Okay, let's state it up front: Judge . Will. Hit. We know this. Any day now, any way now, he'll go apeshit. He'll win AL Player of the Week and scatter some opposing bullpen like pigeons from a sandlot. It. Will. Happen.
Unless he's secretly hurt, in which case, all bets are off.
As for Stanton? That's another story. He'll probably heat up. But his inability to sprint, without tweaking himself - that's a glitch. Rizzo hasn't fully returned from last year's concussion, and then there is Gleyber, currently the top Yankee enigma.
Thus far, he's been a disaster. He started the season hitting leadoff, the Yankees not wanting Anthony Volpe to face extra pressures. That sure didn't last. Torres stank at the top and has continued to skunk-up the depths of the order. He has yet to hit a HR in 124 plate appearances. (Last year he hit 25.) He has all of 6 RBIs and and 33 Ks. And questions that not long ago were unthinkable have become real:
How long can the Yankees get nothing from 2B?
Could Gleyber be this year's Josh Donaldson? Or its Aaron Hicks?
You remember Donaldson and Hicks, last year's Bobsy Twins through May. "Jackie" Donaldson was a complete disaster at 3B, though Aaron Boone defended him, and the YES team constantly saw rebirth in his swings - signs that never materialized. The fans booed, and his BA fell to .142. He was waived and sent to Milwaukee, where he hit .169. This winter, he retired.
On that note, I want to apologize to Donaldson for some of the things we said about him on this site. His problem was simple: He was done. At age 36, he had nothing left. He was out there, feeding his family, and his career was over. You can hate a guy for a lot of things, but growing too old should temper some of the bile. Donaldson was through, and the Yankee management deserved to be booed, not him.
Then there was Hicks, an electrified corpse who left the Yankees hitting .188 (with 1 HR) who suddenly became reanimated in Baltimore, hitting .275 (with 7 HRs.) Alas, Hicksy flipped his final flop this spring in Anaheim, where he was hitting .222 before being recently released.
Donaldson and Hicks, gone but not forgotten...
I raise them because DJ LeMahieu will soon start another rehab assignment. His last one, a week ago, lasted two innings. Expectations were for DJ - as soon as his foot stops hurting - to take over 3B from Oswaldo Cabrera. Well, maybe not. Last night, Oswaldo's 2-run HR saved our bacon. His glove his great, and if Oswaldo keeps hitting, LeMahieu might reclaim his natural position, 2B.
That would leave Gleyber - well - eyeballing the land of Hicks and Donaldson.
One other question here:
Must we, as Yankee fans, always need a pariah? At times, I wonder... because someone is always underperforming. I worry that we have a tendency to latch onto that person, even when the team is winning. Of course, Donaldson and Hicks last year had to go. But Hicks made us look exceptionally bad.
It's hard to imagine that Gleyber - at 27 and entering his walk year - is done. But if LeMahieu moves to 2B - as, frankly, he should - Gleyber is about to face an existential crisis. If he's traded for chum, does anyone not think he'll have a resurgence? Either way, the Zone of Death (TM) must end.
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Is Gleyber hurt? His sudden fall into the depths of Palookaville at such a young age seems unlikely if he's completely healthy. What the hell is the new batting coach telling him? Because he looks terrible.
But speaking of castoff Yankees, Setback Sevvy--due any day now for a physical setback of some sort--got some ink in the ESPN Power Rankings:
"The early key to his success has been fastball location. Last year, batters hit .355 and slugged .692 against his four-seamer; so far this season, it's .189 and .226. He's also throwing a two-seamer much more often (17% versus just 3% last year) and the two pitches seem to be working well together."
Why is it so easy to imagine the Yankees' crack pitching coaches saying, "No, stay away from the two-seamer. It just won't work in combination with the four-seamer, so just go with that."
What do you mean by "could be?"
From the Athletic:
"Torres’ ability to make damage contact has decreased since 2022. His barrel rate in 2022 was 10.7 percent, dropped to 7.9 percent last season and is now down to a paltry 2.3 percent this year. His hard-hit rate went from 45.3 percent in 2022 to 31 percent this year.
"Torres ranks in the bottom 15 percentile in xWOBA, xBA, xSLG, barrel rate and hard hit rate. There’s currently nothing in Torres’ profile that would suggest a turnaround is coming."
Sounds like this didn't start just this year.
Nor did The Gleyber's homerless streak, which is now at 52 games and counting. Combine this with his constant inattention on the basepaths and embarrassing bumbles in the field—witness his throw that hit the lead runner and provided Baltimore with an early lead on Tuesday night. All too typical.
As The Estimable Keefe wrote, "One day Gleyber Torres will not be a Yankee, and that will be a happy day."
But Duque raises a good point: what are the chances that Gleyber will "suddenly" blossom elsewhere? Good, I'd say, judging by the Yankees' track record.
As for the pariah stuff...I genuinely think this reflects the weird ineptitude of the Yanks' coaching and training. Players seems to dive so suddenly, for so long, and (seemingly) for so little reason.
Often this means the front office is hiding injuries. Other times, it seems to reflect awful advice from the coaching staff.
But we're never really kept informed. Hence all of this seems inexplicable.
@ Hoss, It's Yankeestronomy, observing tiny lights in the sky through big telescopes, trying to figure out what's going on up there.
We kept sayin' "trade Torres, trade Torres, trade Torres". This management rarely, if ever, trades away underperformers and downward trenders. Everyone who sucks just has to stay until his contract expires. And even then, you can't discount the outrageous possibility that said underperformer will be re-signed to another megadeal.
So after they get Juan Soto, who apparently has a bad rep as a defender, all of a sudden, Soto must play RF. Which means that Judge, who may be injured, has to play CF. And now, all of a sudden, Judge is to play LF. Musical outfield show, once again. Why don't they have all of the position players shift positions on every single pitch? It might confuse the opposition into paralysis.
It could be that Judge's struggles at the plate this year are related to his defensive position changes. Mayhap he's spending too much time concentrating on CF, LF. I think it's all just terrible management. You have a gold glove outfielder who is supposed to be your best hitter, a big time home run hitter. Baseball 101 says you just leave him alone at his original position. Not jerk him around all over the field.
Anyone think that Oswaldo Cabrera's development has anything to do with leaving him alone at 3B? Jerking guys around, making them learn six different position ain't conducive to offensive production. Leave the jerking to the wonderfully talented escorts from Viscount Victoria's Voluptuous Vixens.
Orioles doing a Yankee impression, 3 on, no outs, no runs.
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