Yankees-Youth Baseball in the Bronx 4/23/18

SportsBozos welcomes a new addition to the writing staff, Joey Naps. Naps has been a devout Yankee fan for his entire life growing up near the Great Ball Orchard in the Bronx and offers invaluable New Yorker style insight into the Bronx Bombers.

With the most talked about and feared lineups that the MLB has seen in years, it’s not just the present but the future of the young N.Y. Yankees that the rest of MLB should be worried about.

The 2018 NY Yankees lineup has been one that has broken records, with 3 consecutive games of at least 4 home runs, they are currently on pace for almost 300 homeruns and over 1,000 runs scored. The scary thing is, they will only get better.

Aaron Judge enters his second full season as a major league ball player and is carrying himself as a team leader and veteran. Please remember that he almost didn’t make the team out of spring training in 2017. Once he made it to the show last year, he has not looked back. He hits in the number 2 slot, a spot generally reserved for those hitters that needed to get on base to bring up the power bats. But with a lineup structured the way the Yankee’s lineup is they are all power bats. I could go on all day about Judge’s approach, his power, his surprising speed and his defense but this is about the youth of the team.

Currently the Yankees have three rookies that have played at least 25 games and Holy Cow, have they been impressive! Tyler Austin has thus far played in 27 games and though his average currently sits below .250 he has provided some surprising power leading all MLB rookies in homeruns with 8 and in RBIs with 23. With Greg Bird on the mend not sure what the future holds for Austin but he has been a welcome addition this season.

The question marks entering this season were at the second and third base positions So the Yankees went out and acquired Brandon Drury and Neil Walker, Drury has spent most of the season on the DL and Walker has turned out to be a great role player for a team built on power, but has dealt with his struggles at the plate. This forced the Yankees’ hand as they then had to promote to high level prospects and again no disappointment. Miguel Andujar was brought in to handle the third base responsibilities as Brandon Drury recovered from migraines since joining the team and filling in he has amassed 42 hits including four homeruns and 16 RBIs, good for third of all MLB rookies. His .286 avg. is more than respectable and .483 slugging is nothing to sneeze at.

As Neil Walker struggled, the Yankees decided it was time to bring up their highly touted prospect Gleyber Torres. Torres has been a prospect that fans have heard an awful lot about over the past few years and how much upside he could bring to the team. Even though we have a small sample size to work with (25 games) it’s easy to believe that all the hype might have been an underestimated by the Yankee brass. His 6 homeruns and 18 RBIs are second among all MLB rookies, his .321/.389/.571 split are eye popping especially for a middle infielder.

To recap: these three rookies, rank 1, 2, 3 in both HR and RBIs for first year players. They have handled themselves as professionals and are holding the torch to light the future of the NY Yankees. The future is a bright one and the rest of the league should be scared.

Joey Naps