March 19, 2025

83 thoughts on “Yankees.com: Cole to undergo season-ending Tommy John surgery”

  1. Expected news is expected.

    I’d say another year of Cole and Judge’s prime wasted but I think they are technically both out of their primes now.

    1. 95% of players I would agree with you, but the special guys like Cole, I really don’t know when their prime ends. The top end guys seem to be still in their prime until they’re, like, 36-37 years old.

      Similarly, I don’t know what the fuck is up with Judge. Dudes shouldn’t be improving in their early 30s, so I don’t know what to think about him.

      But yes, in general, you’re absolutely right that this is another wasted year, which sucks. Hopefully next year won’t be.

    2. Big Jamba had two of his best years at 39 and 40 so I’m expecting another 7/8 big years from Judge especially when he DHs full time. Also age 32 was the last year Jamba had an OPS+ under 800 so I’m expecting big things from Goldschmidt.

  2. Oh Gerrit Cole…how I miss you…it’s like I can still hear your voice on the wind…

    GERRIT COLE (annoyed): I’m still alive you know

    1. if his main goal was to win a World Series, he should have supported the 2024 Yankees but covering first base.

    2. I’m working on projections right now. My first run has NYY at 90-72. Scoring 761 and allowing 677.

      So basically an extended Judge injury away from 86-76. Or a coupla bad series against BAL and BOS from tumbling to 3rd or 4th in the division.

    3. Sic, I didn’t k now you did projections. Can you share them here, or are they for work?

    4. I never really did before. it’s just something I started messing with toward the end of last year. I’m working on building a betting model to try out this year now that AI can mumble its way through the coding. (And hopefully not lose my ass using it.)

      I’m using a blend of BatX, ZIPS, ATC and Depth Charts and spinning up individual player projections into team-level stuff. Part of it is generating PythagW-L% for the betting model.

      My baseline stuff is a little optimistic on most teams it looks like (incl. the 90-win season for NYY), but I messed around to normalize those numbers and that version has NYY at 85. (That might be too low, assuming the guys remaining stay healthy. Hah. Hah hah hah. Hah hah hah hah hah.)

      I got BAL 86-76, BOS 79-84 (seems too low), TOR 82-80, TBR 81-81 (probably too high).

      It’s not hugely far apart from FG projections (not really surprising, given I’m using ATC.) It’s surprisingly high on the M’s. Their pitching should be pretty solid, esp in a pitcher’s park, despite the offense not looking spectacular. May not be a bad bet to win the ALW.

  10. Let’s say Rice doesn’t make the roster, and Dom Smith does (which is seemingly more and more likely every day that Rice continues to not hit).

    I guess the bench would be: Escarra, DJ, Peraza, and Smith, with Grisham playing centerfield every day, and Judge DHing. That’s so uninspiring.

    It would at least be a very good defensive team.

  11. Hal will recoup $27M of Cole’s salary from insurance. Now all they need to do is find one of the readily available $27M aces available for a two-year deal on the free agent market and/or get the Costco bulk pack of gold toilets.

    Either/or.

    1. (enviously) MY Costco doesn’t even STOCK gold toilets

      They do have canned abalone though

    2. Martian homered today off a Tigers minor-leaguer. OPS now .670.

      I do take Spring Training results with a grain of salt, ever since predicting Greg Bird for 2017 MVP .

  16. The more I think about it, the more I think the Cole stuff worked out as well as it possibly could. Without him, they likely don’t make the World Series, and they were probably not making it this year WITH him, so putting off TJS by a year worked out well.

    It just reminds me of Hampton, where they probably should have just done the TJS last season.

    1. One last piece of active Cole news, though, is that he got the internal brace surgery, so hopefully that means that he’ll be back closer to the START of 2026 rather than mid-2026.

    2. So whoever he signs will be 3/4 weeks behind. The only rumor I’ve seen recently was this “ Bleacher Report’s Zachary Rymer recently made the bold prediction that the Bronx Bombers could reunite with Anthony Rizzo as a replacement for Stanton while the slugger is on the shelf.”

    3. Agreed, I don’t like waiting for Martinez so long that he’ll be rusty when they finally sign him. Just sign Martinez now. How much could he possibly be holding out for?

      Beyond that, though, if he’s waiting for guys to shake loose from other teams, those guys will have had full training camps, so that’s not as much of an issue. Think Franchy last season, who Cash got when the Orioles had to cut him loose right before the season. Or Trevy a few years back when the Rangers had a catching surplus.

    1. If he does I am going to remind you all that I predicted it first
      If he doesn’t I’ll just go on about my business like nothing happened

    2. Exactly. I was on record as saying let Cole walk after opting out, and because all the old posts are gone, no one will know how hard I advocated for the Yankees signing Jason Heyward.

    3. I wanted Jason Heyward so badly, and not even so much because I thought he would be amazing (although I thought he would be pretty damn good), my theory was that they should be spending enough that if Heyward sucked, they could eat the cost without it being a problem.

      I have obviously long since abandoned even entertaining the idea that Hal will ever spend at the percentage levels he did when his dad was still alive.

    4. I was so opposed to signing Heyward, and the guy has had one [full] season over .800 OPS since 2012 (not counting 50 games in 2020); career OPS 748.

  23. Hoch Giancarlo Stanton is back in Yankees camp, but there’s still no timetable for him to resume baseball activities. He’s dealing with what Aaron Boone called a “minor” calf issue in addition to the tendon tears in both elbows.

  24. Heyman: Stanton Back Memorial Day at the EARLIEST. Which means July 4th…..maybe…..but more likely Labor Day……maybe…,. Its a good excuse for Cash to stand pat.

    1. Oh my god, Cash, just fucking get JD Martinez. “Oh no, we’ll have a really good hitter on the bench!” WhatEVER can they do with having a really good hitter on the bench!?!?

  26. I love punditry. I saw a blog post criticizing the Yankees if they could have traded for Alec Bohm, but didn’t, now that he is having a good Spring. Sooo….the criticism is that IF he was available for the Yankees to trade (which he probably wasn’t), they should be criticized for not acquiring him?! The Yankees do plenty of ACTUAL stuff you can criticize, why the fuck are you making up theoreticals to criticize them over?!

    1. I’m thinking that most stuff you read on the internet and the comments are stupid people writing stupid stuff. This site is the rare exception. (Except for this comment?)

  27. I’m going with internet comments as dumber than radio callers. Because anonymity protects. On the radio someone listening might actually recognize your voice. Theres no doubt the internet is a lot meaner.

    1. I might have told this story before, there used to be a sports radio host in Buffalo named George Wanderly. His theme song was “I’m A Wanderer” and for some reason his self-bestowed nickname was “the Tiny Tot of the Kilowatt.” He was a complete homer. Once after a Bills loss some guy called in and said something mildly mean and the Wanderly says “no insults.” The guy then proceeds to make some perfectly normal criticism of the Bills and the Tiny Tot got mad and says, “You spitball!” The guy says hey I thought you said no insults. to which the reply was “that wasn’t an insult, it was an indication.”

    3. Split squad has Martian with the B team, where he homers off an actual major league pitcher.

    1. He’s doing better than the reigning MVP, who is batting .105 with a .366 OPS this spring. So clearly Volpe is on track for an MVP caliber season.

  31. If they need to dump Stroman’s money to get another hitter, could Schlitter seriously fill in as a starter? Or do they need to keep Stroman at this point?

    Will Warren’s stuff is just so fucking good, but he had good stuff last season, and he fucking sucked, so…I dunno what to think about that dude.

    1. I am truly fine if no deal materializes. I think with the improved D maybe he gets more outs. Gleyber killed him last year. But he could also barely try because he hates The Yankees now. Tough to say.

      Big mistake to pick up a guy that has had issues with every team he’s ever been with though, I’m sure they’ll learn their lesson this time!

    1. If Holmes excels what does that say about Boone and Blake? I don’t think he will, but what if?

  34. Martian, Rice, and Waldo all with oppo bombs. Guess the wind must have been from the south.

    ETA: Per box score, wind was “25 mph, In From RF.”

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