Yankees mull trade options while stuck in limbo

The Yankees are hoping to become trade deadline buyers but have decided they aren’t quite ready to dive into the market in a big way yet.

Yankees higher-ups met within the last few days and understandably decided to remain in trade limbo for a few more days to see where they stand before making any big buys before the Aug. 1 deadline.

The Yankees headed into Tuesday night’s Subway Series against the Mets tied for last in the AL East, baseball’s best division, but only 2 ½ games behind Toronto in the race for the final wild-card spot.

Yankees people still hope and believe they will end up buying a piece or two and, assuming the team doesn’t fall back over the next few days, they plan to target an outfielder and a bullpen piece.

While they’ve checked in on two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani (as have almost all the teams with hope) and know there’s also an outside chance superstars Juan Soto and/or Nolan Arenado could hit the trade market — at the moment all three megastars seem unlikely to be dealt — in their position, on the cusp of the race, the Yankees are more likely to seriously pursue players who wouldn’t gut their good farm system.

They’ve often been linked to Cubs star center fielder Cody Bellinger, who’s engineering a big return to form after a couple off seasons following an 2019 MVP year with the Dodgers, but the Cubs are one of many teams also in trade limbo at the moment so there’s no guarantee Bellinger will be dealt.

Rockies outfielder Randal Grichuk could be a solid next choice, with a Cardinals’ group that includes Dylan Carlson and Tyler O’Neill possibly next on their list.

The Yankees seem to feel OK about third base with DJ LeMahieu looking a bit better since Sean Casey was hired as hitting coach and Oswald Peraza as a second option.

Outfield is the main position of need, but if they do decide to look at third base, the Nationals’ Jeimer Candelario is available and so might be Reds second baseman Jonathan India (although as of Tuesday, there’d been no talks with the Reds regarding India).

Yankees people believe returns by Nestor Cortes and Jonathan Loasiga could strengthen their generally effective pitching staff and seem to hope superstar Aaron Judge, who’s doing better, can be back shortly after the deadline.

So while they are waiting before making their next major move, they don’t envision themselves as a likely seller no matter how the next few games go.

While the first 100 games have been largely a disappointment, Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner was in for the whole weekend series against the also-ran Royals and was said to be heartened enough by what he saw in the sweep to believe they are unlikely to engineer a sell-off even if things worsen and they go 1-4 or 0-5 this week versus the Mets and first-place Orioles.

In that case, however, they may decide to stand pat or make smaller moves around the margins.