TAMPA, Fla. – It's rare for a general manager in professional sports to be as brutally honest with a player as Brian Cashman was in November. During an hour-long media session, Cashman called Giancarlo Stanton injury-prone and said that getting hurt “seems to be part of his game.”
Cashman's comments led to Stanton's agent, Joel Wolfe, releasing a statement to The Athletic about how people who play in New York have to be made of Teflon both mentally and physically. For the first time since Cashman confronted Stanton, the slugger spoke to the media but kept the contents of his conversation with his GM private.
“He knows my reaction to it,” Stanton said Monday outside his locker at the Yankees’ spring training complex.
Stanton added that he agreed with Cashman, but did not comment further on how the comments affected his offseason and whether he used them as motivation. However, Stanton showed himself to Tampa as a slimmer version of himself. There was never any question whether Stanton was in top shape or not – he's practically made of stone – but both he and the team felt it was important for him to go lighter , as most of his injuries have been minor in recent years. physical, soft tissue related.
Stanton said most of his offseason work has focused on becoming more mobile; The setbacks he has suffered in recent seasons have not allowed him to move as he would like. In 2017, Stanton was in the 70th percentile in sprint pace. In 2023, Stanton ranked in the fourth percentile.
The Yankees' designated hitter became a liability to the team in every way last season. His wRC+ of 89 was 11 percent worse than the average major league hitter. He couldn't run the bases. And due to his lack of mobility, using him in the outfield was out of the question. He hopes the changes he made this offseason will round out his game.
“Become a baseball player again,” Stanton said.
Giancarlo Stanton, seen at a practice on February 19, is preparing for his seventh season with the Yankees. (Nathan Ray Seebeck/USA Today)
Due to the lack of depth last season, manager Aaron Boone had no better choice than to hope Stanton would make it at the plate and return to being one of the most feared hitters in the game. But as of mid-July 2022, Stanton has posted a WRC+ of 84 in 549 plate appearances.
The Yankees have better depth this season, with Juan Soto, Aaron Judge and Alex Verdugo starting in the outfield on their scheduled Opening Day. Boone has mentioned that he wants to give Judge more time at DH to get him up and running on the days he's not playing center field. Trent Grisham, the team's fourth outfielder, is one of the best defenders in the league and will likely play center field when Judge is the DH. The narrative surrounding Stanton for several years in a row has been how he believes playing the outfield helps him. But more than ever he has to prove that he deserves to be on the field.
“My expectation, and Giancarlo and I talked about this at the end of last year, is to make sure the outfield is an option,” Boone said last week. “We'll see if that translates to him being out once or twice a week or if it doesn't depend on how healthy we are overall. We’ll just let it play out. I feel like he’s capable of that and we’ll prepare accordingly in the spring.”
Becoming more mobile isn't the only change Stanton is expected to introduce in spring training. The 34-year-old said there will also be swing changes but did not want to elaborate. It will be interesting to see if Stanton's dramatic, closed stance opens up a bit, as it likely makes it difficult to pull the ball into the air, and that's when he's most dangerous at the bat. Of the 43 at-bats Stanton had last season that resulted in a pulled fly ball or line drive, 13 ended in a home run.
Despite Soto's arrival, Stanton is still under a lot of pressure to bounce back since the Yankees owe him $98 million over the next four years. He has a no-trade clause and even if he didn't, his injury history and contract would make him difficult to sell to other clubs. Stanton said this winter was the “first completely healthy offseason in a long time.” He mentioned that he hasn't taken any international trips like he normally does because he's trying to put the past year and a half behind him. After Monday, Stanton said he wouldn't talk much about 2023. He wants to prove he can still be a valuable member of the Yankees.
“I don’t get paid to be an upstanding guy who says the right things,” Stanton said. “I’m here to contribute and help us win a championship and that hasn’t happened yet. It has to be done. I don't hear any noise. I understand the facts.”
(Top photo by Giancarlo Stanton: Ed Zurga / Getty Images)