00:00Is it safe to say that the Yankees have found their new Cam Schlittler?
00:05And what's the start of the season going to look like with a healthy, big G, John Carlos Stanton?
00:09Let's talk some Yankees baseball with Ryan Garcia of Empire Sports Media.
00:14Ryan, what's up, man? Looking like the third base coach for the Yankees right now.
00:18I like it. Send him in, but not John Carlos Stanton. He ain't fast enough.
00:22All right. Appreciate you hopping on, my man.
00:25And let's get straight into it because there's a viral video out there of the Yankees' top pitching prospect, Carlos
00:31Lagrange, throwing some heat, striking out the captain, Aaron Judge.
00:35I believe it was 102.6 he was clocked at. Judge did take him over the left field wall and
00:41then at bat before the strikeout.
00:42But there's a lot of buzz around this kid.
00:45So what do you think are his chances of being in that starting rotation when the season opens up, especially
00:51since Garrett Cole and Carlos Rodon may not be healthy?
00:56So I do think Lagrange is going to need a little more seasoning in the minor leagues.
01:00I don't think he'll make the rotation out of spring training, but I think he could be a fast mover,
01:04Brandon.
01:05I mean, his stuff is electric. He's sitting 98.5 miles per hour in the four-seam fastball last year.
01:10There are only four starting pitchers in the history of the pitch tracking era who have thrown as many innings
01:16as Lagrange in the big leagues in a season and sat higher than 98.5.
01:21So just think about that. This guy's an outlier in terms of starting pitching velocity.
01:25His sweeper and slider, two different breaking balls, they both registered whiff rates at or above 40%.
01:31And the pitch I think not enough people are talking about is his changeup. It sits 91 miles per hour.
01:36His changeup is a lot of people's fastballs, and that pitch also generated a lot of swings and misses as
01:40well.
01:41Very excited about what he could be in 2026.
01:43So you're saying he may have to go back to the minor league, get a little adobe season on him.
01:48So how long do you think until he's called up to the show?
01:52Well, I love the comparison to Cam Schlittler because I think that we're going to see that similar timeline where
01:57maybe an injury pops up midway through the season.
02:00And around that all-star break, the Yankees call up Lagrange, and he ends up bringing some serious heat to
02:05this rotation.
02:06All right, so what's another storyline out there, or who's a player that we're not talking about enough, but we
02:14will soon?
02:16Well, I'm going to point to fellow pitching prospect Ben Hess.
02:20He was also in AA with Lagrange last year.
02:22I think he's a little bit further behind than Lagrange.
02:25He doesn't have that top-level stuff, but he's got a deceptive release point that creates some weird angles for
02:30hitters.
02:31He's got a really good feel for a curveball.
02:33He's got a nice change-up shape, started throwing a sweeping slider as well.
02:36I wouldn't be surprised if we saw him in the big leagues this year, and I think he's flown under
02:40the radar in a lot of prospect lists.
02:41He is very, very enticing, and he's someone who I would keep tabs on throughout spring training.
02:46All right, the Yankees running it back with a bunch of the players, pretty much the same roster as last
02:51year,
02:51but this year they're going to have Big G healthy on opening day.
02:55So what do you think that early impact on the season is going to be having Giancarlo Stanton healthy and
03:03on this roster at the start of the season?
03:06Well, the Yankees, for most of last year, had an issue with right-handed hitting depth.
03:11Giancarlo Stanton is their second-best right-handed hitter behind Aaron Judge,
03:15so it's important to have him for the start of the year because it puts less pressure on the lefties
03:19in the lineup,
03:20such as Ben Rice or Jazz Chisholm, Trent Grisham, guys of that nature, to have to hit third or fourth
03:26against tough left-handers.
03:27Look, your division has Garrett Crochet.
03:30It has Ranger Suarez on the same team in Boston.
03:33If you look at the Tigers, they've got Fran Brevaldez and Tarek Skubel.
03:37There are some really good left-handed starting pitchers in the American League.
03:39It's important to have that big right-handed presence in Giancarlo Stanton.
03:43Yeah, they led the league in home runs last season,
03:47and they didn't get Big G back until, what, like around half the season was already over.
03:53So, you know, it was great that they started off with the whole torpedo bat thing.
03:58Everybody was talking about that.
03:59But I think Big G being in that lineup from the start to the finish is really going to do
04:04numbers for this squad.
04:06I want to talk about the captain, man, because I feel like Aaron Judge is starting to feel that pressure
04:13of,
04:14I'm getting up there in age, and I need to win a championship in the Bronx.
04:20And, you know, a red flag kind of popped up for me because when he said that it was brutal
04:26to pretty much watch stars sign with other teams at the start of free agency,
04:30and the Yankees do nothing, that kind of alarmed me a little bit.
04:35But then Colin Coward came out and said the Yankees need to take a look in the mirror.
04:40So let's watch what Coward said, and then I want to get your response to both Aaron Judge and Colin
04:47Coward.
04:47You have to self-audit all the time.
04:50The Yankees do not self-audit.
04:51They don't look themselves in the mirror.
04:53So it used to be the Yankees were the most aggressive team in baseball.
04:57Now they're not the most aggressive team in their own division.
05:00That's Toronto.
05:01Or even in their city, that's the Mets.
05:04So the Yankees brought back 24 of their 26 guys.
05:08They spent $200 million in free agency, but it was just re-signing their free agents, right?
05:13And what's interesting is do they not see their deficiencies?
05:16Are they self-auditing?
05:18All right, Ryan, I self-audit myself on, you know, after a weekend of partying, and I look
05:24at that credit card bill, and I'm like, bro, you're doing too much.
05:27You got champagne taste with beer money.
05:29That's me, though.
05:30So was the decision for the Yankees to run it back with pretty much that same team the
05:35right move?
05:36And do you feel like the Yankees are just too stuck in the past?
05:40Yes.
05:41On the offensive side of the ball, the question I often ask is, what should they have done
05:45differently in center field?
05:47I think they need a center fielder.
05:48I'm not sure trading for Luis Robert makes them better or worse than ending up with Trent
05:52Grisham.
05:53Also not sure if you could have topped the offer the Mets made.
05:56The White Sox seem to really like Luis Angel Acuna.
05:59If you look at some other center fielders, Harrison Bader, not sure that his bat is a good
06:03fit for Yankee Stadium.
06:04So I think Grisham might have been their best bet there.
06:06Then in left field, I do believe Kyle Tucker was a better bet than Cody Ballinger if the
06:11Yankees wanted to have the best team possible.
06:13But I also understand that the Los Angeles Dodgers are the Los Angeles Dodgers and they
06:17made a $60 million a year offer and ended up getting their guy.
06:20Bellinger's not a bad consolation prize.
06:22Where I do agree with Coward is in the sense that, look, it's not good that the Los Angeles
06:26Dodgers are what the New York Yankees were 20, 30 years ago.
06:30So the Yankees do need to try and either A, readjust whatever their branding and promotion
06:35is as the flagship franchise of baseball, or B, deliver on that messaging.
06:40A lot of people who have watched the Yankees grew up on this idea that they spend more
06:44than everybody else, that players want to go there, and that they're going to be after
06:48everyone.
06:49Those things just aren't true anymore.
06:51And again, it either needs to be them admitting that and being honest about it, or changing their
06:58actions and acting like the Los Angeles Dodgers.
07:01At the end of the day, I know how Steinbrenner's talked about you don't need a $300 million payroll
07:04to win.
07:05And the most sustainable way to win so far has been being the Los Angeles Dodgers, throwing
07:10just gobs of money and spending over all your deficiencies.
07:13This team should be a good team, but you prefer to be the Dodgers.
07:16Yeah, they can change up the no beard rule.
07:18They can change up the way they chase championships.
07:21That's how I feel.
07:22Coach Garcia, appreciate you hopping on with us, man.
07:27You
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