MLB standings ordered by OPS: Yankees have some work to do early

The New York Yankees are among the best teams in the league and they're far from full strength. We can only hope the stars eventually align so this team becomes the juggernaut fans have envisioned for months now.

This year's collection of players is doing a little bit of everything, but there are a number of areas to improve upon. For example, five stolen bases so far in 2024, coming from just Anthony Volpe and Gleyber Torres? Gotta fix that.

At the very least, however, that's never been the Yankees' bread and butter. It'll take time for them to switch up their identity, so we can't grill them a whole lot there.

An area we can nitpick, however? OPS! You know, the statistic the front office probably cherishes the most. This organization loves walks and extra-base hits more than anything in the world, yet the Bombers sit outside the top-10 in MLB for that category.

And there's a considerable gap between them and the 10th-ranked San Diego Padres, through play on Monday. For some reason, the Yankees' abysmal slugging percentage is holding them back.

MLB standings ordered by OPS: Yankees have some work to do early

Look, it could be worse. The Yankees are 11th in MLB and we can expect them to only improve. But a 13-point gap between them and the Pads is fairly considerable, and it's a tad more concerning when you realize how lopsided the Yankees' offense is right now. Here are their OPS rankings among those who have played in five or more games:

• Anthony Volpe - 1.154
• Juan Soto - 1.009
• Oswaldo Cabrera - .934
• Giancarlo Stanton - .826
• Aaron Judge - .708 (slugging .375)
• Anthony Rizzo - .650 (slugging .317)
• Alex Verdugo - .611 (slugging .316)
• Gleyber Torres - .574 (slugging .267)
• Austin Wells - .457 (slugging .150)
• Jose Trevino - .307. (slugging .097)

Thank goodness this team is getting on base, or who knows where they'd be this early in the season. Although judging through 11 games might be harsh (after all, before Saturday it looked like Stanton was going to be a major problem), the Yankees' best hitter is struggling and a few supporting cast members the team had high hopes for are really lacking a power punch at the moment.

Just something to keep an eye on, because the 2023 Yankees finished 24th in this category with a .701 mark last year. And there are a lot of similar names that carried over from that roster into 2024.