{"id":208479,"date":"2025-07-28T11:21:13","date_gmt":"2025-07-28T11:21:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/208479\/"},"modified":"2025-07-28T11:21:13","modified_gmt":"2025-07-28T11:21:13","slug":"could-oneil-cruz-find-a-new-home-next-week","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/208479\/","title":{"rendered":"Could Oneil Cruz find a new home next week?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cKicking the tires.\u201d \u201cPutting out feelers.\u201d \u201cTesting the waters.\u201d Whatever clich\u00e9 you prefer, it\u2019s the prerogative of every MLB general manager to leave no stone unturned as they attempt to improve their team. This is particularly true at the July 31st trade deadline, the last opportunity for each contender to augment their squad before their roster is largely set for the remainder of the season. So it should be no surprise that Yankees<\/a> GM Brian Cashman has asked after Pirates center fielder Oneil Cruz, per Jon Heyman of the New York Post<\/a>. If Cashman \u2014 or any GM \u2014 is able to pry Cruz loose in the next week, it would likely be the biggest blockbuster of the deadline. <\/p>\n

Listed at 6-foot-7 and 240 pounds, Oneil Cruz is among the most dynamic athletes in the game of baseball today. The Dominican \u2014 whose first name is an homage to Yankees legend Paul O\u2019Neill, his father\u2019s favorite ballplayer \u2014 rates tops among MLB position players in average arm strength (99 mph) and has the fasted throw recorded this season (104.9 mph). He\u2019s also the highest in average bat speed (78.5 mph) and average exit velocity (96.3 mph). He has the hardest-hit ball this season, a 122.9 mph laser beam home run that exited Pittsburgh\u2019s PNC Park altogether and was nearly five mph harder than any ball Aaron Judge has hit this year.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s only the 36th-fastest player in baseball (out of 514) but he\u2019s already swiped an MLB-leading 33 bags while only five players have provided more value on the bases per baserunning runs.<\/p>\n

And yet, despite all this superlative ability, Cruz had last week off, failing to earn an All-Star selection. He ranks 126th in baseball with 2.0 fWAR, a fine number but not one befitting Cruz\u2019s talent. So what\u2019s holding the 26-year-old back from joining the game\u2019s elite? The short answer is that he\u2019s a four-tool player. Cruz\u2019s hit tool has never developed to match his others and, if anything, it\u2019s taken a step back this year. He\u2019s hitting .219 and has already struck out 123 times, limiting the degree to which his bat speed and sprint speed are able to benefit his team. Only four players are striking out at a higher rate than Cruz\u2019s 31.9 percent.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, given Cruz\u2019s generational talent and club control through the end of the 2028 season, the Pirates will be reticent to move their center fielder for anything less than a king\u2019s ransom. Heyman reported that the price for Cruz will be \u201csteep,\u201d which is likely a monumental understatement. As long as he can stay healthy, his floor appears to be a league-average starter, while teams can dream on MVP potential if he can tweak his approach to improve contact.<\/p>\n

If the Yankees are able to pry Cruz free from Pittsburgh, what would be his role in the Bronx? One option would be something akin to what the team did when it acquired Jazz Chisholm Jr. last year. Cruz entered the big leagues as a shortstop, where he struggled before transitioning to center field last year. The metrics are split on his contributions there; Outs Above Average, which is based on range, unsurprisingly has the speedster as above average, but Defensive Runs Saved, a more comprehensive stat, has him costing the team four runs so far this year. <\/p>\n

With his all-world arm strength and supreme athleticism, the Yankees could try him back in the infield, though the need there is diminished after the acquisition of Ryan McMahon. Alternately, if they view him as a viable outfielder, the Yankees could add Cruz and then flip one of their outfielders for help elsewhere. All that said, Cruz isn\u2019t the cleanest fit for this roster, so despite how tantalizing his talent is, it\u2019s not so straightforward to come up with a deal that lands him in the Bronx.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cKicking the tires.\u201d \u201cPutting out feelers.\u201d \u201cTesting the waters.\u201d Whatever clich\u00e9 you prefer, it\u2019s the prerogative of every…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":208480,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2402],"tags":[196,3259,5,1315,1166,439,13330,181,220,4,292,5760,5339,3258,10,776,64,4297,749,26583],"class_list":{"0":"post-208479","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pittsburgh-pirates","8":"tag-a","9":"tag-alley","10":"tag-baseball","11":"tag-could","12":"tag-cruz","13":"tag-exclude-from-stn-video","14":"tag-find","15":"tag-front-page","16":"tag-home","17":"tag-mlb","18":"tag-new","19":"tag-next","20":"tag-oneil","21":"tag-pinstripe","22":"tag-pirates","23":"tag-pittsburgh","24":"tag-pittsburgh-pirates","25":"tag-pittsburghpirates","26":"tag-week","27":"tag-yankees-trade-rumors-deadline"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/114930600395408284","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208479"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208479\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}