To put it as nicely as humanly possible, Joey Gallo is as good as gone before Aug. 2 if the New York Yankees are serious about improving this roster for the stretch run and postseason.
That’s simply the reality. Gallo’s now been in New York for nearly a full calendar year and has done nothing but perform worse and worse to the point where you’re unsure what you’re actually watching.
Across 133 games with the Yankees, Gallo is batting .162 with a .666 OPS, 87 OPS+ (how is it that high?), 24 home runs, 45 RBI, 75 walks and 186 strikeouts. And it wasn’t until he recently started getting reps in right field that he became a competent defender.
And somehow, there’s reportedly going to be interest in the 28-year-old leading up to the trade deadline. That’s been reported by multiple baseball insiders as well as his agent, Scott Boras, who just so happened to talk about Gallo’s situation in New York over the All-Star break.
Gallo has largely spent his career raking in Texas, where the expectations were low and the lights were even dimmer, so there’s an argument to be had that the higher stakes with the most renowned franchise in the world have thrown him off course. Boras kind of alluded to that, too, when talking about other teams that will be interested in trading for Gallo in the coming weeks.
Scott Boras’ comments on Yankees OF Joey Gallo show he can’t handle New York
"“I can’t worry about what Cash is going to do or what the Yankees are going to do,” Boras said on ‘The Show’ with Joel Sherman and Jon Heyman. “My job is to communicate with Joey as best we can, go through the dynamic of what he’s saying to us, get him as much information as we can so that he can progress from where he’s at … I do know that there are a lot of teams that feel Joey, in their market and in their uniform, would be more of the normal than what he is in New York.”"
That last bit says it all. If teams out there feel Gallo would be better off in “their” market — which one can assume is a smaller market since there aren’t any markets bigger than New York — it’s evident there’s a belief he struggles with a more accentuated spotlight.
Sadly for Gallo, his journey to rediscover his “norm” likely won’t be in New York because the team needs a more capable left fielder as well as a bat that can produce around league average, which would surprisingly make a huge difference toward the bottom of the Yankees’ lineup.
Boras’ commentary regarding the interest in Gallo, in addition to the fact others feel he’d me more likely to succeed in a different setting, all but seal the deal on him being traded as well as confirm New York was never the place for him.
Yankees reportedly considering Andrew Benintendi spelling end for Joey Gallo?
The New York Yankees have reportedly had discussions about Andrew Benintendi ... so does that spell the end for Joey Gallo?