Which Yankees Prospects will Wear Pinstripes in April?

Yankees spring training is loaded with potential. But what makes it more intriguing is that, with the Big Club solidly in transition, any of the prospects could play his way onto the team.

The spring is about halfway through, and it’s time to see who is leaving camp with a job in the Bronx.

Yankees training camp is more exciting this year because of one former all-time MLB great: Pete Rose. Most young Yankees fans know Rose as the player banned for betting on the game. But, before that, he was a legend. And that legend started in his first spring training camp.

2^nd baseman Pete Rose signed with the Cincinnati Reds right out of High School in 1960. In 1963, still just 21 years old, he made his first spring training. He had played well his previous season in the minors, hitting .330, and had earned the trip.

But the Reds were not looking for a new 2^nd baseman. Don Blasingame was already manning the position and playing well. He was a big reason they got to the 1961 World Series, although he may have been a big reason they lost. And the following year—1962—he hit .281 with an OBP of .364.

I was going to make some hilarious comparisons to Yankees Jacoby Ellsbury and Brett Gardner along with a wish either of them would have those numbers this year. But looking it at their 2016 statistics made me so depressed I had to stop. Suffice to say neither of them matched Blasingame’s average or OBP last year.

Is this still about the Yankees?

Back to the Reds. There was no question that Blasingame was going to play second base for the Reds in 1963. But, in true Wally Pip-style, he suffered an injury and so Pete took over. And I mean that in the literal sense. He took over the position and never relinquished it. For those who don’t know, Pete was known as Charlie Hustle—meant at first in the pejorative sense—because he ran his hardest on every play. Even walks. He made that his whole career.

So, by the end of camp, Rose had run himself into a starting job and Blasingame out of town; he was traded to the Senators on July 1^st, where he returned to being a full-time player.

The point of the story? If Pete could take Blasingame’s job, and his numbers were better in 1962 than most Yankees in 2016, then almost every position on the Yankees is up for grabs. If a prospect comes into camp and plays at a high enough level, he can leave Florida with the big league club.

Now, with camp just about half way over, is a good time to see who has and has not earned a job that requires wearing pinstripes.