4 Moves The Yankees Should Make To Stem Early Slump

 

Photo: Jim McIsaac

1. DFA Jay Bruce

When Luke Voit went down in late spring training, the Yankees had to find a quick replacement that could start on Opening Day. Enter Jay Bruce, whom Aaron Boone selected over previous backup Mike Ford. The team hoped that he would provide an early punch to the lineup, but in 12 game Bruce has done everything but that. His .118 batting average and dismal .231 OBP has exacerbated a problem that was ever present once Voit went on the IL.

 

2. Bench Aaron Hicks

Although he has great skill as an outfielder, Hicks' struggles at the plate in the early going are well noted. Between the strike outs and unproductive outs, he is certainly wearing the patience of Yankees fans very thin. They could decide to platoon Gardner and Tauchman instead or go even further and seek to trade Hicks away and get a spark with a young prospect. Either way keeping number 31 in the lineup right now is a no go.

 

3. Find another Starter

Thus far the experiment with the luxury tax friendly moves has nor yielded the best results. Other than Gerrit Cole the rotation has looked mediocre. German's spring numbers proved to be fool’s gold as he was jettisoned to the alternate site after just two starts. Kluber and Taillon cannot seem to find their footing after they both missed a year. Montgomery did have a good outing against Baltimore, but the Yankees are going to need more out of him if the others can't step up. It is obvious that the Yankees frugalness in the offseason is beginning to catch up with them. However, that ship can be righted if they make a move now to stabilize the shaky rotation with a fresh arm until Severino is ready to return.

 

4. Consider firing Marcus Thames

Although Thames has accomplished a lot with the Yankees offense over the past three seasons. You can say his hitting approach is not a bad one since the team is always at the top of the majors in slugging percentage, it just gets badly exposed when good pitchers get a hold of them in the postseason. At some point the Yankees have to realize that the current status quo is not going to win them a championship. Moving on from Thames may hurt in the short term, but could bare sweeter fruit in the long run.