Is April 11th too early to start questioning the moves the Yankees made in the off-season? If not, is three games too soon to send mixed signals to a player who should be an integral part of your season? Does anyone really need a day off by Game 4?
While the Yankees were impressive over the weekend, taking 2 of 3 from the rival Red Sox, the opening week of the season provides no respite. Ahead of tonight's game against Toronto, manager Aaron Boone released the following lineup:
Worth noting are two items highlighted in red. The first has D.J. LeMahieu leading off, supplanting this weekend's lead-off hitter, Josh Donaldson. It was an interesting choice, using the power-hitting Donaldson as a lead-off batter. LeMahieu, on the other hand, has been used primarily as the #1 batter in the lineup so that makes sense. That said, does Donaldson need a day off already, against his former team, no less?
More puzzling, perhaps, is the insertion of utility-man Marwin Gonzalez at shortstop. Gonzalez played well in the spring, and certainly deserves an opportunity to play. Unfortunately, Gonzalez sees the field at the direct expense of the new Yankees shortstop, Isiah Kiner-Falefa.
Perhaps I'm reading into this too much, but a 3-game sample size is a bit small to be sending a vote of no-confidence to your (ostensibly) starting shortstop. Kiner-Falefa wasn't great against Boston, managing only a single hit in 11 at-bats. But that's hardly worth a trip to the bench in Week 1 of a very long baseball season.
Back to Donaldson. Day off or otherwise, with Donaldson out of the lineup, it underscores the very basic problem with the makeup of the 2022 Yankees: they have lots of guys at DH. Whether it's Stanton, an adventure in the outfield, or LeMahieu, a man without a position, or Donaldson, a 3B by trade but not necessarily in practice, Boone must play a daily game of musical chairs with his lineup.
One vitally important note about that practice, that even the most novice fantasy baseball players can tell you: if you have a guy who isn't in the lineup every day, there's probably a better player somewhere else who could take his place. (I don't see Juan Soto sitting out too many games for Yadiel Hernandez.) While it affords Boone some flexibility to have super-subs like LeMaheiu and Gonzalez to deploy on a nightly basis, it also means that someone else is NOT going to play. On certain nights, with Stanton in the outfield, or with Kiner-Falefa out of the lineup, the Yankee defense may suffer.
Baseball is great because over the course of 162 games, any and all conjectures will either be borne out or disproven. Statistics will ultimately write the story: games played, runs produced, games won. Yet even then, the post-season awaits those teams good enough to qualify. And as is often the case, a team built to withstand 162 games -- malleable lineups, with subs available up and down -- is not necessarily the team built to win a short playoff series. But we'll have to wait until October before we start complaining about that.
