Yankees post-deadline confidential: Harrison Bader logic, Gerrit Cole pressure and a Gleyber Torres deal-breaker

Yankees post-deadline confidential: Harrison Bader logic, Gerrit Cole pressure and a Gleyber Torres deal-breaker

The combination of a huge division lead and a championship-less dossier since 2009 motivated the Yankees to emphasize October at the trade deadline rather than August and September.

It is putting the playoff cart before the regular-season horse.

Their most controversial trade, in fact, accentuated this as they obtained a player (Harrison Bader) who won’t even play for them before September in exchange for a pitcher (Jordan Montgomery) the Yankees did not see (under the best circumstances) pitching for them in October.

If everything works out, the Yankees would get Bader and Luis Severino back next month to build them up to be factors in the following month.