Yankees, Anthony Volpe (Photo by New York Yankees/Getty Images)
Three of the Yankee’s top prospects are looking at a shot in the big leagues come opening day.
The New York Yankees have always possessed one of the better farm systems across baseball for the past few years. They’ve been able to develop a surplus of homegrown major league talent throughout the years, including Aaron Judge, Gleyber Torres, Luis Severino, Nestor Cortes, and more, as the Yankees still seem to have even more prospects upcoming, with lots of hype surrounding them.
Even though the Yankees roster in its current state looks like a contender, there is definitely more room for the Yankees to make in-house improvements, and there are prospects ready to step up for Aaron Boone and the Yankees front office, on both the hitting end and the pitching side of the game. As always, the Yankee’s farm system is expected to have a significant impact on the way the Yankees work in 2023 as they look to finally make a full push for the world series.
While speculating who can come up, we also have to think of the roster spots the Yankees would have to clear to make roster moves happen, especially if the Yankees want to call up a player, not on the 40-man roster.
Yankees prospect who can make an impact: Anthony Volpe
This spring training season has been fun, especially if you are playing as well as Volpe. He has been on a tear, as Yankee fans were hopeful for entering the spring. So far, the 21-year-old infielder has a slash line of .353/.450/.647 in 20 plate appearances. He has one home run, a line drive to left-center off Pirates RHP Mitch Keller (394FT, 99.1 MPH) Throughout his MiLB career, Volpe has mashed, hitting .286 with a .922 OPS in 2021. This was Volpe’s best year, as he created 186 runs, according to FanGraphs wRC+ (weighted runs created plus) stat.
Looking outside of the stats, he has been able to draw swing comparisons to a couple of Major league all-stars, such as Mookie Betts, and Andrew McCutchen (Credit to @FiresideYankees and @Jlasagna43 on Twitter)
One of the statistical similarities between the three sluggers is their ground ball, line drive, and fly ball rates. All three players in their careers (Volpe in minors) have been able to keep line drive rates in the 20s, and ground ball rates in or below the 30s, except for most of McCutchen’s post-Pirates career. Line drives are key to being a consistent hitter, hopefully suggesting Volpe has the chance to be an elite-level talent.
He would take the role that Isiah Kiner-Falefa had last year, taking on the full-time shortstop role for the Yankees.