members of their 2020 rotation on the free agent market, righty Masahiro Tanaka and lefty J.A. Happ. The Mets, Phillies, Red Sox, Padres, Nationals and Mariners also could be suitors for Paxton.

“Most teams can use a veteran starter, but I’m not that desperate to sign a guy like Paxton because I’m not convinced his arm injuries are past him regardless of what Scott Boras says,” the scout said. “I told our GM, ‘You guys do want you want, but if it was me, I’d be very, very, very, very careful about signing Paxton.’ If it’s a last resort on a short term with incentives, I can see it, but be really skeptical about this one.”

Yankees’ worst nightmare? Mets’ Steve Cohen opens up on winter spending plans

Mets owner Steve Cohen (top left) says his club is talking to all the top free agents, which includes DJ LeMahieu (top right), Trevor Bauer (bottom right) and J.T. Realmuto (bottom left).

By Randy Miller

Yankees managing partner Hal Steinbrenner probably never will admit to being worried or concerned that New York’s other Major League franchise won’t be the same old Mets with billionaire new owner Steve Cohen in charge.

Privately? Yankees ownership and management surely are nervous about the Mets’ sale being approved by MLB in October and becoming official in early November. They should be because Cohen is talking like he’s going to be running the Mets like Steinbrenner’s late father ran the Yankees in the 1970s and ’80s.

You have a glaring need? You go hunting for the best available plug, regardless of price. You have two or three needs? You do the same. Money doesn’t matter.

Well, money matters, but not the way it used to matter to the Mets’ past ownerships groups, who seemingly were outspent by the Yankees nine times out of 10 for all of their existence.

Without naming names, Cohen made it clear on Thanksgiving eve that the Mets are having internal conversations with all of the best free agents in this offseason’s class, including the one that the Yankees badly want to re-sign, second baseman DJ LeMahieu.

“We’re talking to everybody,” Cohen said in an interview with SNY that first aired Wednesday night. “I can’t predict if a player wants to come play for me. Maybe they want to play in a different city. So there’s a lot of unknowns, but we’re having conversations with everybody that matters and anybody that the fans are excited by.”

Translation: The Mets are talking to LeMahieu, who reportedly is seeking a five-year, $100-million contract after greatly outplaying his first Yankees pact, $24 million for two years. And all the while, it’s now known for sure that the Mets are interested in signing J.T. Realmuto, the best catcher on the market, and Trevor Bauer, the top starting pitcher on the market.

Cohen isn’t promising Mets fans that he’ll sign at least one of the three, but at the same time he’s not ruling out getting all three (or other top free agents) to jumpstart a franchise that has missed the playoffs four years in a row and is coming off a 26-34 pandemic-shortened season. After all, the Mets have needs at second base, catcher and starting pitching.

The Yanks are considered the favorites to sign LeMahieu, but that may not be the case. While Steinbrenner is expected to cut payroll after losing hundreds of millions this year due to the Yankees playing a shortened season with no fans in the stands, Cohen sees baseball’s COVID-19 problems as an opportunity.

“I think we can take advantage of the climate that a lot of teams are in where they’re trying to cut their expenses,” Cohen said. “I think we’ll be able to get ballplayers at prices that maybe in a normal year we wouldn’t be able to get.”

Thus, it might be false hope if the Yanks are thinking that they might be able to get LeMahieu to take less years and dollars. Nowadays, who’s to say that Cohen doesn’t swoop in and offer the most money like he did in late August when he outbid Alex Rodriguez’s ownership group and all of the others to buy the Mets?

We’re almost in December, so we’ll probably get a good gauge soon on how much money Cohen is willing to spend this winter. We’ll probably start getting a feel during the Winter Meetings, which will be held Dec. 6-10, and there likely will be some big signings by Christmas or early January.

The Mets want to sign big fish.

“Hopefully something happens, but I’m not going to predict it,” Cohen said. “The goal is to build a great team. We have a great core already, but we have holes. I don’t know if we can fill our holes the first year. That that might be a lot to ask, but I think we can make significant improvements so that we get closer to where we want to be.”

Sounds like George Steinbrenner circa 1976.

Yes, the Yankees should be worried about the Mets now having an owner that has the money and desire to sign any free agent.

These 4 teams have been linked to Yankees target DJ LeMahieu

New York Yankees’ DJ LeMahieu led the majors with a .364 batting average in 2020.

By Brendan Kuty

Imagine life as DJ LeMahieu right now.

There isn’t a team in the majors that wouldn’t want him. The richest franchise in the history of the sport, the Yankees, want him back badly. He’s just 32 years old. And he’s going to get a serious pay raise over the two-year, $24-million contract he received before the 2019 season.

Not so bad, huh?

Here are the four teams linked to him so far:

Yankees

The most obvious name on the list. LeMahieu has (not so) arguably been the Yankees’ best player since he signed two years ago, finishing fourth in the AL MVP vote in 2019 and third in 2020. He’s their leadoff hitter. He’s there lead-by-example guy in the clubhouse. He’s their second baseman, capable of playing a competent first base and third base. And he’s said over and over that he loves the Yankees and wants to remain in the Bronx. The sides are in negotiations regarding a return, but it might come down to whether the Yankees meet his asking price, which is sure to be steep.

Mets

LeMahieu wants at the very least to remain in New York, according to the New York Post’s Ken Davidoff. Could that open a door for the Mets? Well, Robinson Cano getting suspended for the 2021 season after testing positive for steroids for a second time freed up $24 million in payroll next season. The Mets could spend it on pitching, a catcher or an outfielder — three things they need badly. But adding a player the caliber of LeMahieu is never a bad idea, especially when it comes at the expense of your crosstown rival.

Nationals

On Friday, MLB Network’s Jon Morosi reported that the Nationals were considering LeMahieu, as well as a trade for the Cubs star third baseman Kris Bryant. LeMahieu has played 63 games at third base over the last two seasons. The 32-year-old’s versatility also makes plenty of sense in a National League where there might not be a DH next year.

Blue Jays

The Blue Jays “are also in on LeMahieu,” according to the New York Post’s Ken Davidoff. Makes sense. LeMahieu is French, after all. But, really, everyone expects Toronto to throw around its financial might this offseason, and LeMahieu would be an upgrade, particularly at third base if the team doesn’t want to play Vladimir Guerrero Jr. there anymore.