The Yankees shortstop situation has blown up in their face over the past 2 seasons. After letting Didi Gregorius go off to Philadelphia back in 2019 the Yankees thought they had his replacement in Gleyber Torres who was an All Star caliber 2nd baseman the past 2 seasons but it was far from the solution. Torres was horrendous in over 4 years at SS, Torres has accumulated over a -24 DRS. In 2021, Torres was the 3rd lowest qualified SS in DRS, 3rd lowest in UZR ( Ultimate Zone Rating in runs above average). Statically and visually he’s one of the worst defensive SS in the league, that’s why they switched to Gio Urshela to SS during the tail end of the season and granted this is over only 200 innings but he wasn’t that impressive at short as well. So what should the Yankees do about this? Well they should go out and get one of these 2 ELITE Shortstops on the market, 1st up Carlos Correa.
Ok let’s get the obvious out of the way, YES he was an Astro, YES he cheated, should you get over it?…YES!! The Yankees over time have never feared away from signing the best players on the market that were on rival teams, they got Johnny Damon from the Sox, Rogers Clemens from the Sox, Wade Boggs from the Sox, and finally they traded for one of the biggest villains in baseball history in Alex Rodriguez. Did this result in winning years? Yes it very much did and that’s why we shouldn’t fear away from Carlos Correa.
Carlos Correa is one of the best offensive and defensive players in the league regardless of position in the year 2021 clocking in with a 7.3 WAR, 134 wRC+, 26 HR, .366 OBP, .850 OPS, 131 OPS+. He led the league in rWAR (Wins above Replacement) at 7.2, to put that into perspective Mike Trout in his 2014 MVP campaign had a 7.7 rWAR so you can tell Correa is up there with the best. The reason for Correa’s recent success is him using advanced analytics, check out this clip:
As you can see Correa knows what he’s talking about and using this could help other hitters on our team. Correa last season would have led the Yankees in the majority of advanced analytics so don’t say we don’t need him because having one of the best SS in baseball is something every team can use. Defensively Correa was the best defensive SS in baseball winning a Platinum Glove. .981 FP ( Fielding Percentage ) , 156 OOZ ( Plays Made Out of Zone ), and 20 DRS ( Defensive Runs Saved ). There’s no stat for this but his arm strength at short is one of the best in the league regardless of position, watch some of his defensive highlights and you’ll see him roaming to the right and then he sits his feet in the outfield and then he proceeds to throw a piss missile across the diamond like it’s insane.
In Conclusion, the Yankees SHOULD go out and get Carlos Correa if they are really serious about going all in this season and with many questions at many positions getting your corner-piece SS locked up is a MUST. Correa will be seeking a mid to low $300 M dollar contract and rightfully so , will Hal finally open up the books? I guess we’ll have to wait and see…
TheDyspatch 