The New York Yankees, when healthy, should have one of the better offenses in Major League Baseball.
It’s unfortunate that the Yankees have been playing at this level offensively over the past few months without Aaron Judge, but it’s also important to remember that other players have been hurt.
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That includes slugger Giancarlo Stanton, one of the better offensive players in Major League Baseball when he’s healthy. The biggest problem with Stanton is that he hasn’t been healthy for a lot of his career.
Some are starting to wonder what the Yankees will do with Stanton when he comes back. It remains uncertain when that’s even going to be at this point, considering what we’ve seen him go through during his career, but the Yankees obviously have something to figure out.
According to one writer, it’s very possible that Stanton might not even get the type of at-bats that we expect him to when guys are good to go.
“As for the lineup? If everyone stays healthy, it sure seems as if Stanton may be a platoon player when he gets back,” Greg Joyce noted, H/T Heavy.
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“Because realistically, between first base and DH, there are only two spots for Stanton, (Paul) Goldschmidt, Ben Rice and Luis García Jr., so how does Aaron Boone divvy up that playing time? “García may turn into a starter only against righties while Goldschmidt should only start against lefties, but how does Boone decide between Stanton and Goldschmidt in those spots if Rice keeps playing every day? And can Stanton get his rhythm/timing back after a four-month layoff if he is not playing every day?”
In this scenario, everybody on the Yankees would be healthy, which, unfortunately, we’ve seen hasn’t been the case in recent years. This would be a good problem for the Yankees to have, but I have to disagree with Joyce a bit here. It doesn’t ever feel like the Yankees are going to platoon Stanton unless they believe he isn’t one of the best nine players day in and day out.
That would be almost ridiculous.
