Sheffield to Seattle

...and Paxton to the Bronx!! The first major trade of the Hot Stove season was designed to beef up the Yankees rotation and help jump start a Mariners rebuilt, as GMs Brian Cashman and Jerry DiPoto focused on a constasting pair of lefthanders: rookie Justus Sheffield and veteran James Paxton. Potential versus experience, youth versus maturity. Starting fresh versus finding that key missing piece.
It's big step in Cashman's plan to fix a Yankee rotation that was, at best, inconsistent during 2018.
At first glance, I like how it works out for both teams. While I've enjoyed what an infusion of youth has done for the Yankees the past couple of seasons, Paxton moves in alongside Luis Severino and Masahiro Tanaka as the Yanks look to close the gap on the World Champion Red Sox. And the Canada native is just reaching his peak -- at age 30 and coming off his two best Seatttle seasons, he should be a dependable arm for the two remaining years before his agent Scott Boras takes him into free agency.
Sheffield, the Yankees number-one pitching prospect, becomes an important building block for a Seattle club looking to get younger and compete more effectively with the Astros and A's.
Sheffield (and two other prospects) for Paxton. The kind of trade that'll get fans on coasts talking.
(My image of Sheffield is from the Yankees/Phillies exhibition game on March 8th.)

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