The Yankees Have Turned into a Walking MASH Unit
As a part of the FanGraphs staff predictions for this season, I picked the Boston Red Sox to win the American League East, and the New York Yankees to pick up a wild card slot. All 32 of us picked the Yankees to make what would be a third consecutive trip to the postseason. And our preseason projections pegged the Bronx Bombers for 99 wins, the best record in baseball, and a whopping 66.4% chance of winning the American League East. The Yankees – on paper, at least – were and are good.
But life, they say, is what happens when you’re busy making other plans. The Yankees have started slowly, yes, but a 2-4 record is hardly alarming when you’re less than a week’s worth of games into a 162-game season. More worrisome is the fact that the Yankees’ injured list is suddenly beginning to resemble an All-Star team in its own right. First, newly extended center fielder Aaron Hicks went from tweaking his back in Spring Training to receiving two cortisone shots to an indefinite injured list stint with a lower back strain. That’s not good, seeing as Hicks is the second most valuable center fielder in the American League since 2017, behind some guy named Mike Trout. Still, the Yankees are deep, and they could plug Brett Gardner into center field without suffering a major catastrophe.
If this had been the team’s only major injury, the team might have been fine, especially on the back of what was projected to be an elite starting rotation. But also-newly-extended ace right hander Luis Severino joined Hicks on the shelf late in Spring Training after suffering rotator cuff inflammation, and isn’t expected back until May. Shoulder problems, including rotator cuff injuries, are notoriously finicky in pitchers, and while there’s no reason to believe Severino’s injury is more serious that we know, we also don’t know how the hard-throwing right-hander will fare after returning from the injury, particularly after not having had a single Spring Training start. With C.C. Sabathia’s farewell tour on hold after offseason heart surgery, the Yankees’ rotation suddenly started to look a little thin.
But no matter. The Yankees still had a fearsome lineup and perhaps the best bullpen ever, right? But then Dellin Betances’ spring training fastball clocked in the high-80s, and it wasn’t long before a shoulder impingement was diagnosed as the cause of his missing velocity. So Betances joined the list of the Yankees’ walking wounded.
Of course, why should the pitching staff have all of the fun? On the same day, two lynchpins of the Yankees’ fearsome lineup – outfield adonis Giancarlo Stanton and sophomore third-sacker Miguel Andujar – both suffered significant, and potentially long-term, injuries. Stanton suffered a left biceps strain whilst swinging and missing in just the team’s third game of the season, and Andujar suffered a small tear of his labrum diving into third base in the same game. By the end of the team’s second series of the year against the Tigers, Troy Tulowitzki had joined the injured list as well with a calf strain.
How bad are the Yankees’ injuries? Right now, including Tulowitzki, New York has 11 players on its injured list; no other team has more than eight. Here’s the complete list, with 2019 Depth Charts projected WAR:
- Miguel Andujar (1.9)
- Dellin Betances (1.1)
- Jacoby Ellsbury (0)
- Didi Gregorius (1.6)
- Ben Heller (0)
- Aaron Hicks (3.2)
- Jordan Montgomery (0.2)
- C.C. Sabathia (1.4)
- Luis Severino (4.1)
- Giancarlo Stanton (4.2)
- Troy Tulowitzki (0.9)
That’s 18.6 projected fWAR on the injured list at one time, which is more than the 2019 projected WAR for the entire Orioles team. That might also be understating the value of these players; they posted a combined 26 WAR in 2018. Some of these injured list placements were expected; after all, both Gregorius and Montgomery are still recovering from Tommy John surgery and aren’t expected back until midseason, and outfielder Ellsbury fell into a temporal vortex and likely will never be heard from again. Still, that’s a contending team’s starting third baseman (Andujar), starting shortstop (Gregorius), the replacement for the injured starting shortstop (Tulowitzki), starting left fielder/designated hitter (Stanton), and starting center fielder (Hicks), along with its No. 1 (Severino) and No. 4 (Sabathia) starters, and primary setup reliever (Betances), all injured at once.
That’s a lot of WAR for any team to lose, even the Yankees, even temporarily; the team is missing the equivalent of one and a half Mike Trouts. So in some ways, it’s a minor miracle that even after losing that much talent, the team is still projected to win 95 games. In fact, owing to the Red Sox’s nightmarish West Coast trip, the Yankees’ odds of winning the division have remained relatively steady since Opening Day, though they have dipped slightly.
The good news is that the Yankees’ pitching staff is well equipped to weather the storm. Johnny Loaisiga and Domingo German have both impressed as replacements for Sabathia and Severino. Even without Betances, a bullpen featuring Adam Ottavino, Zack Britton, and Aroldis Chapman is still fearsome, even if Chad Green has been hittable in the early going. James Paxton and Masahiro Tanaka have been great. Sabathia is expected back before the end of April, with Betances back around the same time. Severino’s return is somewhat murkier, but projected around May or June. In short, the Yankees should still spend the bulk of their season with their pitching at least largely intact.
The larger problem is one you wouldn’t have anticipated going into the season: the offense. And unlike the pitching staff, help isn’t arriving any time soon. Stanton hopes to be back in early May barring a setback, but Andujar is without a timetable and still may require season-ending surgery. All of a sudden, an infield without a place for D.J. LeMahieu to play regularly just a week ago is deploying Tyler Wade as its starting second baseman. Didi Gregorius won’t be back until the second half.
With so many big bats missing, the result is about what you’d expect. The Yankees gave up just six runs in their most recent three-game set against the Detroit Tigers, but scored only five and dropped two out of three. Tuesday, a lineup featuring D.J. LeMahieu batting fifth managed just one run against Jordan Zimmermann; Wednesday, the team struck out 18 times against a Tigers pitching staff that ranked just 24th in pitcher WAR, 25th in FIP, and 26th in strikeout rate in 2018.
The second wild card gives the Yankees a considerable margin for error, as does their depth. It might all prove to be fine. That said, with Tampa Bay, a deep and talented team in its own right, off to a 5-1 start, and the Red Sox healthy, the Yankees might not have the luxury of treading water until their injured players return if their goal is to win the division. Aaron Judge and Gary Sanchez can’t carry the offensive load by themselves, and Greg Bird is himself injury-prone. Clint Frazier is talented, but untested and coming off a concussion that ruined his 2018. Unless the team is willing to use heavy doses of Mike Tauchmann and Tyler Wade moving forward, the Yankees may have no choice but to start looking for offensive help from outside the organization.
Sheryl Ring is a litigation attorney and General Counsel at Open Communities, a non-profit legal aid agency in the Chicago suburbs. You can reach her on twitter at @Ring_Sheryl. The opinions expressed here are solely the author's. This post is intended for informational purposes only and is not intended as legal advice.
And yet, somehow the Yankees lineup still looks more dangerous than the Indians….
The Indians offense is, currently, the worst in MLB by a decent margin. I don’t see it improving much either even with Lindor back in the lineup. Too easy to pitch around.
You need to tune in a Tigers game….
A decent margin? I sure hope not. Not with the drek the Marlins, Giants, and Royals are running out there.
Do all of you no longer consider the Orioles to be an MLB team?
(If so, I won’t blame you)
The crazy thing is, I see a road to having something resembling an MLB offense, thanks to Nunez, Mancini, Villar, Trumbo, and Stewart (if he ever makes his way out of AAA). Yes, I know that their starting SS is a Rule 5 guy, and their starting 1B is Chris Davis, but there is a shot that they will not embarrass themselves.
Their run-prevention, however, will be hilarious, especially since literally any starter that shows a pulse will be gone by the ASG.
To be fair, the Indians offense got off to a horrible start last year as well.
And for some reason, the Indians under Francona have always started slowly:
2018: 24-25, went on to win 91 games
2017: 31-31, went on to win 102 games
2016: 17-17, went on to win 94 games
2015: 11-20, went on to win 81 games
2014: 11-17, went on to win 85 games
2013: 30-33, went on to win 92 games
Obviously, I’ve cherry picked the number of games. But the bottom line is that there’s not a single season under Francona where the Indians have started out like gangbusters. They’ve always started slow and then built momentum throughout the season (or gone on incredible winning streaks out of nowhere).
“…gone on incredible winning streaks out of nowhere.”
Yep. Just gotta wait for the inevitable 20-game stretch against the rest of the completely trash teams in the AL Central.
Definitely cannot tread water to win the division, they would need to be proactive and with the Jays already seeming to be sellers, you gotta think they can make some calls to some teams in similar positions.
But honestly in this weak AL if they could theoretically stay at around .500 or so until July they should get some guys back from injury and still have ammo to make some trades at the deadline and they should still be fine. They could still be fine as they are now, too.
This just really sucks because now everyone and their mother seems to be yelling about them not signing Harpchado and the Cheap Hal narrative is as strong as ever. A great start and you wouldn’t hear their names once but this is the worst possible start from that perspective but I think saying “See they should’ve signed these guys” is not the best reaction to the injuries. It’s been a freakish start but it’s not smart to say this I think.
The Yankees 2019 season thus far: https://www.reddit.com/r/NYYankees/comments/b8mq34/im_terrible_at_editing_but_heres_the_yankees_2019/
Coming out of the offseason, I thought that the Yankees, Red Sox and Indians all left themselves weirdly thin when there were quite a few veterans that had to sign cheap. Could have significantly raised the floor for the inevitable injuries.
I’m really pulling for the Twins to win the central or a wild card. It’s the reverse of where we were 20 years ago. It’s actually refreshing to see a team trying to maximize their win total instead of their dollars per win.
At the start of spring training, the Yankees literally had too many good players – Frazier had no spot, and only one of Bird/Voit could have made the team, for example. Likewise for the rotation and pen.
The team was well equipped to handle multiple injuries (e.g. they could lose both a starting infielder and outfielder and have above-average replacements waiting), but planning (in the sense of having viable, major league players just “waiting” somewhere) for *multiple* injuries in both the infield and outfield is probably not the best use of resources, even for the Yankees. And logistically, I don’t even know how it would work.
Sometime sh*t just happens.
jeez, you just said what i was trying to say in a way too long comment above in a much better way. this is exactly correct
If one of your infielders is Tulo and one of your outfielders is Hicks, then being able to withstand just one injury in the infield and outfield is taking a big risk. Similarly, Paxton, Sabathia, and Severino (given his second half last year) are big injury risks. Stanton was healthy last year, but has a long injury history as well.
I’m not saying they should have signed Harper/Machado, but they could have used better depth. Guys like torreyes (or even drury, *shudder*) from last year.
Torreyes was out of options and not good enough to crack the 25-man roster when everyone’s healthy, so the Yankees traded him for a PTBNL over the winter. There are rules that exist specifically to prevent teams like the Yankees from stockpiling every marginal player.
OK, then I’ll say it. They should have signed either Machado or Harper. I would have preferred Harper.
Harper/Machado plus the roster they already have would be great, because I don’t care about Hal Steinbrenner’s money. But realistically, signing one of those guys would have meant less spending on depth, and if you remove some mix of Gardner, LeMahieu, Britton, Ottovino, and Gonzalez from the current roster, then the current injury plague would still be happening and the fill-ins would be even worse.
LOL – they could have afforded to do all of those things. The only reason signing Harper or Machado would have “meant less spending on depth” would have been a choice not an inevitability.
Sure, but if your argument is “this team would be better if it spent more money,” that’s not really a revelation, because it’s true of every team at all times forever.
Even the Yankees have a budget.
I know, I know, it’s only 6 games. But watching the team this year has been even more painful than last year when we were subjected to Aaron Boone’s “creative” approach to bullpen management (use your best relievers when leading, no matter by how much, and your worst ones when tied or down by 1 or 2 runs) on a daily basis.
They’re the worst defensive team in the majors, and have a wRC+ of -6 (that’s *negative* 6) in high leverage situations.
I know that last year’s team went through a 2 or 3 month stretch where they had something like a .650 OPS with RISP – this year’s team is already doing its best to top that.
Not saying that this is at all indicative of what’s to come – just that watching this offense over the first week, relative to expectations, has been one of the biggest disappointments of my life as a Yankee fan.
Have Bryce Harper or Manny Machado signed yet? Yanks could really use one of those dudes right about now…
This is (1) a good reminder that projections are not destiny, but that (2) it could have been so, so much worse. DJ LeMahieu* and the reliever corps have turned out to be pretty necessary.
*I still think it’s weird the Yankees paid more to get LeMahieu when Lowrie was available, but as it turns out, Lowrie wouldn’t be much help right now either.
Yeah, funny that the Mets and Yanks went with the acquire every decent infielder strategy and immediately needed the seemingly excessive depth by the second week of the season.
Turns out that Troy Tulowitzki hitting the DL is one of the major milestones of statistical significance. The other, of course, being Mike Trout ascending to the top of the WAR leaderboard.
Tulo on the DL is mostly just a sign of the continued existence of the universe. We’re still here, baby!
They had a chance to get help from outside the organization during the off season but chose to shop at the Dollar Store.
This is why I didn’t buy it when some around here lauded their infield depth, even though I usually believe anything positive written about them. A Tulo injury was inevitable, then it only took one piece of misfortune to make Tyler Wade an everyday player.
This rash of injuries has me thinking: what’s the most preferable way to distribute a bunch of injuries like this? Spread out or concentrated? Or, to choose a specific example, if you were the Yankees, would you choose this set of injuries, or injuries to your ten best starting pitchers?
Trust in the cashman.
Playing these early games in the Northeast where the temperatures are commonly in the 40’s is asking for these kinds of injuries. Baseball isn’t the type of sport where the body is kept warm throughout. It is long periods of stasis interrupted by bouts of explosive muscle movements. I’d be surprised if the injuries that Andujar, Stanton, and Tulowitski suffered would have happened during proper baseball weather. …well, maybe not Tulo. He has a penchant for getting hurt in any weather.
I agree in theory, but actually think the opposite about Andujar and Tulo at least – Andujar’s injury seems like the type that is more “impact-related” and could occur in any weather. While Tulo’s may have been less likely in warmer weather.
So are cold-weather football players more injury prone that SoCal and Florida players?
No.
Football is a sport where once you’re warmed up, your body stays warm throughout the game. Baseball is not.
Fwiw, listing 2 injured guys with 0 projected WAR seems like inflation. Plus I question the algorithm that projected 0.9 WAR for the chronically injured Tulo.