Yankees' Trent Grisham is making his name known
Trent Grisham of the New York Yankees follows through on his eighth-inning pinch hit home run against the San Diego Padres at Yankee Stadium on Wednesday. Credit: Jim McIsaac
Imagine it’s spring training, and you, like every other reasonable Yankees fan, are spending your free time analyzing the team’s outfield depth.
There’s Aaron Judge, obviously, Cody Bellinger, Jasson Dominguez and all his promise, and Giancarlo Stanton sometimes . . . and Trent Grisham. Maybe it takes you a few seconds to come up with that last name (not too long, though — you are, after all, the type of fan who’s analyzing the Yankees’ outfield depth in late February).
Fast forward three months. Stanton is on the injured list with no clear return date, Judge is off to an otherworldly start, and Bellinger and Dominguez are getting acclimated. And Grisham? You scoff. How can anyone even think of sitting Grisham right now?
The first two months of the season have been a wild ride for the player who has at times — perhaps a little unfairly — been a pinstriped afterthought. That’s not really an insult — basically anyone would be an afterthought if he happened to be acquired in the trade that sent Juan Soto to the Yankees for a season. Last year, Grisham played in just 76 games, starting in 52 of them, and the results weren’t great — he slashed .190/.290/.385 and was primarily known for his defense.
But Aaron Boone saw signs of more, and acknowledged that the lack of playing time likely adversely affected Grisham, who nonetheless is a career .217 hitter. Grisham has played more, and he’s made his manager look very smart in the process. Sure, Boone sits Grisham sometimes — as Boone will tell you, four good outfielders, including a young one that benefits from playing time, is a good problem to have — but he’s still played in all but six games.
This year, he’s slashing .292/.376/.640 with 10 homers and 20 RBIs in 31 games. Among players with at least 100 plate appearances, his wRC+ — a measure of a player’s offensive production — is 187, which ranks fifth in baseball. It’s a minuscule sample size, and not indicative of how things will look at the end of the year, but impressive nonetheless.
The latest example was in Wednesday’s 4-3, 10-inning win over the Padres at Yankee Stadium. Dylan Cease had no-hit the Yankees before Bellinger’s solo homer with one out in the seventh, and by the time Grisham came up for his pinch-hit at-bat against Jason Adam in the eighth, the Yankees were down 3-1.
Adam, a tough righty, threw him three straight changeups to start the at-bat — the third of which Grisham fouled off. Then, Adam went back to the pitch, but the lefthanded hitter adjusted, turning on a 90.2-mph offering that just nicked the inside of the plate and driving it 387 feet to right for a two-run homer, his 10th. That home run allowed him to exceed his total from last year in 90 fewer at-bats.
Boone noted that Grisham heated up a little last year with more regular playing time “and he was productive — I thought he did a really good job for us.”
“But really, this spring — I don’t know if he’s better or not, but I just felt that what I was seeing was a really live player,” Boone said. “It just felt [like] you even saw a little more on defense, just how he was moving, [and] at-bat after at-bat after at-bat was quality. And that’s all we’ve seen to start the season. He goes 0-fer the other day but every at-bat is heavy and he’s controlling the zone and getting a lot of really good swings off and, just excited the way he’s playing right now.”
It’s unlikely Grisham keeps up his current pace, and it’s clear he’s on a heater right now. He has six homers in his last 13 games and five RBIs in his last three. He’s also been clutch — seven of his homers have either tied the score or given the Yankees the lead. But there are also signs that Grisham, 28, potentially is turning a corner in a way that could, at least in part, be sustainable.
His quality of contact is up by most metrics, according to Baseball Savant, and though he generally doesn’t chase much, he’s gotten better in that category, too. Grisham has seen notable improvements this year in his launch angle sweet spot, he’s barreling the ball at an improved clip and has squared up more. He’s also striking out less.
He’s “just coming up in big spot after big spot, making big plays in the field,” Max Fried said. “He’s been playing incredible and he’s a big reason why we’ve come up with the wins we have.”
And because of that, he’s no longer the afterthought. He’s not the salary dump in the Soto trade. He’s not the fifth outfielder. He’s the headline.
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.
