Remarkably, we are halfway through the Yankees’ 2024 season. After 81 games there’s too much to comprehensively review and then forecast for the rest of the season, but let’s take a quick look at (what I think are some of) the important take home messages with the information we have.
In no particular order…
I had the Yankees as a 91-92 win team coming into the season, and I still stand by that – they’re a good team, not a great team. The 104-win pace they’ve set thus far got some help from offensive overperformance from several players (Alex Verdugo, Jose Trevino, and Anthony Volpe) who’ve all returned to earth, and as I’ve discussed numerous times, a very fortunate pitching staff.
I based my preseason prediction off my premise that after 82 wins last season, plus seven or eight wins from the additions of Juan Soto and Marcus Stroman, plus some reversal of the comically bad luck at the gods of baseball randomness in 2023 they’d end up with a win total in the low 90s.
The good news? If I’m right, and they play at a 91-win pace for the rest of the season, they’ll finish with 98 wins and likely win the AL East. That’s before any possible trade deadline additions, and therefore an outcome we’ll take 100 times out of 100.
If we’re looking at a half full glass ongoing, we can say that Judge and Soto are one of the best one two punches in the history of the sport, the pitching certainly isn’t going to get worse with the addition of Gerrit Cole (and hopefully a starter at the trade deadline) and expecting some offensive firepower in the second half from Gleyber Torres isn’t unreasonable.
That said, a concern coming into the season was the lineup was very top heavy. “Judge and Soto are monsters and Gleyber is very good but then there’s a lot of head scratching after that” was the position of most reasonable folks. Giancarlo Stanton was mashing baseballs which was huge, but he’s out of the picture at least temporarily, Gleyber underperformed, and Brian Cashman is at the “buy a lottery ticket” stage of filling the first and third base positions.
Barring trade acquisitions, what can be done to turnaround the recent downturn with the current roster?
I’m of the mind that Austin Wells needs more playing time, Jose Trevino less. Wells has been above average defensively (87th percentile in fooling the umpire…whoops…I mean “framing”, and a tick above league average pop time) and although the results haven’t been there offensively, he’s been far from an easy out. Wells’ wxOBA (which believes hard contact is better than weak contact, walks are good, and strikeouts are bad) is better than every Yankee’s except Judge, Soto and Stanton in ’24.
Tell me if you’ve heard this before: The Yankees need a new leadoff hitter. Over the past two and a half months, Volpe has posted a .295 OBP and 92 wRC+ which are both close to his career norms, and both are awful for a leadoff hitter. If it were up to me, Gleyber would lead off. Gleyber at his absolute worst, has almost identical numbers to Volpe over the same stretch (.294 OBP and 89 wRC+) and has a much better back of the baseball card. That said, the smart kids in the room tell me Soto should be leading off which I’d sign off on. “Not Anthony Volpe” is the only correct answer to who should be leading off.
More playing time for Trent Grisham. Grisham is a legit two-time Gold Glove winner at a premium position, and his bat is only negligibly different than Verdugo’s of the course of their careers. Depending on the defensive requirements of whatever field the team is playing on that night, some outfield shuffling can be done, and with Stanton out, Judge and Soto can both get DH at bats as well. There are plenty of ways to figure it out, but I say do it.
Regardless, the second half of the 2024 isn’t going to be boring.
Speaking of Judge…have you read “62: Aaron Judge, the New York Yankees and the Pursuit of Greatness”? If so, let me know. I’ve been eyeing it but haven’t pulled the trigger yet.
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