Yankees Still Have Obvious Expected Flaw To Address at Trade Deadline

Early on in the 2025 MLB regular season, a few major needs have emerged for the New York Yankees.

Some of it has been out of their control, as no one can predict when injuries will occur. What has happened to their starting pitching depth is difficult to prepare for, as what looked like a strength heading into the year has been decimated.

It certainly wasn’t in the Yankees' game plan to have to replace ace Gerrit Cole, reigning American League Rookie of the Year Luis Gil and Clarke Schmidt out of the gate.

In their places, Will Warren, Marcus Stroman and Carlos Carrasco have struggled mightily.

However, outside of Cole, who underwent Tommy John surgery and will be lost for the season, Schmidt and Gil are both projected to return. That will help immensely.

Another major need has emerged for New York at third base, which was a self-inflicted wound.

When Gleyber Torres departed in free agency and it was decided that Jazz Chisholm Jr. would take over at second base, there was a massive void created at the hot corner. 

Shockingly, nothing was done to compensate for their big deadline acquisition last year moving back to his more natural position at the keystone.

Instead, the Yankees were prepared to give that starting job to veteran DJ LeMahieu. To the surprise of no one, he was injured two at-bats into spring training and hasn’t returned to the field since.

That left Oswaldo Cabrera, Oswald Peraza and Pablo Reyes mixing and matching at third base in his absence.

The results, to the surprise of no one but people within the New York organization, have been underwhelming.

“Kind of seems like the plan here was to throw things at the wall for a few months, see if anything sticks and make a trade if nothing does,” wrote Kerry Miller of Bleacher Report.

It is hard to argue against that, as the team seemed to punt on the hot corner out of the gate, hoping someone would emerge.

So far, that has not occurred.

Through 12 games, they have combined for a 0.0 WAR. Peraza has one home run and two doubles as the only extra base hits between the three.

Cabrera is holding his own with a .308/.379/.308 slash line in 29 plate appearances, but the lack of power is concerning. His best attribute is also versatility, as he can play virtually everywhere on the diamond, but the team loses that with him as the everyday third baseman.

This is something that has to change sooner than later since there are too many holes currently in the lineup to consistently produce and score runs.