This Week on the Blog

Alright, this week so the Yanks keep on keeping on, the Giants start participating in their annual OTA's, the Rangers introduce John Davidson, and the Knicks not do anything stupid. One month from now, the Yanks, Rangers and Knicks will all have had their drafts. So fun stuff on the way. Let's take a look at this week.

Yankees: The banged up Yanks have been the beasts of baseball since about game 15. A lot of it has dad to do with the pitching, and the heroics of analytic pick-ups like DJ and Voit. But, really, what we are seeing is 22 year old Gleyber Torres break out, and Gary Sanchez bounce back. Those two have been amazing, and Gleyber isn't just hitting jacks again't the O's. he getting on base and holding his own at shortstop, which isn't very good news for Didi Gregorious. Didis starting his rehab assignment this will and could be back soon, But when he does, he'll have to play really well to stay a Yankee - or be huge trade bait at the deadline.  Speaking about the deadline, Clint Frazier has been mixed up in trade talks for the past two years. But when he is right, which he seems to be now, he's showing a little too much to consider moving him.

Don't forget, the draft is a little early this year, running from 6/3 to 6/5 and the Yanks do have an extra pick.

Giants: OTA's have been pretty businesslike, as reports of DJ's talent and athleticism keep growing. With the OL pretty settled, the Giants may be looking for another rotational pass rusher., like Nick Perry ex of the Packers and of USC.  He might be the fit they are looking for for Bettcher's amoebic 3-4.  In sort of surprising news, Corey Ballentine was able to do position drills as the week progressed.  He may be the most athletic of all the young corners, and we should have all of them going by training camp. And if you're not having visions of long armed CB's Beal and Baker manning the corners, you're not seeing the full picture.

Rangers: the Ranger FO should be back from the World Championship this week just in time to attend the NHL Combine.  In the Clark/Gorton scouting era, the combine has been a part of the building process going all the way back to the Gomez trade, which netted the Ranger Ryan McDonagh - who'd lit it up at the combiner, as did Chrise Kreider and K'Andre Miller.  So it's a big deal for the Rangers, who already know what they are going to do at 2, but have 8 more picks as well as veteran players like Kreider they can trade to get pick betweeen 2 and 20,  So they really have to see what the want. It's going to be a big offseason for the Rangers and, as we've seen, it already started.

Another thing they might do is hire a new AHL coach. They parted with thos old staff a few weeks ago and it's a surprise they haven't named a new staff yet. A big part of what they want to do involves player development and Hartford hasn't been pulling its weight. We saw this when Libor Hajek was havinga sort of nothing AHL season, before coming up and looking damn good before he got hurt.  Why wasn't there a system in place that would have let him show that at Hartford. I'm hoping Quinn knows a division 2 collegiate coach who's looking for a fresh challenge who can come in, echo Quinn's system and really focus on player development.

Knicks: The Knicks continue scouting and looking at trade a free agent options.  I don't much trust these guys yet, so we'll have to see what happens. The wheel of free agent targets seemed to spin toward Kemba Walker this week. I think you'll remember that that's who I thought they'd end up with after the KP trade. That would still be sub-optimal - especially now that he's qualified for a SuperMax deal. That seem like's it's right up David Mills's alley. This could get awful again.

So there it is, Yanks defying the odds, Giants business as usual, Rangers headed to the combine, and we should be nervous about the Knicks.  Have a great one!