It was a busy first day of no baseball in Yankeeland. The Yankees kicked the offseason off by promoting Alan Cockrell to hitting coach, replacing Jeff Pentland. They also promoted Marcus Thames to the big league club and will presumably work as the assistant hitting coach. Thames has worked with Yankees prospects over the last few seasons, and with Greg Bird, Aaron Judge, and Rob Refsnyder all coming through the pipeline, it makes sense to keep their coach–whom they all love–around to help their transition. Thames is still only 38, making it weird that Alex Rodriguez is actually two years older than his new hitting coach.
Yankees promote Alan Cockrell, Marcus Thames; Capuano, Drew, Young become free agents
