The Los Angeles Dodgers on Wednesday traded Tim Locastro to the New York Yankees in exchange for Drew Finley and cash considerations.
Locastro had been dropped off the Dodgers 40-man roster yesterday. He possesses a lot of speed and defensive versatility.
Finley is an intriguing player with a lot of talent but has yet to truly capitalize on the ability that made him a third-round pick in 2015.
He’s only 22, though, and there’s still time for the Dodgers organization to refine his game and get him to the Big League level.
Finley has not yet been able to advance past Low-A in three attempts, but maybe a change of scenery and some new coaching will help.
The righty has thrown 120 innings in the minors, registering a lofty 5.48 ERA and a problematic 4.8 walks per nine innings total.
There are control issues he needs to overcome, but a career 9.7 strikeouts per nine innings indicates that he has good stuff when he can harness it properly.
Locastro played in 21 big league games over the past two seasons with the Dodgers, getting two hits in 11 at-bats and showing off his speed with five stolen bases.
Locastro turned 26 in July, and there is certainly an opportunity for him to compete for playing time with the Yankees.
He was originally drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays in the 13th round of the 2013 draft and ended up hitting .283 in Rookie ball that season.
He flashed his talent in Class A the next season as a member of the Vancouver Canadians, where was selected to compete in the Northwest League all-star game.
He stole 32 bases in 67 games that season, all while hitting .317 and making a name for himself as a fascinating young player to keep an eye on.
He continued showing an impressive ability to hit for contact and steal bases, as stole 30 bases and hit .310 in 70 games for the Lansing Lugnuts of the Midwest League in 2015.
The Dodgers made the move to acquire Locastro in July 2015 along with Chase De Jong in exchange for three international slots.
There’s a great piece that Dennis did back in December 2016 where he sat down for an interview with Locastro to discuss his journey through the minors.
Locastro was assigned to the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes of the California League after the Dodgers acquired him, and he spent part of 2016 with them as well until he was promoted to AA.
He was selected to the Texas League all-star game as a member of the Tulsa Drillers in 2017 and reached AAA that same season.
He combined for 127 games between AA Tulsa and the AAA Oklahoma City Dodgers in 2017, hitting .308 and stealing 34 bases.
That minor league performance in 2017 was good enough for the Dodgers to call him up to the majors in late September of that season.
It’s going to be really interesting to see if Locastro can establish a firm role with the Yankees as a utility guy and pinch-runner.
Finley is a bit of a project at this point, but the Dodgers are going to see if they can be the ones to help him unlock his potential.
Locastro’s story has quite a bit in common with former Dodger Ronald Torreyes whom we also got from Toronto and who also ultimately wound up with the Yankees (we traded him as part of a deal for Rob Segedin). He’s given them three pretty good seasons as a utility infielder so ironically he and Locastro may wind up competing for a spot on the 25 man roster this spring. Finley’s father works in the Dodger front office so although he may have a little upside, nepotism may also be involved here. After all if you trade Tim Locastro to the Yankees and they have to throw cash into the deal to even it out, you probably can’t expect too much. Of course, we also didn’t expect anything when we drafted Mike Piazza as a favor to Tommy.
Drew Finley huh? Never heard of him, but let me guess – he’s got a curve with warp speed spin, capable of maintaining the same multiple absolutely directions in space, creating 300mV/*/s radians per second of angular velocity. To date that pitch couldn’t find a strike zone with GPS, but we can fix him. I wonder what the Yankees intend to do with Locastro.
I say the Dodgers got the short end of the stick again, but what else is new.