Major League Baseball

MLB Mailbag: How bad are the Yankees? Cubs' top prospects ready? Best NBA players for baseball?

Updated May. 2, 2023 5:09 p.m. ET

Welcome to another edition of my MLB Mailbag. By now, you should know the deal: You ask, I answer. Let's go!

Hi Jake. I feel like this is the worst season in Yankees history. Please tell me why I'm wrong (but probably right). — Matthew

I was at the Yankees' ninth-inning capitulation Monday night, and lemme tell ya, that thing was an absolute masterclass in late-game self-destruction. It's only May 2nd, but things in the Bronx are already fraught, and for good reason. The Yanks have lost four in a row and seven of their past nine. A hip strain just pushed Aaron Judge to the IL, where he'll join 12 of his teammates. Meanwhile, many of the healthy players are playing like skeletons, the bottom of the lineup is dreadful, the depth is nonexistent, Nestor Cortes looks mortal; the list of issues goes on and on.

So while FanGraphs still gives them a 65.3% chance of making the postseason, the fourth-best odds in the American League, the Yankees, at present, simply do not resemble a legitimate World Series contender.

But the worst Yankees season ever? No chance. That assertion is what we in the business call an "overreaction." Many Yankees fans like Matthew here have an understandably high standard, given the team's history of excellence, but my dude, you just cannot go full panic mode on a .500 team a month into the year. It's a long season.

By record, the worst season in modern franchise history belongs to the 1908 New York Highlanders, who went 51-103 and saw their first baseman quit in September after it was alleged that he was throwing games. But while playing as the "New York Yankees," this organization has never sludged through the strife of a 100-loss season. In fact, they are one of only five clubs in the post-integration era who've never experienced 100 losses (the other four: the Dodgers, Angels, Cardinals and ... Rockies).

The closest the Yanks came was 1990, a season in which they lost 95 games and had their owner, George Steinbrenner, temporarily banned for life for digging up dirt on one of his own players. So yeah, things have changed.

Jose Trevino cranks a solo home run to give the Yankees an early lead over the Guardians

These Yankees are far from excellent, but this same club bumbled and stumbled its way through long stretches of 2022 and woke up in October with 99 wins. Is this Yankees team bad? Maybe. But are these Yankees worse than the 1990 Yankees or 1908 Highlanders? Even though I was minus-five years old and minus-87 during those seasons, I'm gonna say no. Judge and Gerrit Cole alone won't let that happen, even if the other 24 guys are total pumpkins.

Do you know of any other older minor-league players past or present with as interesting of a journey as Drew Maggi? — Jordan

Maggi has been the talk of the town. The dude got a well-earned call-up to the Pirates, got a start, got a hit, got to go on a bunch of TV shows and then got sent back to Altoona, Pennsylvania. A tip of the cap to Mr. Maggi, who persevered for 13 minor-league seasons, had his moment in the sun and will now return to the grind, his dream fulfilled.

But while Maggi’s 1,155 minor-league games endured before an MLB call is a testament to fortitude and grit and many other related buzzwords, it’s not the all-time record. That belongs to Mr. John Lindsey, a bat-first first baseman who played 1,446 games in the minors from 1995 to 2010 before appearing with the Dodgers at age 33.

He was called to pinch hit against the Padres on Sept. 8th, 2010, for what would have been his MLB debut, but was ruthlessly pulled for a different pinch hitter after San Diego brought in a right-handed pitcher to face him. Thankfully, he got into a game the following day and picked up his hit later that week before breaking his hand on a hit-by-pitch and never playing in the bigs again. John Lindsey, a Drew Maggi for older millennials.

Thoughts on the Cubs having MLB-ready talent in AAA like Christopher Morel and Matt Mervis, and letting them stay there while the big-league team could use their bats and maybe not be swept by the Marlins in all one-run losses. — Lara

This is a toughie. When it comes to top prospects, MLB teams are always balancing (1) winning in the short term at the big-league level and (2) ensuring their best prospects are receiving consistent playing time. Of course, there’s sometimes a service-time manipulation aspect involved, but for the sake of this conversation let’s put that on ice.

If the Cubs had to win a baseball game tomorrow to save the future of the human race, they would promote Morel and Mervis immediately. And that’s because they are two of the best 26 players currently employed by the team.

However, putting Morel and Mervis in the majors right now could create a situation in which they wouldn’t be playing every day. Ian Happ, Seiya Suzuki and the rejuvenated Cody Bellinger are the everyday outfielders. Patrick Wisdom, Dansby Swanson and Nico Hoerner have three of the four infield spots on lock. Trey Mancini has started slow at first base, but the team invested two years in him and needs time to un-funk himself.

Ian Happ crushes solo home run to put bow on Cubs' 5-1 win over Nationals

So, my read on things is that the team wants to keep the DH spot open and flexible to give various players the opportunity to move around the diamond. I think eventually the team will cut bait on either Edwin Ríos or Eric Hosmer and promote Mervis as the full-time DH. Someone else will get injured for a bit and Morel will get the call, as well.

If I was running the team I would have promoted Morel already, but I do understand the rationale (somewhat) of giving him regular at-bats in Triple-A ... for now. It's probably worth noting this is exactly why the Cardinals demoted Jordan Walker last week.

What would you say is the new "good range" for ERA now that offense is up? — Liz

The average MLB starter's ERA before play on Monday night was 4.55, up a half a run from last year's 4.05 full-season mark and last April's 3.93 mark. Why is offense up? It's likely a combination of the new shift rules, the new baserunning rules and a potentially livelier baseball.

As fans, we're forced to rethink our perspective on numerical landmarks all the time. Hitting .300 had long been the mark of a "good hitter." Then, everyone but Luis Arráez stopped hitting .300 and we realized that OPS and eventually OPS+ were more representative metrics. And though ERA has its flaws (luck, park factor variation, inherited runners), it's always going to be around, so we might as well come up with a revised understanding of what it means to have a good ERA (ERA+ is helpful here).

Pablo López has a 4.00 ERA right now (and a 109 ERA+) and I think of him as a "good pitcher." That's also a nice big round number. So for now, why don't we say anything above a 4 ERA is pretty good? Great. Sometimes baseball analysis is easy.

NOTE: If you want to be a nerd like me, I recommend, when evaluating pitchers, to use things like BB%, K%, HardHit%, Whiff% and all those other Baseball Savant-type stats. They really do work! But if you wanna be a more casual yet still informed ball fan, that's rad too! All are welcome.

What do you think hitting stats would look like if MLB put an expansion team on the Moon — Alex

Does the altitude in Mexico City make a future expansion team a nonstarter? These home runs are fun but also a little ridiculous — Nat

I’m not going to answer either of these two unrelated questions directly. Instead, here they are together, answering one another. How beautiful.

Which NBA player would do well in MLB? Which player would be most fun to see play? — Anonymous

These are two very different questions.

A buddy of mine got bumped to the bench on his 12U travel team as a kid because Donovan Mitchell, now of the Cleveland Cavaliers, showed up one day and was predictably amazing. Mitchell grew up around the game (his pops has worked for the Mets for over 20 years) and isn't too tall that his swing would be a mess. So, besides guys like Pat Connaughton who played baseball at the pro or collegiate level, I'm rolling with Mitchell.

The most fun? It's obviously Giannis Antetokounmpo, right? He has a body type nonexistent in baseball (7-foot and incredibly long), he's from a country with very little baseball heritage (no shade to the Greek ballplayers out there) and we know that he looks like a clunky robot swinging a bat.

Maybe we should try him on the mound?

Got a question for Jake? Follow him on Twitter @CespedesBBQ at look out for his mailbag tweet each week.

Jake Mintz, the louder half of @CespedesBBQ is a baseball writer for FOX Sports. He played college baseball, poorly at first, then very well, very briefly. Jake lives in New York City where he coaches Little League and rides his bike, sometimes at the same time. Follow him on Twitter at @Jake_Mintz.