Well, this news did not come as much of a surprise:
#Yankees announce Jeter to DL.
— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) July 19, 2013
Your 2013 Yankees, ladies and gentlemen! Here one day, gone the next, return awhile later, and gone immediately afterward. After his first game back from the 60-day disabled list in an early return, Derek Jeter strained his quad running to first base. He missed the final three games before the All-Star Break and will now go on the 15-day disabled list retroactively as of Friday July 12th. Chris Cotillo of SBN's MLB Daily Dish was the first to break the news.
Jeter will be eligible to return during the Yankees' next home series, which is against the Tampa Bay Rays on July 26-28. To be specific, he can return on Saturday, July 27 (A-Rod's birthday present!). At least the quad strain wasn't a recurrence of the ankle injury, I suppose. Hopefully it heals without any setbacks, but someone should bubblewrap the Captain just in case there are any ravenous pitching machines around his area.
According to Josh Norris, the Yankees will call up former White Sox utilityman Brent Lillibridge to replace Jeter on the roster. If fans remember Lillibridge, it is likely because he robbed the Yankees of a win in April 2011 with two terrific catches in right field. He's not a very exciting player since he's a career .207/.271/.339, 63 wRC+ player who is better in the outfield than the infield (where help is more imperative), but after getting dealt to the Yankees from the Cubs in a minor June deal, he hit .355/.425/.724 with seven homers and a 209 wRC+ in 87 plate appearances in Scranton. Since he has a poor MLB track record and only had a 98 wRC+ in 48 games with the Cubs' Triple-A team beforehand, it's easy to chalk that up to small sample size noise.
The Yankees will have to make a move to get Lillibridge onto the 40-man roster, but no move has been announced yet. All logical 60-day DL transactions have been made, though I suppose if Jayson Nix or David Phelps's injuries are worse than we know, the Yankees could move one of them there. Of the minor league players on the 40-man roster, it seems like David Adams, Corban Joseph, Brennan Boesch, Brett Marshall, Melky Mesa, or Thomas Neal are most in danger of being DFA'd. Even though he's done well in Triple-A, my money is on Neal, though it could very well be Boesch since he's injured and useless right now, too.
Update
Boesch has indeed been given his release, according to the Yankees' Twitter account. In 23 games with the Yanks, Boesch hit .275/.302/.529 with a 123 OPS+, but his hits never seemed to come at the right time, as evidenced by his -0.50 WPA. He became expendable when Curtis Granderson briefly made his return, and the Yankees sent him down to Triple-A. When Grandy got hurt, Boesch returned but was sent down again once Andy Pettitte was activated from the DL, since the roster was tight at the time and the Yankees didn't want to lose Lyle Overbay. He was removed from a game with shoulder tightness on June 5th and never returned. The Yankees could try to re-sign him to a minor league deal as they did when they cut David Adams from the 40-man roster in early April, but Boesch might want to move on. It seemed pretty clear that he wasn't returning from injury anytime soon though, so it's not much of a loss.