The New York Yankees have a massive problem at the catcher position. That problem’s name is Gary Sanchez. Yes, I know that some Yankees fans are likely getting ready to type an angry comment back at me for suggesting this, but should the bombers move on from Sanchez after this year?
Sanchez is getting ready to turn 28 years old in December. You cannot deny the power that Gary Sanchez has in his bat. He is lethal when he’s able to connect the barrel to the ball. The problem is those lethal shots are becoming fewer and further between.
Since being called up in 2016, Sanchez has hit an astonishing, 111 home runs in 400 games. Over a 162 game average that’s just about 45 home runs a year. While those numbers the Yankees love, the batting average and the defensive stats are not figures they love.
Since the start of the 2017 season, Sanchez is hitting just .230 and he’s had 45 passed balls in 258 games started at catcher. These are not the kind of numbers the Yankees want from their star catcher.
I know that many people will want to keep pointing to the power numbers, but Sanchez is turning into a blind squirrel at the plate. Sure, he’ll run into a nut every once and a while, but when he’s hitting .177 since 2018, your power defense becomes irrelevant.
The Yankees Options
There’s nobody that the Yankees have on their team that I want to root for more than Gary Sanchez. I want to see Sanchez hitting close to 300 and smacking 40 home runs a year. I want to see the Yankees catcher gunning runners down with his elite arm.
The problem is, the things he does well, we’re not seeing them very often at this point. So what do the Yankees do? Well the easy thing to do is to keep Sanchez and pray that he can stay healthy as well as become more consistent.
Sanchez is just entering his first year of arbitration this year. The Yankees have him relatively cheap next year. If the bombers want to explore other options, they can try to trade Sanchez then turn to the city of Brotherly Love.
J.T. Realmuto is considered by many to be the best catcher in baseball. He hits for average, he has good power, he can steal bases, and he’s a gold glover. Realmuto will enter free agency after the 2020 season.
The Yankees have been interested in the past, and they could make a run at him in the offseason. It should be an expensive offseason given the fact that DJ LeMahieu, James Paxton, and Masahiro Tanaka are all free agents.
The Yankees do have some holes to fill after this year. Realmuto could be a very real option for the bombers in the offseason especially if they can get a good return in a Sanchez trade. The biggest thing about him is that he’s consistently good which is something that we cannot say about Gary Sanchez.