The New York Yankees have four outfielders that are hurt and/or on the DL, and the season isn’t even a week old.
A month ago at the start of Spring Training, the New York Yankees had a pretty big problem — a good problem. They had a plethora of talented outfielders that they could deploy at any time. Now, just a few games into the season, that outfielder pool has been almost entirely drained.
Rookie outfielder Billy McKinney got his first career start on Friday in Toronto and got another start on Saturday. Unfortunately, he had to leave Saturday’s game in the first inning against the Blue Jays.
With McKinney leaving the game on Saturday that now makes four outfielders that are now hurt and/or on the DL for the Yankees. As of this moment, they have no remaining outfielders on the 40-man roster outside of Brett Gardner, Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton. So should Yankees fans be worried?
The answer is yes and no. Yes, they should be worried because of what I just said. They don’t have any extra primary outfielders left on the 40-man roster. They’re not calling up Estevan Florial despite the outstanding Spring he had, and Jacoby Ellsbury -who’s the closest to returning- isn’t eligible to come off the DL until April 5. Even though he can be activated on the fifth that doesn’t necessarily mean he will. He still has to get the at bats he missed in Spring Training when he was originally hurt.
There is some light at the end of this tunnel though. They have guys on the roster who are versatile enough to play the outfield. Ronald Torreyes, Brandon Drury, Neil Walker and Tyler Austin have all spent some time whether in the minor leagues or the big leagues in the outfield.
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Tyler Wade who has a lot of speed can play the outfield, but probably won’t because as Aaron Boone put it, it wouldn’t be fair to him. Brandon Drury is probably the next man up to play the outfield since he did so as recently as last season.
Whoever the Yankees pick to play some outfield in the even that McKinney has to miss time Yankees fans should be happy that none of these injuries are season enders.