Did Cashman Finally Get Something Right?

It’s an interesting question in a very early season. I like to give credit where credit is due and I do when it is earned. Some folks are praising Cashman early on but let’s get closer (much closer) to the dog days of summer before we go breaking out the trophies and medals for “most improved” categories.

The bullpen was a serious weakness last season. We knew it needed an overhaul so that’s why we said LET THE YANKEES BULLPEN BLOW UP BEGIN! The Yankees experiment with Devin Williams was a disaster and even Luke Weaver crashed and burned in epic fashion that I never expected. He didn’t address his problem with tipping pitches and that helped him lose his job. Both guys are playing for that other New York team now, and Cashman has made over the bullpen.

That new bullpen has a 3-0 start after sweeping three from the Giants with their perceived weaker bullpen. Four relievers combined for 4 2/3 scoreless innings to finish off Saturday’s 3-1 win to make it 11 shutout innings in the opening series. All three of the Yankees 2025 trade-deadline additions played key roles in the series and now it has the baseball world asking if Cashman outsmarted everyone. Read more about what NJ.com had to say HERE.

Last season the bullpen ERA was 4.37, 7th worst in MLB and 11th best in the American League. That was a big drop from the 2024 World Series season when their 3.62 bullpen ERA ranked third in the league and sixth overall. The Yankees did look sharp after losing some bigger names over the winter but it’s easy to look sharp in the first series of the season. Everyone’s rested!

The Yankees don’t NEED big names to be successful. We had that last year and it didn’t work well for us. The Yankees do need good strategy, guys with good fundamentals and rest! How many times have we seen the Yankees bullpen just get taxed and absolutely drained after being used to much and too often? It’s one of the Yankees biggest faults. It happens every. stinking. season! The Yankees change their roster but they don’t change the way they operate and it annoys me.

So yeah, right now Cashman may look like a genius to some. It is way too early to start celebrating. I want to see how Camilo Doval, Jake Bird and David Bednar adapt and perform over the next six months. That’s a grind! We caught a glimpse of success now, but we need to see long term results. Not to mention, odds are pretty good that Cashman will look to add new reinforcements by the trade deadline so those guys will also need to be evaluated.

I am not going to toot Cashman’s horn just yet with the existing bullpen. I will say the Yankees made smart additions by subtraction by getting rid of dead weight. 

That’s as far as I will go….for now. 

–Jeana Bellezza-Ochoa

BYB Senior Managing Editor

Twitter: @nyprincessj