You Can't Fake Prime Age Talent

Aaron Boone Can't Fix the Core Yankees Problem

The Yankees lost both games to the Mets, including a horrific Game 2. The team shows no real signs of pulling out of the dive it entered a month and a half ago. I’m seeing a lot of Yankee fans on social media calling for Aaron Boone to be fired.

I’m not Boone’s biggest fan. Some of his lineup decisions have been puzzling with little logic. But I don’t think the current Yankees predicament is remotely his fault. His puzzling decisions are mostly all shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic. He has no good options.

The core problem of the 2024 Yankees is that the players on the roster just aren’t that good. Everything else is just a distraction.

This image was going around on Twitter today:

I couldn’t think of a clearer distillation of the current problem on the roster. Yankee cleanup hitters have an absolutely pitiful OPS of .586 in 2024, last in the major leagues by a mile. Teams have finally wised up to how bad the Yankees lineup has been after Judge and Soto and started giving Judge the Barry Bonds treatment.

The problems don’t stop at leadoff. Here are where the Yankees stand in wRC+ by lineup position:

• 1st: 28th

• 2nd: 1st

• 3rd : 1st

• 4th: 30th

• 5th: 10th

• 6th: 5th

• 7th: 7th

• 8th: 23rd

• 9th: 7th

These ranks are a fascinating distribution. The worst Yankees hitters are well above average compared to the worst hitters on other teams. MLB hitters are struggling, so getting a .263/.348/.389 batting line out of your 7th hole counts as pretty great in 2024. Only the 8th spot is a below average at the bottom of the lineup.

Leadoff and cleanup, the key players surrounding Soto and Judge, are an utter disaster. Yankee leadoff hitters, mostly Volpe and Rice, have hit .222/.278/.354. Yankee cleanup hitters, mostly Verdugo, are somehow worse, hitting .203/.263/.323.

All of this is to say that Brian Cashman has been able to assemble a roster of passable below average hitters, Judge and Soto, and not a lot in between.***

***I’m ready to declare Austin Wells as the third good hitter, but he’s still slugging under .400.

Maybe there’s a universe where two or three more good hitters emerged from the Yankees roster. Most of them have done it before - Anthony Rizzo, DJ LeMahieu and Giancarlo Stanton have all been well above average hitters in the recent past. Alex Verdugo and Gleyber Torres are younger than that group, and both have a solid track record of being at least average at the plate. Volpe has unrealized potential as a hitter.

But all of them also came into the 2024 season with flaws. The old guys were running on fumes. None were good over the course of the 2023 season. The young guys were flawed; Verdugo has always had a low ceiling as a hitter, and Torres has been prone to awful slumps. It is not surprising that all of them have been bad or injured in 2024.

We can contrast the middle part of the Yankee lineup with the Orioles. Jordan Westburg is 25 years old with a .815 OPS. Coltor Cowser is 24 with a .740 OPS. Ryan Mountcastle is 27 with a .744 OPS. Ryan O’Hearn is 30 with a .816 OPS. These guys aren’t stars, but they are solid above average MLB hitters. They collectively provide a ton of support for the elite players at the Orioles’ core. If you walk Gunnar Henderson and Anthony Santander, you may get punished. If those guys are in a short slump, the team has secondary scoring that can win some games on their own. They’re a healthy group, because players in their 20s are less injury prone.

There’s no reason why the Yankees can’t assemble a similar group of mid-ranged young hitters. Of this group, only Cowser was a high draft pick. But, they don’t. Brian Cashman assembles thin rosters full of old, injury prone players who have seen their best days. Then, he acts shocked when most of his bets don’t work out or half the roster ends up on the IL by mid season.

Maybe Aaron Boone deserves to be fired, but he’s not the core problem. He can’t fix a lack of talent. Only the GM can do that, but Brian Cashman now has a long record of failing to fill out a roster. He needs to go.