Brian Cashman said on Thursday he still doesn't anticipate making any moves before Sunday afternoon's trade deadline, even as questions surrounding the rotation and the bullpen remain.Hughes' stuff is there? Really? Didn't look like it while serving up 9 hits to the worst lineup in baseball yesterday.
"I'm going to be hard-pressed to find anything better than getting Bartolo Colon and Phil Hughes off the disabled list," the Yankees GM said at a Hope Week charity event on Staten Island. "I can't imagine I'm going to run into anything but you've still got to go through the motions."
... Cashman believes Hughes will get back to the pitcher he was a year ago, even after manager Joe Girardi opened the door to a competition between Hughes and Ivan Nova, who could start for the Yankees on Saturday in one half of a doubleheader against the Orioles.
"His stuff is there. We’re seeing it," Cashman said of Hughes, who surrendered two runs in six innings in a loss to the Mariners on Wednesday.
"We're prepared for chaos if it comes before Sunday's deadline. But I like the team we have."I don't agree with that either. The Phillies are a championship team. The Red Sox are a championship team. Even the Giants, with one ring under their belt already, are better built for October with their pitching staff than we are.
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"I go into the marketplace with a team that's a championship-caliber team as it sits," Cashman said. "It's hard to upgrade on that."
I'm sure, or at least hopeful, that this, like most things said by Cashman near the deadline, is just posturing. You can't appear to be needy heading into any kind of negotiations because then the other party can and will take advantage of you, and in the case of a trade, rob you blind. But if he really believes that this team is good enough to win as is, then blind is exactly what he is.