New York Yankees star Aaron Hicks’ rehab appears to be going very well.
When Yankees center fielder Aaron Hicks had surprise Tommy John surgery following the 2019 season, it both devastated the fan base and confirmed his intestinal fortitude.
After all, we’d heard rumblings of a serious elbow injury in August when Hicks first pulled up lame on a throw against the Red Sox, but we quickly moved on once the slugger returned to hit an all-important Game 5 ALCS home run against Houston, posting a .353 OBP in the series in relief of Giancarlo Stanton.
Turned out Hicks really was the worse for wear, and yet by all accounts his rehab process went swimmingly all offseason long. Taking all the glowing words into account, did anyone really expect to see him back on the field and swinging a bat at full speed before Aaron Judge?!
Hicksy! He looks back, back, back, back to me.
That vintage Hicks swing from the left side is arriving at an all-too-perfect time, and indicates the Yankees really could get one of their premier switch-hitting bats back for the start of this bizarrely shortened season, which MLBPA and MLB are approaching a resolution on. Though Judge’s recovery remains shrouded, Hicks taking to the field at GMS proves that his progress has reached an optimal point, AND that players appear to be moving forward, as Rob Manfred suggested in his memo Wednesday.
Of course, any postseason moment Hicks has in 2020 won’t exactly rival his 2019 smash off the pole — after all, without fans, how can he possibly replicate this electricity?
Regardless, watching Hicks work his magic in the cage like nothing ever happened is a welcome sign for Yankee rooters, as the good news begins to trickle in slowly, hopefully undoing the deluge of bad that’s dominated these past few months, especially Monday.
Hicksie in the cage. Gerrit Cole driving to Yankee Stadium for a bullpen session. Hopefully, this series of teases manifests itself in on-field dominance soon enough.