Thus far, the Yankees have imported two relievers through the trade market, with the early-winter stunner that brought Devin Williams to the Bronx and the out-of-nowhere trade that added Fernando Cruz to this unit. Free agency has a ton of bullpen depth, but without Tim Hill back on the team at the moment, they lack a left-handed reliever, and perhaps they aren’t all that interested in paying money to add an arm to the bullpen. As things stand now, the Yankees are over the fourth threshold of the Luxury Tax, bringing a 90% surcharge on top of any signing.
If the Yankees sign Tim Hill at around $7 million, they must pay a $6.3 million tax to finalize the transaction, and I can see why that wouldn’t appeal to them. With this mock trade, they’ll acquire a cost-controlled reliever in lefty Andrew Nardi, who could save them money on a reliever and allow them to further invest in an infield that desperately needs help.
Andrew Nardi Brings Even More Firepower To Loaded Yankees Bullpen
Last season Andrew Nardi posted a 5.07 ERA which would scare most Yankees fans off immediately, but relievers are more prone to randomness than other position groups because they participate in a small percentage of a team’s innings in a season. With a 2.76 xERA and 3.33 FIP, most underlying metrics believe that Nardi wasn’t much different than he was last year when he posted a 2.67 ERA, he just ran into some less fortunate luck and underperformed. The Yankees are more focused on how a pitcher manages contact and their K-BB%, not their ERA, and Nardi would fit them like a glove.
Over the past two seasons, Andrew Nardi is top-five among left-handed relievers in K%, K-BB%, and SIERA, as he’s done an excellent job of punching batters out without having high walk rates. While home runs are an issue, Nardi doesn’t allow that much damage contact, which is why his xERA, which factors quality of contact allowed, has always viewed him favorably. Tim Hill excels at limiting damage contact but doesn’t miss bats and Fernando Cruz excels at generating whiffs but allows loud contact, but Andrew Nardi excels at both.
The Yankees would be adding someone with an elite ability to generate weak contact while striking out tons of batters, and since Andrew Nardi is pre-arbitration, they likely won’t receive a tax bill for him that exceeds the $1 million mark. It serves as a win-win for the Yankees and Marlins, but who would Brian Cashman be able to woo Miami with in order to pull off such a trade?
A player who I think fits Miami perfectly is C/1B Rafael Flores, as while Agustin Ramirez has already been sent over there by the Bronx Bombers for Jazz Chisholm, having more catching depth is never a bad thing. He posted a 149 wRC+ across 122 games last season between High-A and Double-A, posting a near 94 MPH average EV while hitting baseballs north of 114 MPH. Flores is a top 10-15 prospect in the organization but plays a position where the Yankees may not have much room for him at in the immediate future.
The second player who will go to Miami in this mock trade is a pitcher they acquired from the Red Sox this winter, as Elmer Rodriguez-Cruz is a young projectable right-hander with a firm fastball. He sat around 95 MPH this year while reaching 99 MPH, and his excellent slider is a pitch that should excite any prospect evaluator. Cruz posted a 2.91 ERA across 89.2 MiLB innings, striking out 102 batters with a 3.56 FIP.
After going 19-18 in one-run games this season, the Yankees would be supercharging their bullpen with some of the top strikeout artists in the sport to lock it down in big games.
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Devin Williams and Luke Weaver already give the Yankees one of the best one-two punches in baseball, but the rest of their bullpen is full of swing-and-miss weapons. Fernando Cruz, Ian Hamilton, Jake Cousins, and Mark Leiter Jr. are all capable of striking out over 25% of batters faced as well, and Andrew Nardi would add a ~30% strikeout rate guy to the roster. If a young arm like Clayton Beeter steps up and takes a job in Spring Training, we could be looking at a group that runs the best strikeout rate for any bullpen in baseball, a departure from the last two seasons.
Over the last two seasons, the Yankees’ bullpen is 14th in K% (23.9%), and while they do an excellent job keeping the ball on the ground, you’d love to add some more swing-and-miss. They’ve done a great job addressing that already with Devin Williams and Fernando Cruz, but Andrew Nardi takes this group to another level. Furthermore, it alleviates some of their financial issues that stem from the Luxury Tax, which they can further improve by moving Marcus Stroman and an arb-eligible reliever such as Mark Leiter Jr.
If someone eats about $10 million of what Stroman is owed in 2025 and they move Leiter they could free up about $12 million in payroll, which pushes them to $292 million and opens up plenty of opportunities.
Signing Ha-Seong Kim to a deal that would make him around a $15 million Luxury Tax hit would only cause the Yankees to get taxed on about $6 million of those dollars, which would bring about a $5.4 million tax hit, bringing the total money committed to about $18.4 million, which isn’t market value for Kim, but certainly shouldn’t scare them off. It sounds like me bootlicking for Hal Steinbrenner, but the alternative route here is signing Tim Hill, who is good but certainly places a hard cap on what they can do in their infield.
If Hill signs for about $8 million, which is less than Jose LeClerc and Andrew Kittridge, the Yankees’ moves to free up payroll would be undone as they’d have a payroll of around $300 million. That means that signing HSK at the same price would come with about $14 million of the $15 million he signed for being taxed at a 90% clip. It brings the total committed money to $27.6 million, which is a lot of money to pay to roster him even though I’m higher on him than the consensus.
Paying a reliever shouldn’t be out of the question necessarily, but it would 100% limit what they do in the infield, and while I love Tim Hill, the odds that he’s productive enough to outweigh the stench they have with DJ LeMahieu getting regular playing is extremely low. You can suddenly see why they haven’t brought back Hill yet, and why in my opinion, trading out of their shallow farm system to acquire a reliever may be their best course of action.