Andres Chaparro
The Big Fish. The Door Prize. By far the most exciting thing the Yankees could do right now.
And Chaparro's earning it.
Famously not on the 40-man either -- and thanks, Every Other MLB Team in the Rule 5 Draft, for helping us out here -- Chaparro began the 2023 season at Triple-A in an 0-for-29 skid. On April 8, he broke the ice with a home run ... and never stopped.
Now, Chaparro's hitting .228, but that means he's gone 18-for-50 since his silent start (.360) while pummeling eight homers.
He might not be the team's third baseman of the future. He might come with an "offense-only" profile, in the most pessimistic sense, but ... that's exactly what the Yankees need right now. In fact, it's possible they've never needed a Triple-A offensive infusion more.
Prospects often struggle when they're given a new test, which Yankee fans are learning first-hand through the trials and tribulations of Volpe/Cabrera/Oswald Peraza. There's certainly a chance Chaparro begins his big-league career with a similar 0-fer skid to the one that tripped him up in Scranton earlier this month.
That said, he's the player mentioned on this list with the most likely shot at a big-league future with the Yankees. And, if they intend to use him eventually, he's going to begin his career with a hurdle, whenever that time comes. Maybe they'd prefer to break him in when the offense is humming and they can hide him. That power, though ... he'd be a much more logical DH than Calhoun, and could probably go immediately from "promoted" to "batting fifth nightly". That's a sad indictment of the Yankees' roster construction, but it's also an endorsement of his impressive power. And it might be time.