Yankees troll Red Sox with prospect-filled lineup for spring training rivalry opener

The New York Yankees' proud tradition of sending out their prospects and strangest starters for spring training games against the Boston Red Sox proudly rages on Monday evening. This time around, they've added a minor troll wrinkle.

The final scores of spring games do not matter, of course. And the final scores of Yankees-Red Sox spring games matter even less than the others to the Yankees. Despite the two teams not meeting in the regular season until June these days, a COVID vestige left over for reasons unknown, the Yankees still prefer not to tip their hands too early, especially when traveling to Boston's camp. They also want to avoid overexposing their players and creating potentially embarrassing moments that leak into the rivalry as it peaks.

In other words, no, Jasson Dominguez will not be receiving the opportunity to lose a fly ball in the sun on Monday afternoon.

Instead, the Yankees will send a few less established top prospects to Fort Myers to give their lineup some thump, with Roderick Arias hitting eighth and Spencer Jones, new stance and all, situated fifth. It also doesn't seem accidental that Dominic Smith and Pablo Reyes, two recent Boston folk heroes, are hitting third and fourth.

Yankees spring training lineup vs. Red Sox: Dom Smith poised to Dom-inate

As Giancarlo Stanton's injury sounds more dire by the day and Trent Grisham's slow-to-start spring refuses to budge, Smith might ... actually ... make the Yankees' Opening Day roster. Hopefully, it's Ben Rice who's the "beneficiary" of most of the additional at-bats instead (he's leading off and catching today), but the Yankees do prefer some veteran thump, and Smith was certainly competent in Boston last year. It's certainly plausible he fills this season's Willie Calhoun role, a role we'd hoped wouldn't exist anymore after the addition of Juan Soto last winter. Oh, well.

The Yankees got their first spring win out of the way quickly this February in the opener, then dropped the next two in relatively silent fashion, save for a Jones homer and quick rally in Saturday's loss to Toronto. If they're going to win this one, it'll need to be started nicely by ... team photographer Carlos Carrasco.

See? We told you they didn't want to give the Sox any intel, despite Boston going in the opposite direction and running out Tanner Houck and Alex Bregman.