At one point, Slade Heathcott was one of the New York Yankees top prospects. Now, he is looking for a new team to latch on to.
In a somewhat surprising move, the Yankees have released outfielder Slade Heathcott to open up a spot on the 40-man roster.
This marks the second time in less than two years that Heathcott has been released by the Yankees. In December of 2014, Heathcott was given his release and then immediately re-signed by New York to ensure he couldn’t be easily claimed by any of the 29 Major League clubs. The move seemed odd at the time, considering he was working his way back from injury and it would have been much easier to DFA the once promising prospect. The Yankees promoted Heathcott to the majors in June of 2015, thus explaining why he wasn’t DFA’d six months prior to his big league debut.
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According to a team source, the Yankees have no plans to re-sign Heathcott at this time.
The Yankees plan to use the open roster spot to promote left-hander Richard Bleier, whose contract was purchased from Scranton/Wilkes-Barre on Thursday.
Heathcott, 25, was selected 29th overall in the 2009 MLB Amateur Draft and turned down a baseball scholarship to LSU for a $2.2 million signing bonus and a chance to wear the pinstripes at Yankee Stadium. Although he did make it to the Bronx for a short stay, Heathcott has been shackled throughout his professional career by his battle with alcoholism, which he’s been fighting since his high school days in Texas. The Yankees realized their talented young prospect was in trouble and directed him towards former big league pitcher Steve Marsonek for guidance during his rehab process.
Once cleared of the demons that distracted him off the field, Heathcott encountered a rash of injuries that would impede his progress towards improving on the field. In 2010 & 2011, Heathcott underwent two major surgeries on his left shoulder and then another separate procedure on his right knee in 2014 that would force him to miss parts of the 2012-2013 seasons and only see action in 9 games during the 2014 campaign.
Here’s a look at Heathcott’s injury timetable courtesy of FanGraphs:
When fully healthy, Heathcott would often flash the talent that ultimately made him a first round selection. In 8 seasons as a professional, Heathcott slashed .272/.345/.402 and flashed some serious leather in the field as shown here courtesy of FanGraphs:
At the time of his release, Heathcott was on the Triple-A disabled list with yet again another knee injury. Just last week, vice president of player development Gary Denbo commented that Heathcott was making good progress in his recovery.
Essentially, a combination of injuries, emerging prospects and a glut of outfielders at the major league level led to Heathcott’s release. Aaron Judge, Dustin Fowler and Jake Cave have all had tremendous starts to their respective minor league seasons and Mason Williams is expected back from a shoulder injury sometime this summer.
With Brett Gardner and Jacoby Ellsbury penciled in everyday and the Carlos Beltran reunion tour in full effect, there was simply no room for Heathcott, who was hitting .230 at Scranton/Wilkes-Barre before his injury to make his mark with the Yankees. Not to mention Aaron Hicks is locked in as the fourth outfielder, further clogging things up for future call-ups.
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As long as Heathcott can remain relatively healthy, he’ll most likely catch on with another organization and have an opportunity to display his above average speed and elite defensive skills that had Baseball America rate him as the Yankees 18th rated prospect.