Since the trade deadline last year there have been rumors of the New York Yankees willingness to trade veteran catcher Brian McCann. It makes sense for them with the emergence of Gary Sanchez, who should be their everyday catcher in 2017.
David Lennon of Newsday, suggests that the Mets and Yankees could make a good match with the Mets looking to possibly upgrade at the catcher position and the Yankees in need of young pitching.
In Lennon’s trade proposal, the Yankees would send McCann and cash to the Mets for either Jay Bruce or Curtis Granderson and a young pitcher, possibly Robert Gsellman or Seth Lugo.
According to Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports, the Yankees have shown they may be willing to pay half of the $34 million left on McCann’s contract but want multiple young players in return.
McCann, 32, has a guaranteed two-years, $34 million left on his deal and has a $15 million team option for 2019 that would vest if he has 1,000 plate appearances from 2017-2018, catches 90 games in 2018, and doesn’t finish the 2018 season on the disabled list.
McCann caught 92 games in 2016, played 130 overall, and hit .242/.335/.413 with 20 home runs and 58 runs knocked in. He was a 0.9 WAR and 1.3 WAR player in 2016 according to Baseball Reference and FanGraphs respectively. The defense has started to slip for the once solid defender with a -5 DRS and throwing out only 23% of base stealers in 2016.
The left-handed hitting McCann has spent the last three seasons playing in the home run haven of Yankee Stadium. Despite playing in a great ballpark for lefty hitters he has hit only .235/.313/.418 overall in his three years with the Yankees. Which makes you wonder what are his numbers are on the road over that span.
The answer isn’t pretty. Over the past three seasons, McCann has slashed an ugly .225/.299/.359 away from Yankee Stadium. To put those numbers in perspective, Rene Rivera hit .222/.291/.341 for the Mets in 2016.
There’s no question that after a terrible season by Travis d’Arnaud in which he hit just .247/.307/.323 in 75 games, that the Mets could be looking for an upgrade at the catcher position. He also had another trip to the disabled list, this time for a strain in his rotator cuff.
It would certainly make sense for the Mets to have shown interest in McCann and even more so if the Yankees are willing to take back a contract like Bruce ($13M) or Granderson ($15M). What doesn’t make sense for the Mets would be to trade one of Gsellman or Lugo right now, especially with the uncertainty surrounding the health of their top five starters and Bartolo Colon signing with the Atlanta Braves on Friday.
The Mets should be looking into every avenue to either replace d’Arnaud or at least provide him with a backup that has more potential than Rivera. What they don’t need, however, is a guy like McCann making $34 million over the next two years (and possibly more) only to get similar production to Rene Rivera and without his defensive skills, and at the cost of a young pitcher that could help in the majors next season.
