The Yankees acquired Nathan Eovaldi from the Marlins, and sent out the person who was slotted to play second base:
The News has learned the Yankees completed a multi-player deal with the Marlins, acquring hard-throwing righty Nathan Eovaldi and a yet-to-be-named lefty reliever for Martin Prado and righty David Phelps.
Last season, Eovaldi was 6-14 with a 4.37 ERA and 142 Ks in 199.2 innings pitched.
So could the Yankees be planning on making Jose Pirela their second baseman? He will be seasonal age 26 in 2015, so he would be getting a starting job at peak. He hit well in AAA, and did well in his seven games at the major league level. The Yankees would also save about $10 million at the position, money which might be used to get them under the luxury tax, or pay a decent chunk of Max Scherzer‘s contract. They could also think about moving Didi Gregorius or Brendan Ryan to second.
Eovaldi is interesting, because he has a live fastball, but doesn’t strike out a lot of batters. That makes me wonder if his pitch selection is poor. I’d actually like to see what the Pirates could do with him.
Since Prado can play anywhere, he gives the Marlins some flexibility, but I have to agree with FanGraphs:
Maybe the Marlins realize that either McGehee and Gordon aren’t that good, and Prado will split time between both positions. But then, did they really need to give up an interesting young arm for a part-time infielder on the downside of his career? I like Prado more than most, but and I’d play him over McGehee, but even I don’t see that as a huge upgrade. This looks more like the Marlins moving wins around than getting better, but they definitely got older in the process.
The Yankees also got a backup for Mark Teixeira in the person of Garrett Jones.