The LoHud Yankees Blog

Tonight is the deadline for Rule 5 protection. Right now the Yankees 40-man roster is at 31 players, but not all of those open spots will — or should — be used for Rule 5 eligible players. Free agents signings still need to make the list, as do any big leaguers the Yankees might find in a trade.

There are a few non-tender candidates, but Brian Cashman has already said he doesn’t expect a roster crunch, and that seems about right. Nine open spots is a lot, especially given the lack of front-line Rule 5 candidates.

Obviously need protection
Dellin Betances and Brandon Laird
In my opinion, these are the absolute no-brainers. Betances is one of the elite prospects in the system, and Laird has put himself on the verge of that group with steady production level after level. The fact Cashman dropped Laird’s name this week as a potential Major League bench candidate pretty much tells the story. Barring a significant surprise, these two will be added to the roster.

Close to major league ready
Wilkins Arias, George Kontos, Lance Pendleton, Ryan Pope
In my mind, this is the next tier of candidates. All four are pitchers — Arias is the only lefty — and all four could open in Triple-A next season. Kontos was arguably the biggest prospect of the bunch before Tommy John surgery in 2009. I don’t think any of these four is a sure thing to make a big league roster out of spring training, but I think all four would have the potential to do it. I could see one or two of these being protected, but not all four.

Injured talent
Jairo Heredia, Alan Horne, Brad Suttle
All three of these have been bigger prospects than any of the four listed ahead of them, but injuries have taken their toll and slowed their progress. Horne is definitely out of consideration — too many surgeries, he’ll have to prove himself again — but Heredia and Suttle could be wild card choices by a team hoping to go big in the Rule 5. Neither has played above High-A, and I don’t think either could stick on a roster. I’d be surprised to see any of them protected.

Names to know, but not protect
Abraham Almonte, Craig Heyer, Jose Pirela, Kevin Whelan
Almonte is an outfielder who was once seen as having considerable upside, but the results haven’t been there. Pirela is a young infielder who might make sense if the Yankees didn’t already have a wealth of internal utility candidates. Whelan is a hard-throwing reliever who actually had a better chance of making the roster a year or two ago. Of these four, Heyer is the one I can’t quite put a finger on. He’s not a big name, but he walks almost no one — six walks all season —  and he was sent to the Arizona Fall League after steady production the past three seasons. I might be underestimating him, but I don’t think he’ll be added.

Bottom line
I will not be stunned if Laird and Betances are the only players added to the roster today. I think there will be one or two more — whoever the Yankees like most out of Arias, Kontos, Pendleton and Pope — but as Cashman said this week, there really isn’t a significant roster crunch developing. The Yankees have room to protect a ton of guys, but probably don’t have the need to protect more than three or four.

Just wanted to pass this along in case anyone is going to the football game at Yankee Stadium tomorrow.

Metro-North will provide special train service to the Army vs. Notre Dame football game on Saturday. The game starts at 7 p.m. at Yankee Stadium.

“Train to the game” service will run via the Hudson, Harlem, and New Haven Lines. For those of you in Manhattan, there will be shuttle service via Grand Central Terminal and Harlem-125th Street Station.

Get more information here at the Metro-North website.

On the day he arrived in Orlando, Brian Cashman said not to expect much. The Yankees have big things to do this winter, but they weren’t going to get them done during the general managers’ meetings, and they weren’t going to get them done during the owners’ meetings. One small move. That’s all Cashman suggested, and that’s all that happened.

At least, that’s all that happened for the Yankees. Some other teams were busy, and some of the moves were interesting from the Yankees point of view.

John Buck’s three-year deal
Nine months ago he was non-tendered by the Royals. This week he signed a three-year, $18-million deal with the Marlins. The catcher position is a tricky one. Florida saw enough in Buck’s breakout season to commit to him. The Yankees catching position is in transition, but they have internal options coming in waves and don’t have to make a risky signing in the name of replacing Jorge Posada. By the way, if you don’t already, this might be a good time to appreciate just how long Posada has been one of the best catchers in the game.

Joaquin Benoit also got three years
Last year, the Tigers paid big money for Jose Valverde. This year, they gave $16.5 million to Benoit, who signed a minor league deal heading into the 2010 season. The Benoit contract speaks to the value of setup relievers. The eighth is a big-money inning, and if one of the Yankees young guys — Joba Chamberlain or Dave Robertson or any number of upper-level pitching prospects — could take that job and hold onto it, that would be a huge plus. Let’s not forget, not so long ago the Tigers seemed fairly set with Joel Zumaya and Fernando Rodney.

Jake Westbrook re-signed in St. Louis
And my friends back home were happy. As for the Yankees, I’m sure it was little more that white noise, some background move while they stay focused on the big Cliff Lee-shaped prize. The strange thing about the Yankees the pitching market is that it’s basically all or nothing. If they sign Lee, and Andy Pettitte comes back, then the Yankees rotation decisions are easy as could be. If not … well then this winter could get really interesting. The Yankees are hoping things like the Westbrook signing remain perfectly meaningless. If Lee goes else where, Ken Davidoff reports that Plan B involves signing Carl Crawford, then trading for pitching. Plan A is much less complicated.

I’ve seen hundreds of at-bats by Juan Miranda. Literally hundreds of them. I’ve talked to scouts about his talent, I’ve talked to Miranda about his family and I’ve long believed he can be a viable hitter at the Major League level. I like Miranda as a player and as a person.

I know next to nothing about Scott Allen.

But I’m still convinced the Yankees made a good trade this afternoon.

It wasn’t a great trade and certainly not a big trade, but I think it was a good trade. Miranda no longer played a role in the Yankees system. When he signed, he seemed like a guy who might move quickly and eventually takeover for Jason Giambi at first base (I always thought Miranda’s glove was better than advertised). Then the Yankees signed Mark Teixeira and Miranda became an afterthought. Even when Nick Johnson was hurt this season, opening a spot for a left-handed hitting DH/1B, Miranda got only a small look.

Out of options next year, Miranda could not have returned to Scranton/Wilkes-Barre and I don’t believe he would have cleared waivers. His only spot on the Yankees would have been more or less exclusively as a designated hitter, and the Yankees don’t seem likely to carry one of those. His bench impact would have been limited by his lack of versatility.

So, the Yankees did the smart thing and traded him out of the league to a team that needs a first baseman. In return, they got a 19-year-old kid who’s not a huge prospect – Miranda was never going to fetch that – but who seems to have some legitimate upside.

I talked to two people about Scott Allen today. The first, a scout in the Yankees organization, said he wasn’t the guy assigned to check on Allen, but he has heard good things about him. “Young with a chance,” he said.

The second was Mark Newman, who emailed this brief scouting report: “Projectable kid with FB up to 93. He has a good feel for spin and the change. Does miss bats and we think there may be some upside.”

Most likely, Newman said, Allen will open in the High-A Tampa rotation.

Obviously Allen’s not a sure thing, but his chances of playing a significant role in New York might actually be higher than Miranda’s.

Associated Press photo of Miranda.

Just got back home and had a text from Brian Cashman waiting for me when I landed.

Before my flight, I had texted Cashman to ask whether the Juan Miranda trade was the small move he was talking about on Tuesday. His response:

“Always trying to make moves”

Fair enough, Cash. Fair enough.

Former Yankees catcher Jim Leyritz had one manslaughter charge dropped today in his DUI case in Florida.

The charge of manslaughter while impaired was dropped after testimony that Leyritz was actually not above the legal limit at the time of the crash that killed 30-year-old Fredia Ann Veitch.

A defense expert testified that Leyritz’s blood-alcohol level spiked after the crash because he had a vodka shot to calm his nerves. His blood-alcohol level was tested at .14 three hours after the crash. The legal limit is .08.

Leyritz still faces a manslaughter charge because he’s accused of running a red light at the time of the crash. There has already been testimony that Leyritz was not speeding at the time of the crash.

I had a slight moment of panic this morning. Walking to the Waldorf lobby to wait for the owners’ meeting to break up, I realized I was going to be at the airport for this afternoon’s Cy Young conference call. No good if CC Sabathia were named the winner.

And a colleague had already assured me there was no chance the baseball writers were nuanced enough to give the award to anyone but Sabathia.

Ultimately, there was no need for me to be on the call. The writers got it right. The best pitcher in the American League won the Cy Young. Felix Hernandez barely finished with a better-than-.500 record, but he was more durable and dominant than anyone in the league. He just happened to pitch for one of the worst teams.

Sabathia was very good this season. So was David Price, and so were Jon Lester, Cliff Lee and Jered Weaver. Saying they weren’t Cy Young winners doesn’t take away from their seasons. Hernandez was just better, that’s all. He didn’t win many games, but he deserved to win more than he did. He deserved to win the Cy Young.

The result is being billed as a win for the sabermetrics community, and maybe it is, but it might also be a win for those who simply look more deeply into the same old stats we’re used to seeing.

From the BBWAA site: The Mariners’ run support for Hernandez was 2.4 per game. Seattle scored two or fewer runs in 15 of his starts. He was 2-10 with a 2.84 ERA in those games. In his nine no decisions, Hernandez pitched to a 1.92 ERA. Let’s not forget he also led the league in innings and ERA and finished second in strikeouts.

There are no advanced stats in that paragraph, but it does a good job of capturing Hernandez’s season and explaining why his small win total is fairly meaningless.

Maybe writers made their decisions based on a series of numbers they looked up on FanGraphs and BaseballProspectus. Or maybe they just took a more nuanced look at the stats we’re used to seeing.

UPDATE: After I got through airport security and could actually turn on my computer, I didn’t want to start a new post for the same bit of news, so I just topped this post with my thoughts on the Cy Young. Here’s the original AP story about the award. This has all the nuts and bolts about the top three finishers.

Felix Hernandez has been chosen the AL Cy Young Award winner.

The Seattle ace won by an easy margin in results released Thursday by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. King Felix went just 13-12, but was a victim of poor run support all season. He led the majors with a 2.27 ERA, topped the AL in innings and was second in strikeouts. The 24-year-old righty from Venezuela drew 21 of the 28 first-place votes.

Tampa Bay’s David Price got four first-place votes after going 19-6 with a 2.72 ERA. CC Sabathia, who led the league with 21 wins for the Yankees, drew the other three first-place votes and finished third.

The 13 wins by Hernandez marked the fewest for a Cy Young starter in a full season.

Here’s the announcement from the Yankees. Juan Miranda obviously never found much of a role with the Yankees, and he will be out of options next year. I don’t know much of anything about Scott Allen…

The New York Yankees today acquired minor league right-handed pitcher Scott Allen from the Arizona Diamondbacks in exchange for first baseman Juan Miranda.

Allen, 19, went 4-4 with a 4.73 ERA in 16 starts with Single-A South Bend in 2010, striking out 79 batters in 78.0 innings pitched with just 22 walks. He made his professional debut with short-season Single-A Missoula in 2009, going 1-0 with a 0.51 ERA in 12 relief appearances (17.2IP, 1ER). Allen was originally selected by the Diamondbacks in the 11th round of the 2009 First-Year Player Draft from Lyman High School (Fla.).

Miranda, 27, batted .219 (14-for-64) with three home runs and 10 RBI in 33 games with the Yankees in 2010. In 46 career Major League games over three seasons with the Yankees (2008-10), he has a .253 (21-for-83) batting average with four home runs and 14 RBI. Miranda is one of 15 Cuban-born players to appear in a game for the Yankees. He was originally signed by the Yankees as a non-drafted free agent on December 22, 2006.

On his way out of the Orlando’s Waldorf Astoria this morning, Hal Steinbrenner shed no new light on the Yankees ongoing talks with Derek Jeter or any other free agent.

“I would like be relaxing Christmas Eve,” he said. “But it will take as long as it takes. The important thing is we don’t make it personal because we have a lot of respect for one another, and we keep talking. That’s the deal. We have to keep talking. And we will.”

In the past 24 to 48 hours, a handful of reports have surfaced that suggest the Yankees are very close to making their initial offer to Jeter’s camp, and that the thing most dividing the two sides might be years, not money.

Steinbrenner refused to comment beyond saying he’s happy with the “tenor” of these negotiations.

“This is a business negotiation,” he said. “None of us want to make it personal, because it’s not personal. Both sides have a lot of respect for one another. My family has a lot of respect for Derek, and I believe it’s a mutual thing. It’s been a good history. We’re going to do our best to keep it by the book.”

There is nothing new to report, Steinbrenner said, on Mariano Rivera, who has certainly taken a back seat to Jeter in terms of public curiosity.

“These are two great Yankees,” Steinbrenner said. “We realize that. It makes it a bit different, but as I said two days ago, the process is still the same.”

Hal Steinbrenner, Brian Cashman and Randy Levine have all said this week that the Yankees have been in ongoing talks with Derek Jeter’s representation. This morning, Joel Sherman reported that an offer could come within the next few days.

Sherman is hearing an initial offer of three years, close to $45 million. Sherman says the Yankees are likely willing to go four years to make the deal work, while Wally Matthews reported last night that the Yankees are willing to include significantly more money.

“Derek Jeter is a great Yankee and he’s a great player,” Levine told us last night. “That said and done, now is a different negotiation than 10 years ago.”