360 - Yanks deadline moves and George Lombard Jr called up!!

Lombard Jr is up!  Volpe was sent down!  Exciting times in Yankee land as the trade deadline has come and gone.  I discuss it all.

The Yankees are living the most maddening version of baseball: starters keep them in games, but the offense can’t buy a big inning and the bullpen keeps turning late leads into coin flips. I dig into the ugly run-scoring trend, why it’s happening across the lineup, and what it means when your margin for error is basically one mistake per night. If you’ve been watching great pitching get wasted, you’re not alone, and I discuss our shared frustration.

Then the biggest jolt of the week: top prospect George Lombard Jr gets the call, and Anthony Volpe gets sent down to Triple-A!!!  Woooo! I talk about what Lombard’s arrival could change right away (defense, arm, range) and what to be realistic about (rookie adjustment time at the plate). It also opens up a broader conversation about how the Yankees evaluate talent, why certain players get endless patience, and how “small positives” can distract from real production over a full season.

Finally, I break down Brian Cashman’s poor trade deadline. Luis Garcia looks like a rare add who’s actually trending up, but the roster fit is messy with multiple first basemen and limited DH space. Heliot Ramos feels more like a gamble, with questions around strikeouts and defense. And the missed opportunities sting, especially watching Adley Rutschman land with the RED SOX  while the Yankees still have glaring needs at catcher and in the bullpen. If you care about the Yankees’ direction, this is a must-listen. Subscribe, share the show with a friend, and leave a review with your take: what single move would you have made?

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Transcript

Welcome And The Yankees’ State

SPEAKER_00 0:13

Welcome to Jersey Guy Sport, George Force. Welcome for the Yankees, the Giants, the Knicks, the Rangers, and the Ruckers Charlotte Knights. Want to thank you for listening. Today we're talking about George Lombard Jr. is called up, and the Yankees make a few trade deadline moves, though not enough. So let's go ahead and get started. Well, it's been a minute here, folks, and I thought I would go ahead and have a Yankee podcast today, talk about a little bit about the state of the Yankees, talk a little bit about the trade deadline, and just see how we're doing lately with the New York Yankees. So the Yankees called up someone I love, made a couple trades at the deadline as far as how they're playing before we get into the trades and the moves. The Yankees are in a spot now where they are getting strong starting pitching on most days while not being able to hit a lick and also having a little trouble lately closing out games with the relief pen.

Strong Starters And A Dead Offense

SPEAKER_00 1:10

The reason I'm going into this before we talk about the transactions is I wanted to lay the groundwork for what I think we needed at the trade deadline versus what we actually got at the trade deadline. So the Yanks, again, I've been getting strong starting pitching for a very long time. Now I'm recording this on Tuesday, Monday night. The Yanks did not get strong starting pitching. Cam Schlittler, of all people, did not have a good night. And the Yankees actually scored a few runs. So it was an anomaly of swords. You have to throw last night out because that is not indicative of how the Yanks have been playing over the last month or so. But they have not been hitting a lick, a lick. Strong starting pitching, mediocre to poor bullpen recently, and no hitting at all. And the offense has really been so putrid that it's amazing they won any games over this recent stretch. Over the last 15 games, I wrote this down, the Yanks have scored two, two, eight, three, two, one, three, four, nine, three, five, one, two, two, two. Right? Those are the number of runs the Yankees have scored. And if you take out the four bigger games in those 15 games, they scored 2, 2, 3, 2, 1, 3, 3, 1, 2, 2, 2. You can't win games like that, guys. It's just not good enough. The offense has been so pathetic, and it's across the board. Everybody has been hitting worse than their career average. And it just seems like without Judge, without Bellinger, without Stanton, no one is stepping up. Everyone is basically going the opposite direction. They're all hitting worse, not better, in the absence of the big hitters. And so the Yankees really, really needed some help at the trade deadline in a lot of areas. They needed bullpen help, potentially a closer, certainly some setup guys. They needed a catcher. They need a bunch of other stuff, right? A bunch of other stuff. All right, so let's just set

Lombard Jr Up Volpe Sent Down

SPEAKER_00 3:15

that up. First of all, I want to talk about something I'm really, really, really happy about. George Lombard Jr. is being called up to the Yankees today on Tuesday, August 4th. Anthony Volpe is being sent down to AAA. Oh my God, this is big news. I cannot tell you how thrilled Jersey guy is here that this is happening. Anthony Volpe has been the bean of my existence, along recently with uh Austin Wells. But Volpe, if you listen to this podcast, you know, is the bean of my existence. I cannot stand him. He is one of the more overrated players I've ever seen. If I had to hear the announcers or the writers talking about, you know, Volpe's positives one more time, I was going to bash myself in the head or something. I'm so glad to not have to see him potentially for the rest of the season. George Longbard Jr., if you don't know, is our number one prospect. He is a shortstop with a very strong arm, who is apparently very good defensively, with a really good range. And apparently he's a really good hitter, although apparently it takes him time at every level to adjust. So when he was called up to A, took a little while, and then he hit. Then double A, it took a little while, then he hit triple A, it took a little while, then he hit. So I would not be surprised when he gets to the majors if he doesn't hit right away, but I don't care. I don't care. I've seen Volpey not hit for four years. So seeing Lombard not hit for two weeks is not going to kill me at this point. I'm just so, so, so excited that the Yankees actually did something with that pathetic piece of shit, Anthony Volpe. I cannot stand that we had to see him for three and a half years with his lack of production rolling the ball in. He had a relay throw last week where he he fielded the ball right on the edge of the outfield grass, basically one foot away from the dirt on the infield and rolled it in the home plate on the relay throw. It was like a two or three hopper. Like he has no arm whatsoever. He can't hit. I can't stand watching him. I don't even like his face anymore. So stupid running around the bases with his helmet coming off. I've just had enough of him. I'm so happy George Lombard Jr. is up. This is one of the more happy moments of Jersey Guy this year, especially for the Yankees. I can't tell you how happy I am. The Yanks, as you know, by the way, it's not just Volpey. The Yanks have a history of hanging on too long to awful players, right? And I've talked about this before with Sanchez behind the plate, and now, of course, Austin Wells behind the plate and Joey Gallo. You could name a hundred people, right? The Yankees between Boone and Cashman. No, no, no, no. He'll get better. We saw a slightly better swing, and you know, he really is, you know, seeing the ball better. Yeah, he struck out four times. Yeah, but he looked at those balls great. You know, they find any positive in these terrible players, and and Volpe, the same thing happened, right? They just saw all these positives in what is a big nothing burger in Anthony Volpe. And I hope we never see him in the majors again. But if I should only be so lucky, we do not know how well Lombard Jr. is going to hit in the majors, especially early, as I detailed a minute ago, but we do know he will be a much better defender than Anthony Volpe ever was. He's a superior defensive shortstop, he has tremendous range, he has a much stronger arm than Volpe. For that reason alone, I am thrilled to have George Lombard Jr. up here with the team, and I'm so looking forward to him. And again, you know, we just shouldn't judge him immediately, particularly on his hitting, but we'll see. Now, if we can all get rid of the other piece of dead weight, which is Austin Wells behind the plate, I'm going to address that a little bit later because the trade deadline, slight positives and some negatives. So let's

Breaking Down The Luis Garcia Deal

SPEAKER_00 6:59

talk about the trade deadline. And our esteemed GM in chief Cashman. So the first move that Cashman made was he picked up Louis Garcia from the Nationals. He traded with the Nationals. Garcia is a first baseman. Apparently he used to play second, but he was terrible, like last in the majors and defensive runs, say minus 17 or some crap. So he's an awful second baseman, but then he's a first baseman who hits lefty, right? So it turns out we have a lefty first basem already, guys, right? His name is Rice, and he's an all-star. So we're gonna have to find a spot for Garcia. He was in the lineup last night and had a really good debut Monday night in an awful Yankee loss. He had a big two-run home where that gave the Yankees the lead late in the game before the bullpen just lit it up and the Yankees' bullpen blew up and gave the lead back. But Garcia is 26 years old. He's a lefty hitting first baseman, and as I said, apparently a really poor second baseman, but he's having a very good offensive year, like a breakout year, which is great. It's been a long time since the Yankees have picked up someone who was on the upswing, who is having one of these breakout years, who is better now than he's ever been. It's usually the other way around. They were really good in 2024, you know, in their charable this year or something. But, you know, look at his career statistics. This is the opposite. This guy's been okay in his career, but he's having the best year of his career right now. He's he's really good. And that that's you know, we'll have to see where he can fit into the Yanks lineup, you know. Against righties, you know, he can be, I guess, at first base or DH, right, and have Rice at the other spot. Against lefties, I don't know. Is he on the bench? You know, I don't know. We're gonna have to see, you know, what it is, because now you have three first basemen. Right. So here we go with the Yanks, right? You have Goldschmidt, you have Rice, and then you have Garcia. So we have three first baseman, like we used to have three lefty catchers, we now have three first basemen, right? So obviously, you know, against righties, one of them is gonna have to sit, also against lefties, too, right? The other one has to be DH until Stanton gets back. Then two of them will have to sit. In any case, Garcia is having a great year. He's batting 283, right? Apparently he has an 873 OPS, he's got 23 homers, and apparently his slugging percentage was the best in the National League when he got traded to the Yanks. So 560 slugging percentage. So the Yankees actually got someone who's having a really good year with some pop, although he doesn't really have a spot on the team. We actually got a good offensive player. For that, the Yankees gave up four pitchers. We gave up Ivanny Cruz, Jake Bird, who sucks, and then prospects, Ben Grable, who's another reliever, and Jack Siebert. So not not much at all, honestly, for something we really, really needed. I don't think any of those pitchers were gonna help us, especially in the short term. So this this trade was worth it. Although, again, there's the caveat, there isn't really a spot for him. So I think he's gonna play a lot less than he probably thinks he's going to play. But he seems like a player we need to make some kind of room for some way. But the question is, you know, exactly where, when will he fit in and play? But Garcia is having a career year, and the Yanks are definitely getting him at a good time. The

Why The Heliot Ramos Trade Worries

SPEAKER_00 10:31

other move, the single other move the Yankees made to tread that line is obtaining Heliot Ramos in a trade with the Giants. This one I'm not thrilled about at all. He is also 26, and he is a righty hitting outfielder. He played the majority of his big league games in left field while he also mixed in some center and right. He was batting 264 with nine homers, 36 ribbies, 74 games with the Giants. So he didn't play all the games. I don't know if that was for platooning or for you know whatever reasons. He was injured, but he's only played 74 games, you know. The majors, by the way, they played about 100 games so far in MLB. So if you've only played 74, you've missed a quarter of the games for one reason or another. So 264, only nine homers, only 36 ribbies. Not particularly great. I like the average. I do not like the homers and the ribbies. If he's a contact hitter, that would be great. Apparently, he is not a contact hitter. Against lefties, though, he was hitting 292 with an 835 OPS. So that's good. You know. It does seem like the hype, though, for this guy is more than what he really is. The more I research him, the more I'm like, ugh, this is probably less of what we need instead of more of what we need, right? He's apparently a strikeout king. He's below average defensively, apparently not a good fielder at all in the outfield. And he strikes out way too much. So that is not great. Although, you know, he'll fit right in on the Yankees, right? So he'll just be another player with that particular, you know, profile. Strikes out a lot, doesn't play good defense. But, you know, maybe we can catch some kind of lightning in a bottle here. He's not really good against righties. He's a righty hitting outfielder who doesn't hit well against righties, strikes out a lot, and is below average defensively. So we're gonna see about him. This just seemed like a shot in the dark, just to add someone who can hit lefties, because apparently we don't have anyone that's righty on the team that can hit well, especially with you know Judge and Stant now. You know, so we're gonna have to see what's going on here. We're gonna have to see. Overall, for Cashman, if I had to summarize, it was a pretty pathetic trade deadline here.

Cashman’s Deadline Misses And Frustrations

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Not particularly thrilled with what everything he did. For example, he got outbid by the Red Sox for Baltimore's Adley Rushman. If you don't know who Adley Rushman is, he's an all-star catcher that was on the trade block. If you think about the Yankees and you think about things we need, do you think we could use an all-star catcher on our team? Do you think that would be a good thing to go get? The Orioles three-time all-star catcher was traded to the fucking Boston Red Sox. And if I can't tell you what makes me want to pull my hair out about Catchman, this one miss, getting outbid by the Red Sox would do it. This is epitomizing the current Yankees versus the old Yankees. I am telling you, if George Steve Runner was around, there isn't any way in God's green earth we would have gotten outbid by the Red Sox for a perfect fit for this team. And, you know, not that Rushman is perfect, but he's a three-time All-Star. And if you look at our current catcher, you know how much I cannot stand Austin Wells. And while he's hit a little better over the last week, who gives a shit? The guy is batting 165. That is with his, you know, recent surge talking about Austin Wells. How is it possible that you don't look far and wide for any catcher that might be available anywhere? Never mind a three-time all-star catcher from the Baltimore Orioles. Now you might say, well, they might be reluctant to trade him to a division rival. Well, you know what? Guess what? They did trade him to a division rival. They did. They traded him to the Boston Red Sox. So that is not a part of this whatsoever. Now, Rushman is not having the greatest year this year. He has only eight homers, and he's batting 251, but he's still a really good catcher. He's knocked in 47 runs in a down year. You know, compare that against some of the Yankees here, and you can tell me what you think of Rushman. But, you know, I have to tell you, this epitomizes Brian Cashman's incompetency and and just overall, I'm just not sure what to say, you know, about this lack of urgency with Cashman and with Hal Steinbrenner at the deadline compared to previous ones, right? You let him go not only to another team, but to a division rival. So not only didn't we get him and significantly upgrade our catching position, which is a disaster, but you let him go to the Red Sox. And so we're going to have to see him over and over and over, not just against Baltimore now, who who cares, but against the Red Sox, who seem to be improving week after week after week this year. Would not be surprising if the Red Sox finished ahead of us at this point with how they're going and our trajectory. I mean, you think the Yanks needed a catcher? How does that happen? How does that happen? I mean, in addition to that, you know, Cashman did nothing at all to help the bullpen. Nothing. And I think he was swayed by a recent good stretch that the bullpen had. The bullpen most of the year has been poor, and people will point to statistics and say, well, they had, you know, the lowest DRA over this stretch or up to this point. If you have eyes and you watch the Yankee bullpen this whole year, you know they have not been great. They had a very good stretch for about three weeks, maybe a little longer, up to maybe a week ago, week and a half ago, where they were pathetic again. But before that last week and a half, they had a nice little run. And I think that nice little run swayed both the fans and Cashman into thinking our bullpen was good enough to like win a championship. And believe me, our bullpen is not good enough to win a championship. And Cashman did nothing to help it. Nothing. Nothing whatsoever. I mean, they were focused on Mason Miller for a while. Give me a break. You know, he would be great, but there's no way we're trading Lombard Jr. or someone for him. Cashman did nothing, nothing to help the pen. I know that this is a particular year where 24 of the 32 teams are within five games of a playoff spot. So there are less teams with which to make a trade. But other teams seem to have no problem with that, right? It seems like Boston got themselves an all-star catcher, right? Other teams make good trades. Why can't Cash Ran? It's another symptom of a terrible general manager who's, you know, too old and the game has passed him by. Did nothing. Did nothing. And I think he was again swayed by, you know, three weeks of really good relief pitching, which the Yanks got, you know, for a short time.

Recency Bias And Misreading Talent

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But it's a symptom of what I think is the Yankees in particular, and that is recency bias. You know, they're swayed so much more by a short-term uptick in something and completely forget the long-term downtick in a person, a pitcher, a team. The lack of ability to properly assess talent continues to be the downfall of the New York Yankees, where they think certain players are better than they are and they stick with them too long. They take short-term good play as a symptom of an overall thing, whereas if, you know, everyone that watches baseball knows that it's a long season. 162 games, there's ups, there's downs. Everyone knows that you can't take what a player, a pitcher, a team does in a week, even two weeks, and say that's how they are, right? You have to look at them over the long stretch. Just because Wells has had a good week or two doesn't mean he's not a fucking disaster of a player. He's batting 165 or even less. I don't even know what it is, right? Don't sit here and tell me, look how good he's hitting, because in a week, last week, week and a half, he's hit the ball hard. He's got a couple hits, he had a homer last night. Great. So his average is all up to 165. Let's put him on the all-star team. I mean, give me a break. You have to have the ability as a general manager and as a fan to properly assess talent. And that means sometimes taking a step back, looking at the 10,000-foot view and saying, hmm, what has this person done this year? Not just in the last week, but this year, right? And I think the inability to properly do that continues to hamstring the Yanks and hurt them at this trade deadline big time. Whatever reason, he got no relievers, did not get the catcher that we needed, and continued to do nothing except for, you know, two of those moves that I just detailed.

Bullpen Reality Check Before October

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Now the Yankee starters have been wonderful versus the relievers, with the exception of Warren with a couple blips, Weathers with a couple blips, they've all been really good. Schlitter added one bad outing yesterday. Again, that's not indicative of anything. But the Yankee starters have been absolutely brilliant, brilliant this year. Really, really good. Really, really good. The relievers have not been, other than a nice stretch for three weeks or a month. They have not. Cruz is pretty good most of the time, but he's up and down. Bednar has sort of stabilized himself. He's had a rough stretch in the beginning, but lately he's been pretty good. Hill got knocked around again yesterday, right? You name all the other relievers. People are getting hit left and right at this point. Blackburn had a good season, but he's starting to get knocked around. We're having some trouble in the pen. And I think it's not being recognized, and it certainly is not a bullpen in my mind that can win a World Series. So perhaps we'll when we shift one or more of the starters to the pen. Maybe then, you know, we'll have some additional help there, and we'll see how that goes. But, you know, in in the playoffs, you could use probably Schmidt out of the pen if he's not going to start a game. I think that's helpful. You can use Warren, you can use Weathers, you know, we're gonna have to see how it all goes. But the inability to improve the bullpen was a huge miss. And the inability to let Adley Rushman not be on the Yanks and get outbit by the Red Sox is just an embarrassment for this fucking team and for Brian Cashman. He should be embarrassed to be the general manager. Pathetic trade deadline overall in my mind. Basically, we attained Ramos, who strikes out three times more than he walks. I looked that up. He's got three times more strikeouts than he does walks this year. And apparently is poor defensively. He has nine homers. So I don't know what all the talk is about him, but he doesn't seem that good. And then we got Garcia, who in my mind does seem like a good player and one of the rare players we got having a good year. And of course, there has to be some negative with him. There's no position for him. It's like the Yankees obtaining a third catcher, right, in the beginning of the year. Third lefty catcher, right? He doesn't really have a position on the team. He's a lefty first baseman. Turns out, you know, we have one of those. His name is Ben Rice, and he's an all-star. So, you know, he is gonna play. We're gonna have to find a position, I think, you know, for Garcia. But um, you know, it would have been nice to have someone in the position that we need. Still, it's it's it's in my mind, that's a good pickup, and Ramos is probably not a good pickup. So that's the entire trade deadline of moves by by Ryan Cashman, completely ignoring the pen, completely ignoring catching or any other player. So no closer, no catcher, no bigger bats. I am, however, extremely excited about George Lomard Jr. being called up. I can't tell you how happy this makes me, how long I've been waiting for it. And I'm very excited that Anthony Volpe set down to AAA. Very, very happy. And, you know, Garcia might be a fit if we can find a place for him. So, you know, there's that to look forward to. You know, and and the last thing to look forward to before I wrap this up is at some point, at some point, we are going to get some of our big bats back in the lineup. We don't know when, but you know, Bellinger might be a couple weeks away. We don't really know. Judge, it's up in the air. They're being extremely vague with him, which doesn't fill me with joy or optimism. And then Stan is just an enigma, just a ridiculous, pathetic enigma. But those are three massive bats that are missing from the lineup. So we get them back, we see George Lombard Jr., we check out the new players. Maybe there's some hope. We're gonna have to see as this team goes on. So that's

What Could Still Save This Season

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it. That's my summary of the trade deadline moves and the call-ups, and that's gonna do it for the podcast. Want to thank you for listening to Jersey Guys Sports. Please subscribe to the podcast, tell your friends all about it. I'll be back soon with some more sports talk.