Yankees' 7-Player Blockbuster Is Impact Upgrade with Bonus of Hurting Red Sox

After selling all sorts of wares on the summer trade market last year, the New York Yankees have made it known they're back in buying mode this year.

The Bombers made a big trade with the Chicago White Sox on Tuesday. Multiple reporters helped break the story as the Yankees finished off a 6-3 win over the Minnesota Twins, and then the White Sox made it official:

Bear with me while I pull out my blockbuster measuring stick and...

[Clock ticks, Jeopardy music plays.]

Yup, that's a blockbuster.

It certainly helped the Yankees. And if that's good news in any context, it's especially good news in the context of their recent skid. They were in first place in the American League East for almost all of May and June. Now, at 48-44, they're in third place and with only the American League's second wild-card spot in hand.

The checklist of how this helped begins with Todd Frazier. Between his two All-Star appearances and the 40-homer season he had just last year, the 31-year-old has the creds of a star. And he's come on strong since his OPS dipped below .600 on May 15. He has an .849 OPS and 13 homers in 53 games since then.

Unless a subsequent trade moves Chase Headley, Frazier doesn't have a clear opening at the hot corner.

But that's OK. He can also play first base, and that happens to be where the Yankees need his bat more. They went into Tuesday getting just a .686 OPS from their first basemen, which was the second-worst mark in MLB.

Elsewhere, this deal helped a bullpen that was very much in need of help.

That's not a true statement based on FanGraphs WAR, in which New York's pen was second only to the Los Angeles Dodgers. But what jibes more with reality is how the bullpen has hurt the Yankees' win probability. It's been a leaky ship.

Tyler Clippard was part of the problem, so him now being gone is part of the solution. David Robertson and Tommy Kahnle are two more parts of it.

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The Yankees know from seven years of previous experience what to expect with Robertson. And with a 2.70 ERA and 4.3 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 31 appearances, the 32-year-old is also having his best season since he left the Yankees after 2014.

Kahnle, 27, is more of an unknown, but he's been the better reliever of the two this season. He has a 2.50 ERA in 37 appearances, with an excellent 8.6 K/BB ratio to boot.

What may give some pause about Kahnle is that his walk rate has fallen off a cliff this season. But lest anyone label that unsustainable, it's a trend that goes back to last fall. All thanks to adjustments.

"It's just a few changes, one with the leg kick and keeping my head on a straight line," Kahnle told Colleen Kane of the Chicago Tribune in April. "That's basically keeping me going toward home plate and keeping my fastball command right there. [I'm] just a little more focused as well."

Sounds like a keeper. And with club control through 2020, Kahnle is a keeper.

Yankees manager Joe Girardi has a tough job ahead of him to figure out the pecking order for Robertson, Kahnle and incumbents Dellin Betances and Aroldis Chapman.

But in addition to Robertson, a generally dependable reliever, Girardi has to like that he now has three of MLB's eight hardest throwers at the back of his bullpen. And while the club's starting rotation remains a question mark, a deeper bullpen does downsize that question mark.

In addition to upgrading their own roster with this trade, the Yankees also blocked their biggest rival from making upgrades with a similar trade.

Per Bruce Levine of 670 The Score in Chicago, the Boston Red Sox wanted Frazier and Robertson to solve their own third base and bullpen problems:

FanGraphs' Dave Cameron sized up the situation like so: "Odds are the Yankees simply outbid the Red Sox, and I wouldn't be surprised if making sure the Red Sox didn't get better easily was at least partly the reason the Yankees got involved."

And the cost the Yankees paid wasn't too great.

Blake Rutherford's departure from the New York farm system was no small blow. Just a year after being picked 18th overall in the draft, he's already the No. 30 prospect in baseball for MLB.com.

But among the many top prospects the Yankees have accrued in recent months, the outfielder is the furthest from being MLB-ready. He's only 20 years old and is currently playing in Single-A.

Besides, as good as Rutherford may be, Erik Boland of Newsday heard he's no Estevan Florial:

For his part, Ian Clarkin is a good-but-not-great left-handed pitching prospect. Tito Polo is a 22-year-old outfielder who's experienced varying degrees of success in the minors.

Clippard? He's only in the deal so the remainder of his $6.15 million salary can balance out the remainder of the $37 million Frazier and Robertson will make, the former through the end of 2017 and the latter through 2018.

In all, it's a go-for-it trade that didn't crush the Yankees' hopes of competing in the future.

Since they're arguably ahead of schedule after throwing themselves into a rebuild just last year, it's exactly the kind of deal they needed to ponder. And with plenty of time still to go before the July 31 trade deadline, the Yankees might have one or two more moves left in them.

For now, the one they have under their belt looks like a heck of a springboard.

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference and FanGraphs.