Uh oh. Hear that rustling in the bushes? Someone in the know must've claimed the New York Yankees have strong potential contributors down on the farm. He must be carrying water for Big Yankee instead of telling a plainly obvious truth.
Prior to ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball broadcast between the Mets and Giants, Jeff Passan discussed several upper-crust trade deadline targets, claiming the Yankees could be involved if names like Mackenzie Gore of the Nationals or Joe Ryan of the Twins happened to become available.
The way he described their potential to disrupt things got the angry corners of the internet's attention; Passan believes the Yankees' farm is strong enough to "get anyone they want" with the right package.
Note to everyone frothing at the mouth: This does NOT mean they could add Paul Skenes and James Wood tomorrow in a blink. It just means that they've done an excellent job developing upper-tier arms in recent seasons, while also providing starting catchers to several current MLB clubs from a pipeline that still has more to be mined. The preseason farm system rankings most Yankees haters dogmatically believe may not be entirely accurate to the world in July.
Jeff Passan on the Yankees ahead of the trade deadline:
“They have the farm system to go out and get anyone they want”
👀
Yankees farm system is healthy ahead of MLB trade deadline, per ESPN's Jeff Passan. But should they use it?
Now, of course, the real issue here is the context. Sure, the Yankees could blow away a team like the Twins in the Ryan chase — but they won't. They don't want to evacuate all their prospect capital in one fell swoop. What they could do is not akin to what they will do. Brian Cashman never goes for it this forcefully. He certainly won't do so in 2025 with this flawed roster. The haters have no reason to spit venom. But don't worry, they did anyway!
Boston Red Sox fans were, of course, up in arms — and yes, Boston, you also have the farm system to trade for whoever you want. You have the same thing.
The collective reaction to Passan's comments was a smarmy overload that amounted to either, "Wait, 1,000 anonymous troll accounts assured me the Yankees farm drank bleach? What happened?" or, "The Yankees are a psyop that secretly runs ESPN and MLB, which explains why they win the World Series ... never."
Yes, Passan and Heyman and most of the big writers all run cover for the Yanks every chance they get…
The league office is in New York and is littered w/ ex-Yanks, so unsurprisingly they benefit from favorable coverage, umpiring, etc.
For the 10,000th time, any Red Sox fan who still thinks MLB favors the Yankees and doesn't also favor the Red Sox is legitimately out of their mind. There's nothing MLB loves more than the creaky, Fenway Park-dwelling, "small-town" rival matching up with the Yankees on the national stage and running them over with the power of friendship. Passan is also in nobody's pocket. He's the same man who told Yankee fans to "shut the f*** up" last month. But I digress.
There's nothing to flip out about here, but that won't stop anyone from flipping and flipping and flipping some more. The Yankees have sent more top talent out in recent seasons (Carlos Narvaez, Agustin Ramirez, Michael King) than they had in the decade prior. More teams are interested in dealing with Brian Cashman than they used to be. There's still a "Yankees Tax" that costs them more to get moderate trades across the finish line because no one wants to help the league's Big Bad. They have a lot of pitching prowess in the upper minors, but more than likely won't use it.
