At the beginning of the offseason, Brian Cashman said the Yankees were not going to go into the 2022 with Gleyber Torres at shortstop. With a tremendous crop of free agent talent available, the Yankees missed out on Corey Seager, Marcus Semien, and Javier Baez.
This week we’ll look at a few free agents and trade targets to fill the role.
Today we look at the case for and against trading for Amed Rosario from the Cleveland Guardians.
AMED ROSARIO: A QUICK OVERVIEW
Amed Rosario came into his career as an international signee by the New York Mets, coming out of the Dominican Republic and signing for a franchise-high $1.75 Million in July, 2012. Rosario then spent the next 5 years in the Minor Leagues (2013-2017), slowing moving up from Rookie ball in 2013 to Triple-A through half of the 2017 season. On August 1st, 2017 Amed Rosario made his MLB debut with the new York Mets against the Colorado Rockies. He then spent the next 4 years (2017-2020) with the New York Mets before being traded to the then-Cleveland Indians in a major trade deal that sent Francisco Lindor and Carlos Carrasco to Flushing. Rosario then spent the 2021 season with Cleveland, though his future there could be uncertain given the sense that they are in a rebuild and because Rosario had good value with having two years left (2022-2023) under arbitration. He is projected to make around $5 Million for the 2022 season.
Over his career, Amed Rosario has hit to a .272/.307/.404 (.712 OPS/93 OPS+) triple-slash with 551 hits, 43 Home Runs, and 205 RBI’s over 544 games. He’s also put in just over 4,300 innings at shortstop to a -29 DRS and a -2.5 UZR. (He also spent 123.1 innings at Center Field in 2021). Combined with everything, he’s accumulated +5.5 bWAR and +7.4 fWAR over parts of 5 seasons in the MLB.
In 2021, Amed Rosario had his 2nd best season to date as he hit to a .282/.321/.409 (.731 OPS/99 OPS+) triple-slash with 155 hits, 11 Home Runs, and 57 RBI’s. He also went 13/0 when it came to stealing bases/getting caught. On defense, he had a -9 DRS but a +1.7 UZR. According to Fangraphs, Rosario was a positive offensive player (OFF of +0.6) and defensive player (DEF of +6.3). All told, Rosario accumulated +1.9 bWAR and +2.7 fWAR.
Amed Rosario also does not have much of an injury history at all. He had two short stints on the then-DL while in the minor leagues (once in each of 2015 and 2016), and that was it for injury-related appearances on the list. In 2020 Rosario did suffer quad tightness in one game and was kept out of action for a few days, but avoided the Injured List. In 2021, Rosario was put on the IL for 4 days for matters related to COVID-19 and passing return-to-play protocols after he had to tend to matters outside of the USA.
THE CASE FOR AMED ROSARIO:
A long-term shortstop is not the answer for the New York Yankees. Well, it might have been with Corey Seager (too bad he signed with the Texas Rangers already), though his injury history is also very concerning considering the deal that he got. Truthfully, a stop-gap shortstop is the Yankees best option currently as we have to hope that at least one of the prospects pans out. This is where Amed Rosario becomes a great move.
Amed Rosario is under contract for the perfect amount with his two years of arbitration. Those years also come at a really nice price with an expected Arb 2 salary for 2022 at about $5 Million, which means his Arb 3 salary for 2023- unless he plays himself into an MVP season- is likely to be around the $10 Million mark. Considering most other options would cost that combined rate over 1 year (Didi/Simmons) or double that (Correa/Seager), this is a very affordable contract that would easily allow the Yankees the room to make further moves.