First reporting on the backup C situation today, from Bryan Hoch:
"The Yankees have spoken to Austin Romine’s agent about a potential return, but they believe Kyle Higashioka is ready to be the backup. Higashioka is out of minor league options."
Either way NY will need to add a third guy who has options, the Padres have four catchers on their 40 man and a roster crunch ahead of next week's rule 5 deadline and they really want to add offense, so I came up with this at baseballtradevalues.com (their values on guys in parentheses below).
NY sends SD Clint Frazier (19) and Miguel Andujar (27.2) for Austin Hedges (22.1), Manny Margot (8.2), and Cal Quantrill (14).
All five of those guys are currently on the fringe of their team's future plans (Andujar is the only one currently starting in the Roster Resource depth charts, at DH, and he will be bumped by Stanton once Gardner is resigned, Tauchman in LF), and it would be trading huge offensive potential to SD for proven defense at C and CF and a possible young back of the rotation SP to throw in the mix with Montgomery and King. SD currently has overpriced and bad options at 1B and LF (Hosmer/Myers), Andujar/Frazier easily could be upgrades there even with their defensive issues (keep Andujar away from 3B and Clint away from RF) and SD wouldn't be giving up much to get a chance to see and they're both pre-arb. I think NY would add $4-$5M of salary in this deal and free up a 40 man spot for SD, just an idea.
Then NY could let Higashioka and Hedges battle it out for backup in spring training, Hedges is an incredible defender but was a dreadful hitter this past season, I think NY needs a superior defender behind Sanchez if at all possible. Some defensive numbers on Hedges:
"Here’s how Hedges ranks according to various defensive indicators:
- Baseball Prospectus’ Fielding Runs Above Average number (FRAA) judges that he has essentially saved 24.7 runs more than an average catcher (1st in MLB among catchers)
- Fangraphs places a 23.4 Defensive WAR indicator on his 2019 work (2nd in MLB among catchers)
- Hedges has logged a 18.7 RAA according to Statcorner (1st in MLB among catchers); the site also finds that he has been +141 on framing strike calls (1st among catchers)
This, friends, is how you can log 1.7 WAR through 85 games despite being one of the absolute worst hitters in baseball (.196/.262/.351 this year)."
https://www.gaslampball.com/2019/9/1/20842620/austin-hedges-baseballs-best-defender
Then if Higashioka holds his own in the spring and they want to give him a shot, Hedges can be sent to the minors or if Hedges makes the team, NY would need to add someone else with options. Hedges could give Gary a lot of late innings off in games with leads and keep him fresher, a catcher closer.