Alexander Wilson
Saturday night against the Rays offered the clearest possible example of what the New York Yankees are giving away by keeping Randal Grichuk on this roster. Ninth inning, chance to take the lead, and Grichuk stepped to the plate and swung at the first pitch he saw, popping it harmlessly to center field. The inning was over before it had any chance to develop. Another wasted opportunity, another moment where the bench produced exactly what everyone watching knew it was going to produce.
Grichuk is 0-for-10 to open the season. He has not reached base once. The Yankees have used him in pinch-hit and pinch-run situations, which is precisely where you need your bench to deliver, and he has delivered nothing. At some point the math becomes unavoidable: a player who cannot get on base is not a bench player, he is a roster spot that is costing you outs in moments that matter.
What Grichuk Is and Is Not
Grichuk has always been a streaky right-handed bat with pull-side power against left-handed pitching. When he is hot, he is genuinely useful. When he is cold, he is essentially an automatic out, and nothing about his profile suggests he is capable of turning a series around through sheer on-base ability or bat-to-ball skill. He is a specific tool for a specific matchup, and right now the Yankees are deploying him in situations that require something he has never been.
The larger problem is that the bench does not have much depth behind him. When Boone reaches for his options in a late-inning situation, Grichuk is one of the first names on the card. Until that changes, nights like Saturday are going to keep happening.
The Dominguez Case Is Getting Stronger
In Triple-A, Jasson Dominguez is doing everything the Yankees could ask from a player in his position. Through 17 games with Scranton, he is hitting .347/.389/.673 with four home runs, 11 RBIs, and a 166 wRC+, meaning he has been 66 percent better than the average Triple-A hitter in the early going. The power numbers are real. The contact has been consistent. The 23-year-old is not just surviving in Triple-A, he is punishing it.
The Yankees’ preference has always been to give him daily at-bats in the minors rather than a bench role in the majors. That logic still holds as a philosophical position. A young player who needs development time benefits more from playing every day in Scranton than from sitting on a big-league bench waiting for a spot start. But the calculation changes when the alternative is keeping a player on the active roster who is actively hurting the team in important situations.
Grichuk sitting on 0-for-10 with a first-pitch pop-up in the ninth inning of a game the Yankees needed to win is not neutral. That is a negative contribution, and a young player with Dominguez’s offensive upside is almost certainly a better option at this point regardless of the development philosophy.
The defense remains the legitimate concern with Dominguez, as it has been all spring and throughout his time in the organization. His routes in left field and his reads off the bat have been inconsistent, and the Yankees know that. But a player who is batting .347 with four home runs and a 166 wRC+ in Triple-A is producing at a level that demands a roster conversation, especially when the player he would replace has produced absolutely nothing.
Boone has options. Dominguez is one phone call away. The longer the Yankees wait on this, the more likely it is that another ninth inning comes along with Grichuk at the plate in a moment the team needs someone better.
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