The old saw about Memorial Day in baseball is that it's the first time you're "allowed" to look at the standings and leaderboards, if you're a fan. If you actually run a team, the date serves as a milestone on the season calendar, when hard opinions about the roster you've constructed start to be formed.
Well, we're 10 days past Memorial Day, so what does all of this say about the New York Yankees? I guess it depends on your perspective.
Fans: This team's offense stinks. It's scoring fewer than four runs per game and ranks in the game's bottom five. It's horrendous. Who put this mess together?
The people who actually put this mess together: We are better than this.
The latter is a paraphrase, but it sums up the approach so far by New York's brain trust, which is to tout the performance records of the hitters they've assembled and suggest that the season will be rescued by the good kind of regression to the mean.
The thing is, both perspectives are right.
The track records were strong enough to generate a forecast in my system of 97 wins for the Yankees, the second-highest total in baseball behind the Dodgers. But as the 2021 data rolls in and we lean into the middle third of the season, that projection has been steadily falling. Even after the Yankees thumped hapless Minnesota for a second straight night on Wednesday, it has fallen to 89.
That's not a disastrous outlook, of course, so it's far too early for New York fans to write off the season. That's true even as the messages from general manager Brian Cashman and his manager, Aaron Boone, are drowned out by the howls for change, which have become increasingly shrill. Still, whether it's the performance of the current roster or the names in the lineup or the name of the one making out that lineup, something has got to change. And perhaps with 17 runs in two nights at Target Field, that change is already underway.
To understand how likely it is that the Yankees can still become the team we thought they were, we need to understand just where they've fallen short. Yes, it's offense, but that's a large canvas.
So let us try to be a little more targeted and a little more specific by offering five numbers that illustrate what's broken in the Bronx, and how (or if) it can be repaired.
1. 0.18
What this number represents: The difference in run scoring for the Yankees at home (3.79 runs per game) and on the road (3.97).
What it means: Basically, it means that they Yankees have stunk on offense both at home and on the road, so blaming the weather or any other kind of external factor doesn't hold up to scrutiny. The AL average for runs is 4.46, so New York has been well below average whether or not they are at Yankee Stadium.
This dynamic isn't unheard of, but New York typically scores more at home than away, even though in recent seasons Yankee Stadium has been a below-average scoring ballpark, while being above average in terms of homers. This year's Yankees have hit about 8% fewer homers at home than away even though they've played four more games at Yankee Stadium, but from 2017 through 2020, they hit an aggregate 24% more homers at home.
What has happened to the Yankees' home hitting advantage?
At least part of it might be roster construction. Yankee Stadium and its predecessors have favored lefty pull hitters since the first version of the stadium was built in 1923 as a cozy new home park for Babe Ruth. This year's club has gotten 24% of its plate appearances from the left side, according to Trumedia data. That's the lowest figure for any Yankees team since 1974.
That number has been as high as 68%, which was the case in 2015. The last time the Yankees won the World Series (2009), the number was 60%.
Can it be fixed and how? Finding a lefty-hitting first baseman/DH type would be a step in the right direction. Sure, getting Luke Voit healthy and back to his 2020 form would be like a major trade acquisition in itself, but he's a righty slugger who doesn't help the platoon disparity. New York needs to upgrade its depth at the position, especially if Voit's physical issues linger. One in-house replacement, Mike Ford, went 3-for-36 at home before being demoted. His ostensible replacement, 27-year-old rookie Chris Gittens, started 0-for-7 at Yankee Stadium.
Still, the Yankees aren't going to suddenly land a bunch of premier lefty pull hitters in the middle of a season. And as they've seen, just because a player (Rougned Odor) hits from the left side and has power, that doesn't mean he's actually going to help your offense.
Alas, the remedy here is the one the Yankees have preached: patience. Hope, with fingers crossed, that the stalwarts of the roster return to the form suggested by their track records. But also keep your eye on the market as the transaction season starts to warm up.
2. Minus-13.1
What this number represents: This is Fangraphs' rating of how many runs the Yankees' collective baserunning efforts have contributed compared to the average team.
What it means: When people talk about the Yankees' attack being too one-dimensional, this is part of what they are talking about. If they aren't hitting the ball out of the park, they can't beat you with base hits and the kind of baserunning that helps turn non-homer hits into runs.
It's not just the Fangraphs formula. The baserunning component of Baseball Reference's version of WAR has the Yankees at minus-6 baserunning runs, tied for the worst total in the majors. You don't have to be fast to be a good baserunning team, but the Yankees aren't that, either. According to Statcast, New York's average sprint speed (28.1 feet per second) ranks 27th in the majors.
All of this means that Yankees baserunners have scored just 25% of the time when they reach base. That is -- you guessed it -- the worst mark on the majors. The MLB average is 31%, and the league leaders are Red Sox and Astros, both at 35%. The Astros, incidentally, rank last in average sprint speed.
A lot of Yankees fans have decried Boone's lack of aggression. New York has attempted just 18 stolen bases (14 successful), the fewest in the majors. According to Baseball Reference, the Yankees have taken an extra base on a hit just 30% of the time. Stop me if you're heard this before: That's the lowest figure in the majors.
Unbelievably, despite this conservative mindset, New York has been put out on the bases 29 times. That's seven more times than any other team in the majors. It's like a Groucho Marx routine: The Yankees are terrible at being aggressive, but they aren't aggressive often enough.
Can it be fixed and how? If the Yankees stop their bluster about paying heed to the CBT (Competitive Balance Tax, or luxury tax in plain English), clearly they need to target someone who adds to the dynamism of their attack. With Aaron Hicks down for the season, center field is a great place to add that person, and someone such as Baltimore's Cedric Mullins or Miami's Starling Marte leaps to mind.
Really, though, the Yankees need to be a station-to-station team. The lack of steals and extra bases taken is not ideal, but you can't pair those things with also being thrown out far more than any other team. If anything, the Yankees need to get even more conservative with this mix of lumbering behemoths.
3. .364
What this number represents: This is the Yankees' weighted on-base percentage on contact (wOBAcon), per Baseball Savant. It ranks 19th in the majors. The MLB average is .368.
What it means: For all the attention paid to the Yankees' strikeouts, that's not really the problem. Sure, they strike out too much, but so have several elite offenses over the past few years. New York's team strikeout percentage (25%) is the fifth worst in the AL, but the AL average is 24%, so they aren't that far off. And when you consider that the Yankees lead the AL in walk rate (10.5%), the strikeout figure is even somewhat acceptable.
A bigger issue is what has happened when the Yankees do make contact. Or, more to the point, what doesn't happen. The Yankees rank near the top in other Statcast measures including exit velocity (89.6 mph, tied for third), hard-hit percentage (42.9%, tied for first) and rate of barrels (9.4%, sixth). Despite that, the Yankees have had precious little to show for their strong collective plate discipline and ability to hit balls hard.
Can it be fixed and how? Because of all those strong off-the-bat tracking measures, the Yankees' expected wOBA on contact (.402) dwarfs their actual wOBAcon (the .364 listed above) by 38 points. No one comes close to that kind of disparity.
It's worth noting that at the league level, expected wOBAcon is 13 points higher than the actual number, so squaring up the two numbers isn't really the goal in this context. The oft-discussed changes to the ball play into this as well. What you want is to be less an outlier in relation to other teams, this season. The numbers of previous seasons are a guide, but you have to keep in mind those were put up in different league contexts.
The biggest underachievers in this category have been Odor, Aaron Judge (who has been terrific, but his expected numbers are staggeringly high), DJ LeMahieu, Miguel Andujar and Clint Frazier. Andujar hadn't played much until his recent surge, but other than reconfiguring things to get him more time and Odor less, this really is a matter of believing in the track record. In theory, the disparity between quality of contact and results should start to even out.
The Yankees are doing a good job of controlling the zone. They hit the ball hard when they hit the ball. The results haven't reflected those qualities, but for proof of concept, just look at where the Yankees have ranked in recent years with largely the same group of hitters. Yes, a targeted acquisition or two is needed. But so too is a commodity hard to find at times in Bronx baseball, at least off the field: patience.
4. 113
What this number represents: The number of points in batting average LeMahieu has lost off last season's total. He has dropped from .364, which ranked in the 100th percentile of the majors because he, you know, won the batting title, to .251, which is in the 40th percentile.
What it means: This is a big red flag. A .251 average -- that's not LeMahieu.
You could also point to his 157-point drop in isolated power, from .226 to .069, the latter of which is in just the sixth percentile of the majors. Yet, as with several of his teammates, it seems like LeMahieu has been somewhat unlucky in that regard. His expected wOBAcon (.360) is near last season's figure (.366). One would hope that things will even out in this regard.
While batting average is only a small component of player evaluation, it can be an important diagnostic tool, especially for a player like LeMahieu, whose value has been largely tied to his .303 career average. When you try to tease out the meaning of this drop, you ask a core question: Is it bad luck, opponent adjustment or simply a loss of skill?
Luck plays some part, to be sure. LeMahieu has a BABIP of just .299, down from his career mark of .343 and his .370 spike last season. But some of that is also skill: His average exit velocity is down 1.5 mph from last season, according to Statcast. And part of that might be an issue with LeMahieu's swing plane. His average launch angle is up this season, but his rate of line drives has plummeted, from 29.1% to 23%.
While LeMahieu's plate discipline numbers have held steady, he has simply swung and missed much more often than usual. He's whiffing 7.7% more often than a season ago, both overall and when swinging at pitches in the zone.
Can it be fixed and how? The disparity between expected wOBA on contact and actual should shrink, one would think, and it would likely work in conjunction with a positive regression in BABIP. The concern is LeMahieu has had seasons like this before. In fact, in many ways, his so-so final season in Colorado (2018) looks like a Coors Field-adjusted version of what he's doing in 2021.
Perhaps one suggestion is that while LeMahieu gets things ironed out, the Yankees should stop moving him around so much defensively. He's a Gold Glove second baseman, so just put him there next to Gleyber Torres and Gio Urshela and leave it alone. The added benefit would be less Odor.
5. 38.5%
What this number represents: That's the percentage of times this season a Yankees hitter has put the ball into play on his pull side, according to Trumedia. That ranks 25th in the majors.
What it means: Well, I don't know what it means. Generally speaking, I'm very much in favor of teams being less pull conscious. Doing so diversifies the offense and makes it tougher to defend. For the Yankees? If this is product of intentionality, I'm not sure it's working out.
The companion stat to the 38.5% pull-side figure is 35.6%, which is how often they've hit put the ball into play in the middle of the field. That's the second-highest figure in baseball. If this was simply a matter of the Yankees being who they are, that would be one thing. But last season, these metrics were flipped: New York ranked sixth in pull frequency and dead last in balls up the middle.
Now here is still another number: 320 feet. That's the Yankees' average fly-ball distance, down from 320.8 last season and 330.5 during New York's explosive 2019 season. This number should go up as summer sets in, but it's still below the MLB average, which is down this season in general, perhaps largely to the reconfigured ball.
If you consider these departments in tandem, then you get a theory: During a season in which the ball isn't flying as far as past years, the Yankees are suddenly hitting much more often into the parts of the field where the fences are most distant.
Does this theory hold water? Kinda, sorta. The Yankees rank ninth in homers per fly ball, which suggests they are holding their own. They also don't have an excessive total of fly outs, relative to the rest of the majors. Still, the Yankees' .687 OPS on balls hit in the middle of the field ranks just 26th in the majors. On balls to the pull side, they have a .986 OPS, which ranks 13th.
Can it be fixed and how? Can a team that has been hitting the ball up the middle suddenly revert to pulling the ball? Should they? Will the way pitchers are attacking them allow for it? Hey, I'm just the one asking the questions. But given the construction of this roster, most of the Yankees who can become more pull conscious probably should do so.
That doesn't hold true for everyone, of course. Judge is just as dangerous when going up the middle or to opposite field as when he pulls, and getting him to hit to all fields is a big part of keeping his numbers strong. LeMahieu is not a pull hitter. Just four of Giancarlo Stanton's 11 homers have come to the pull side.
However, Torres has been pulling the ball less often than in past seasons, though his spray chart has shifted more to the opposite field than up the middle. His power numbers are down and might improve if he reverts to a more pull-conscious approach. Frazier's power numbers are down. He has been hitting the ball up the middle far more frequently this season, at the expense of pulling the ball. Nevertheless, four of his five homers this season have come to the pull side.
What it all adds up to
For those ready to throw out the Yankees' brain trust, there is no ready-made answer as to what's going to fix baseball's most underachieving offense. The solution will involve a little patience, a little roster maintenance and a little honing of individual technique.
The saving grace is that the Yankees have a group of players who, together, have been a part of some of the most potent offenses in recent baseball history. No, it's not a versatile offense. Yes, it's possible that the offense is being undermined by changing league conditions.
However, there is no planet and no set of league conditions under which this group, if it stays moderately healthy, should be a below-average offensive team, much less the bottom-five outfit they've been so far. And the Yankees can pitch, so their level of run prevention along with a reversion to an even average attack is a postseason-making formula.
Things can only get better from here. Unless, of course, Yankee Stadium opens to full capacity and things actually get worse.