Didi Gregorius of Yankees Is Expected to Miss First Month of the Season
Yankees shortstop Didi Gregorius will begin the season on the disabled list with a shoulder injury that is expected to sideline him until May, General Manager Brian Cashman said.
Gregorius was found to have a strained right shoulder, his throwing shoulder, which he injured Saturday while playing in an exhibition game for the Netherlands as it prepared for a semifinal of the World Baseball Classic. Gregorius, 27, was a rare bright spot in the Yankees’ desultory 2016 season. He hit .276 with a career-high 20 home runs and 70 runs batted in and appeared to have established himself as a central figure in the team’s rebuilding effort.
Cashman said his staff had had a long meeting about how to replace Gregorius. Among the candidates are second baseman Starlin Castro, who was a longtime shortstop for the Chicago Cubs; the utility player Ronald Torreyes; and Ruben Tejada and Pete Kozma, both of whom are signed to minor league contracts. Tyler Wade, who has not played above Class AA, will also be considered.
Source Link: https://www.nytimes.com/
It’s pretty easy to be biased, as a Diamondbacks fan, in evaluating DiDi Gregorius’ ability to play short. I’m not a scout in any sense of the word, but if I had to evaluate him, I’d say he’s at least average defensively, with some flashes of brilliance sprinkled in–I might call him above average. He seems to have a good first step, good range, and a terrific like seriously, arm. What’s more, everyone in the organization raves about his defense, but I guess that’s to be expected. If you search his name on MLB.com’s video page, it doesn’t take long to find videos of him making some pretty nifty plays at short. Obviously, you can’t really evaluate a shortstop’s ability based on the number of flashy plays he makes, but of course those are the plays that get posted on MLB.com. I would like to see him playing. Because it’s really got me scratching my head.
In my experience, when an infielder passes the eye test but rates poorly on defensive ratings, it’s due to a lack of range. Yankees fans will swear that Jeter is a ballerina out there, but he rates as the worst fielder at any position ever. You can see that a guy makes strong throws or rarely boots a play, but it’s a lot harder for your eyes to interpret an inability to get to a ball as “bad defense” as compared to booting a grounder or throwing the ball away. Most shortstops that have good arms and hands but bad range really should be moved to 3B. That probably won’t happen with Didi since he doesn’t “profile there” as a skinny guy with no power.