New York Yankees: How Recent Acquisitons Will Affect the Bombers

On Friday, the Yankees improved their outfield depth by trading Sergio Mitre to the Milwaukee Brewers in exchange for Chris Dickerson, as well as supplementing the back end of the rotation by signing Kevin Millwood.

Although the fourth and fifth spots in the rotation have already been handed out to Ivan Nova and Freddy Garcia respectively, Millwood will supply good depth in case of injury or ineffectiveness by the back end.

Chris Dickerson, 28, has spent time the Reds and Brewers organization and hasn’t been too productive. Last year for Cincinnati and Milwaukee, Dickerson hit .206 with 5 RBIs and 4 stolen bases to go along with an OBP of .250 (lower than the league batting average).

Not an outstanding talent to say the least, so don’t expect Dickerson to have all that much of an impact on the Yanks’ season.

Although last year Kevin Millwood found little success in Baltimore, leading the AL in losses with 16 and registering a 5.10 ERA, he has been a fairly productive pitcher his whole career.

However, Millwood has been very up and down during his time in the league.

For instance, from 1999 to 2002 Millwood went from 18-7 to 10-13 and then from 7-7 to 18-8. That was about ten years ago, but Millwood still shows signs of his up-and-down success, as just two seasons ago his ERA was a more-than-respectable 3.67.

Coming off a poor season (in which he was given very little run support), I expect Kevin Millwood to get a decent number of starts for the Bombers and be nothing less than productive.

Overall, these two moves may not prove to influence the Yankees’ season all that much. However, Millwood is a slight improvement over Mitre, and they do add a little bit more outfield depth, which may (but probably won’t) come into play as CF Curtis Granderson is currently nursing a strained oblique.

But the season is long and anything can happen as the Yankees get set for opening day.

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