Yankees Farm Report Part Four: Triple-A Scranton RailRiders

Gleyber Torres

That just leaves the offense, and we’ll start at the top: 3B Gleyber Torres. It can be so easy to get too excited about a young Yankees player. I think back fondly to those days when I thought Jorge Mateo was a great prospect. But I am not sure it is possible to overstate how good Torres can be.

His rise has been well chronicled, and he is now the number two prospect in all of baseball, first for the Yankees. But what is most telling is that the Yankees promoted him to Scranton even though he never actually conquered Double-A. He batted only .273 and had more SO (21) than walks (17).

That doesn’t matter, however, when Girardi and the Yankees coaches had plenty of time to see him play in spring training. And they all voted to bring Torres north with the club. So Torres is coming, and he is coming soon, as the Yankees have already admitted.

What that means for Chase Headley I am sure I don’t know.

Clear and Present Danger

But I do know what it means for the Yankees: another top talent taking the field every day starting sometime soon. Two things have to change. One, Gleyber has to get used to Triple-A; he is only slashing .207/.361/.241. But notice his OBP remains very high.

And Headley will have to go through another rough patch. I don’t wish it on him, but it remains a strong possibility.

One thing is certain, and that is that Gleyber Torres will play for the 2017 New York Yankees. And he probably won’t be alone. I don’t know what is happening at Scranton, but it seems like they have an inordinate number of players all blossoming at the same time.

In some sense of brevity and self-preservation, here is a short review of the rest of the players with real chances to see time in pinstripes this year.