Plenty of teams have unenviable end-of-spring roster quandaries, but very few of them respond to crunches by handing a division rival exactly the pitcher they’d been looking for for months on end. Thanks, Blue Jays! The New York Yankees owe you a debt of gratitude for fumbling around with Ryan Yarbrough until the clock ran out on creativity.

All camp long, the Jays — knowing the soft-tossing Yarbrough wasn’t in their plans — could’ve sent him far away from the AL East. The Dodgers utilized Yarbrough well during his time in LA. Maybe they wanted him back as insurance, given their injury-risk-filled rotation?

The Yankees, and the rest of MLB, are very thankful the Dodgers did not come to that conclusion. Instead, Yarbrough will be getting a World Series ring with the road team when he visits Dodger Stadium this week, and the Blue Jays will remain out in the cold.

Instead of finding a creative pathway for his exit from Toronto in the middle of March, the Jays simply released him during their final roster shuffle at the end of the month, allowing the Yankees to pounce on a pitcher they’d apparently long coveted.

While it took him a while to get ramped up and stretched into a viable starter, Yarbrough has been bedeviling and baffling the rest of baseball ever since they handed him the ball. Monday night in Anaheim might’ve been his crowning achievement against an Angels team that has been secretly surging. After allowing a leadoff 440-foot tank to rising All-Star shortstop Zach Neto, he left the rest of the sheet blank, completing six masterful one-run innings before turning things over to the bullpen.

Yankees swiped Ryan Yarbrough from Blue Jays, and he’s been a miracle worker

An afterthought lefty slinger pitching with the same ruthless efficiency as Kevin Gausman? Given their own surprisingly competitive standing in the AL East, the Blue Jays definitely could’ve used that.

Instead, the Yankees will gladly take the windfall.

Eventually, Yarbrough’s magic will recede somewhat (probably … yeah, definitely … or, maybe not?). The hope is that, when that time comes and he tires just a bit, Luis Gil will be nearly ready and the trade deadline will be upon us. If you’re worried about Yarbrough’s stability in the meantime, though, just know that he’s inducing the slowest exit velocity in baseball (99th percentile) with the slowest incoming fastball velocity in the game (1st percentile). Things just … slow down when Yarbrough’s around.

Except, apparently, the Blue Jays’ whirring, buzzing brains, working overtime to outsmart themselves.