April 23rd, 2021: Torres, LeMahieu, Chapman, Kluber, Taillon, Rotation, Mailbag

For the first time since 2005 and only the 18th time in franchise history, the Yankees have lost 11 of their first 18 games. They needed a win last night to avoid the ninth 6-12 start in franchise history and the first since 1985. Yeesh. Anyway, the Yankees are on pace to go 63-99 with 144 games remaining. To today’s thoughts.

1. Weekly observations. What a month this last week has been. Seriously. The Yankees are somehow boring (because they're struggling to score) and making new headlines every single day. I look forward to the day we can all look back and laugh about April 2021. Hopefully it comes soon. Here’s what I have to say about the last few games.

Gleyber’s jog and missing offense

On the list of things currently wrong with the Yankees, this is near the bottom, but good grief, Gleyber Torres has to run harder on that ground ball in front of the plate Wednesday night. My dudes, this is not okay (GIF via @NewsBronx):

Beyond giving the sports talk radio crowd red meat, you’re playing like garbage, both individually and as a team, and you should give a better effort than that. I’m not asking for a full sprint to first base, just a representative effort. What Torres did was one step up from a Cliff Lee.

"I think anytime you have that kind of situation where the guy has to get off the mound, you better get after it,” Aaron Boone said after the game, adding he planned to speak to Gleyber about the play. “... That's got to be better."

Most hustle down the line is eyewash and that play had no impact on the outcome of the game (had he run hard, Torres would’ve been out by 10 feet instead of 25 feet) but it made Robinson Cano jogging out a routine grounder look like Adam Rosales sprinting around the bases on a home run. My bar for what qualifies as appropriate hustle is low and even that was below it.

Casually jogging out the grounder is not an indictment of Gleyber’s character or anything like that. It’s a struggling player on a struggling team being frustrated on a cold night. Nothing more, nothing less. Torres screwed up, he knows he screwed up, and he owned up to it after the game. Don’t do it again and that’ll be the end of it, as far as I’m concerned.

"It was a check swing and at that moment I really didn't know if it was fair or foul. I didn't see the ball well. I started running late. I feel like I can put a little more effort to run to first base,” Torres said after the game. “... I know what I did and I feel like I can put a little more effort on that play. Tomorrow is another day and I just want to (help the team)."

Torres certainly helped the team last night, picking up three hits. It was his first multi-hit game of the season. Going into last night Gleyber was hitting .226/.338/.323 (91 wRC+) with 10 doubles and three home runs in 228 plate appearances dating back to last year. He hasn’t chased out of the zone (21.3%) or struck out excessively (22.1%). He just hasn’t driven the ball when he makes contact. There have been a lot of weak popups and fly balls lately.

Torres is sporting an 82.8 mph average exit velocity and a 27.3% hard-hit rate, both of which rank in the bottom 10% of baseball. He’s not hitting for power and he’s not getting hits in general because he doesn’t deserve them based on the quality of his contact. Torres is taking too many off-balance swings, like the check swing that produced the weak grounder he didn’t run out.

“I feel like I’m missing too many pitches,” Torres added after Wednesday’s game. “In this situation right now, I want to help my team and I don’t do that when I go to home plate. I feel confident. I’m just working hard before the game to control what I can control. It’s a hard situation right now, but I think it’s part of the game. It’s not how you start, it’s how you finish.”

It wasn’t long ago that Cano, then a 25-year-old All-Star, slogged through a miserable 2008 season that sent everyone into a frenzy, including calls for a trade (remember the Matt Kemp rumors?) and a demotion. Cano bounced back with an eight-year run in which he was one of the 3-5 best players in the world. You have to be patient with young, talented players, otherwise what’s even the point?

Xander Bogaerts had a randomly bad age 24 season in 2017. Carlos Correa did it at age 23 in 2018. That doesn’t make what Torres, now 24, is going through any easier to swallow, but it does happen. Not running out that weak ground ball is an eyesore and nothing more. The bigger problem is he hasn’t been hitting, and with the rest of the team not hitting, the shortcomings are magnified.

(Gleyber went 10-for-23 with two homers, seven walks, and six strikeouts in seven postseason games last year. You needn’t look back far to see the last time he was a dominant hitter, even in a tiny sample.)

LeMahieu rolling over everything

It appears DJ LeMahieu, the one hitter in the lineup who would seem to be virtually slump-proof, forgot his usual right field approach at home in the offseason. Look at his ball in play heat map:

LeMahieu has put 10 balls in play this week and they went ground ball to second, line drive to right, ground ball between short and third, ground ball to short, ground ball to third, ground ball to third, ground ball to third, fly ball to left, line drive to left, line drive to second. His 32.7% pull rate is both lower than the league average (40.4%) and by far the highest of his career.

Like just about everyone else in the lineup, LeMahieu’s exit velocity is down a touch, and he’s putting bad swings on mistake pitches. The story of the season has been getting hittable pitches and doing nothing with them …

• Yankees on pitches in the zone: .238 AVG and .393 SLG (.320 xwOBA)
• MLB average on pitches in the zone: .269 AVG and .469 SLG (.342 xwOBA)

… so much so that even LeMahieu is caught up in it. His strikeouts and swings and misses are up a bit, though nothing alarming at this point in the season, and he is still hitting the ball hard relative to the league average. It’s just that he’s putting a lot of pitches on the ground and toward the left side of the infield. That’s not LeMahieu. He usually wears out right field.

“We’re frustrated. Personally frustrated. Everyone’s frustrated,” LeMahieu said this past weekend. “I think everyone has to look at themselves and continue to get better and not be afraid to make some adjustments. I have a lot of confidence in this lineup. The confidence is not shaken, but we definitely haven’t played the way we’re capable of.”

I worry about LeMahieu less than I worry about anyone else in the lineup because everything about him is so simple and natural. It’s a short, direct swing with basically no excess movement, and I’m confident he’ll get on track soon. Right now though, he’s a bit fouled up at the plate. LeMahieu has been rolling over on a lot of hittable pitches lately.

Chapman’s dominance

Aroldis Chapman has been out of this world good this season. Look at these numbers:

• 23 batters faced and 16 strikeouts (69.6%)
• 26 misses on 50 swings overall (52.0%)
• 9 misses on 10 swings against the splitter (Austin Riley ruined the 100% whiff rate with a foul ball Wednesday)
• 14 straight regular season appearances with multiple strikeouts and no more than four batters faced
• 2 non-strikeout outs (Cavan Biggio flew out and Guillermo Heredia popped up)

“(The success) goes to how comfortable I feel using the split,” Chapman said earlier this week. “I can't say that I'm completely surprised by the reaction of the hitters, but I am extremely happy with the results. I think it's about using it in specific counts and certain situations. It's something that I worked on a lot, so I’m comfortable with the pitch and definitely happy with the results.”

I wish Boone would use Chapman a little more often -- the ninth inning Sunday would’ve been perfect (keep the deficit at one, off-day Monday, etc.) -- though that’s easier said than done. The bullpen in general has been great this year and Chapman looks as dominant as he’s looked at any point as a Yankee. His velocity is up a tick and the splitter is so, so good.

Kluber & Taillon

Corey Kluber and Jameson Taillon have identical 5.40 ERAs but they look very different to me. One is trending up and the other leaves you squinting your eyes looking for positives. In his best start as a Yankee the other day, Kluber walked twice as many batters as he struck out, got six swings and misses among 90 pitches, and ran out of gas in the fifth inning. Blah.

That isn’t to say we can’t take positives from Kluber’s outing. He did induce a lot of weak contact (83.1 mph average exit velocity), and when he missed his spot, he missed more out of the zone than out over the plate. Kluber still misses his spot a lot -- A LOT -- though, and he doesn’t miss by a few inches. He misses by the full width of the plate. At least we're kinda sorta starting to see some progress.

“If you are trying to look at the whole picture, I think there is a lot of good in the first four innings,” Kluber said after the game. “As frustrated as I am with some of the results -- free passes and things like that -- I do honestly feel like I’m moving in the right direction. Things are really close to being at the point I’d like to be. Just wish it would arrive a little bit sooner.”

Compared to Kluber, Taillon is taking more than baby steps. Hitters do not look comfortable in the box against him the way they do Kluber, and Taillon has shown the ability to beat hitters in the strike zone. Not consistently yet, but often enough that you can sense he’s not too far away from putting together truly dominant outings start to finish. He’s getting closer.

“What I was most excited about was the stuff I worked on in between the outings showed up today,” Taillon told Greg Joyce earlier this week. “I thought we had a good idea of where the top of the zone was. I threw way more curveballs. We got that pitch really involved in the game plan … If I can keep doing that for 30 starts or whatever that number is, I think we’ll be in a really good place going forward.”

Taillon owns a 32.8% whiffs-per-swing rate on his four-seamer, a top 10 mark in baseball and on par with guys like Chapman (33.3%) and Tyler Glasnow (33.6%), and he’s not walking anyone (3.5%). His velocity is gradually ticking up too. There have been a few 96s the last two times out. Marcell Ozuna is great hitter and Taillon overpowered him here (GIF via YES Network):

For a guy coming off his second career Tommy John surgery, Taillon looks better than I would have ever reasonably hoped. He looks like a pitcher who, as long as he stays healthy and is able to get stretched out to 100 pitches, can be a worthy No. 2 postseason starter behind Gerrit Cole. If he settles in a fierce two times through the lineup guy, that’s cool too.

The Yankees are being very careful with Taillon early on and I get it completely, and I am totally cool with it. The early returns are very promising and it's an arm worth protecting. The ingredients for Taillon to be a legitimately above-average starter, possibly even dominant, are there and will hopefully show up more as he gets deeper into the season.

Kluber, meanwhile, looks like a 35-year-old coming off a major injury. His stuff has been okay and he needs to be fine with it to have success, and he hasn’t done that enough yet. Hopefully those first four innings Thursday were a sign he’s beginning to turn the corner. With Taillon, I feel the corner has already been turned. It’s just a matter of getting built up.

“I’ve loved what I’ve seen, frankly. Really, the whole way,” Boone told Joyce following Taillon’s start Tuesday. “I really feel like this is what we’ve been seeing and it’s been building a little more and more each time. I’m pretty pleased with where he’s at in his buildup and his progress.”

Nelson is getting too much responsibility

For the second time this week I have to say I like Nick Nelson, he’s got a pretty good arm, but he’s getting too much responsibility in the early going. He shouldn’t have been used as an opener last Friday and he certainly shouldn’t have been brought in to face the middle of the order with the bases loaded Wednesday. I mean, what was that?

“Once they got to Ozuna there, being in the fifth inning there, I knew it was Nelson I wanted to go to because I knew we would have to get a little bit of length and not just run to our high leverage guys that early again tonight,” Boone said after the game, seemingly unaware he can use a high leverage reliever to get that big out, then go to Nelson to start the next inning fresh.

With the offense struggling so much, limiting the damage has to be a top priority. If that means using Darren O’Day to get one out with the bases loaded in the fifth inning to keep a 1-0 deficit a 1-0 deficit, so be it. Nelson walked in an insurance run, and normally a 2-0 deficit wouldn’t be insurmountable, but has been lately. That second run was deflating.

Nelson now is what Jonathan Loaisiga was in 2019. A second year pitcher with a live arm who has yet to show consistency, and shouldn’t get important innings as long as better options are available. Little things like Nelson allowing an insurance run are easier to overlook when the offense is putting runs on the board. Lately it’s been contributing to losses.

The numbers on a struggling offense

Had you asked me to rank all the things that could potentially contribute to the Yankees losing 11 of their first 18 games before the season, I would’ve said:

1. Injuries.
2. The non-Gerrit Cole starters are trash.
3. The bullpen is unexpectedly bad.
…
957. Almost everyone is healthy but no one is hitting.

I wonder what kinda odds I could’ve gotten on the Yankees being dead last in slugging percentage on April 23rd? Probably could’ve made some money there. The numbers to date are staggering. This is worse than even the most pessimistic projections (includes last night):

• AVG: .206 (29th, Cubs are 30th at .200)
• OBP: .301 (23rd)
• SLG: .330 (30th, Rangers are 29th at .349!)
• wRC+: 84 (26th)
• HR: 17 (26th)
• Runs per game: 3.61 (25th)

In the last nine games the Yankees have scored 3, 3, 4, 2, 3, 2, 3, 1, and 6 runs. In the last nine games they have recorded 4, 8, 6, 3, 5, 3, 5, 5, and 11 hits. Not a single starting position player has been pulling their weight. Literally everyone 1-9 is underperforming. The lineup last night:

The Yankees haven’t been just bad through 18 games. They’ve been bad and boring, and that’s the worst kind of bad. I would rather watch a good hitting/bad pitching team over a bad hitting/good pitching team every day of the week, no questions asked, and right now the Yankees are the latter. The pitching has been so good overall (3.39 ERA and 3.59 FIP)! And it’s been going to waste too often.

“If I knew (how to fix it), I would tell the whole team, but it just seems like we’re putting a lot of pressure on ourselves. Probably too much pressure,” LeMahieu said last weekend. “Nothing relaxes you more than results. You can say, ‘Don’t worry about the results, worry about how you go about it,’ and that’s all good until you face a bunch of adversity. Then you try even harder to get results.”

Aaron Judge added: “I think it’s kind of the same thing as ‘hitting is contagious.’ When one guy gets a hit, you kind of feed off that, and you can kind of get rolling. Sometimes when nobody’s getting hits, you kind of feed off of that, too. You can just kind of see it from the very get-go. Somebody doesn’t get the job done their first at-bat, you can sometimes see people carrying it over to their next at-bat or on defense or stuff like that. So I think it’s really just about -- even me, personally -- forgetting about, if I go up there, my first at-bat, I don’t get the job done, hey, forget it. Now, what can I do? What can I do in the dugout to help the team?”

Without explicitly saying it, Judge and LeMahieu indicated there has been a snowball effect and it sure does seem like everyone has been going up to the plate trying to hit a five-run home run. We’ve all seen one or two players going through it at a time. But an entire lineup? The Yankees look like they’re simultaneously trying too hard and not hard enough*. It’s remarkable.

* I say that only because every team looks like they’re not trying or are disinterested when they’re struggling. That’s not unique to the Yankees. No team looks lively when they’re losing.

Hopefully last night’s win and offensive breakout (“breakout”) gets the Yankees moving in the right direction, because there’s really nothing they can do other than wait for their hitters, almost all of whom are in or approaching their prime, to perform up to expectations. The season will get on track when that happens and not a second sooner.

2. The upcoming rotation. Domingo German rejoined the rotation last night and was fine. He gave up a lot of hard contact (nine balls over 95 mph) but settled down after a rocky first inning. The Yankees didn’t need a fifth starter until tomorrow, so starting German last night gave the other starters extra rest. The Yankees have done a good job taking advantage of the schedule to give their guys extra rest in the early going. It’s one of the few things going right.

The Yankees are three games into a 13 games in 13 days stretch and they are planning to use a spot starter Sunday (Sunday’s starter is currently listed as TBA) to give everyone an extra day. It will be Deivi Garcia*. Either that, or the Yankees are going with a bullpen game that day, and I can’t see it. (Mike King is not eligible to come up until Tuesday because of the 10-day rule.)

* Man on the scene Conor Foley says Garcia threw five innings and 85 pitches at the alternate site Monday. He’ll be on an extra day of rest Sunday.

Only twice in 18 games has a starter pitched on normal rest (Gerrit Cole on April 6th and Corey Kluber on April 14th) as the Yankees ease everyone in after the short 2020 season. They could go with this rotation the next nine days to continue giving everyone extra rest (Montgomery and Cole are the confirmed starters the next two days, everything after that is my speculation):

• Fri., April 23rd at Cleveland: Jordan Montgomery (with an extra day of rest)
• Sat., April 24th at Cleveland: Gerrit Cole (with an extra day of rest)
• Sun., April 25th at Cleveland: Deivi Garcia (send down Nick Nelson to clear room?)
• Mon., April 26th at Orioles: Jameson Taillon (with an extra day of rest)
• Tues., April 27th at Orioles: Corey Kluber (with an extra day of rest)
• Weds., April 28th at Orioles: Domingo German (with an extra day of rest)
• Thurs., April 29th at Orioles: Jordan Montgomery (with an extra day of rest)
• Fri., April 30th vs. Tigers: Gerrit Cole (with an extra day of rest)
• Sat., May 1st vs. Tigers: Mike King (send down Garcia to clear room)
• Sun., May 2nd vs. Tigers: Jameson Taillon (with an extra day of rest)
• Mon., May 3rd: OFF

Garcia would not stay on the active roster between April 26th and May 1st. The Yankees would send him down following his start and call up a reliever for a few days, then send that reliever down when King is recalled. Jay Bruce’s retirement opened a 40-man roster spot, so that reliever could be anyone (I'm not sure who's on the road trip taxi squad though).

My thinking is the Yankees don’t want Taillon starting on normal rest just yet, so they’ll insert another spot starter at some point between April 27th and May 1st. May 1st makes the most sense. Use the spot starter on, say, April 28th, then you have German, Montgomery, and Cole pitching with two extra days of rest from April 29th to May 1st. That’s a little much.

May 1st is the best date for that spot starter because it keeps everyone on close to a normal schedule. If they want, the Yankees could even send German down following that April 28th start because they wouldn’t need their fifth starter until May 8th, and Garcia would be eligible to be recalled that day (or they could just start King again). Fifth starter musical chairs, basically.

The Yankees essentially have three fifth starters with Garcia, German, and King. They can all be shuttled back and forth between MLB and the alternate site too, giving the Yankees a good deal of flexibility. They’re taking advantage of it too. I’m pleased with the way they’re using their depth to spread the workload around early. Of all the things going wrong with the Yankees these first three weeks, the pitching workload isn’t one of them.

3. 2021 draft prospect: New York HS C Joe Mack. The 2021 MLB Draft will take place during the All-Star break and J.J. Cooper (subs. req’d) reports MLB has informed teams the draft will be 20 rounds, the minimum number allowed under last year’s March agreement. The Yankees hold the No. 20 pick. Here is our 2021 draft prospect coverage archive.

Mack, 18, is from East Amherst up near Buffalo. His high school did not play any games prior to the pandemic last spring but teams did get eyes on him in summer showcase events, where he performed well against high-level competition. Mack’s brother Charles was a sixth round pick in 2018 and is currently a Twins minor leaguer.

MLB.com ranks Mack the No. 18 prospect in the draft class and Baseball America (subs. req’d) has him at No. 23. Here’s some video and here’s a piece of MLB.com’s write-up:

Mack has the chance to be an impact player on both sides of the ball. The left-handed hitter has the chance to be an above-average hitter, showing off an advanced approach all summer with an impressive ability to pick up base hits with two strikes. He has more alley-to-alley gap power, but he has the strength and bat speed that point to at least average power in the future. While speed isn’t a part of his game, he’s far from a clogger and runs well for a catcher.

All summer, Mack showed off plus pop times to second base, consistently under 1.9 seconds. He’ll need to keep working on his overall defensive game, but given his baseball awareness, there’s little question he’ll be at least a solid average receiver

A few weeks ago I noted high school catchers have a terrible track record in pro ball. Only nine high school catchers have amassed at least +5 WAR the last two decades and only six of the nine did so as catchers. Only two of the six had significant careers (Joe Mauer and Brian McCann). It is a demographic with a terrible hit rate, historically.

The Yankees have had a little success with high school catchers though. Austin Romine is in his 10th big league season, Kyle Higashioka is a legitimate MLB backup, John Ryan Murphy became a tradable asset, and there’s Greg Bird too. He was a high school catcher who moved to first base because of a back injury (though not many thought he’d catch long-term).

Three years ago the Yankees selected Anthony Seigler, another high school catcher, in the first round because he had a unique skill set as an extremely athletic backstop with good defensive chops and bat-to-ball skills. Mack is somewhat similar based on the scouting report. He projects to stay at catcher and his lefty swing points to offensive upside.

The Yankees typically gravitate to hit over power prospects in the first round (Aaron Judge is a notable exemption, though they took him in a year they had three first round picks) and it seems the thinking is power is difficult to project because the ball is constantly changing, so focus on players who can make consistent contact, and hope the power arrives at some point.

Even with the high school catcher risk, Mack is one of my favorite prospects in the draft class, and the Yankees typically gravitate toward athletic up the middle players with a chance to really, really hit. Taking a catcher in the first round for the third time in four years (Seigler in 2018 and Austin Wells in 2020) won’t be a dealbreaker. Take the best player and sort ‘em out later.

4. Rapid fire thoughts. Luke Voit (knee) is heading to Scranton early next week to start hitting and thank goodness for that. He alone won’t cure what ails the offense, but the Yankees need all the help they can get. The Yankees haven’t given a firm timetable for Voit’s return but I’m guessing he’s still 3-4 weeks out. The important thing is he’s progressing well following surgery … Jeff Passan reports MLB and the MLBPA recently started negotiations for the next Collective Bargaining Agreement. Cubs player rep Ian Happ told Bruce Levine the two sides are explaining where they stand and no proposals have been made yet. These talks typically begin the offseason prior to the CBA expiring (it expires Dec. 1st), but MLB and the MLBPA a) had to focus on pandemic issues this past offseason, and b) really don’t like each other. We are closer to a work stoppage than any point since 1994 but my foolishly optimistic prediction is the two sides will get a deal done because no one wants to shut the sport down again (and forfeit more money) so soon after last year’s shutdown. That doesn’t mean they’ll hug and sing Kumbaya. There will be leaks and public jabs galore, but they’ll get a deal done. Expanded postseason, universal DH, something to reduce or eliminate service time manipulation, an international draft, and a draft lottery will be part of the next CBA, is my guess … And finally, the Nationals are 7-9 with a -20 run differential, and they’re currently without Juan Soto (shoulder), Stephen Strasburg (shoulder), Jon Lester (COVID-19), and a handful of others. Need them to keep this up so Max Scherzer hits the trade market. Ideally, Scherzer will come out and say he’ll only waive his no-trade protection to join the Yankees and crush Washington’s leverage. Would be cool. Might as well ask about Soto too. Worst that can happen is they say no, right? (Of course, with the way the Yankees have been playing, we might be a few weeks away from the Nationals asking about Gerrit Cole.)

Mailbag Questions of the Week

Joe asks: Is it fair to start thinking if Boone is the right guy for the job? This is less a reaction to 5-10 and moreso due to trends we’ve seen throughout his tenure with this team - lackadaisical play, lack of fundamentals, lapses in concentration on the field and base paths. He simply doesn’t seem to be maximizing the talent on this team. It’s up and down the roster across multiple years.

It’s not unfair. Ultimately, it’s difficult to properly assign blame (it starts with the players to me, no questions asked), and Aaron Boone is only starting the rotation he’s given and filling out the lineup with the players on the roster, and even then he’s not the only guy calling the shots. He didn’t decide to use Nick Nelson as an opener last Friday on his own, for example.

Joe is correct though. The sloppy play has been a constant since Boone took over, and it was easy to chalk that up to a young roster making youthful mistakes early in his tenure. The young players are veterans now and it hasn’t improved. If anything, it’s gotten worse. And, not for nothing, much of the young core has plateaued or gone backwards the last few years.

Maybe that’s not on Boone. He is the manager though and it reflects poorly on him. The Yankees hired him because they thought he was the right man to help these young players take another step and become a juggernaut, and that hasn’t happened. The Yankees have been really good the last few years! But it would be wrong to say it’s gone smoothly.

I think Boone is below average strategically, though so many moves (this reliever will face that hitter, etc.) are scripted ahead of time these days. He’s not shooting from the hip in the dugout, you know? But, when the Yankees play the Rays and Kevin Cash constantly puts his players in positions to succeed in a way Boone does not, it’s hard not to notice.

Boone’s contract is up after the season and I don’t think he’s going anywhere. It would probably take a disastrous season for the Yankees to move on, and I don’t mean 84-78. I mean 65-97 or something like that. I think it’s more likely Boone gets replaced because he asks for too much money than performance reasons, to be honest.

Hal Steinbrenner and Brian Cashman love Boone and I don’t think they’re cutting bait after one bad season (which might not be anything more than a bad start). I’m sure he has his strengths as a manager behind the scenes, but the public facing portion of his job (strategic decisions, saying one thing and doing another, etc.) leave a lot to be desired.

Seth asks: I know it's an insane thing to even bring up but Gleyber has been so lost at the plate and equally lost in the field, would it be the craziest idea to send him down? Bring up Tyler Wade, sure up the defense and try to get Gleyber to figure out his game at the alternate site. Hopefully it could be like when they sent down Chad Green, worked on a few things and then came back to the Bronx back to his normal self in a couple weeks. Clearly whatever he's doing now is not working. Am I crazy for considering this?

Seth was ahead of his time. He sent this question in Tuesday, the day before Gleyber Torres didn’t run out the ground ball and everyone went all “time to send him down!” crazy.

I wouldn’t say Seth is crazy. Just a little misguided. It’s been three weeks! Three bad weeks, but not three “this guy looks like he completely forgot how to play baseball” weeks. I am concerned about Torres becoming a singles hitter. I’d like to know why he isn’t driving the ball. The swing decisions are generally good though. His four MLB seasons:

• 2018: 29.2% chase rate and 68.2% in-zone swing rate
• 2019: 31.0% and 74.7%
• 2020: 21.0% and 68.2%
• 2021: 21.3% and 66.9%
  (MLB averages: 26.0% and 65.6%)

Gleyber isn’t hacking at everything Javy Baez-style. I feel like he’s in control of his at-bats more often than not. There just hasn’t been enough hard contact. The defense at short isn’t good but it’s been better of late, no? There were several high-profile mistakes the first week and, unless I’m forgetting something, nothing egregious the last two weeks. He’s settled down in the field.

It’s one thing to sit Clint Frazier in favor of a veteran like Brett Gardner. Sending Torres down so you can play Tyler Wade or Kyle Holder or Gio Urshela at short though? Nah. Also, there’s nowhere to send Gleyber either. He’d have to go to the alternate site and play Phillies alternate-siters three times a week. Doesn’t seem like a great place to work through a slump.

The Yankees could demote Torres to “send a message” to the other players, though that’s not really a thing that happens. Sending a message is something outsiders talk about. The Yankees have been getting booed since Opening Day, the fans openly revolted, and Aaron Boone chewed the team out last week. If they didn’t get the message after all that, they’re not getting it after demoting a key regular.

As poorly as he’s playing this year, Gleyber is the Yankees’ best option at shortstop and I don’t think it’s even close. What that says about roster construction is another matter entirely, but he’s the best option. The Yankees can either work with Torres and try to get him right, or hope for a miracle from a lesser player. The latter is not a thing smart teams do.

My hunch is Seth sent his question in out of frustration and I get it. I’ve worked through a few Aaron Hicks trades in my head the last few days. After the weird 60-game season, I think we need some time to recalibrate our perspective back to 162 games. Three bad weeks shouldn’t be enough to land an established MLB player in the minors.

Anonymous asks: Very early I know but I do not feel this team is a World Series contender.  Far worse (for me), they are just not fun to watch and haven't been since last season.  If (very big if) they feel they need to make major changes, what do you think something like that would look like?

There’s not much the Yankees can do to shake things up right now. Their internal options are limited and April trades are rare. I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for Aaron Boone or a coach to get fired (the Yankees have not made an in-season managerial change since 1990 and I don’t see that changing now), so yeah, not much they can do.

What the Yankees can do is build a more functional roster. Jay Bruce’s retirement allowed the Yankees to call up Mike Ford*, an actual first baseman. He’s not Mark Teixeira but he is their best option defensively (it's nice having someone who can make a scoop no?). Other small moves they can make to build a more functional roster:

Replace Rougned Odor with Tyler Wade. Odor had his weekly “good game to save his roster spot” game last night. He’s pretty bad though and has no versatility. Wade is also pretty bad! But he’s a better defender than Odor and he can play the three non-first base infield positions. At a minimum, he gives the Yankees a proper backup shortstop without sacrificing much (any?) offense. You can also leverage his speed as a pinch-runner.

Replace Nick Nelson with Mike King. I went through the possible upcoming rotation earlier in this post, so this isn’t a simple one-for-one swap. King may have to make a spot start soon. That said, King is a better pitcher than Nelson, so when the time comes and the Yankees can set their roster a bit more permanently, he should be in the bullpen. We’ll see Nelson again later this year. It is inevitable. For now, King is the better option.

Replace Mike Tauchman with Derek Dietrich. It’s probably time we talk about Tauchman’s spot on the roster, huh? He is redundant with Brett Gardner and doesn’t bring anything to the table the Yankees don’t already have. Gardner (and Wade) can pinch-run and Gardner can be the defensive replacement/spot starter in the outfield.

Brian Cashman has said several times that he gets a lot of calls about Tauchman, so it might be time to cash him in as a trade chip (not that I think he’s fetching a huge return). The risk is you trade Tauchman and lose an outfielder to injury at some point, but you deal with that when the time comes. (Can’t Estevan Florial do the pinch-runner/defensive replacement thing in a pinch?)

Replace Tauchman with Dietrich and you get more power, something the Yankees have weirdly lacked this year (Dietrich will put a mistake in the seats and get hit by enough pitches to post a respectable OBP) and more versatility. He’s played plenty of first, second, third, and left field in his career. Dietrich brings more to the roster than Tauchman at this point, no?

The downside with Dietrich, Gardner, Wade, and Kyle Higashioka on a four-man bench is no righty bat to pinch-hit for Ford, unless you’re willing to regularly burn your backup catcher as a pinch-hitter (almost no team will do that). It’s not ideal, but so be it. I think that’s the best bench the Yankees can build right now. It won’t fix everything, but it’s a step in the right direction.

* It is truly bonkers the Yankees chose Bruce, who was so bad he retired two weeks into the season, over Ford coming out of Spring Training, then called up Ford and batted him *cleanup* three days later. Is Ford good enough to bat cleanup or not good enough to get the nod over Bruce? He’s somehow been both this month.

John asks: Do the Yankees have the lowest BABIP in baseball on balls that register as hard hit?

It feels like it, no? Giancarlo Stanton hit a 117.3 mph line drive with an .840 expected batting average Wednesday night and Marcell Ozuna -- Marcell Ozuna! -- ran it down. Here’s the video. When stuff like that happens, I can’t do anything but laugh. Stanton should be less strong and start dunking those rockets in front of outfielders for bloop singles, I guess.

Anyway, yes, the Yankees do have one of the lowest BABIPs on hard-hit balls this year. Statcast defines a hard-hit ball as anything with a 95 mph exit velocity or higher, and the league average on hard-hit balls is a .412 BABIP (.488 AVG and .981 SLG). Here’s the bottom of the leaderboard going into yesterday’s games:

1. Cubs: .320 BABIP
2. Cleveland: .321 BABIP
3. Padres: .363 BABIP
4. Athletics: .375 BABIP
5. Astros: .376 BABIP
6. Braves: .381 BABIP
7. Phillies: .389 BABIP
8. Yankees: .390 BABIP

Pretty huge gap between the bottom two teams and everyone else. Rough luck on hard-hit balls for the Cubbies and Cleveland so far. On the other end of the spectrum, the Marlins lead the way with a .527 BABIP (!) on hard-hit balls this year. The Red Sox are a distant second at .494 and no other team is over .480.

The Yankees are still below the league average when you break it down by batted ball type. They have a .339 BABIP on hard-hit ground balls (.355 league average) and a .434 BABIP on hard-hit fly balls and line drives (.458 league average). The Yankees have some of the biggest gaps between actual performance and expected performance on hard-hit balls:

• Batting average: .458 actual vs. .546 expected (third biggest gap)
• Slugging percentage: .876 actual vs. 1.092 expected (third biggest gap)
• wOBA: .569 actual vs. .680 expected (third biggest gap)

Once upon a time we’d look at these numbers and say the Yankees are unlucky, though that’s an oversimplification. Some guys on the roster are easy to defend (Gary Sanchez pulls most balls in play, Stanton still has a 58.3% ground ball rate, etc.) and that has contributed to the low BABIP on hard-hit balls. You can more easily align your defense against them.

You’re never truly as bad as you look when you’re playing your worst and never truly as good as you look when you’re playing your best, and thank goodness for that, because the Yankees look awful right now. Some of those hard-hit balls will find holes eventually, and soon some poor pitching staff will wear it when the regulars get on track and all the regression happens at once.

(Send your requests for Tuesday's random Yankee series and questions for Friday's mailbag to RABmailbag at gmail dot com.)