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Cashman fielded offers for Gray at deadline, wasn't prepared to sell low

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In the days leading up to Sonny Gray's demotion to the bullpen, New York Yankees general manager Brian Cashman fielded trade inquiries about the right-hander.

"I had definitely teams that were in contention and teams that were not in contention because of his control year next year that asked about Sonny Gray because they know what his capabilities are and that his stuff is still the same," Cashman told "The Michael Kay Show" on Thursday, according to Brendan Kuty of NJ.com.

Gray has endured plenty of struggles over the last year in New York. He owns a 4.85 ERA and 1.42 WHIP across 32 starts since coming over from the Oakland Athletics, and he was booed off the mound Wednesday after allowing seven runs in 2 2/3 innings against the last-place Baltimore Orioles. That start ended a string of three encouraging performances that suggested Gray was back on track and resulted in his removal from the rotation. He was replaced by Lance Lynn.

With the Yankees looking for starting pitching at the deadline, Cashman wasn't prepared to sell low on Gray, who has another year of team control and cost New York three prospects to acquire.

"(Teams) approached it in a buy-low situation where it did not make any sense, especially when you saw what he was doing for us in July in those more recent four starts as well as June," Cashman said.

"So, in his June and July, it looked like he was ... turning the corner. Did he have some bad starts during those two months of June and July? He did. But they were nothing like how it was in April and May and it looked like he was going in the right direction. ... So I was not presented with anything that would make me feel like I missed an opportunity."

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