Yankees Report Card: Player Grades for March and April

The first month of the season for the Yankees is almost over which means its time to hand out some player grades for March and April.

The past month for the Yankees has been filled with ups and down headlined by all the injuries that have ravaged their roster so early into the season. The Yanks have been plagued by injury more than any team in recent history as they currently have an unfathomable 13 players on the IL. Day after day it seems like another player goes down and yet they’ve somehow managed to post a record of 16-11.

It’s quite the accomplishment for the Yanks to be sitting in second place just 1.5 games behind the first place Rays and five above the defending champion Red Sox. Things started off on a terrible note losing the first two series of the season at home to the Orioles and Tigers but lately, they’ve played great team baseball and have won 10 of their last 12 games.

All the injuries have opened up opportunities for many players we didn’t expect to see contribute much at all this season let alone in April. For the most part, they’ve all taken advantage of their chance to play on a consistent basis and have helped the team transform into a gritty bunch that can win games by playing small ball.

The starting pitching had a rough first couple weeks but they’ve been the catalyst during this recent stretch while the bullpen surprisingly continues to underwhelm (4.58 ERA). The offense hasn’t bludgeoned teams as we expected but it’s hard to blame them considering five of their Opening Day starters are already out with injury. That’s not even including Aaron Hicks and Didi Gregorius who started the season on the IL and have yet to appear in a game.

Even though the lineups we’ve seen over the past couple weeks resemble ones you’d see during a split-squad Spring Training game that hasn’t negatively impacted the Yankee win column at all. Against the odds, this team has not only weathered the storm but thrived and the good news is that reinforcements will arrive soon and once that happens the wins will continue to follow.

Now onto the Grades for March and April.